Becoming Your Own First Responder

Quinn sat on the edge of their twin bed, staring at their phone screen through blurry eyes. Their heart was still racing from the confrontation with River, their roommate who they’d thought was a close friend. River had cornered Quinn in the kitchen, demanding three months of rent money upfront since Quinn had just been laid off that morning over email.

“I don’t trust that you’ll be able to cover your half going forward,” River had said coldly. “All our friends agree with me.” The words stung worse than the financial demand. Had River really discussed Quinn’s private business with their mutual friends?

Quinn scrolled through their messages with Oakley for the dozenth time. No response. They’d been dating for two months, and now a week of silence. If Oakley wanted to break up, just say so. Where was the closure?

Quinn’s family had never been a source of emotional support. Why was there no one to simply say “I get it, of course you feel this way”? Am I too needy? Quinn wondered.

Outside, sirens wailed in the distance. The sound felt oddly poignant, someone out there was getting the help they needed, quickly. Quinn needed help, but from whom? Just someone to care.

Quinn had tried talk therapy at the sliding-scale clinic, but every session felt like paying to be invalidated. Quinn’s body felt heavy and disconnected and they couldn’t remember the last time they’d prayed. They weren’t sure God would hear them anyway.

All Quinn knew was the misery of being stuck in this room, holding a phone full of unreliable contacts. They wanted someone to witness what they’d been through, to believe them, to help them understand what they even needed. But that someone felt impossible to find.

If Quinn’s story resonates with you, you’re not alone. When the people around us don’t provide what we need, we can learn to become our own first responders. This isn’t about never needing support—it’s about building skills to care for yourself when others fail you.

When you’ve survived complex trauma, betrayal, or narcissistic abuse, you often find yourself desperately needing support from the very people who can’t or won’t provide it. This article will help you learn to become your own first responder. We’ll explore how to provide yourself with the essential things every trauma survivor needs:

1. Closure: Finding closure on your own when others leave you hanging
2. Validation: Believing your own reality when others won’t acknowledge it
3. Witnessing: Being seen and heard, even if it’s by you yourself
4. Nurturing: Providing comfort and care to yourself when you’re emotionally wounded
5. Safety: Protecting yourself when others don’t
6. Meaning-Making: Finding purpose in your pain when life feels senseless
7. Identity Rebuilding: Discovering who you are beyond survival mode
8. Professional Support: Knowing when and how to get backup

You’ll also find practical scripts for communicating your needs, gentle affirmations for difficult moments, and a comprehensive list of resources at the end. This isn’t about becoming completely self-sufficient or never needing anyone again. It’s about developing the skills to show up for yourself, especially when external support isn’t available or safe.

Understanding Your Survival Brain and Learning Self-Compassion

Before we dive into specific strategies, we need to talk about two foundational pieces that make everything else possible: understanding how your brain works during stress, and learning to speak to yourself with kindness instead of criticism.

Why Being Your Own First Responder Is Harder Than It Sounds

When you need these skills the most is often when they’re hardest to access. Your brain during trauma or high stress works very differently than your brain during calm moments. When your nervous system detects danger – whether it’s real physical threat or emotional overwhelm – your thinking brain essentially goes offline. This is your survival system doing exactly what it’s designed to do to keep you alive.

Instead of thinking clearly, you might find yourself responding automatically.

• Fight responses might look like getting angry, arguing, or feeling rage that seems too big for the situation.
• Flight responses could be wanting to escape, avoiding certain places, or literally leaving situations abruptly.
• Freeze responses often feel like going blank, feeling stuck, having trouble speaking, or feeling disconnected from your body or surroundings (called dissociation).
• Fawn responses might show up as people-pleasing, over-apologizing, or taking care of others’ emotions at your own expense.
• Flop responses combine elements of freeze and fawn – your body goes limp while you passively comply, like feeling numb during an argument or going along with harmful behavior because resistance feels impossible.

None of these responses are wrong. They’re your nervous system’s attempt to keep you safe. The challenge is that when you’re in these states, accessing the thinking, self-caring part of yourself becomes nearly impossible. If even choosing where to start feels impossible, that’s not laziness—it’s a symptom of trauma’s impact on executive functioning. Just begin anywhere, and let that be enough.

The Foundation: Changing Your Inner Voice

Perhaps the most important skill for becoming your own first responder is learning to speak to yourself with compassion instead of criticism. Many trauma survivors have developed a harsh inner critic that sounds like the people who hurt them. This inner voice might say things like “Maybe I’m overreacting,” “I should be over this by now,” or “I’m too weak to handle this.”

Safety begins inside your own mind. When you stop judging yourself and start supporting yourself during times of struggle, you can begin to see the possibility of actual safety and healing. This shift from inner critic to inner supporter is foundational for everything else in this article to work.

Quinn realized that they spoke to themselves more harshly than they would ever speak to a friend. When River demanded the rent money, Quinn’s first thought was “I’m so embarrassed. I’m such a failure for getting laid off.” Learning to respond with “This is a really difficult situation and anyone would be stressed” was the beginning of creating internal safety.

Real first responders understand that crisis situations require special protocols. They don’t just learn their techniques once – they practice them repeatedly until their responses become automatic under pressure. They run drills in calm moments so that when crisis hits, their training kicks in even when clear thinking doesn’t.

This means becoming your own first responder isn’t about having perfect responses in the moment. It’s about practicing small, simple actions when you’re calm so they’re more likely to be available when you’re not. It’s about progress, not perfection, and celebrating even the tiniest steps forward.

Here’s what realistic expectations look like:

During an acute trauma response: Your only job is to survive and get to safety. If you can remember to breathe or move to a safer space, that’s enough. You’re not failing if you can’t remember any techniques.

In the hours or days after: Basic self-care becomes possible. Maybe you can drink water, eat something simple, take a shower, or get some sleep. Small steps count.

When you’re feeling more regulated: This is when you can plan, practice new skills, and prepare for next time. Don’t expect yourself to do deep healing work when you’re barely hanging on.

Remember: even professional first responders don’t operate perfectly under pressure. What makes them effective is that they show up, they do what they can with what they have, and they keep trying to help. You can give yourself this same compassion.

Affirmation: “I am learning to show up for myself with kindness, one small step at a time.”

1. Closure: Finding Closure When Others Leave You Hanging

One of the most painful aspects of trauma and abuse is how often you’re left without closure. People ghost you, liars deflect when confronted, and sometimes the safest choice is to walk away without explanation. You’re left with questions that feel urgent but may never be answered. Oakley wasn’t the first person to ghost Quinn, and sadly wouldn’t be the last.

As your own first responder, you can learn to “secure the scene” and provide your own sense of closure. This doesn’t mean pretending everything is fine. It means acknowledging that closure is something you can create for yourself, independent of what others do or don’t give you.

Assess What Happened: First responders assess danger before acting. For you, this means acknowledging the truth of what happened—without needing anyone else’s permission to call it wrong. Once you name it for what it is, you can smartly refuse to open yourself to further harm. Quinn resisted the very strong urge to be vulnerable in a long cathartic text to Oakley after a week of silence. To send it and not hear back would only increase the injury and prolong the pain.

Remove from Danger Zone: Quinn left the kitchen and refused to engage with River until they could collect their thoughts. Once in the privacy of their own quiet space, Quinn could begin to sort out what just happened without allowing River to manipulate them further. If possible, you can make the choice to not give an unsafe person access to you without owing them an explanation. Safety first. You’ll be able to figure out next steps much more clearly when you’re away from danger.

Provide Treatment: Create your own closure rituals. Quinn wrote a detailed letter to Oakley expressing everything they wished they could say about being ghosted. They never sent it, but reading it aloud to their empty room and then tearing it up felt cathartic. They also wrote a letter to their boss for laying them off over email with no chance for a face to face conversation. Quinn still mentally replayed all the things they wanted to say for a while, but each time they followed the closure ritual, the power of painful emotions behind it weakened.

Adjust Perspective: Reframe your story in a way that gives you agency. Instead of “Why did this happen to me?” try “What can I learn about myself from how I survived this?” You get to be the author of what your experience means, regardless of what the other person intended.

For ongoing situations with harmful people you can’t completely avoid, you can create closure around your attempts to change them while maintaining necessary boundaries. It’s hard not to get stuck in cycles of trying to make unreasonable people be reasonable, or trying to get validation from people who will never give it. Learning to close the door on those attempts while still managing necessary contact is a vital skill.

Many survivors find this type of self-created closure overly simplified at first. “I’m choosing to close this chapter not because it’s resolved, but because I deserve to move forward” can feel impossible when you’re still in pain. That’s okay. Closure often happens in layers, and you might need to create it multiple times as you heal and understand more. Start with whatever feels manageable, even if it’s just: “I acknowledge that this hurt me, and that matters.”

Bottom line, you can process the situation on your own timeline without the other person participating. You can focus your energy on what you can control moving forward. And you don’t need an apology to know that what happened wasn’t okay.

Affirmation: “I can find closure within myself, even when others leave me with questions.”

2. Validation: Validating Your Own Reality When Others Won’t

Validation might be the most fundamental need for trauma survivors, especially those who’ve experienced gaslighting or emotional manipulation. When others have told you that your perceptions were wrong or your feelings were too much, learning to trust your own inner knowing becomes both essential and terrifying.

Take Vital Signs: Just like first responders check pulse and breathing to assess what’s really happening, you can learn to check in with your own emotional and physical responses as valid information. That knot in your stomach around certain people, the way your shoulders tense in specific environments – these are data points, not random occurrences. Even if these responses may be based on something historical rather than current, they are still real and need to be honored rather than ignored.

Document the Incident: Keep validation journals that create a record of your reality. Write down the facts of what happened, how it affected you, and why your response made sense. Include phrases like “Of course I felt scared when…” or “It makes sense that I was confused because…” Quinn started writing: “It makes sense that I felt betrayed when River shared my private business with our friends. Anyone would feel violated by that.”

Recognize Normal Responses: Learn about common trauma reactions to provide yourself with evidence-based validation. When you discover that being constantly on guard (called hypervigilance), feeling overwhelming emotions that seem bigger than the current situation (known as emotional flashbacks), or people-pleasing behaviors are normal responses to trauma, it helps you understand that you’re having normal responses to abnormal experiences.

Your nervous system often recognizes danger before your thinking mind does. Quinn’s body felt exhausted after every interaction with River, even “normal” conversations. Learning that this energy drain was a typical response to being around manipulative people helped Quinn trust their instincts about limiting contact.

Find books, articles, podcasts, and videos by trauma experts describing experiences similar to yours. Hearing your experience described by someone with professional credibility can counteract years of being told you were “too sensitive.”

Finding Safe Online Communities: Look for moderated support communities rather than open forums like Reddit. Consider NAMI online support groups, 7 Cups peer support (which has some moderation), or closed social media groups with active moderation and clear community guidelines. Always prioritize communities focused on healing and recovery rather than just venting about trauma. When joining any online community, start by observing before sharing, and trust your instincts about whether the environment feels supportive or triggering.

Scripts for Seeking Validation:

“I’m looking for someone who can help me understand if my response to this situation makes sense, without trying to fix or minimize what I experienced.”

“I need to talk to someone who has experience with these types of situations and can help me reality-check what happened.”

“Can you help me understand if what I’m feeling is normal, without trying to talk me out of my feelings?”

For those dealing with discrimination or institutional problems, document everything. Keep records of incidents and note patterns. This isn’t just about building evidence – it’s about having concrete proof when others try to make you doubt what you experienced. (Although, it’s common for unhealthy people to refuse acknowledging the truth regardless of facts or evidence, which is even more reason to not rely on someone else for validation unless they’re proven to be emotionally safe.)

You might also consider using AI chatbots for perspective when human support isn’t available – while not a replacement for human connection or professional help, they can sometimes offer validation and help you organize your thoughts when you’re feeling confused or isolated. Type in the whole situation and ask the AI to help you understand the dynamics and facts.

Affirmation: “I trust my inner knowing and honor my emotional responses as valuable information.”

3. Witnessing: Becoming the Witness You Never Had

One of the deepest needs trauma survivors have is for someone to truly see and acknowledge what they’ve been through. When you’ve been gaslighted or told your perceptions were wrong, having a witness feels essential for healing. The challenge is that many people aren’t equipped to be present for your truth, especially if it makes them uncomfortable.

Assess the Situation: Learning to witness yourself compassionately is like being your own detective and medic combined. You’re both gathering evidence of what really happened and responding to that evidence with kindness rather than judgment.

Create Records: Trauma journals serve as both witness and evidence. Write specifically to acknowledge what happened with phrases like “This really happened,” “This wasn’t normal,” and “My feelings about this made sense.” Quinn started each entry with “Today I’m witnessing for myself that…” followed by whatever they needed to acknowledge. Sometimes the most healing thing you can write is: “What happened to me was real, and it affected me.”

For an easy start, try simple writing prompts:

• Today I acknowledge that…
• Something that wasn’t my fault was…
• A feeling that made complete sense was… Something I survived was…

Recording yourself speaking about your experiences can be powerful, especially if your trauma involved being silenced. You don’t have to keep these recordings forever, but hearing yourself speak your truth out loud, without interruption, can be deeply validating. You might also use voice-to-text features to create written records if speaking feels easier than writing.

Symbolic Expression: For experiences too overwhelming to approach directly, symbolic representation can help. Use objects, colors, or images to represent different parts of your story. A heavy rock might represent the weight you carried, broken pottery might represent what was damaged. Ponder the Japanese art of kintsugi – repairing broken pottery with gold, making it more beautiful than before – as a metaphor for how your healing can transform your wounds into sources of strength.

Observe Progress: Surround yourself with reminders of your healing journey – photos that show your growth, quotes that speak to your experience, or meaningful objects that represent your resilience. These visual cues can provide validation when you need reminders of your progress.

The Undefined Witness: Anonymous blogging platforms like Medium (with privacy settings enabled and comments disabled) can allow you to share your story without exposing your identity. Creative expression through art, music, or simple crafts like making collages can reach parts of your experience that words can’t touch.

Understanding Trauma Dumping: Many survivors experience an almost irresistible urge to share their trauma story repeatedly with anyone who will listen. This isn’t weakness – it’s your psyche’s attempt to find someone who will witness and validate your reality. The compulsive need to “purge” your story through repetitive telling is normal, but it’s important to recognize when you’re seeking external validation for internal wounds that need witnessing.

When you notice this urge, pause and ask: “What do I personally need to witness about this experience right now?” Often, you can give yourself this witnessing first, which reduces the urgency to seek it from others who might not be able to witness it safely. This doesn’t mean never sharing your story – it means being intentional about when, how, and with whom you share it.

Scripts for Requesting Witnessing:

“I need someone to listen to what I’ve been through without trying to fix or minimize what I’m sharing.”

“Can you just hear my experience without offering advice right now? I’m not looking for solutions – I just need someone to acknowledge that this was hard.”

“I’m looking for someone who can be present with me while I share something difficult, without trying to make it better or tell me how to feel about it.”

Affirmation: “My experience deserves to be witnessed with compassion, starting with my own.”

4. Nurturing: Providing Comfort When Care Isn’t Available

Learning to nurture yourself when you’re emotionally wounded is like performing emotional first aid. When you’ve grown up without consistent nurturing or been surrounded by people who didn’t provide care, you might not even know what nurturing feels like, let alone how to give it to yourself. Nurturing is responding to your pain with gentleness instead of criticism, meeting your needs with care instead of neglect, and treating yourself like someone worthy of comfort and kindness.

