Category Archives for "Childhood Trauma"

There is no such thing as a straightforward trauma and this applies even more when regarding CPTSD. Each and every trauma has its own complexity. 

Being in a (car) accident may seem more straightforward in terms of trauma therapy, but the nervous system's responses are extremely complex and are very dependent on what you have gone through previously.  

You can go through a severe accident and rebound fairly well; or, you can you go through a traumatic event and be absolutely devastated afterward because of an already present history of childhood abuse or neglect.

Having a traumatic history will further impact you, and the traumatic event might be the last drop in the bucket that leads to CPTSD.

CPTSD and its Relationship to Childhood Trauma

Most complex post-traumatic stress disorder is caused by repeated exposure to traumatic events or episodes which often relate to childhood experiences. This kind of trauma might also referred to as developmental trauma disorder.

There is no such thing as a straightforward trauma and this applies even more when regarding Complex PTSD. Each and every trauma has its own complexity. 

Trauma has a certain set of defined reflexes in terms of the nervous system and psychological responses. There is a sense of helplessness and loss of control which is infused with a core emotion of anger, sadness or fear. From there, the surplus of unrestrained energy further dissociates into a coping emotion and coping mechanisms.

When we talk of multiple episodes and traumatic incidents, as in CPTSD, then you also get a variety of set survival reflexes imprinted onto your nervous system and psyche.

How It Can Go from Bad to Worse: CPTSD

Let me highlight this with an example:

Karuna is an unplanned, unwanted child by both parents. Her father is never there for her, and her mother is nagging and overbearing. Karuna has learned that it is best to passively hold still and keep quiet.

Her overwhelming core emotion is deep sadness at not being noticed, loved, nourished, or wanted. Her coping emotion is fear of openly speaking up and being openly vulnerable. With this pattern set in her psyche, she enters adolescence.

She gets into a situation where she is with a man, and although she doesn't consent to have sex with him emotionally, she is unable to speak out and stop him. The experience turns out to be very upsetting for her. Furthermore, this experience really topples her delicate emotional balance, and develops into full-blown CPTSD with severe symptoms of depression, dissociation, and hypervigilance.

CPTSD and The Complexity of Multiple Trauma

When working with CPTSD clients, you have to be aware that there are multiple traumatic incidents or episodes at play. As a therapist, you have to be able to differentiate between what connects with what as the different feelings, emotions, and time periods will often interconnect with one another, making treatment of Complex Trauma or CPTTSD all the more arduous.

You can certainly work through complex post-traumatic disorder and trauma. It is hard work, and it won't be easy, but the payoffs are more than worth.

Do you have CPTSD or complex post-traumatic stress disorder? Leave your comments below.

Suffering persistent verbal abuse as a child can affect you very deeply.

Often, you react based on your own painful experiences and you are likely not even aware that you are doing it.

As a child when you go through verbal abuse—for example your mother repeatedly shouting and verbally abusing you—it marks you. Out of that hurt, you make a decision for yourself, like: "I hate you" or "I will never be like you".

The Outcome of the Reactive Patterns of Childhood Verbal Abuse

By the time you are an adult, this mindset has become completely integrated, and you will act on it as your righteous reality.

When you have your own children, for example, you might find it hard to set boundaries or give them direction out of a fear that you will repeat your mother’s verbally abusive behavior. It is a reactive pattern that will play itself out from going from one extreme, abuse, to another extreme, neglect, which can be equally harmful.

How Awareness Creates Potential for Change

Either extreme will do damage in some manner or another. Bringing awareness to these patterns and the underlying pain gives you the opportunity to find the middle ground of neither too much nor too little.

Do you recognize some of these above-described patterns? Leave your comment below.

Keywords: Domestic Abuse.

The variety of adversities in life that we can go through is staggering. What appears to have the deepest impact on us seems almost invariably to be trauma experienced in childhood and through child domestic abuse.

