Trauma-Informed Blog
New content weekly! Survivor Stories, Research Articles, Poetry, and more written by clinicians, coaches, survivors, and mental health professionals.
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How To Spot Sexual Abuse in Children
As a survivor of sexual abuse and horrific trauma, I can attest that it is the worst pain a human being can endure. It feels like being tortured, and in simple terms, it is. As adults in this day...
What the Parentified Child Looks Like as an Adult
Parentification is usually described as a childhood role reversal. A child becomes the emotional caretaker, mediator, problem-solver, or stabilizer in a home where adults are inconsistent,...
The Labyrinth of Healing: What Complex Trauma Taught Me About Becoming Whole (Part 2)
The Paradox of Post-Traumatic Growth If you haven't read Part I of this article, you can read it here. I used to resist the language of post-traumatic growth. It felt like another demand—another...
How Meditation Can Help Your Busy Mind to Unwind
We’re all busy and juggle work with our personal lives. Some manage this better than others and float through the every day. Other people don’t have it all figured out 24/7. Everyone has bad...
Stuck Points in Healing from Complex Trauma
Whether you are struggling to contain painful rumination, finding it difficult to cope in the present, or feeling apprehensive about the future, there is a good chance that stuck points are...
When “Calm Down” is Contempt
“Calm down” often lands as a status move, not support. For trauma survivors, it raises arousal and hardens resistance. Use language and behavior that actually lower risk.
Are You a Positive Thinker? The Benefits of a Positive Mind
Hey, how are you doing today? Can you remember your first thoughts this morning? Was it a positive thought about your day ahead? Our world is full of negativity right now. It can be hard to tune...
When Being “Good” Hurts: The Doormat Syndrome
This piece reflects on people-pleasing, boundary struggles, and how learning to protect your inner peace can support long-term emotional health for those living with trauma.
“The Channel is Right but the Volume is Too High”: Understanding Emotional Triggers
In a scene from one of my favorite films, The Iron Giant, a boy named Hogarth plays in a junk yard with his new friend, a giant metal man fallen from space. In the midst of their game, Hogarth...
The Labyrinth of Healing: What Complex Trauma Taught Me About Becoming Whole (Part 1)
For a long time, I believed my healing would announce itself with a clear endpoint—a day when the pain would finally stop, when the hypervigilance would dissolve, when I would wake up and simply...
How Trauma Turns Us Into Controllers—and How We Finally Learn to Let Go
This article examines how trauma turns control into a survival reflex, wiring the brain to predict disaster and interpret ordinary setbacks as threats. It offers a grounded path back to peace by reclaiming responsibility for mindset, rather than relying on others to regulate emotional storms.
Complex PTSD - The Damage from Abuse and Trauma
The Damage of Abuse Trigger Warning: This post contains personal accounts and detailed discussions of childhood abuse. If you are currently feeling vulnerable or find these topics...
What is Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder?
“Complex PTSD comes in response to chronic traumatization over the course of months or, more often, years. This can include emotional, physical, and/or sexual abuses, domestic violence, living in a war zone, being held captive, human trafficking, and other organized rings of abuse, and more. While there are exceptional circumstances where adults develop C-PTSD, it is most often seen in those whose trauma occurred in childhood”.