Triage Your Needs: The exhaustion from complex trauma runs soul-deep. You might feel like you’re barely hanging on hour by hour. Start with the smallest possible acts of care rather than elaborate self-care routines when you can barely manage survival. This might look like keeping snacks by your bed so you can eat something without leaving your room, having a water bottle within reach, or simply taking one conscious deep breath.

Provide Immediate Comfort: Physical nurturing can be accessible even when emotional nurturing feels complicated. Put your hand on your heart when upset, wrap yourself in a soft blanket, or make a warm drink. Your nervous system responds to gentle physical care even when emotions feel chaotic. Quinn found that warm baths helped when everything else felt overwhelming.

Develop Internal Caregiving: Practice self-parenting by developing an internal voice that speaks to you like a loving parent would speak to a frightened child. Quinn realized they were far more compassionate to friends than to themselves, so they started asking: “What would I say to my best friend if they were going through this?” Then they practiced saying those same words to themselves.

Create Comfort Kits: In a box, assemble a collection of items that engage your senses soothingly. Essential oils, calming music, soft textures, or peaceful images. Keep these accessible for when you’re struggling, because trauma often disrupts your ability to think clearly about what might help. If these items are already in one place, you only need to think of the singular box rather than the many things inside of it.

Find Natural Comfort: If possible, companion animals provide unconditional nurturing when human relationships feel complicated. Pets offer physical affection and acceptance without judgment. Even if you can’t have a pet, volunteering at shelters or watching animal videos can provide some nurturing energy.

Nature offers nurturing that doesn’t require anything from you in return. Trees, water, sky, and earth have been comforting humans for millennia. Even looking out a window at natural elements or having plants in your space can offer an awareness and connection to something large and wondrous.

Body Work: Professional touch therapy like massage, craniosacral therapy, myofascial release, or reflexology can provide nurturing through skilled, boundaried touch, especially healing for those whose trauma involved touch violation or who grew up without healthy physical affection.

Creative Therapy: For those with limited energy, try tiny nurturing acts: cutting paper snowflakes, coloring with crayons, making simple origami, or arranging flowers from your yard. The goal is gentle engagement, not masterpieces.

Affirmation: “I am worthy of gentleness and care, especially my own.”

5. Safety: Creating Protection When It Isn’t Provided

Safety is the foundation that makes everything else possible. Learning to create your own sense of safety isn’t about becoming invulnerable – it’s about developing your ability to recognize danger and respond in ways that protect your wellbeing.

Secure the Perimeter: Emotional safety boundaries are limits you set to protect your wellbeing. Don’t share personal information with people who’ve used it against you, limit contact with individuals who consistently upset you, or choose not to engage certain topics with particular people. If setting boundaries feels ‘selfish,’ remember: protecting your safety isn’t cruelty—it’s a prerequisite for healthy relationships. Boundaries aren’t walls – they’re gates you control. Quinn learned to stop sharing personal concerns with River after realizing River used this information to create drama with their friend group.

Protect from Further Harm: Safety includes shielding yourself from additional damage when you’re already wounded. Set inner monologue boundaries by learning to interrupt harsh self-criticism – and when you notice that critical voice, don’t judge yourself for judging. Simply notice it with curiosity rather than more criticism. Limit contact or information sharing with unsafe people during emotionally fragile periods. Avoid triggering news, social media, or content when you’re struggling. Create environmental protection by avoiding overwhelming places or situations, limiting stimulation when your nervous system is activated, and giving yourself permission to say no and not let obligation or guilt rule you. Also, protect yourself by not making big decisions when you’re in crisis mode.

Evacuate to Safety: Physical safety planning involves thinking through protection in various situations. Have exit strategies from social gatherings, keep important documents accessible, maintain some financial independence even if it’s just keeping some cash on hand, or know how to quickly contact help. Even small safety measures can significantly reduce anxiety and increase your sense of control.

Establish Communication Protocols: Digital boundaries have become increasingly important. Block harmful numbers and social media accounts, adjust privacy settings, use different email addresses for different purposes, and be thoughtful about personal information you share online. Your digital space deserves the same protection as your physical space.

Provide Calming Treatment: Learn techniques to help your nervous system recognize when you’re actually safe. Deep breathing, progressive muscle relaxation, grounding techniques using your five senses, and gentle movement can signal safety to your nervous system. Quinn learned to notice when their shoulders hunched and jaw clenched – signs their body was bracing for danger even in safe situations. Consciously relaxing these muscles helped their nervous system understand that immediate threat had passed.

Set Up Treatment Area: Create safe spaces in your physical environment where you can retreat to regroup. A corner of your bedroom with comfortable seating, a car where you have privacy, or even a bathroom where you can take breathing space. Having designated safe spaces helps you feel less trapped when situations become overwhelming.

Manage Resources: Financial safety, even in small amounts, provides important options and reduces vulnerability. Keep some cash accessible, maintain your own bank account, or develop skills that could provide income if needed. Even small steps toward financial independence can significantly impact your sense of security.

Scripts for Communicating Safety Needs:

“I need to step away from this situation because it doesn’t feel safe for me right now.”

“I’m not comfortable discussing this topic.”

“I need some time to think about this before I can respond.”

For systemic unsafe situations like domestic violence, stalking, workplace harassment, or family threats, safety planning becomes more complex and requires professional guidance through legal consultation, domestic violence advocates, or organizations that understand the specific challenges you’re facing. Don’t try to handle dangerous situations alone – these require specialized expertise to navigate safely.

Affirmation: “I can trust myself to recognize danger and take steps to protect my wellbeing.”Subscribed

6. Making Meaning: Finding Purpose When Life Feels Senseless

One of the most challenging aspects of trauma recovery is trying to make sense of experiences that seem senseless. As your own first responder, you can learn to create meaning from your experiences, even when no one else can provide satisfactory answers.

Observe Positive Gains: Post-traumatic growth doesn’t mean being grateful for trauma or pretending it was “worth it.” It involves recognizing ways you’ve developed strength, wisdom, or compassion as a result of surviving difficult experiences. Quinn noticed they’d become exceptionally good at reading people’s emotional states and recognizing manipulation. While they wouldn’t have chosen to develop this skill through trauma, acknowledging it helped them see that their pain had contributed to their ability to help others and protect themselves.

Documenting your capabilities and resources that helped you survive can reveal strengths you might not recognize. What qualities enabled you to endure what you endured? What internal resources did you draw on? Sometimes abilities that developed through survival – like being highly observant or good at reading situations – can be applied in positive contexts once you’re safer.

Define Values: Identify what matters most to you, separate from what you were told should matter. Trauma strips away everything non-essential, often revealing core values you might not have recognized otherwise. Quinn realized their experience with betrayal had taught them that authenticity and loyalty were non-negotiable in relationships – a clarity that helped them make better choices about who to trust.

If exploring meaning-making feels overwhelming or you don’t have clear answers yet, that’s completely okay. There’s deep healing in simply accepting yourself exactly as you are without pressure to “do better” or “be more.” Sometimes the most meaningful thing you can do is honor your current capacity without judgment. Recognizing your limits and working within them is wisdom, not weakness.

For a gentle start, try smaller approaches:

• What’s one thing I value about how I handled today?
• What’s one small way my experience might help someone else someday?
• What’s one thing I’m grateful survived in me despite everything?

Purpose-driven projects: These can transform personal pain into something that serves others. This might involve advocacy, creative projects, mentoring, or any activity that uses your experience to benefit others. The goal isn’t to make trauma “worth it,” but to ensure your suffering contributes to something meaningful that helps create positive change in the world.

When considering helping others, gently check that you’re offering help where it’s actually wanted and needed, rather than using service to others as a way to avoid dealing with your own pain. True service focuses on what the other person needs, not what makes you feel better about your experiences.

Faith Recovery: If your faith or spirituality feels fractured, that’s not a failure. Trauma can sever our sense of connection to the divine or sacred. Healing may involve reframing or rebuilding those beliefs in gentler, more loving ways—at your pace, on your terms.

Affirmation: “I can create meaning and purpose from my experiences, even the painful ones.”

7. Identity Rebuilding: Discovering Who You Are Beyond Survival

When you’ve spent years in survival mode, learning who you are beyond your trauma responses can feel both exciting and terrifying. Rebuilding your identity is like conducting search and rescue – you’re both discovering who you’ve always been underneath the survival strategies and creating who you want to become.

Search and Recovery Operations: Many trauma survivors realize they don’t know what they actually like, want, or who they are when not protecting themselves from harm. Start small with preference exploration. Notice what colors, foods, music, or activities genuinely appeal to you versus what you think you should like. Quinn discovered they actually loved bright colors and bold patterns and made a point to add pops of color to their cozy bedroom.

Assess Available Resources: Recognize capabilities you have that aren’t just about surviving trauma. What are you naturally good at? What do people come to you for help with? Sometimes strengths that developed through survival – like being highly observant – can be applied in positive contexts once you’re safer.

The reality is that trauma survivors are often behind in some developmental areas because you’ve been focused on survival while others had the safety to explore interests and develop skills. This isn’t your fault, and acknowledging this gap is important rather than pretending it doesn’t exist. You’re doing necessary work that others took for granted, and there’s no shame in starting where you are.

Discover New Skills: Learning new abilities in areas unrelated to trauma can expand your sense of identity beyond being someone who has “been through things.” You can try simple creative expressions: arranging books by color, creating small displays with meaningful objects, organizing collections like stones or shells in pleasing patterns, humming melodies that make you feel good, or moving your body in ways that feel natural and comfortable.

If identity exploration feels overwhelming, try very small creative acts: making simple collages from magazine pictures, doodling patterns while listening to music, or writing single words that describe how you want to feel. The goal isn’t artistic achievement – it’s gentle self-discovery.

Plan for the Future: Envision who you want to become rather than who you had to be to survive. If fear or pain wasn’t the primary factor in your decisions, what would you choose? This isn’t about denying your past – it’s about expanding your identity to include possibilities beyond your survival story.

Affirmation: “I am discovering and creating who I want to be, one choice at a time.”

8. Professional Support: Knowing When to Call for Backup

Just like first responders know when a situation requires specialized backup, learning to recognize when you need professional help is vital. This isn’t about failing to handle things independently – it’s about recognizing that some wounds require specialized treatment.

Recognize When Backup Is Needed: You deserve proper professional care, not just whatever you can afford. Working with poorly trained therapists can create additional trauma, waste limited resources, and convince you that therapy doesn’t work. A bad therapist can set healing back significantly, while a skilled trauma therapist can accelerate progress in ways that make the investment worthwhile.

Warning signs that indicate you need professional support include persistent thoughts of self-harm, inability to function in daily life for extended periods, substance abuse as coping, feeling disconnected from your body or surroundings in ways that affect your ability to function safely (dissociation), panic attacks that don’t respond to self-help, or trauma responses getting worse rather than better.

Other indicators that professional support would be beneficial: feeling stuck in the same patterns despite your efforts, relationships that consistently end in similar harmful ways, work performance suffering due to trauma responses, physical symptoms that might be trauma-related, or feeling overwhelmed by the healing process.

Request Appropriate Specialists: When looking for trauma-informed help, credentials and specialized training matter more than general therapy credentials. Look for therapists who specifically mention trauma training and use evidence-based approaches.

EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing): Helps process traumatic memories through guided eye movements, allowing your brain to properly file away disturbing memories.

Internal Family Systems (IFS): Works with different parts of your personality, helping heal wounded parts while strengthening your core self.

Somatic Experiencing: A body-based approach that helps release trauma stored in your nervous system.

Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT): Helps examine and challenge trauma-related thoughts and beliefs.

Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT): Teaches specific skills for managing intense emotions and improving relationships.

Trauma-Focused CBT: Cognitive Behavioral Therapy adapted for trauma, helping identify unhelpful thought patterns while developing practical coping strategies.

Assess Qualifications: Questions to ask potential therapists and what answers to look for:

• “What specific training do you have in trauma treatment?” Look for: Specific certifications, ongoing education, years of trauma-focused practice
• “What approach do you typically use for complex trauma?” Look for: Evidence-based modalities, individualized treatment plans, familiarity with your specific type of trauma
• “How do you handle it when clients feel overwhelmed in session?” Look for: Trauma-informed responses, awareness of pacing, commitment to safety and not retraumatizing
• “What’s your philosophy about the pace of trauma healing?” Look for: Patient-centered approach, no pressure for quick fixes, understanding that healing isn’t linear

Identify Red Flags: Warning signs in potential therapists include minimizing your experiences, pushing you to “get over” things quickly, lacking trauma training, seeming uncomfortable with trauma topics, trying to diagnose you immediately, making you feel judged, or pressuring you to forgive without accountability.

Scripts for Communicating with Potential Therapists:

“I’m looking for someone with specific training in complex trauma and PTSD. Can you tell me about your qualifications and approach?”

“I need a therapist who understands that healing takes time and won’t rush the process. How do you typically pace trauma work?”

“I want to work with someone who uses evidence-based trauma treatments. Which modalities are you trained in?”

“I need to feel safe and understood, not judged or pushed beyond my capacity. How do you ensure clients feel safe in session?”

Handle Dangerous Situations: If you’re in immediate danger from domestic violence, stalking, workplace harassment, family threats, or other harmful situations, professional help should include specialized safety planning. Don’t try to handle dangerous situations alone – these require experts who understand the specific risks and safety strategies for your situation.

Legal Considerations: In some situations, therapy records can be subpoenaed in legal proceedings. If you’re involved in custody disputes, criminal cases, or other legal matters, your therapy notes might be used in court, and your therapist might be required to testify. Discuss confidentiality limits with potential therapists before beginning treatment so you understand what information might not remain private.

Coordinate Resources: Financial considerations include therapists who offer sliding scale fees, community low-cost clinics, employee assistance programs, insurance coverage for trauma therapy, community mental health centers, and university training clinics.

Affirmation: “I deserve professional support that honors my experience and accelerates my healing.”

The Reality of Healing: Progress Over Perfection

Becoming your own first responder isn’t about perfect self-sufficiency or never needing others again. It’s about building the inner resources to consistently show up for yourself—especially when support is absent. This takes time, with setbacks and breakthroughs, good days and hard ones.

Healing from complex trauma can be inconsistent. You might thrive in one area while struggling in another, or feel strong for weeks then barely function for days. This isn’t failure—it’s the nature of healing.

Celebrate every so-called “small” victory. Taking space when you need it, avoiding drama, trusting your instincts, or simply making it through a hard day without harming yourself—these are not small. They’re signs of strength and growth.

As you practice in low-stakes situations, the gap between knowing what to do and being able to do it will shrink. The goal isn’t to eliminate trauma responses but to expand your options beyond old survival patterns.

Your ability to be your own first responder will fluctuate. Some days you’ll use advanced tools. Other days, it’s enough just to stay alive and be gentle with yourself. Both are valid. Both matter.

You’re re-parenting yourself—learning skills others may have gained in safer homes, often while still facing ongoing stress. Acknowledge the depth of that work. It’s heroic.

You’re not meant to do this alone forever. Being your own first responder lays the groundwork for healthy interdependence—not isolation. As you grow, you’ll naturally attract healthier relationships and engage from choice, not desperation.

The goal isn’t independence—it’s interdependence: two whole people showing up for themselves and each other. That’s the kind of connection you’re preparing for.

Your healing matters—to you and to others. Every act of self-rescue sends ripples outward. You’re breaking cycles, modeling resilience, and helping build a world where those who’ve been hurt can still heal and thrive.