The impact of child domestic abuse can vary greatly depending on the intensity, duration, and support or lack of support when we go through neglect, abuse, misattunement and relational/attachment trauma.

How Trauma Involves the Nervous System

What makes child domestic abuse so pervasive is that it affects the developing nervous system and sense of self at such a primary level. Children are vulnerable because they are dependent for their survival on the emotional and physical support of adults.

When that sense of trust and vulnerability has been dishonored, it can create very deep and consistent patterns. These patterns can be withdrawal, distrust, hyperactivity, shut down and depression. To name a few.

What appears to have the deepest impact on us seems almost invariably to be trauma experienced in childhood and through child domestic abuse.

When this happens, it is as if the foundations haven't been laid correctly; then, the rest of life's experiences are stacked on top of the flawed foundation, the results of which become crystal clear from the natural, very revealing perspective of the nervous system.

The developing brain successively grows through different developmental stages. From the more primal-survival impulses (i.e. limbic system and brainstem) that, among other things, regulate fight, flight, freeze, breathing and swallowing; to the greater complexity of the thalamus or mid-brain which manages emotions and relationships to self and others; and finally, as the icing and cherry on the cake, the neo- and pre-frontal cortex where language, anticipation, communication, and imagination are organized, harmonized and become focused.

This is a rough roadmap, of course, but you get the gist. When no security has been established from an early age, too much of our energy becomes invested in our very early, more primal brain structures—fight, flight and freeze for example—and we become deficient in other areas like communication, relating to self and others, and possibly even motor coordination.

Neuroplasticity and Recovering from Childhood Trauma and Domestic Abuse

Not all is lost, however. Our brains and nervous system, thank goodness, have a fair bit of neuroplasticity.  In other words, we can have experiences that are corrective. Experiences that can rewire our nervous system, which in turn can change how we relate to ourselves and others.

A lot of this work will consist of re-establishing healthy boundaries by working with anger and changing the pattern of our experiences and perspectives to do with trust and vulnerability. Your best advice would be to work with an experienced therapist who can guide you through all of this with the appropriate, necessary sensibilities.

Did this article on childhood trauma and domestic abuse resonate with you? Leave your thoughts and comments here below.

Attachment Trauma is a disruption in the important process of bonding between a baby or child and primary caregiver.

The field of trauma is quite vast. When you think of trauma, you most likely identify with traumatic incidents or prolonged child abuse and neglect. You often do not consider attachment trauma and attachment bonds and how these impact and attract further traumatic experiences and even partners in life.

You attract your partner based on the character traits of your father or mother. And, either you end up with a partner who has similar character traits to our parents, or exact opposite ones. Most of this choosing happens unconsciously.

Attachment Trauma is a disruption in the important process of bonding between a baby or child and primary caregiver.

You reenact deeply ingrained patterns through a set of reactions. When you find yourself struggling with similar situations as adults, you might ask yourself, "How the heck did I end up here again?"

Attachment Trauma and Attachment Bonds

To explain it very simply, you basically have three "faulty" attachment bonds and they really shape the fundamentals of your character:

One is where a parent is overbearing and controlling, leaving you no space to develop your own identity; the second occurs when you are left to your own devices with lack of support even to the point of neglect; and the last one fits between two states where you might find yourself being yelled at or "frozen" out by a parent on the one hand, and the next moment being showered with regrets and confessions of love.

All three attachment bonds are subject to various degrees of intensity, that define the level of developmental attachment trauma that might be affecting your life.

Finding One's Way Out of Attachment Trauma

It can take time to begin realizing that you are not attracting the right people in your life and how this relates to your specific attachment bond. It takes some effort to work through it and start to get the right people and partner to begin taking notice.

When you start doing this, it all begins to fall into place. Attracting the right people into your space becomes easier and creates synergies!

As always, you will have to work at it and work diligently.

What is your attachment bond?

Keywords: Complex PTSD Treatment.