You are not broken. You are not too much. You are not alone. You’ve survived so much—and now, you’re learning to thrive. That takes courage. And you have more of it than you know.

Final Affirmation: “I am showing up for myself with compassion, wisdom, and patience.”

Resources

I have not personally used all of these resources, so please exercise your own discernment before engaging with these organizations.

CRISIS RESOURCES

For free and confidential support 24/7:

988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline Call or text 988, or visit www.988lifeline.org

National Domestic Violence Hotline Call 800-799-SAFE (7233), text LOVEIS to 22522, or visit www.thehotline.org

Love Is Respect (Dating Abuse Helpline) Call 866-331-9474, text LOVEIS to 22522, or visit www.loveisrespect.org

Crisis Text Line Text HOME to 741741, or visit www.crisistextline.org

Trans Lifeline Call 877-565-8860, or visit www.translifeline.org

TrevorLifeline for LGBTQIA+ Youth Call 866-488-7386, text START to 678-678, or visit www.thetrevorproject.org

THERAPY RESOURCES

Association for Behavioral and Cognitive Therapies (ABCT) Find CBT-trained therapists: www.abct.org

Association for Contextual Behavioral Science (ACBS) Find ACT-trained therapists: www.contextualscience.org

Behavioral Tech Find DBT-trained therapists: www.behavioraltech.org

EMDR International Association Find EMDR-trained therapists: www.emdria.org

The Center for Self Leadership Find IFS-trained therapists: www.selfleadership.org

ADDITIONAL SUPPORT RESOURCES

CPTSD Foundation – www.cptsdfoundation.org

Anxiety and Depression Association of America (ADAA) – www.adaa.org

National Alliance on Mental Illness (NAMI) – www.nami.org

Depression and Bipolar Support Alliance (DBSA) – www.dbsalliance.org

National Center for PTSD – www.ptsd.va.gov

BPD Central – www.bpdcentral.org

Treatment and Research Advancements Association for Personality Disorder (TARA) – www.tara4bpd.org

National Eating Disorders Association (NEDA) – www.nationaleatingdisorders.org

International OCD Foundation (IOCDF) – www.iocdf.org

Children and Adults with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (CHADD) – www.chadd.org

If you are experiencing thoughts of self-harm or suicide, please reach out for immediate help. In the US, you can contact the 988 Suicide & Crisis Lifeline by calling or texting 988. If you are in immediate danger, call 911. You deserve support, and help is available.

Copyright Notice: This excerpt is from my forthcoming book. All content is © 2025 Worldwide Groove Corporation. Unauthorized reproduction, distribution, or use of this material without permission is prohibited. Thank you for respecting my work. 😊

Photo Credit: Author, Substack

Guest Post Disclaimer: This guest post is for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing shared here, across CPTSDfoundation.org, any CPTSD Foundation website, our associated communities, or our Social Media accounts, is intended to substitute for or supersede the professional advice and direction of your medical or mental health providers. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the guest author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the CPTSD Foundation. For further details, please review the following: Terms of Service, Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer

“Why does my body still feel ‘broken’ years after my traumatic experience?”

Before we begin, I want to reassure you that while this article discusses how trauma affects your body, it also offers practical, actionable steps to help with healing. This article will explore how trauma rewires your body, why these changes happen, and how to work with—not against—them. Some of what you read may feel personally concerning or frustrating, so please take breaks as needed and try to stay grounded. Remember that understanding these changes is the first step toward addressing them.

Important Note:
This article is intended for educational and self-help purposes. While it reflects current understandings of trauma and its physical impacts, it is not a substitute for personalized medical or mental health care. If you’re experiencing significant or distressing symptoms, please seek evaluation from a licensed healthcare provider. Self-diagnosis can sometimes lead to unnecessary anxiety or missed medical conditions, so consider this article a companion to—not a replacement for—professional support.

Ash’s Story

Ash stared at their reflection in the bathroom mirror, barely recognizing the person looking back at them. Three years had passed since they discovered their partner’s betrayal and left the marriage that had nearly destroyed them. But the stranger in the mirror still carried the physical imprints of that trauma—and of the years of subtle narcissistic abuse from their family of origin before that. They also carried deeper imprints from childhood medical trauma, having spent months in the NICU as a premature infant, their tiny body subjected to necessary but painful procedures before they had words to understand them.

Their skin seemed different somehow. Their digestion was unpredictable. They caught every cold that came around. And sometimes, they swore their body even smelled different than it used to, especially when they were stressed. Despite therapy and emotional healing work, their body still didn’t feel like home.

“Why can’t I just get over this?” they wondered, the same question that haunted them daily. Their mind knew they were safe now, but their body hadn’t gotten the memo. It continued to operate as if danger lurked around every corner.

Complicating matters further was the fact that their ex-partner continued to send harassing texts and emails, each one like a floating ember that threatened to reignite the trauma response they were working so hard to calm. Complete safety remained elusive, even as they built a new life. And with two young children to parent—including their five-year-old who needed extra support for sensory processing challenges—Ash rarely had moments of true calm to focus on their own healing.

What Ash didn’t yet understand was that their body wasn’t broken—it was adapting. Like a forest after a wildfire, their body’s systems had transformed in response to threat. And just as forests eventually recover—sometimes with even greater diversity than before—their body held the capacity to heal, even if it would never be exactly the same.

Note to readers: This article is written with both accessible everyday language and more detailed clinical information. The clinical sections are in italics and marked as “Optional Deep Dive.” You can skip these sections and still understand all the main points of the article. This structure allows you to engage with the information in a way that works best for you, especially if reading about these topics feels overwhelming.

Neurodivergence & Trauma: Important Intersections

Before diving into the main content, it’s important to acknowledge that neurodivergent individuals (those with autism, ADHD, sensory processing differences, etc.) may experience trauma and its physical effects somewhat differently. The inherent sensory sensitivities and emotional regulation differences in neurodivergent people can sometimes make it difficult to distinguish between trauma responses and neurodivergent traits, or in some cases, when it’s both.

For example, sensory overload in an autistic person may look similar to hypervigilance from trauma, while ADHD emotional dysregulation might resemble trauma-triggered emotional flooding. For example, an autistic person forced to mask their traits may develop trauma responses to social situations, while an ADHDer punished for impulsivity may associate shame with normal energy fluctuations. If you’re neurodivergent and have experienced trauma, understanding these intersections can be crucial to your healing journey. Working with practitioners who understand both trauma and neurodivergence can help untangle these overlapping experiences.

Important note: Neurodivergence itself isn’t traumatic. Trauma arises when neurodivergent traits are stigmatized, punished, or forced into conformity. Many neurodivergent survivors carry wounds from being told their natural ways of thinking, moving, or sensing were ‘wrong’ – not from being neurodivergent itself.

Throughout this article, we’ll note some specific considerations for neurodivergent individuals where relevant, though everyone’s experience is unique regardless of neurotype.

When Your Body Becomes a Stranger: The Disconnect of Trauma

One of the most distressing physical effects of trauma is the profound sense of disconnection from your own body. Many survivors report feeling uncomfortable in their own skin, no longer recognizing or trusting the body that houses them. This experience—known as somatic disconnection—can range from mild detachment to profound experiences where your body feels alien or unreal (depersonalization).

This bodily alienation isn’t just an emotional experience—it’s a physical adaptation to overwhelming events. When trauma occurs, especially repeated trauma, many survivors learn to tune out physical sensations as a way to survive. Pain, hunger, fatigue, even emotions with physical components (like the tight chest of anxiety or the heaviness of grief)—all these signals become background noise to be ignored to keep functioning. This body disconnection serves a protective purpose during trauma but often continues long after the danger has passed.

The trauma disrupts your awareness of your body’s internal state (interoception), creating a profound disconnect. You may struggle to identify basic physical sensations or needs. This often accompanies a difficulty identifying and expressing feelings (alexithymia) as the mind and body lose their natural connection.

Over time, this disconnection creates a cycle: your body sends signals, you don’t listen because you’ve been conditioned not to, so your body “speaks louder” through intensifying symptoms. Eventually, your body may even force you to stop by “giving out” completely—perhaps through illness, collapse, or a health crisis that prevents you from continuing to push forward. Often, these physical shutdowns happen right before or during important events or opportunities, which can feel like your body is sabotaging you. But from your body’s perspective, it’s been trying to get your attention for a long time, and this is its last-resort communication method.

Your body may seem like it’s betraying you, while from the body’s perspective, you betrayed it first by ignoring its warnings and needs. This perception of the body as an enemy often begins in childhood for many trauma survivors, especially when caregivers dismissed, punished, or ignored expressions of physical needs or discomfort. When a child learns that hunger, pain, or exhaustion will be met with dismissal or criticism, disconnecting from these sensations becomes a survival strategy. This also manifests from early life medical procedures where the child doesn’t understand the help or necessity, only their helplessness and pain.

“Why should my body trust me?” Ash had wondered during a therapy session. “I ignored its signals for years. I pushed through exhaustion, dismissed pain, pretended I wasn’t hungry or scared or angry when I was. I treated my body like an enemy, so now it acts like one.”

Breaking this cycle begins with recognition: your body isn’t your enemy. It’s a faithful ally that has been trying to protect you all along, even when its methods became counterproductive.

Hope Note: Reconnection with your body is possible. The path back to safe embodiment involves gentle inquisitiveness, compassion, and gradually learning to hear and respond to your body’s signals instead of overriding them.

How Trauma Hijacks Your Body’s Natural Systems

When a forest faces the threat of fire, everything changes. Plants that once focused energy on growth now divert resources to survival mechanisms. Some trees seal their bark, others release seeds that only germinate after intense heat. Animals flee or burrow deeply. The entire ecosystem shifts into survival mode, with every organism’s priorities fundamentally altered by the presence of threat.

Your body responds to trauma in a similar way. Systems that once maintained general well-being and growth shift toward hypervigilance and protection. Functions needed for immediate survival receive extra resources, while those deemed non-essential during crisis receive less. This isn’t a malfunction—it’s your body working exactly as designed when facing overwhelming stress, particularly from someone you trusted.

Think of trauma as an environmental shift that forces your body’s ecosystem to adapt for survival. Much like certain plant species dominate after a forest fire while others recede, trauma causes some bodily systems to become hyperactive while others become quiet. After a forest fire, species that can quickly take advantage of newly opened space and increased sunlight—like fireweed and certain pine trees with fire-activated seeds—flourish first. These “pioneer species” stabilize the soil and create conditions for the next wave of forest recovery. Similarly, your body’s stress response systems quickly activate to protect you, while growth and restoration systems temporarily recede.

The systems that get sacrificed first are those that aren’t immediately necessary for survival—like digestive efficiency, reproductive function, and tissue repair mechanisms. These changes aren’t “just in your head” or signs of weakness—they’re sophisticated biological adaptations that helped you survive.

Hope Note: Your body’s changes aren’t permanent sentences, though they can feel overwhelming. The same adaptability that helped you survive can be redirected toward healing. Recovery isn’t about “erasing” these changes but about understanding them and creating new patterns of safety that allow your body to gradually shift out of survival mode.

Optional Deep Dive: Trauma-Induced Systemic Dysregulation

These systemic changes can be understood as Trauma-Induced Systemic Dysregulation (TISD). This involves disruption of your body’s essential regulatory systems, including the autonomic nervous system, hypothalamic-pituitary-adrenal (HPA) axis, immune function, and gut-brain communication pathways. These systems normally work in harmony to maintain equilibrium (homeostasis), but trauma forces them into persistent survival patterns that gradually deplete your physical and mental resources—this accumulating wear and tear on the body from chronic stress is known as ‘allostatic load.’

The dysregulation is particularly profound with developmental trauma (childhood abuse, neglect, or medical trauma occurring from birth to age 18) and attachment trauma (betrayal by caregivers during childhood or by intimate partners in adulthood). Examples of betrayal by caregivers include physical or emotional abandonment, consistent failure to meet basic needs, abuse, or using a child to meet the caregiver’s emotional needs. Partner betrayal might include infidelity, financial deception, emotional manipulation, abandonment during crisis, or abuse. Each body system adapts to protect you during these betrayals, but these adaptations come at a metabolic and physical cost when maintained long-term.

Key Takeaway: Your body’s systems aren’t malfunctioning—they’re still in “survival mode” even though the danger has passed. Or, maybe the danger hasn’t fully passed. Understanding this is the first step toward healing.

How Trauma Changes Your Body: From Most Noticeable to Most Hidden

Before we explore these changes in detail, let me clarify a few terms that you’ll encounter in this article. When I mention “betrayal trauma,” I’m referring to harm caused by someone you depended on and trusted deeply—like a parent, caregiver, intimate partner, or close family member. This violation of trust creates unique wounds because the person meant to provide safety became a source of danger, leaving your nervous system confused about where to turn for security.

“Narcissistic abuse” refers to a pattern of manipulation, control, and emotional harm perpetrated by someone with narcissistic traits. This often includes tactics like gaslighting (making you question your reality), intermittent reinforcement (unpredictable cycles of reward and punishment), isolation from support systems, and emotional invalidation. This type of abuse is particularly damaging because it targets your sense of self and reality.

1. Nervous System on High Alert: Why You Can’t Just “Relax”

What You Might Notice:

• Feeling jumpy or startled easily
• Racing heart, even when “nothing’s happening”
• Trouble sleeping despite exhaustion
• Tension in your shoulders, jaw, or back that won’t release
• Difficulty feeling safe even in secure environments
• People-pleasing behaviors that seem automatic (the “fawn” response)

When you experience betrayal trauma or narcissistic abuse, your nervous system rewires itself to prioritize survival. What feels like anxiety is actually your body trying to protect you by staying vigilant. The problem isn’t that your body is overreacting—it’s that it got trained by trauma to see danger everywhere.

Imagine a smoke alarm that was exposed to so many house fires it now rings at the slightest hint of warmth. That’s your nervous system after trauma—it’s doing its job, just with a much lower threshold for detecting threats.

The “fawn response” deserves special mention here because many trauma survivors don’t recognize it as a survival response. Fawning refers to automatically appeasing, people-pleasing, or accommodating others, especially in situations of perceived threat. This might look like agreeing when you don’t actually agree, putting others’ needs before your own even when it harms you, difficulty saying no, or compulsively caretaking others. If you often find yourself abandoning your own needs to keep others happy, particularly when you sense conflict or disapproval, you might be experiencing the fawn response—a survival strategy your nervous system adopted to keep you safe in environments where having boundaries or expressing needs was dangerous.

Recovery Path: Your nervous system can gradually learn to recognize moments of relative safety. This isn’t about forcing yourself to relax, but rather gently helping your body distinguish between times of active threat and times when the danger is temporarily lessened or not immediately present. Even if complete safety isn’t achievable yet, your nervous system can develop more flexibility in how it responds to different situations.

Simple Approaches:

• Diaphragmatic breathing: Place one hand on your chest and one on your belly. Breathe so that your belly hand rises more than your chest hand. This signals safety to your nervous system.
• Humming, singing, or gargling: These activities stimulate your vagus nerve, which helps regulate your stress response. Even just 1-2 minutes, 2-3 times daily can be beneficial. Consistency matters more than duration.
• Progressive muscle relaxation: Tense each muscle group for 5-10 seconds, then release completely and allow 15-20 seconds to notice the sensation of relaxation before moving to the next muscle group. Start from your toes and work up to your head. This technique helps by creating contrast—when you deliberately tense a muscle and then release it, the release often goes deeper than your default “relaxed” state, which may actually be carrying significant tension. This contrast helps your nervous system recognize what genuine relaxation feels like, even if you’re chronically tense. If deliberately tensing feels triggering, you can modify by simply focusing your attention on each muscle group and inviting it to soften without the tensing step.