Most clients I see will bring up this question at some point. Furthermore, it is frequently asked on social media pages. It would be easy to give a conclusive "yes" or "no" answer and back it up with valid reasoning and personal experience, but doing so would prevent us from looking at what’s driving that question.

Complex PTSD Treatment and Will I Ever be Free From Trauma

When suffering the effects of Post-traumatic Stress, this question is most likely to come from a sense of despair. Being in a hyperaroused and/or static state is an unpleasant predicament to be in. Moreover, you can easily start to believe that it will never change.

It is important to understand that thoughts of despair and disbelief are part of the emotional state one is in. This understanding can help bring about correct perspective and remove the emphasis on giving too much importance to these thoughts and thus prevent sinking further into a state of depression.

Complex Trauma, Early Life Experiences, and Complex PTSD Treatment

Trauma and PTSD, in most cases, is not caused by a solitary incident. It is highly linked to developmental trauma issues that have formed characteristic structures; this causes individuals to be more likely to enter into situations that can be retraumatizing.

For example, someone who has never been able to fully develop a sense of independence as a child due to an over-authoritative and chiding father figure will possibly attract a future partner or circumstances where similar dynamics are at play. That partner or institution can be abusive, physically or psychologically, without any expression of resistance or outrage from the individual being abused, due to the embedded conditioning from childhood. To speak out would bring about the anger of the father and, as is the case with children, there is dependence for support, emotionally and physically, from the parents (attachment bonds). Independent thinking and acting are thereby suppressed through fear, and the subsequent stunned silence becomes the status quo.

Trauma and PTSD, in most cases, is not caused by a solitary incident. It is highly linked to developmental trauma issues that have formed characteristic structures; this causes individuals to be more likely to enter into situations that can be retraumatizing.

That same fear can prevent making clear boundaries by speaking up in adult life, while at the same time, all over again, attracting similar abusive situations and people. This is called re-enactment and is the setting for PTSD to develop. PTSD and developmental trauma issues are thus, in most cases, solidly linked.

The Different Depths of Emotional Suffering

You can work with blame, guilt, anger, fear, or overwhelming sadness related to specific events such as rape or a battle incident in a war zone that has triggered your full-blown PTSD. Having done solid work with a trusted therapist where you find things have been going uphill you suddenly may find yourself, a year or later, suffering all over again from similar symptoms. It could even make you wonder whether all the hard work that you have done was worth it.

At this point, you must realize that you are very likely coming upon something which is prior to that which you have so far worked on. The emotional residue which surfaces is associated with residual conflict at a deeper level that needs to be resolved – very possibly developmental issues.

Becoming aware of this puts you back in charge rather than returning to despair. It is up to you then how deep down the rabbit hole you want to go.

How is your process of Complex PTSD Treatment going for you? Leave your comment below.

Keywords: Developmental Trauma Disorder, DTD.

While challenges provide opportunities for learning, they can, at times, also be overwhelming. Whenever this is the case, the overwhelm is typically characterized by structures involving resistances.

To a degree, everyone suffers from some form of developmental trauma; however, when a child is exposed to multiple and prolonged traumatic events, the likelihood of Developmental Trauma Disorder is highly increased.

History of Developmental Trauma Disorder

The diagnosis of Developmental Trauma Disorder (DTD) is relatively new. It seeks to clarify and identify a range of anxiety and dissociative disorders and place them under one umbrella, instead of attributing a variety of conditions to one person.

To a degree, everyone suffers from some form of developmental trauma; however, when a child is exposed to multiple and prolonged traumatic events, the likelihood of Developmental Trauma Disorder is highly increased.

PTSD & Developmental Trauma Disorder

While Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder can be highly complex, it is far surpassed by Developmental Trauma Disorder in terms of depth, impact, and complexity.

Furthermore, persistent symptoms of PTSD are often related to Developmental Trauma issues.

The likelihood of Developmental Trauma Disorder to set in takes place mostly in and around the first decade of a person's life. It forms characteristics that include various protective mechanisms and the urge to reenact the trauma. Unless the tendency to repeat the trauma is recognized, the response to the environment is likely to repeat and replay the original traumatizing, abusive, but familiar relationships and incidents; hence the relationship between PTSD and Developmental Trauma.

Cause and Effect: Developmental Trauma Disorder (DTD)

Developmental Trauma Disorder comes into play after multiple and chronic exposures to traumatic events. Most often the exposure is at an interpersonal level (i.e. family and community). Inflicted trauma presents itself as ongoing verbal, emotional and physical abuse, neglect, and compromised attachment bonds.

Early life traumatization interferes with neurobiological development and quality of information processing. Studies link adverse childhood experiences to depression, suicide attempts, drug abuse, sexual promiscuity, domestic violence, cigarette smoking, obesity, physical inactivity, STDs, liver disease, cancer, stroke and diabetes in adulthood.

Does the diagnosis of DTD resonate with you? Leave your comment here below.

I would argue that our developmental trauma issues are endemic, regardless of whether we refer to them as conditioning or traumas, and have far-reaching consequences which affect our physical and psychological health, as well as our personal and social relationships.

While the mechanisms that are set up to cope with these early stresses are a necessity at the time to survive, they become burdensome obstacles later on in life. The earlier we go through traumatic experiences, the more hard-wired and implicitly codified they become in our body and mind.

To work through developmental trauma issues can be tedious and challenging; nonetheless, the payoffs through increased energy levels are more than worth it!

Do you have some form of Developmental Trauma? Leave your comments below.

Keywords: Recovering Complex PTSD

Recovery from Complex PTSD and Childhood Trauma is not going to happen overnight, no matter how many "quick-fix" promises are made to you.

Trauma, in most cases, is complex, and the longer you've lived with it, the more complex it is.

PTSD or Complex PTSD is often offset by a singular event that tipped the scales and made your emotional and physical health spiral out of control; however, it is often the buildup of traumatic developmental patterns that have set the stage and are at the root of most Post-Traumatic Stress symptoms.

We all wish that our problems had been solved yesterday, and this pressure we put on ourselves aids in slowing down our progress by making us feel incompetent before we even start.

Understanding Trauma and Having Healthy Expectations

Recovering from Complex PTSD and childhood trauma is hard work, but I am convinced you can heal. I have seen those I have worked with experience incredible transformations that allow them to have normal lives again. Having a normal life is a huge step when you have suffered from Post-Traumatic Stress.

Trauma, in most cases, is complex, and the longer you've lived with it, the more complex it is.

It is important to have healthy expectations, though, so you aren’t stressed about immediate results. Having healthy expectations helps you to get started in the first place so that you’re willing to put in the effort to see improvements, no matter how small. In order to see results, you need a trusting relationship with your therapist.

If you feel like you’re really stuck deep in the woods in recovering from Complex PTSD, you won’t make it out on your own. You need a caring professional who can look at your situation from the outside; someone who can help you navigate those woods while speeding up your recovery process. Without the right relationship and the right therapist, you won’t experience lasting results.

Ingredients for Healthy Recovery from Complex PTSD

Although I can’t convince you to trust, as that is something that grows through the process of interaction, I can tell you that I understand your needs:

• Intention to want to heal
• Persistence to keep going
• Setting healthy expectations
• Seeing improvements and results

After you have committed to the first three on the list, I can help you see life improvements and results.

I can’t promise you the world, as our sessions are dependent on your commitment, but I can show you that healing is possible in our first introductory session.

Working with Someone who Understands Recovering from Complex PTSD

This session will allow us to meet, and it will provide you with insight into the effectiveness of my method. There’s no commitment, so if you decide you aren't ready, I won’t pressure you to continue with future sessions. You are in charge of the process!

What I can say, though, is that everyone who has worked with me has gotten value out of our interaction, be it a few sessions or a longer-term commitment.