It’s important to understand that both your sympathetic (“fight-or-flight”) and parasympathetic (“rest-and-digest”) nervous systems are essential for health. You can remember which is which with “S is for Stress and for Sympathetic.” The sympathetic system activates your body for action and protection, while the parasympathetic system promotes recovery, healing, and calm. Neither is “bad”—you need both to survive and thrive. The problem after trauma isn’t having a sympathetic nervous system; it’s that it stays activated too much and too often, while your parasympathetic system struggles to engage when it’s safe to rest.

Optional Deep Dive: Nervous System Changes

Trauma disrupts the balance between your sympathetic (“fight-or-flight”) and parasympathetic (“rest-and-digest”) nervous systems. In narcissistic abuse survivors, the body often gets stuck in sympathetic dominance (chronic activation of the stress response) or in a freeze state of parasympathetic shutdown (collapse, numbing, disconnection). This dysregulation can be measured through tests like Heart Rate Variability (HRV), which quantifies how flexibly your heart responds to changing conditions—lower HRV indicates a more rigid, stress-dominated system.

The fawn response—a people-pleasing, appeasing reaction to perceived threat—is particularly common in relational trauma survivors and correlates with low vagal tone (reduced parasympathetic nervous system activity). This response often develops in childhood when a child learns that safety depends on anticipating and meeting the needs of unpredictable caregivers.

Key Takeaway: Your hypervigilance isn’t psychological weakness—it’s physical evidence of how hard your nervous system worked to keep you safe during trauma.

2. Your Body’s Chemistry: Why You Might Smell and Feel Different

What You Might Notice:

• Body odor that seems different than before your trauma
• Breaking into a sweat when around your abuser or encountering trauma triggers
• Excessive sweating or changes in sweating patterns
• Skin that seems more reactive or sensitive
• Temperature fluctuations—feeling too hot or too cold
• Blushing or flushing (reddening of the skin) more easily
• Changes in breath odor
• Different taste in your mouth
• Changes in how your urine or stool smells
• Altered fingernail or hair texture/strength

If you’ve noticed that your body seems to produce different smells since your trauma, you’re not imagining it. Chronic stress and trauma actually change the chemical composition of your sweat and other bodily secretions. This happens because stress hormones affect many sweat glands throughout your body, not just those in your armpits and groin. These changes alter what your body secretes and how bacteria on your skin process these secretions.

Even more interestingly, trauma can alter both your body chemistry AND your perception of smell. Your sense of smell becomes rewired, potentially making you more sensitive to certain odors, especially those associated with threat or trauma memories. These smell associations vary from person to person based on your specific trauma experiences—there’s no universal set of smells that affect all trauma survivors the same way.

The sudden sweating response when you encounter your abuser or a trauma trigger is a normal protective response—your body remembers the threat before your conscious mind does, activating the “fight-or-flight” response. This “fear sweat” serves a biological purpose, though it can feel embarrassing or intrusive in social situations.

Recovery Path: While some body chemistry changes may persist, supporting your overall stress response system can help normalize these patterns over time.

Simple Approaches:

• Regular, gentle movement to help process stress hormones
• Mindful hygiene: Use personal care products without harsh chemicals, synthetic fragrances, parabens, phthalates, or other potential irritants. Look for “fragrance-free” rather than just “unscented”
• Natural fabrics that allow your skin to breathe (cotton, linen, bamboo, silk, hemp)
• Calming techniques before situations where you might encounter triggers (these will be discussed in more detail later in the article)
• Acknowledge the change rather than fighting it—your body is telling its story

Optional Deep Dive: Body Chemistry Changes

Trauma can affect the body’s stress response systems, which may influence sweat production and body odor. Here’s what some survivors report and what emerging science explores:

Stress Hormones and Sweat: When the body is under chronic stress (like after trauma), stress hormones can change sweat composition. Some people notice their sweat smells stronger or different during periods of anxiety or flashbacks.

The “Fear Sweat” Phenomenon: Preliminary research suggests that stress-induced sweat (sometimes called “fear sweat”) may have a distinct odor compared to sweat from exercise or heat. This could be due to shifts in skin bacteria that break down sweat compounds differently.

Gut-Skin Connection: Trauma’s impact on gut health might indirectly affect body odor. If the gut becomes more permeable (a common issue in chronic stress), certain byproducts can enter circulation and be released through sweat, potentially altering scent.

Brain Changes and Scent Perception: Trauma can heighten sensitivity to smells—especially those linked to past threats. Some survivors report being acutely aware of their own body odor or reacting strongly to scents tied to traumatic memories.

Important Considerations

While these patterns are observed anecdotally and in early research, individual experiences vary widely. No long-term studies have tracked how body odor changes throughout trauma recovery. Factors like diet, hygiene, and genetics also play major roles.

Key Takeaway: The changes in your body odor and sweat patterns are direct physical evidence of how stress hormones have affected your body’s chemistry—not a sign of poor hygiene or health.

3. The Gut-Brain Highway: Your Second Brain Under Stress

What You Might Notice:

• Digestive issues that appear or worsen after trauma (IBS, bloating, constipation, diarrhea)
• Food sensitivities that you didn’t have before
• Digestive upset in response to stress or triggers
• Cravings for comfort foods, sugar, or carbs
• Feeling nauseous in triggering situations

The gut has often been called our “second brain,” containing more nerve cells than your spinal cord and producing many of the same neurotransmitters as your brain. Trauma profoundly disrupts the communication between your gut and brain, changing everything from digestion to how you process emotions.

Your gut microbiome—the ecosystem of bacteria in your digestive system—plays a crucial role in your overall health, including mood regulation and immune function. After trauma, especially early childhood trauma during critical developmental windows (ages 0-3 years), this ecosystem can become significantly altered long term.

Many survivors wonder if these gut changes can be fully reversed. The answer is nuanced but hopeful. Your gut microbiome is highly adaptable even in adulthood, and while early-life trauma can leave lasting fingerprints on your gut ecosystem, significant healing is absolutely possible.

Early childhood trauma can permanently alter the diversity of microbial species, disrupt the training of your immune system, and change gut-brain axis wiring. While some of these changes may persist, your body has remarkable ways of compensating. Even if your microbiome never exactly matches what it might have been without trauma, it can still achieve a new, healthy equilibrium that supports your wellbeing.

Recovery Path: The gut microbiome can be one of the faster systems to respond to healing interventions, often showing improvements within weeks to months, though deeper healing may take longer.

Simple Approaches:

• Trauma-sensitive eating: Focus on nourishment rather than restrictive diets
• Probiotic foods: Yogurt, kefir, sauerkraut, kimchi, and kombucha support healthy gut bacteria
• Fiber-rich foods: Feed beneficial bacteria with vegetables, fruits, and whole grains
• Reduce gut disruptors: Minimize artificial sweeteners, excessive alcohol, and unnecessary antibiotics
• Stress management before meals: Taking a few deep breaths before eating improves digestion

Specific Probiotic Guidance:

• Look for multi-strain products containing Lactobacillus and Bifidobacterium species
• Aim for products with 10-30 billion CFUs (colony forming units)
• Check for strain specificity (e.g., Lactobacillus rhamnosus GG, Bifidobacterium longum 1714, Lactobacillus acidophilus NCFM, Bifidobacterium lactis Bi-07)
• Some require refrigeration (check label), but shelf-stable options can be effective too
• Take with meals for best absorption and protection from stomach acid
• Avoid taking within 2 hours of antibiotics or with strong antimicrobials like oregano oil
• Activated charcoal can bind to and reduce the effectiveness of probiotics, so separate them by at least 2 hours
• Rotating different products every few months may provide broader benefits
• Imported products may have reduced potency if irradiated during import, so check for domestic manufacturing or special shipping methods

Optional Deep Dive: Gut Microbiome and Trauma

Emerging science suggests a strong connection between trauma, stress, and gut health. Many people with PTSD or complex trauma report digestive issues, food sensitivities, or imbalances in gut bacteria. Some animal studies suggest that early-life trauma can lead to lasting shifts in gut microbiota that are harder to reverse, even with probiotics—possibly due to long-term changes in gut barrier function or nervous system signaling. While research is still evolving, some patterns have been observed:

• Microbiome Shifts: Trauma, especially during early life, may affect the balance of gut bacteria that help regulate inflammation and immunity. Some survivors find that probiotic-rich foods or supplements (like those containing Lactobacillus or Bifidobacterium strains) support their digestion and mood.
• The Gut-Brain Link: The vagus nerve, which connects the gut and brain, plays a key role in digestion and stress responses. Trauma can sometimes disrupt this connection, leading to slower digestion, bloating, or heightened stress signals. Practices like deep breathing, yoga, or vagus nerve stimulation may help restore balance over time.
• Early Trauma and Long-Term Effects: Animal studies hint that severe stress during critical developmental periods might lead to lasting gut sensitivity. While the gut can heal, some survivors notice they’re more prone to certain imbalances, like leaky gut or food intolerances.

Supporting Your Gut After Trauma

While everyone’s body responds differently, some approaches that survivors often explore include:

• Probiotics: Strains like L. rhamnosus and B. longum are commonly studied for stress and gut health, though individual results vary.
• Anti-Inflammatory Foods: Bone broth, fermented foods, and fiber-rich diets help many people manage gut inflammation.
• Nervous System Regulation: Trauma therapies like EMDR, somatic experiencing, or mindfulness may indirectly improve gut health by lowering systemic stress.
• Professional Guidance: Working with a functional medicine doctor or nutritionist can help tailor interventions to your unique needs.

A Note on Cutting-Edge Approaches

Some newer areas of exploration—like psychedelic-assisted therapy or microbiome transplants—show intriguing potential in early research, but they’re not yet widely available or fully understood. Always prioritize safety, legality, and professional supervision when considering experimental options.

Key Takeaway: Your digestive issues aren’t “just stress”—they reflect actual changes in your gut bacteria and nervous system functioning. While some early trauma effects may linger, focus on function rather than perfection: even if certain species don’t return, their roles can be fulfilled by other microbes in a newly balanced ecosystem.

4. Immune System Confusion: Why You Might Get Sick More Often

What You Might Notice:

• Catching every cold or virus that comes around
• Taking longer to recover from illnesses
• Developing allergies or sensitivities you didn’t have before
• Unexplained rashes, hives, or skin reactions
• Fatigue that doesn’t improve with rest
• Flare-ups of autoimmune conditions

Chronic trauma puts your immune system in a difficult position. It stays activated to protect you, but this constant activity eventually leads to exhaustion and immune system dysfunction. Like a security guard who hasn’t slept for days, your immune system might overreact to minor threats (allergies, sensitivities) while missing the important ones (viruses, infections).

Recovery Path: The immune system responds well to stress reduction and rebuilding basic health foundations, though it may take months to recalibrate fully.

Simple Approaches:

• Prioritize sleep quality: Immune rebuilding happens during deep sleep. This may be challenging with trauma-related sleep issues, but even small improvements in sleep quality can help. Create a calming bedtime routine, minimize screen time before bed, keep your bedroom cool and dark, and consider tools like weighted blankets if they feel comforting.
• Gentle, consistent movement: Supports lymphatic flow without adding stress
• Anti-inflammatory foods: Colorful fruits and vegetables, omega-3 rich foods, turmeric
• Mindful management of mast cell reactions: Notice triggers for flushing (skin reddening), itching, or rashes and minimize exposure to foods, chemicals, scents, or situations that provoke these reactions when possible

Mast cells are immune cells that release histamine and other inflammatory compounds when triggered by potential threats. In trauma survivors, these cells often become more reactive, contributing to symptoms like flushing (skin reddening), itching, hives, and digestive upset after exposure to certain foods, chemicals, or emotional triggers.

Optional Deep Dive: Immune System and Trauma

Trauma often disrupts immune system balance, creating a state of simultaneous chronic low-grade inflammation and impaired immune defense. This paradoxical response develops when some inflammatory pathways become persistently active while the body’s normal regulatory systems become less effective.

Many trauma survivors experience overactive mast cell responses, which in some cases may develop into conditions like Mast Cell Activation Syndrome (MCAS). In these situations, mast cells can become hypersensitive, releasing disproportionate amounts of inflammatory substances when exposed to potential triggers.

This inflammatory state creates physiological changes that may:

• Increase vulnerability to frequent illnesses
• Raise risk for inflammatory health conditions
• Contribute to autoimmune-like responses

While individual experiences vary, these patterns help explain why trauma survivors often report complex health challenges involving both hyperactive immune responses and reduced infection resistance.

Key Takeaway: Your immune changes aren’t weakness—they’re the result of your body allocating resources to survival rather than maintenance during prolonged threat.

5. Stress Response System: The Command Center of Trauma Adaptation

What You Might Notice:

• Feeling wired but tired—exhausted but unable to relax
• Weight changes, especially increased abdominal fat
• Brain fog and memory issues
• Hormone fluctuations or irregularities
• Blood sugar swings affecting mood and energy
• Sleep disruption, particularly waking at night

While less immediately noticeable than other symptoms, changes in your stress hormone system (the HPA axis) drive many of the physical effects of trauma. This system coordinates how your body responds to stress, regulating everything from energy to immunity to brain function.

Cortisol is one of your primary stress hormones. In healthy amounts, it helps you wake up in the morning, respond to challenges, and manage inflammation. However, trauma can disrupt its natural rhythms. Initially, trauma often causes cortisol to stay elevated, but over time, many trauma survivors develop abnormally low or erratic cortisol patterns. These disruptions affect your metabolism (potentially leading to increased abdominal fat), immune function, and even brain activity.

IMPORTANT: The Double-Bind of Relational Trauma

Unlike other threats, trauma from caregivers or partners creates a unique biological conflict. Your body is programmed to seek comfort from trusted people when stressed, but when these same people are the source of danger, your biological systems receive contradictory commands: “connect for safety” and “flee from danger” simultaneously. This contradiction doesn’t just feel emotionally confusing—it creates measurable disruptions in hormone patterns and nervous system functioning that make relational trauma particularly impactful and exhausting. Understanding this helps explain why recovery from abuse by trusted others involves unique challenges compared to other types of trauma.

Recovery Path: The stress response system can be one of the slower systems to recalibrate, often taking a year or more to show significant improvements, but steady progress is possible with consistent support.

Simple Approaches:

• Establish consistent daily rhythms: Regular sleep-wake times and meal times
• Manage blood sugar: Regular meals with protein, healthy fats, and fiber
• Gentle adaptogens: Herbs like ashwagandha can help support stress resilience (consult a healthcare provider first)
• Mindfulness practices: Regular brief mindfulness breaks throughout the day

Optional Deep Dive: Stress Response System Changes

The body’s central stress response system (the HPA axis) relies on carefully balanced feedback loops that trauma can disrupt. Survivors often develop altered cortisol patterns—sometimes chronically high levels, but more commonly (especially in long-term trauma) an unusually low or “flat” cortisol response. These shifts influence metabolism, cognitive function, and immune activity.

Relational trauma—particularly betrayal by caregivers or partners—has distinct effects on this system. When someone who should provide safety instead becomes a source of threat, it creates a biological paradox: the instinct to seek comfort clashes with the need for self-protection. This conflict can lead to erratic stress hormone fluctuations, where signals for connection and danger fire simultaneously. Over time, this strains the body’s ability to regulate itself effectively.

Key Takeaway: Your stress response system adapted to help you survive chronic danger. Now it needs time and support to learn that the emergency is over. Or, maybe the danger hasn’t fully passed. Understanding this is the first step toward healing.

Fatigue: The Overwhelming Exhaustion of Trauma

Fatigue is one of the most common and challenging aspects of trauma recovery, yet it’s often overlooked or dismissed. This isn’t ordinary tiredness—it’s a bone-deep exhaustion that can feel insurmountable and often doesn’t respond to regular rest. You might feel like you’re constantly running on empty, struggling to accomplish even basic tasks, or needing to recover for days after mild exertion.

This persistent fatigue has multiple physical sources:

• Chronic activation of stress response systems depleting energy reserves
• Inflammatory processes requiring metabolic resources
• Sleep disruption preventing proper recovery
• Mitochondrial dysfunction from long-term stress (your cells’ ability to produce energy becomes impaired)
• The immense energy cost of constant hypervigilance and emotional management

If you’ve been told “you’re just not trying hard enough” or “everyone gets tired,” know that trauma-related fatigue is a real physiological condition, not a character flaw or laziness. Your exhaustion is a logical outcome of the enormous energy your body has expended trying to keep you safe, and it deserves the same compassion and treatment as any other physical symptom.

Recovery approaches:

• Honor your current energy limits rather than fighting against them
• Pace activities throughout the day rather than pushing through
• Prioritize the most essential tasks when energy is limited
• Track your energy patterns to identify your best times of day for different activities
• Consider supporting mitochondrial function with appropriate supplements (under practitioner guidance, see more info below)
• Practice self-compassion when fatigue limits your capacity

Other Physical Signs of Trauma

Beyond the major system changes already discussed, trauma creates numerous other observable physical changes. Understanding these can help validate your experience and guide recovery approaches.

Skin Changes

What you might notice:

• “Skin writing”: Light scratching or pressure leaves raised red marks that stay visible longer than normal
• Excessive sweating in specific areas like hands, feet, or underarms, even when you’re not hot or exercising
• Skin problems like acne or rashes that flare up during stressful times or after emotional triggers

Optional Deep Dive: Skin Manifestations

Dermatographia (also called “skin writing”) causes the skin to become unusually reactive—light pressure, scratching, or even rubbing can leave red, raised marks that linger. This sensitivity is linked to histamine release from mast cells, which may be more easily triggered in individuals with a history of trauma or chronic stress.

Hyperhidrosis involves excessive sweating in specific areas like the palms, soles, or underarms. In some people, this may be related to an overactive stress response system—especially heightened activity in the sympathetic nervous system, which governs the body’s fight-or-flight reactions.

Eye Changes

What you might notice:

• Your pupils staying dilated (larger) even in bright light
• Dry, irritated eyes that worsen during stress
• Becoming more sensitive to bright lights or visual movement

Optional Deep Dive: Ocular Signs

Many people with trauma histories notice changes in how their eyes function, particularly during stress or triggering situations. Common patterns include:

1. Pupil Responsiveness

• Some report exaggerated pupil reactions to light, especially during hypervigilance
• Others notice persistently dilated pupils even in bright environments
• These changes may reflect altered nervous system regulation

1. Dry Eye Symptoms

• Increased eye dryness, particularly during stressful periods
• Likely connected to shifts in autonomic nervous system function
• May fluctuate with stress levels

1. Visual Sensitivity

• Heightened discomfort with bright lights or certain visual patterns
• Some describe visual stimuli as physically painful during distress
• Often worsens during or after triggering experiences

These manifestations typically represent the body’s adaptive responses to prolonged stress rather than permanent damage. Many survivors find symptoms improve as their nervous system regulation recovers.

Posture and Muscle Changes

What you might notice:

• Rounded, hunched shoulders that developed as a protective posture
• Pelvic floor problems like tension, pain, or weakness (may manifest as pain during sex, urinary urgency or incontinence, constipation, or lower back pain)
• Jaw clenching, teeth grinding, or TMJ (jaw joint) pain

Optional Deep Dive: Musculoskeletal “Trauma Postures”

Fetal Shoulders: Many trauma survivors unconsciously adopt a rounded, protective posture—shoulders curled forward, chest slightly collapsed. This stance can serve as a kind of physical shielding of the body’s most vulnerable areas, especially after prolonged periods of fear or threat.

Pelvic Floor Patterns: Trauma can affect the muscles of the pelvic floor in different ways. Some survivors develop chronic tension or tightness (a hypertonic pattern), which may cause pain, discomfort, or difficulty relaxing during intimacy. Others experience a looser, more collapsed state (a hypotonic pattern), where the muscles feel weak or disconnected. For many, both patterns can show up—either at different times or in different muscle groups—especially in the context of complex trauma, where the body may have cycled through various survival responses like freezing, dissociating, or bracing for impact.

Jaw Tension and TMJ Discomfort: Chronic jaw clenching or teeth grinding is a common physical expression of unprocessed stress or vigilance. Survivors often notice tightness in the jaw or pain near the temples, especially during or after triggering experiences. This tension may reflect the body’s attempt to suppress emotion or remain “on guard.”

Voice and Speech Changes

What you might notice:

• A flat, monotone voice or a voice that sounds strained or raspy
• Difficulty finishing sentences when discussing triggering topics
• Speaking more quietly or with vocal fry (a creaky sound) especially in stressful situations
• For singers: difficulty accessing your full vocal range, voice cracks or breaks, losing pitch control when singing, or feeling disconnected from your voice
• Complete loss of words or inability to form coherent sentences when highly triggered (“trauma aphasia”)

Optional Deep Dive: Voice & Speech Patterns

Vocal Cord Tension: May manifest as a flat affect (ventral vagal shutdown) or raspy voice (recurrent laryngeal nerve irritation).

Speech Apraxia: Mid-sentence freezing when triggered, as the limbic system overrides speech centers (sometimes called “Broca’s arrest”).

Vocal fry or whispered speech: Common in those who learned to make themselves “smaller” or less noticeable to avoid abuse. Not all instances of vocal fry relate to trauma, as it can be a cultural or regional speech pattern as well.

Optional Expanded Deep Dive: Voice & Speech Changes for Singers

For singers, trauma often shows up in the voice through deeply embodied responses. The larynx (voice box) and the muscles that support it are highly sensitive to emotional states and shifts in the nervous system. When someone with a history of trauma sings, certain patterns often emerge—not because of a lack of technical ability, but because the body itself is responding to past experiences of threat.

Laryngeal Tension Patterns: Many trauma survivors carry chronic tension in the muscles around the larynx, especially the extrinsic muscles that anchor it to the jaw, tongue, and chest. This tension can limit the natural rise and fall of the larynx during singing, affecting range, flexibility, and ease. Even singers with excellent technique may experience premature vocal fatigue or discomfort after singing, especially in emotionally charged pieces.

Breath Support Disruption: The breath system is often impacted by trauma. Shallow breathing, breath-holding, or unconscious abdominal bracing are common survival adaptations. Because singing requires full, relaxed diaphragmatic engagement, these patterns can make it difficult to access the steady breath needed for vocal control. Singers may find themselves unable to sustain long phrases or may feel “cut off” from their breath in performance situations.

Proprioceptive Changes: Trauma can alter body awareness, creating a sense of disconnection between how something feels and how it’s actually being executed. Singers might struggle to “find” certain notes or registers that were previously easy, or feel confused by changes in vocal control. This isn’t a loss of skill—it’s a temporary disruption in the brain-body connection that coordinates motor function under stress or dissociation.

Resonance Shifts: The spaces that help shape vocal tone—particularly in the throat and upper airway—may constrict during trauma responses. This can result in a trapped or muffled sound, or a sudden loss of resonance, especially in emotionally vulnerable material. Some singers describe it as if the voice is “caught” or “closed off,” even though everything seems structurally fine.

Registration Disruption: Smooth transitions between chest, head, and mixed voice require fine-tuned muscular coordination and nervous system regulation. When trauma dysregulates the nervous system, these transitions can feel jagged or unreliable. Singers may experience voice breaks or inconsistent register blending, even in technically familiar passages. Rebuilding this coordination often involves both nervous system regulation and gentle, targeted vocal work in emotionally safe settings.

Additional Considerations for Neurodivergent Singers: Autistic singers or those with heightened sensory sensitivity may experience more pronounced challenges with body awareness or vocal coordination. Extra patience, flexible strategies, and customized body-mapping approaches can make a meaningful difference.

Heart and Blood Flow Changes

What you might notice:

• Heart racing when you stand up quickly
• Fingers or toes turning white or blue in cold or during stress
• Blood pressure that swings between too high and too low

Optional Deep Dive: Cardiovascular “Trauma Signature”

POTS-like Symptoms: Many trauma survivors experience a sudden increase in heart rate upon standing, sometimes accompanied by dizziness, lightheadedness, or fatigue. This pattern is especially common among those with a history of developmental trauma. In some cases, the symptoms are consistent with Postural Orthostatic Tachycardia Syndrome (POTS), though not all meet formal diagnostic criteria. These responses reflect dysregulation in the autonomic nervous system, particularly the balance between sympathetic and parasympathetic activity.

Raynaud’s-Like Responses: Some individuals notice that their fingers or toes turn white or blue in response to cold or emotional stress. This is due to an exaggerated constriction of blood vessels—a common pattern in those with heightened sympathetic reactivity. While often associated with Raynaud’s Phenomenon, similar vascular responses are frequently seen in trauma survivors even without a formal diagnosis.

Blood Pressure Fluctuations: Trauma can create wide variability in blood pressure depending on nervous system state. During states of hyperarousal (fight-or-flight), blood pressure may spike. In contrast, during dissociative or shutdown responses, blood pressure may drop. These fluctuations reflect the body’s attempts to navigate perceived threat, even when the threat is no longer present.

Sensory Processing Changes

What you might notice:

• Being easily startled by sudden noises or movements
• Becoming overwhelmed by sensory input like loud sounds, bright lights, or certain textures
• Experiencing ringing in your ears that appears or gets worse during stress or when triggered

Optional Deep Dive: Neural and Sensory Changes

Heightened Startle Response: Many trauma survivors find themselves easily startled by unexpected sounds, touches, or movements. This reflects an overactive threat detection system, where the brain—particularly the amygdala—remains on high alert, ready to mobilize a defensive response even when danger is not present.

Sensory Sensitivity: Trauma can lead to heightened sensitivity to sensory input such as noise, light, textures, or smells. These sensitivities may stem from a nervous system that’s chronically overstimulated, or they may arise because certain sensations echo past traumatic experiences. The result is often a feeling of overwhelm or discomfort in environments others might find unremarkable.

Tinnitus or Ear Ringing: A persistent or intermittent ringing, buzzing, or hissing sound in the ears can emerge or intensify during periods of stress. This may be influenced by subtle shifts in muscular tension, blood flow, or neural activity in areas tied to hearing. For some survivors, tinnitus flares in response to trauma-related triggers, making it both a sensory and emotional stressor.

These physical manifestations aren’t imaginary—they’re visible evidence of how trauma has rewired your nervous system. Recognizing these patterns can help validate your experience and guide targeted healing approaches.

Key Takeaway: These observable physical changes aren’t “just in your head”—they reflect real neurobiological adaptations that occurred in response to trauma and can be addressed through appropriate trauma-informed care.

In the following sections, we’ll discuss practitioners, tests, and approaches that can help address these symptoms. While some options may require financial resources, we’ll also include accessible self-help strategies throughout.

If you can only focus on one area of healing due to limited resources, nervous system regulation and digestive health often provide the most foundational support for overall recovery.

Healing Timeline: The Forest’s Regrowth

Before we explore specific approaches to healing, it’s important to understand that recovery follows natural patterns similar to a forest regenerating after a fire. Like ecological restoration, healing can’t be rushed but can be supported. Understanding the typical timeline can help you set realistic expectations and recognize progress, even when it feels slow.

Important: Safety First

It’s vital to understand that significant healing requires a foundation of relative safety. If you’re still in an actively traumatic situation, your body will maintain its protective adaptations—and rightfully so. This doesn’t mean no healing can occur, but full recovery requires an environment where your nervous system can gradually recognize that the danger has passed.

If you’re still dealing with ongoing trauma, including post-separation abuse, harassment, or continued contact with abusers through co-parenting or legal battles, your healing timeline will be affected. Like a forest where embers continue to reignite small fires, ongoing contact with sources of trauma can continually reactivate stress responses.

What You Can Do If Complete Safety Isn’t Yet Possible:

• Focus on harm reduction rather than complete healing
• Create small pockets of safety when and where you can
• Build a support network that validates your experience
• Learn regulation techniques that can be used discreetly
• Practice boundary setting when it’s safe to do so
• Work with a trauma-informed therapist who understands the complexity of ongoing trauma

With these considerations in mind, here’s what healing might look like when sufficient safety exists:

The First Months (1-3):

• Nervous system: You may notice brief moments of feeling safer
• Digestion: Improved regularity or reduced acute symptoms
• Sleep: Falling asleep might become easier, though staying asleep may still be challenging
• Energy: Small increases in available energy

This is like the first green shoots appearing after a forest fire—signs of life returning, but still fragile.

The Middle Period (3-12 months):

• Nervous system: Longer periods of feeling regulated before getting triggered
• Digestion: More consistent functioning, fewer severe reactions
• Immune function: Fewer minor illnesses, improved recovery time
• Stress response: More resilience to everyday stressors

This resembles the early succession stage in forest regrowth—pioneer species (fast-growing plants that can thrive in disturbed soil) establishing themselves, creating the conditions for more complex growth and stability.

The Longer Journey (1-3 years):

• Nervous system: A new baseline of greater calm, with triggers becoming less intense
• Hormones: More balanced patterns emerging
• Body chemistry: Gradual normalization of sweat, odor, and other physical markers
• Identity: Growing sense of your body as an ally rather than an enemy

This represents the maturing forest—diverse new growth establishing a different but vibrant ecosystem.

Persistent Adaptations (Beyond): Some trauma adaptations, particularly from early developmental trauma, may persist in modified forms. Like a forest that grows back with a different composition of species after a fire, your body may establish a new, healthy equilibrium that’s different from its pre-trauma state.

Areas that may retain differences include:

• Gut microbiome composition (though function can improve significantly)
• Certain HPA axis response patterns (such as morning cortisol levels, stress reactivity speed, or recovery timing)
• Baseline inflammatory markers
• Nervous system sensitivity thresholds

However, these differences don’t necessarily mean dysfunction. Many survivors develop remarkable resilience, intuition, and capacity for empathy precisely because of how their bodies adapted to trauma.

Key Takeaway: Recovery isn’t linear—you’ll have setbacks and growth spurts. Progress often happens in a spiral pattern, revisiting challenges but with growing capacity each time. Be patient with yourself, especially if safety is still being established.

Read the rest of this article including steps toward healing in the first book in Ellen’s series “There’s A Word for That”: https://a.co/d/00yKwGEj

This article is in Ellen’s first book of her “There’s A Word For That” series. Order it here.

Copyright Notice: This excerpt is from my book. All content is © 2025 Worldwide Groove Corporation. Unauthorized reproduction, distribution, or use of this material without permission is prohibited. Thank you for respecting my work. 😊

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The Weight You Carry

You wake up each morning with a heaviness that makes even lifting your head from the pillow feel impossible. The weight isn’t physical—it’s the accumulation of emotional wounds, betrayals, and the exhausting effort of pretending to be okay when you’re anything but.

There’s a peculiar kind of loneliness in walking through the world carrying this invisible burden. People pass by with casual greetings—”How are you?”—a question that forces you into an impossible choice: lie and say “I’m fine” while wanting to die inside, or risk the vulnerability of honesty when so few truly understand the depth of your pain.

So you smile. You nod. You perform the dance of normalcy while inside, a voice whispers that continuing to exist shouldn’t be this unbearable.

The Fog of Invisibility

In this state, it becomes frighteningly easy to picture a world without you in it. Not because you’re actively planning to leave, but because you fundamentally believe you don’t matter—not really. Even when people insist you’re important to them, their words can’t penetrate the dense fog you’re lost in.

You don’t even remember when you started believing you don’t matter. It feels like a truth you’ve always known, buried deep in your bones. There seems to be no amount of love, affirmation, or validation that will make it register in your soul that you truly matter. The narcissist didn’t create this belief, but they identified it with unerring precision and exploited it until it grew to consume your entire reality. Palpably feeling loved seems like something “other people” get to have, but it seems impossible for you.

For many survivors, the only tether keeping them anchored to this world is their children. The thought of abandoning their kids is unthinkable—the one line they won’t cross. But this creates its own cruel trap: they don’t want to be in this harsh world, yet they can’t leave it. They’re caught in limbo, neither fully living nor able to escape.

This brings crushing waves of guilt. They grieve the time they’ve lost with their children while battling this internal darkness. They mourn not being the parents they desperately want to be—fully present, engaged, and joyful. Instead, they go through the motions, knowing their kids are growing up, that these fleeting years are passing, and that irreplaceable stretches of precious parent/child moments have been robbed by this struggle.

They’ll never get that time back. And just knowing this doesn’t magically end the struggle. So they face the heartbreaking knowledge that more days will be lost, more precious moments missed, before their children are grown and gone.

The Silent Struggle: Loss of Will to Live

Victims may feel deep apathy, hopelessness, or a loss of motivation to engage in life or pursue future goals. In narcissistic abuse and complex trauma, this often comes from prolonged emotional, psychological, or relational distress caused by the abusive dynamic.

This isn’t about wanting to die—it’s about no longer feeling capable of living. It’s waking up each morning, believing you don’t have what it takes to survive in this world. And you can’t imagine having to endure more days, months, decades feeling this way. Thinking about the future feels overwhelming and triggering because you’re bracing yourself for the next wrecking ball.

For survivors of narcissistic abuse, this silent struggle often goes unrecognized. Friends and family might see someone functioning—going to work, maintaining appearances—while inside, that person feels panic and dread about their own existence.

The Inner Struggle: Beyond the Surface

When Words Fail

For many people actively struggling with the loss of will to live, simply forming words to describe their experience becomes impossible. They may receive a text from a concerned friend asking, “How are you?” and find themselves staring at the screen, utterly paralyzed.

This isn’t merely an emotional block—it’s rooted in brain biology. When trauma overwhelms us, our nervous system can shift into a protective shutdown mode (what scientists call a “dorsal vagal state”). In this survival state, the thinking and language parts of our brain temporarily go offline. The brain literally deprioritizes our ability to form words and sentences while it focuses on basic survival functions. This is why trauma researchers sometimes refer to this as “speechless terror”—the experience is so overwhelming that the brain’s language centers cannot process or express it.

To someone who hasn’t experienced this state, it seems inconceivable that a person couldn’t muster a simple response. But in these moments, language itself becomes inaccessible. How do you translate the vast, formless void inside you into words? How do you explain that you’re simultaneously numb and in excruciating pain? That you feel nothing and everything at once? And you’re literally incapable of expressing it.

So the message sits unanswered. Adding another layer of shame, another reason to withdraw further, believing you don’t have what it takes to live in this world.

“But My Abuse Wasn’t That Bad”

A common obstacle to seeking help is the belief that their experiences “weren’t bad enough” to justify their deep suffering. Survivors often downplay their trauma, thinking:

“Other people have it so much worse.” “I wasn’t physically harmed, so why am I falling apart?” “They didn’t mean to hurt me, so this isn’t really abuse.” “I’m just too sensitive.”

Many struggle to accept the word “abuse,” finding it hard to connect it to their experience. This minimization isn’t accidental—it’s often shaped by the abuser, who downplays the harm they cause and makes the victim feel like their reactions are overblown.

This cycle of self-doubt deepens the pain, layering shame about the struggle itself on top of the original trauma.

The Protective Part That Wants to Give Up

In the internal family systems (IFS) therapy model, the part of us that wants to stop living isn’t trying to harm us—it’s trying to protect us in the only way it knows how. It’s not a destructive impulse but a misguided protector that sees ending the struggle as the only solution.

This part formed when other coping strategies failed—when fighting didn’t work, fleeing wasn’t an option, and freezing no longer brought relief. It whispers, “I can make the pain stop,” believing it’s offering mercy, not destruction.

Recognizing this as a protective response, however paradoxical, can help survivors replace fear and shame with self-compassion.

Living Minute by Minute

For someone in acute crisis, even “taking things one day at a time” can feel overwhelming. Their world narrows to surviving moment by moment, unable to imagine a future beyond the next few minutes.

They genuinely don’t know how they’ll exist from one hour to the next. Basic tasks become monumental achievements—eating a meal, taking a shower, responding to a text. On particularly difficult days, the only goal might be to eat three small meals or simply not resort to hospitalization.

These individuals often develop elaborate ways to avoid potential triggers. They may:

• Avoid all public places or social media for fear that one negative interaction with a stranger could push them over the edge
• Stop watching any shows with suspenseful or emotional content
• Experience panic at notification sounds, dreading the task of responding
• Rehearse casual conversations to prepare for inevitable social interactions

It cannot be overstated how fragile someone can be during these periods—existing in a constant state of pain and torment, where the slightest additional stress threatens to break them completely.

The Invisible Wounds

Beneath the surface of daily life, survivors of narcissistic abuse carry unseen wounds that impact every part of their being—their thoughts, emotions, physical health, and spiritual well-being. The harm runs deep because it attacks their very sense of identity and self-worth, leaving them questioning their right to exist.

Causes:

Existential Shame and Humiliation: Beyond ordinary shame about actions or behaviors, narcissistic abuse often creates a profound existential shame—the feeling that your very existence is somehow wrong or flawed.

This isn’t simply feeling bad about something you did; it’s feeling that who you fundamentally are is defective. The narcissist’s constant criticism, devaluation, and manipulation create a state of existential humiliation where you feel inherently unworthy of taking up space in the world. This deep shame becomes a core identity, making the thought of continuing to exist feel pointless or even wrong. You’re embarrassed at your own existence.

Emotional Exhaustion: Victims of narcissistic abuse often endure relentless invalidation, neglect, and emotional turmoil, leading to extreme fatigue and loss of motivation.

The constant vigilance required to navigate a relationship with a narcissist—walking on eggshells, managing their unpredictable moods, defending against accusations, and trying to make sense of reality when someone keeps distorting it—taxes every emotional resource you have. Eventually, your emotional reserves are completely depleted. You have nothing left to give—not even to yourself.

Hopelessness and Worthlessness: Narcissistic abuse can erode a person’s self-esteem and sense of worth, fostering feelings of being trapped and powerless.

After years of being told you’re not enough, that your feelings don’t matter, or that you’re the problem, you begin to see yourself through the narcissist’s distorted lens. Your achievements become meaningless, your dreams seem ridiculous, and your future appears pointless. Why bother living when you’ve been convinced your life has no value?

Cognitive Dissonance: The conflict between reality and the narcissist’s false narratives can contribute to confusion, self-doubt, and despair, making life seem meaningless.

Living in two worlds—the real one and the narcissist’s version—fractures your sense of truth. You doubt your own perceptions and memories. This constant state of uncertainty exhausts the mind and spirit, making simple decisions feel overwhelming. Life becomes a maze with no exit, where nothing makes sense anymore.

Identity Erosion: When someone systematically strips away your sense of self, you may eventually forget who you are outside of the abuse.

The narcissist slowly replaces your authentic self with the version of who you must become to survive. Your preferences, boundaries, dreams, and even your personality become shaped by their demands and criticisms. When you finally emerge from the relationship, you may feel like a stranger to yourself, unsure of what you like, what you want, or who you are meant to be.

The Layered Nature of Trauma: Many survivors of narcissistic abuse carry previous wounds from childhood that made them vulnerable to narcissistic manipulation in the first place.

Childhood emotional neglect, attachment trauma, or growing up with narcissistic parents can create the perfect foundation for later narcissistic abuse. The narcissist didn’t create your wounds—they simply found them with unerring precision and exploited them. This layering of trauma upon trauma creates a compounding effect, making recovery particularly challenging. You’re not just healing from the current relationship but from a lifetime of having your sense of self and worth undermined.

Grieving What Was Lost

Survivors of narcissistic abuse often carry an unspoken, invisible grief—a mourning that few recognize or validate. Unlike grief caused by death, this loss is ambiguous, complex, and deeply personal. What has been stolen isn’t just a relationship or a period of time—it’s a sense of safety, trust, identity, and sometimes, even the belief that joy is possible.

You may grieve the person you were before the abuse—someone who once moved through life with more ease, trust, or optimism. Or perhaps you grieve the time you lost—years spent trying to make things work, trying to be enough, trying to survive in an environment that was slowly eroding you. Some mourn the family they never truly had, realizing that the people who were supposed to love them were incapable of doing so in a way that was safe or nurturing.

Grief may also appear in unexpected ways: feeling waves of sorrow over memories that now seem tainted, feeling anger over what you tolerated before you understood it was abuse, or feeling deep sadness when you witness healthy relationships and realize what you never had.

Many survivors struggle with self-blame in their grief. They wonder, Why didn’t I see it sooner? Why didn’t I leave earlier? Why did I let it affect me this much? But this is not a failure on your part—it is a testament to how deeply you loved, how hard you tried, and how much you deserved better.

Grieving is painful, but it is also proof that you are healing. It means you are recognizing what you lost, what was taken from you, and what you still deserve. True healing doesn’t mean erasing the grief—it means making space for it while also making space for what comes next: reclaiming your life, your identity, and your future.

Living in the Shadow

When the will to live has been eroded by narcissistic abuse, survivors don’t just think differently—they experience the world differently. What was once colorful becomes gray; what once brought joy becomes empty; what once felt meaningful becomes pointless. This isn’t simply a shift in perspective but a fundamental alteration in how reality is experienced moment by moment. The outer persona may continue to function while the inner self has gone dormant, creating a shadow existence where one merely goes through the motions of living.

Manifestation:

Emotional Numbness: Victims may experience detachment from their emotions, as the constant invalidation and gaslighting make it difficult to trust their own perceptions.

Survivors often describe feeling like they’re “dead inside” or “just going through the motions.” This numbness isn’t a choice—it’s the mind’s way of protecting itself from overwhelming pain. When feelings have been weaponized against you, shutting them down becomes a survival strategy.

Reduced Capacity for Joy: Simple pleasures and future aspirations become difficult to connect with, as the narcissistic relationship strips away a sense of purpose and hope.

Activities you once loved bring no satisfaction. Future dreams seem pointless or unattainable. The present moment feels empty. This isn’t depression as most people understand it—it’s a profound disconnection from the very things that make life worth living.

Self-Isolation: Withdrawal from social connections and neglect of personal care are common as the person feels disconnected from the world.

The energy required for social interaction becomes too much to bear. Basic self-care feels pointless. Why shower, eat well, or rest when nothing matters anyway? This withdrawal often reinforces the feeling of disconnection, creating a cycle that’s difficult to break.

Persistent Feeling of Defeat: A pervasive sense that no matter what you do, things will never improve or change.

This isn’t pessimism—it’s the result of having your efforts consistently undermined, your successes diminished, and your hopes repeatedly crushed. When every attempt to improve your situation has been sabotaged, giving up seems like the only logical response.

Small Triggers, Massive Waves

For survivors with Complex PTSD from narcissistic abuse, what appears to be a minor incident can trigger a catastrophic collapse of your will to live. The depth of this reaction often seems incomprehensible to those who haven’t experienced complex trauma.

When Trust Is Shattered Again

Consider this true story: A trauma survivor hired a dog sitter through a reputable company while away on vacation. Midway through the trip, they discovered through security cameras that the sitter was neglecting their beloved pet—not staying at the house as promised, leaving the dog alone for 17 hours, failing to provide food, and sending false updates about the dog’s care.

From several states away, they scrambled to find emergency care for their pet while documenting the neglect with timestamped video evidence. The vacation was ruined, but worse was coming. Despite irrefutable evidence and promises from the company, the sitter remained on the platform after being suspended for only one day, even posting public lies denying any wrongdoing and openly calling the survivor a liar.

For someone without trauma, this would be infuriating. For a complex trauma survivor, it was catastrophic. The combination of betrayed trust, gaslighting, injustice, powerlessness, and institutional failure to protect the vulnerable hit every trigger point from their abuse history. Being publicly called a liar—and watching that lie be allowed to stand without consequence—recreated the exact dynamic of their previous trauma. And doing everything in their power to pursue justice, only to have no influence, was soul shattering. For weeks afterward, they found themselves thinking, “I don’t want to be alive anymore.” The depth of despair was so severe they had to ask family not to leave them unattended.

To an outsider, this reaction might seem disproportionate. But trauma doesn’t operate on logic. When your psyche has been previously shattered, even the smallest betrayals can reopen those wounds completely.

The Invisibility of Triggers

Triggers can be unexpectedly small—a flash of painful memory, an unanswered message, a minor mistake at work. To others, these moments seem trivial, but to a trauma survivor, they can spiral into despair in an instant, reigniting feelings of shame, abandonment, or fear. The body reacts as if the past is happening all over again, no matter how much time has passed. For someone with CPTSD, these moments can instantly trigger:

• Emotional Flashbacks: Suddenly feeling the same helplessness, shame, or terror you experienced during the abuse
• Overwhelming Fatigue: A wave of soul level exhaustion that makes continuing to stay alive seem impossible
• Dissociation: Mentally “checking out” because reality becomes too painful
• Return to Hopelessness: All progress seems erased in an instant
• Sleep Seeking: The desperate wish to “go to sleep and never wake up”—not actively wanting to die, but wanting desperately for the pain to stop

What makes these triggers so devastating is that they often appear inconsequential to others. A friend’s constructive feedback becomes a crushing blow. A minor setback feels like definitive proof of your worthlessness. A happy memory brings guilt and confusion rather than joy.

The thoughts that follow aren’t dramatic plans for self-harm but quiet surrenders: “Being alive is too hard.” “I can’t do this anymore.” “I just want this to be over.”

This is why recovery isn’t linear. A survivor might be doing well for weeks or months, only to encounter a trigger that temporarily erases all sense of progress and returns them to that place of not wanting to continue living. And they often suffer in complete silence, because how do you explain to someone that a seemingly minor disappointment has made you lose your will to live?

Read the rest of this article in the first book of Ellen’s series “There’s A Word for That”: https://a.co/d/01GdqiwJ

Copyright Notice: This excerpt is from my book. All content is © 2025 Worldwide Groove Corporation. Unauthorized reproduction, distribution, or use of this material without permission is prohibited. Thank you for respecting my work. 😊

Photo Credit: Author – Additional Terms and disclaimers for images used in my posts on CPTSD Foundation.

Guest Post Disclaimer: This guest post is for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing shared here, across CPTSDfoundation.org, any CPTSD Foundation website, our associated communities, or our Social Media accounts, is intended to substitute for or supersede the professional advice and direction of your medical or mental health providers. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the guest author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the CPTSD Foundation. For further details, please review the following: Terms of Service, Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer

Not all people living with CPTSD have a history of childhood trauma, but those who do may struggle relationally because of learned coping mechanisms that served to connect to caregivers in childhood (e.g. perfectionism, people pleasing). Our very first venture in life is connecting with our caregivers; therefore, it is important to understand that children will adopt and repeat behaviors they perceive as aligning with their caregivers.

Such behaviors can and often do cause relational issues in adulthood, as many survivors of childhood trauma do not recognize their behaviors as anything more than how they accomplished that connection in childhood. Many times, these relational issues are explained by attachment styles, but rarely are relational issues connected to learned behaviors related to a lack of safety and choice in childhood.

Those of us with a history of childhood trauma may lose adult relationships because those behaviors that connected to caregivers in childhood are ineffective in healthy adult relationships. My friend Lauren Starnes explained it like this:

“behaviors that served to connect you in childhood serve to disconnect you in adulthood”.

Perhaps the saddest part of childhood trauma is its potential to affect people across their lifespan. Suffering often continues into adulthood and is played out in fractured and lost relationships. Nobody is at fault, really. Usually, loved ones (especially a spouse) are operating with a knowledge deficit.

Knowledge is powerful, and understanding how childhood trauma affects humans has the potential to support survivors of childhood trauma and those who love them. Additionally, trauma survivors are not without responsibility and that is sometimes a hard truth, but healing comes with learning. Knowledge provides safety and autonomy–something those of us with a history of trauma know little about.

But as adult survivors, we can choose to learn and alter ineffective coping, we can choose power, we can learn and we can change. We have a choice now. The work is hard, but it is worth it.

“When you know better, you do better” Maya Angelou

Perhaps one of the most liberating experiences as a survivor of an abusive childhood came when I finally understood the effects of childhood trauma. It wasn’t until I began advocating for survivors that I learned about Adverse Childhood Experiences.

I felt validated and suddenly able to extend grace and compassion for my behaviors that hurt the people I loved. I understood that, given my experiences with abuse and neglect, I was simply doing the best I could with behaviors I had created to survive and connect. There were parts of me that weren’t convinced that I had an abusive childhood, but learning about Adverse Childhood Experiences altered my life and gave my pain a name.

Adverse Childhood Experiences is measured by a questionnaire (10 questions) that probes for abuse (emotional, sexual, physical) and/or neglect (emotional, physical). Also included are separation factors such as severe mental illness in the home (resulting in hospitalization or completed suicide); substance abuse; or imprisonment of a family member. The ACE questionnaire was developed by Kaiser Permanente and the Centers for Disease Control in the 1990s. Originally created as a weight loss study, researchers found a connection between childhood trauma and physical manifestations that caused participants to drop out of the study. Since many survivors of childhood trauma are high utilizers of the health care system (Hargreaves et al., 2019), the ACE study could be foundational to our understanding (and DSM adaptation) of CPTSD.In the meantime, an understanding of maladaptive behaviors that may be present in survivors of childhood trauma could support survivors.

Those who have a history of Adverse Childhood Experiences need social support, but often maladaptive behaviors serve to disconnect them from people. Until survivors recognize these behaviors, they cannot address them. After many fractured relationships, I realized I had work to do including learning healthy ways to connect to my friends and family. For me, two prominent behaviors caused irreparable fractures in important relationships—people pleasing and perfectionism.

People-pleasing can manifest in many ways, but perhaps the most prominent is the inability to say no to others.

Amenability as a child connected me to caregivers, and I learned early to always agree to any plan and never to resist. While this did connect me to my mom in childhood, in adulthood it has served to separate me from people.

For example, when making plans with others, I did not have the language or the ability to simply say “no thank you, that doesn’t work for me,” so I cancelled more plans than I kept. After a while, friends and family stopped asking me to make plans with them. This led to loneliness, shame, and despair.

Once I learned that I simply wanted people to be happy with me and to accept me, I understood that people-pleasing was not the way to deeply connect with them.

Now, when something is asked of me, I do not answer on the spot. My standard is “let me get back to you”—because I know I almost always don’t want to go with that plan. Taking a moment to think allows me to choose to respect the time and energy of my friends and family while also giving me the choice to make a decision based on interpersonal factors (time, energy, desire). Both can be true; I can respect their time and energy, and I can choose to say no–without fear of separation from them.

The key to recovering from people-pleasing is to choose wisely who you allow into your inner circle.

Be careful about anyone whose presence in your life depends on how many times your will is bent to theirs. For those living with a spouse, it is important to invite them to join you on your healing journey. And if people-pleasing is a behavior you use to connect with others, consider having honest conversations with those in your circle. Recruit them to help you. Ask them to stay connected to you even if you don’t accept those dinner plans.

For those of you who love people pleasers, don’t hesitate to go deeper when making plans or when submitting a request to them; their default may always be to make themselves amenable to you.

When the people pleaser behavior is present, gently guide them back to connection with you that is not based on their amenability to your plan.

The opposite is true, though. Be careful about keeping people in your life whose connection to you depends on your performance. Sometimes this means separating from family members; this can feel brutal, but sometimes it is necessary for your healing. Ask me how I know…

Perfectionism is a common maladaptive coping mechanism that is a result of childhood trauma (Smith et al., 2019). This maladaptive coping mechanism, often adopted in childhood, is particularly difficult because perfectionism can equate to vocational and economic success.

However, perfectionism can cause problems in adult relationships because perfectionists also hold others to high standards. The perfectionist can be judgmental of others, particularly when others don’t meet perfect standards. I learned that perfect grades connected me to my mom, something I deeply desired, and as long as I can remember, I never accepted less than 100% in my academic pursuits.

This became painfully clear to me when I submitted my dissertation to my chair. When she requested a minor revision, and I was unable to accept the revisions as minor and deemed the entire document (245 pages) a failure.

During a subsequent counseling session, I realized that it was never about being perfect; it was about being securely attached to my dissertation chair, whom I highly respected. It was a valuable lesson for me and one that I am still learning.

I am learning that I am not perfect, and I am learning that my friends and family are not perfect. I am learning that we grow together and that life is messy, and that mistakes will be made.

Sometimes I sit in imperfection just to demonstrate that imperfection will not kill me. Those imperfections have nothing to do with my value as a human being.

Perfectionism may have served its purpose in childhood, but it will destroy our ability to maintain strong relationships in adulthood. Learning to accept imperfections may always be a struggle, but I am grateful for supportive people around me who remind me that I am valuable even if I never accomplish a single thing in this life. That is true of you too, my fellow survivor.

You do not need to be perfect to be loved; you just need to be you to be loved. For those of you who love survivors of adverse childhood experiences we need you to extend care and compassion, and maybe even congratulations when we stop trying to be perfect for you to accept us.

Keep reminding us that you love us because we are imperfectly human.

Dear Survivor: you can rest now. You are accepted. You are SEEN. You are KNOWN. You are HEARD. You are VALUED, JUST as you are. Dear loved ones, it is important that you get help too. Don’t give up, keep fighting for us.

Remember, nobody did that for us when we were most vulnerable. The best news? There is help, there is hope. There are armies of people who want to stand in the gap for you. I am honored to be one of them.

Sources:

Hargreaves, M. K., Mouton, C. P., Liu, J., Zhou, Y. E., & Blot, W. J. (2019). Adverse childhood experiences and health care utilization in a low-income population. Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 30(2), 749–767. https://doi.org/10.1353/hpu.2019.0054

Smith, M. M., Saklofske, D. H., Yan, G., & Sherry, S. B. (2019).
Adverse childhood experiences and multidimensional perfectionism in young adults. Personality and Individual Differences, 146, 53–57. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.03.042

Photo Credit: Unsplash

Guest Post Disclaimer: This guest post is for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing shared here, across CPTSDfoundation.org, any CPTSD Foundation website, our associated communities, or our Social Media accounts, is intended to substitute for or supersede the professional advice and direction of your medical or mental health providers. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the guest author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the CPTSD Foundation. For further details, please review the following: Terms of Service, Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer

The Aftershocks of Childhood Shame: A Guide for Survivors

[Content Warning: This article discusses childhood trauma, emotional abuse, animal harm, and shame experiences. Please engage at your own pace and practice self-care while reading.]

Eliana closed her office door and leaned against it, suddenly breathless. Her presentation had gone perfectly—the client was impressed, her boss had praised her work in front of everyone, and the project was greenlit with an increased budget. By all accounts, this was a professional triumph.

Yet here she was, eyes closed, whispering, “I’m so tired,” as the memory flooded back without warning: She was nine, proudly showing her teacher the extra credit project she’d spent the weekend creating. The teacher had smiled, praised her work, and then asked her to present it to the class. Twenty-five years later, she couldn’t remember what happened next, only the crushing feeling that she’d done something terribly wrong by being proud of her work.

This memory, like dozens of others, would ambush Eliana throughout her days—while grocery shopping, during meetings, even when laughing with friends. Each one brought a physical wave of shame so intense it felt like her body was trying to collapse in on itself, along with an exhaustion that went beyond physical tiredness—a soul-level weariness that made her want to simply disappear.

If this sounds familiar, you’re not alone. This experience—these ghosts of childhood shame that haunt adult survivors of complex trauma and narcissistic abuse—has a name: “shame flashbacks.” But knowing the term doesn’t ease the burden. What might help is understanding why you should never feel embarrassed about the things you did as a child, and learning how to finally put these ghosts to rest.

The Trauma Earthquake and Its Aftershocks

Childhood trauma like an earthquake—a devastating event or series of events that shakes the very foundation upon which you were building your life. The immediate impacts are obvious and catastrophic, but the damage goes deeper than what’s immediately visible:

• The foundation is compromised: Your developing brain, identity, and nervous system are altered by the experience.
• The supporting structures are damaged: Your sense of safety, trust, and self-worth develop cracks that may not be apparent until weight is placed upon them.
• The architecture becomes adaptive: As you continue to grow, you build your life around these compromised structures—developing strategies and beliefs designed to prevent further collapse.

The shame flashbacks you experience decades later are the aftershocks—seemingly random, unpredictable tremors that can suddenly destabilize you long after the original earthquake. Just as geological aftershocks can continue for years following a major earthquake, these emotional aftershocks can persist long into adulthood.

What makes these aftershocks particularly disorienting is that they often occur when everything seems stable. You’ve built a good life, you’re functioning well, and then suddenly—a memory, a gesture, a comment triggers an aftershock, and you’re plunged back into the feeling of the original earthquake, despite being far from the original danger.

Understanding shame as aftershocks helps explain why:

• The intensity feels disproportionate to the trigger
• The timing seems random and unpredictable
• The sensations are profoundly physical, not just emotional
• The experience can be as disruptive as the original trauma

Throughout this article, we’ll return to this metaphor to help explain both why these shame responses persist and how healing works—not by ignoring the damage, but by carefully reinforcing your foundation and retrofitting your emotional architecture to withstand these ongoing tremors.

Understanding the Roots of Shame: Psychological Frameworks

Before diving into the specific reasons you should never feel embarrassed about your childhood behaviors, it’s helpful to understand several psychological frameworks that explain why these shame responses persist long after childhood:

Complex PTSD and Chronic Shame

Many survivors of narcissistic abuse and childhood trauma develop what trauma expert Pete Walker describes as Complex PTSD (CPTSD). Unlike PTSD from a single traumatic event, CPTSD results from prolonged exposure to relational trauma, and one of its hallmark symptoms is a pervasive sense of shame. This isn’t just occasional embarrassment—it’s a deep, persistent belief that there is something fundamentally wrong with you.

Attachment and Shame

Our earliest attachment relationships shape how we view ourselves in relation to others. Secure attachment develops when caregivers consistently respond to a child’s needs with attunement and care. However, when these attachments are disrupted by narcissistic, neglectful, or abusive parenting, children often develop insecure attachment styles:

• Anxious attachment: Characterized by fear of abandonment and a tendency to seek excessive reassurance
• Avoidant attachment: Marked by emotional distance and difficulty trusting others
• Disorganized attachment: Involving contradictory approaches to relationships, often stemming from caregivers who were both sources of comfort and fear

Each of these attachment patterns intertwines with shame in unique ways, creating relationship patterns where either vulnerability feels dangerous (avoidant) or rejection feels catastrophic (anxious).

The Neurobiology of Shame

Your brain physically changed in response to chronic shame experiences. The neural pathways for shame became well-worn highways in your nervous system, activating automatically at the slightest trigger. However—and this is crucial—neuroplasticity means these pathways can be rewired. Your brain can create new, healthier response patterns with consistent practice and support.

11 Reasons You Should Never Feel Embarrassed About Things You Did As A Child

1. Your brain wasn’t fully developed

As a child, your prefrontal cortex—the part of your brain responsible for decision-making, impulse control, and understanding consequences—wasn’t fully developed. It doesn’t reach maturity until your mid-twenties. You literally didn’t have the brain capacity to respond “better” to many situations. You were doing the best you could with a brain that was still under construction.

2. You processed the world through a child’s perception and modeled what you saw

Children naturally see themselves as the center of their universe—not out of selfishness, but because that’s how developing minds work. When bad things happen around them, they assume they must be the cause. If a parent was angry, depressed, or abusive, you likely internalized that as “I made them feel this way” or “I deserve this treatment.”

This wasn’t your failure—it was a normal developmental response to abnormal circumstances. Similarly, you simply didn’t know there were other ways to be. Your environment was your entire world. If you grew up in chaos, chaos seemed normal. If love was conditional, conditional love seemed normal.

Children learn primarily through observation and imitation. If you behaved in ways that now make you cringe—being manipulative, passive-aggressive, people-pleasing, overly dramatic, or emotionally withdrawn—you were likely mirroring the behaviors that were modeled to you. You can’t blame a child for speaking the “language” they were taught.

3. You were programmed to maintain attachment at all costs

Human children are biologically wired to maintain connection with caregivers—it’s a survival mechanism. When faced with the choice between being authentic and keeping parental love and protection, your instinct for survival kicked in. If you abandoned your true self to maintain attachment, you were following the most basic human programming. This wasn’t weakness; it was your body’s way of keeping you alive.

4. You were taught the wrong lessons about your worth

If you grew up with narcissistic or emotionally immature caregivers, you were likely taught that your worth was conditional—based on achievement, appearance, behavior, or usefulness to others. Children believe what they’re told and shown, especially about themselves. The shame you feel isn’t evidence of your inadequacy; it’s evidence of what you were wrongly taught.

The Unpredictable Spotlight of Shame

Many survivors can recall moments when they were simply existing—playing, daydreaming, or just being a child—when suddenly an adult’s negative attention would spotlight them, often with humiliating comments: “Stop acting like the village idiot,” or “Do you have to be so embarrassing?”

These moments were particularly confusing and damaging because:

• You weren’t self-conscious until that moment—you were simply being yourself
• The criticism came without warning or explanation
• You couldn’t identify what you’d done “wrong”
• It was often performed in front of others, adding public humiliation
• The behavior being criticized was often just normal childhood existence

This pattern taught you that your natural state of being was somehow shameful, that you could be enjoying life one moment and be humiliated the next without understanding why. Over time, this created a hypervigilance about simply existing in the world—a constant background anxiety that at any moment, your very way of being might be deemed unacceptable.

When narcissistic parents use these tactics, they’re rarely actually responding to anything inappropriate in the child’s behavior. Instead, they’re often:

• Using the child as a prop in their social performance
• Attempting to get approval or laughs from other adults
• Asserting control and dominance
• Projecting their own insecurities
• Maintaining their role as the judge of all behavior

The result? A child who learns that existing authentically in the world is dangerous and that shame can strike at any moment, for no comprehensible reason.

5. You didn’t know you were allowed to have needs

Many trauma survivors learned early that having needs—for comfort, attention, help, or even basic care—was somehow wrong or burdensome. You may have been praised for being “so independent” or “such a little adult” when in reality, you were being neglected. Children are supposed to have needs. That’s normal, not shameful.

6. You were responding to impossible situations

Children in traumatic environments often face no-win scenarios: If you spoke up, you were punished; if you stayed silent, you felt guilty. If you showed emotion, you were “too sensitive”; if you didn’t, you were “cold.” The “wrong” behaviors you feel ashamed of were often your attempts to navigate impossible situations with the limited tools you had.

7. You had to become a different person to survive

Many trauma survivors developed a “false self” to please caregivers or avoid abuse. This might have involved being unnaturally quiet, overly agreeable, high-achieving, or taking on caretaking roles. If you feel embarrassed about being “fake” or “performing” as a child, remember that this was a sophisticated survival strategy—evidence of your resilience, not your weakness.

For many, this shift from authentic existence to self-monitoring happened suddenly and repeatedly. One moment you were happily playing, lost in your own imagination or joy, the next moment you were jolted into painful self-awareness by a parent’s cutting remark or dismissive comment. These moments teach children to subconsciously toggle between states: the freedom of unselfconscious being versus the constraint of being constantly on guard against criticism. Over time, many survivors learned to abandon the former entirely, living in a perpetual state of self-monitoring and performance. And much of the time they have no idea they’re doing this.

8. You didn’t know healthy boundaries existed

If your boundaries were repeatedly violated, or if you witnessed unhealthy relationships, you had no model for appropriate boundaries. The times you may have been “too agreeable,” let others take advantage of you, or conversely, when you lashed out to protect yourself—these weren’t character flaws but symptoms of never being taught healthy boundary-setting.

9. Your emotional education was neglected

Children don’t inherently know how to identify, process, or express emotions—they need to be taught. If your caregivers dismissed your feelings (“Stop crying or I’ll give you something to cry about”), punished emotional expression, or were emotionally volatile themselves, you never received this crucial education. Emotional difficulties weren’t your fault; they were the result of emotional neglect.

10. You were dealing with an adult-sized burden with child-sized shoulders

Many children of dysfunctional families become parentified—taking care of siblings, managing household responsibilities, or emotionally supporting adults. If you feel embarrassed about times you failed at these tasks, remember that no child should have been given those responsibilities in the first place. The failure was in the adults who burdened you, not in your inability to carry that weight.

11. You were reacting to trauma, not choosing behavior

What adults may have labeled as “bad behavior” was often trauma response: hypervigilance, dissociation, emotional dysregulation, or fight/flight/freeze/fawn reactions. These weren’t choices; they were your nervous system’s automatic attempts to protect you from perceived threats. Your body was doing exactly what it was designed to do under threat.

The Body’s Response: Shame Lives in Your Physical Self

Shame isn’t just a psychological experience—it lives in your body. As psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk explains in his groundbreaking work “The Body Keeps the Score,” trauma and chronic shame create lasting physical effects:

Somatic Expressions of Chronic Shame

• Immune System Impact: Research from the ACEs (Adverse Childhood Experiences) study shows clear links between childhood trauma and physical health problems in adulthood, including autoimmune disorders and chronic inflammation
• Physical Tension Patterns: Many survivors develop characteristic tension in the neck, shoulders, or gut—physical armor against perceived judgment
• Pain Syndromes: Conditions like fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and unexplained pain disorders often have connections to trauma histories
• Your Body’s Alarm System: Shame triggers can send your nervous system into fight/flight/freeze/fawn states, affecting digestion, sleep, and energy levels

These physical manifestations aren’t “all in your head”—they’re real physiological responses to your experiences. The exhaustion Eliana feels when shame hits isn’t just emotional fatigue; it’s her body responding to a perceived threat with the same intensity as if she were facing physical danger.

Understanding this somatic component is crucial because healing often needs to involve both the body and mind. Practices like trauma-informed yoga, somatic experiencing therapy, or even simple grounding exercises can help recalibrate a nervous system stuck in shame response.

Try This: When shame hits, place one hand on your heart and one on your belly. Take three slow breaths while silently saying, “This feeling is old and was never about me. My body is responding to the past, not the present.” Notice any shift in your physical tension as you acknowledge the source of these sensations.

When Shame Has No Memory: Understanding Implicit Trauma

Not all shame comes with a clear memory attached. Sometimes, you might experience sudden waves of overwhelming shame without knowing why—a formless, nameless feeling that you’ve done something terribly wrong or that there’s something fundamentally flawed about you. This is often connected to implicit memory—experiences that were stored in your body and emotional systems before you had the verbal or cognitive capacity to form explicit memories.

These might include:

Pre-verbal Experiences

Some of our most profound shame can originate from our earliest years, before we could form narrative memories. The infant who cried and wasn’t soothed, the toddler whose excitement was repeatedly met with irritation—these experiences don’t become stories we can recall, but they become feelings embedded in our nervous system.

Atmospheric Trauma

Sometimes it wasn’t a specific incident but the persistent atmosphere of your childhood home. If you grew up with a pervasive sense that you were a burden, unwanted, or somehow “too much,” this might not be attached to any particular memory but was communicated through countless subtle interactions.

Body-based Shame

Many survivors experience shame as a purely physical sensation—a hollowness in the chest, a burning face, a desire to disappear—without a connected narrative. This can be your body remembering what your mind cannot explicitly recall.

The Shame of Existing

Perhaps the most profound form is what some therapists call “existence shame”—the deep sense that your very being, your taking up space in the world, is somehow wrong. This rarely connects to specific memories because it wasn’t created by a single event but by a persistent message that your authentic self was unacceptable.

How to Work with Implicit Shame

When shame arises without memory:

• Acknowledge the feeling without demanding a reason. “I’m feeling shame right now. I don’t need to know why to respond with compassion.”
  Attend to the body sensation. Place a hand where you feel the shame in your body. Breathe into that space with gentle awareness.
• Speak to the feeling directly. “This shame was never about me. It was about the environment I was in and the treatment I received. This feeling is old and doesn’t reflect the truth of who I am or who I’ve always been.”
• Create containment. Visualize the feeling as having boundaries—it is a part of your experience, not the totality of who you are. Imagine putting it into a golden bubble and letting it float up to the sky.
• Remember context. Even without specific memories, you can recognize: “These feelings were formed when I was vulnerable and dependent, in circumstances I didn’t choose.”

This formless shame can be the most difficult to address precisely because it lacks a narrative you can reframe. Yet by acknowledging its existence and responding with the same compassion you would offer to your remembered child self, you can gradually create new implicit memories—ones of being met with understanding rather than judgment.

When Children Harm: Understanding and Healing from Your Most Shameful Actions

Among the most painful shame experiences survivors carry are memories of times when, as children, they harmed others—perhaps another child, an animal, or themselves. These memories often carry the heaviest burden of shame because they seem to confirm the deepest fear: “I really was bad.”

A man in his sixties shared that his most persistent shame came from a memory of killing a turtle when he was six years old—an act he has carried as evidence of his inherent badness for over five decades. What he revealed later was that at the time, he was being sexually trafficked by his parents from infancy. This context changes everything about how we understand his childhood action.

The Neurobiology of Re-enactment

When children experience severe trauma, especially ongoing abuse, their developing brains and nervous systems are profoundly impacted. Children who harm others or animals are often:

• Re-enacting their own victimization: Attempting to process overwhelming experiences by shifting from the powerless position to the powerful one
• Responding from a dysregulated nervous system: Acting from fight/flight activation rather than from the higher reasoning centers of the brain
• Expressing unspeakable emotions: Using behavior to communicate feelings they have no words for and no safe person to tell
• Seeking a sense of control: Trying to gain some agency in a life where they have none

The “Identification with the Aggressor” Defense

Psychologists recognize that children sometimes psychologically identify with their abusers as a survival mechanism. This doesn’t mean they become like their abusers in character, but rather that they may temporarily adopt behaviors they’ve experienced as a way of making sense of their trauma or trying to master their fear.

Contextualizing, Not Excusing

Understanding the context of harmful actions you took as a child doesn’t mean excusing them or suggesting they didn’t matter. Rather, it means recognizing that:

• A child acting from trauma is fundamentally different from an adult choosing to harm
• Your actions emerged from your circumstances, not your character
• What you did then reflects what was done to you, not who you inherently are
• Children have extremely limited tools for processing severe trauma

Healing from Your Most Shameful Actions

If you carry shame about something harmful you did as a child:

1. Recognize your complete context. Don’t isolate the behavior from the full circumstances of your childhood. What else was happening to you? What were you being exposed to? What resources for processing emotions were available to you?
2. Apply developmental understanding. Children at different ages have different capacities for impulse control, emotional regulation, empathy, and understanding consequences. Your action needs to be viewed through the lens of your developmental stage at the time.
3. Practice fierce compassion. Imagine watching another child with your exact history do what you did. Would you condemn them as inherently bad, or would you recognize their pain and need for help?
4. Allow for grief alongside shame. Many survivors find that beneath their shame is profound grief—for the animal or person they harmed, but also for the child they were who was so desperate and alone that this action seemed necessary.
5. Consider symbolic amends. While you can’t undo the past, many survivors find healing in making contributions to related causes—supporting animal welfare organizations, child protection agencies, or other efforts that help prevent similar suffering.

Remember: One action, even a harmful one, taken by a traumatized child does not define their character or worth. It is a symptom of their circumstances, not their soul. That child—you—deserved help, not condemnation.

When Good Deeds Feel Shameful: The Paradox of Trauma-Induced Shame

One of the most confusing aspects of shame flashbacks is that they can attach to positive memories as easily as negative ones. Many survivors share the bewildering experience of feeling intense shame when remembering acts of kindness or generosity they performed—organizing charity events, helping others, sharing gifts, or expressing care.

A survivor might recall organizing a care package project for people serving overseas, only to be flooded with embarrassment rather than pride. Another might remember publicly thanking someone who helped them, and feel overwhelming shame at the memory. Despite having done something objectively good, the emotional response is pure, visceral shame.

This happens for several interconnected reasons:

The Distorted Mirror of Visibility

For those raised in environments where being seen was dangerous, memories of being visible—even for positive reasons—can trigger delayed shame responses. While a part of you genuinely wanted to contribute or express care (by organizing the care packages, for example), another part—the protective part shaped by trauma—later responds with alarm: ‘You’ve made yourself visible. You’ve taken up space. This is dangerous.’

This explains the confusing experience of feeling genuinely motivated to do something meaningful, only to be ambushed by shame afterward. The shame isn’t about what you did, but about the perceived danger of having been noticed at all, which might lead to unfair judgement—a danger that was very real in your childhood. Just for existing.

The Contamination of Small Mistakes

When a small mistake or misunderstanding occurs within an otherwise positive action (like stumbling over words during a thank-you speech or forgetting to acknowledge someone important), the trauma brain magnifies this detail until it consumes the entire memory. This is because in abusive environments, tiny imperfections were often used as justification for disproportionate punishment or criticism.

The Discomfort of Positive Regard

Many survivors were conditioned to feel uncomfortable with positive attention or appreciation. If doing good things led to being singled out for praise, and praise was followed by heightened expectations or eventual disappointment, your nervous system might have learned to associate even positive attention with danger. And simultaneously, you may crave affirmation as reassurance against your deepest fears.

The “Who Do You Think You Are?” Effect

In narcissistic family systems, taking initiative often triggered the narcissist’s insecurity. A child demonstrating competence, leadership, or generosity might have been met with comments like “Who do you think you are?” or “Look who thinks they’re so special.” This teaches you that stepping into your power is somehow arrogant or wrong. Societal forces (e.g., school shaming, religious guilt, cultural hierarchies) often compound personal shame, making it harder to unravel. Especially in systems where:

• perfectionism is rewarded,
• self-worth is tied to productivity,
• self-criticism is mistaken for humility.

Healing This Particular Wound

This specific type of shame—shame for good deeds—can be particularly persistent because it’s so irrational, and yet so visceral. Here are approaches that can help:

1. Practice the “Both/And” perspective: “I both made a small mistake AND did something genuinely kind and worthwhile.”
2. Document objective feedback: Keep a record of the actual responses you received for your actions, not just the shame response your brain generated later.
3. Challenge the ownership of shame: When shame arises around a positive memory, ask “Whose voice is this? Who benefits from me feeling ashamed of my kindness?”
4. Reframe visibility: Practice saying “It’s safe for me to be seen doing good things” when these memories arise.
5. Honor your younger self’s courage: Recognize that any act of generosity or leadership requires you to overcome the very conditioning that now generates shame about it.

For many survivors, this shame diminishes over time with healing work, but it can persist for decades. The good news is that recognizing this pattern as a trauma response rather than legitimate shame is itself a significant step toward freedom. Your rational mind recognizing the irrationality of the shame is the beginning of its power diminishing.

Righteous Anger: The Path Through Shame

For many trauma survivors, there’s a crucial emotion that’s often missing in their healing journey: healthy anger. Survivors of narcissistic abuse were frequently punished for showing anger or taught that their anger was inappropriate, selfish, or dangerous. As a result, many survivors skip the anger phase of healing and default to self-blame and shame.

Why Anger Matters in Healing

Righteous anger—anger in response to genuine mistreatment—serves several important functions:

• It establishes boundaries: Anger signals “This treatment is not acceptable”
• It reallocates responsibility: Anger says “This wasn’t my fault; it was wrong what they did”
• It provides energy: Anger can mobilize you out of the paralysis of shame
• It honors your worth: Anger confirms “I deserved better than what I received”

The Shame-Anger Connection

Shame and anger are often two sides of the same coin. What looks like shame (“I’m terrible”) may actually be anger turned inward (“They treated me terribly”) because directing anger outward felt too dangerous in your childhood environment.

Accessing Healthy Anger

If you find yourself drowning in shame about past experiences, try these approaches:

1. Witness your child self: Imagine watching what happened to you happening to another child. What would you feel toward the adults in that scenario?
2. Write an unsent letter: Express all the anger you weren’t allowed to show then. No one needs to see this—it’s about accessing the emotion.
3. Use physical release: Punch pillows, scream in your car, or engage in intense exercise to help move the energy of anger through your body safely.
4. Validate the anger: Tell yourself “I have every right to be angry about how I was treated.”

Remember that healthy anger doesn’t mean acting aggressively or holding onto bitterness—it means acknowledging the natural emotional response to mistreatment as part of your healing process. For many survivors, allowing themselves to feel angry about their mistreatment creates space for the shame to finally begin dissolving.

When Present Becomes Past: Adult Shame Flashbacks

Thus far, we’ve primarily addressed shame related to childhood experiences or memories. But one of the most insidious aspects of trauma-based shame is how it infiltrates your adult experiences, creating new shame flashbacks about current events in your life.

Eliana’s experience at the beginning of this article illustrates this perfectly—her professional triumph triggered a shame response not because she did anything wrong in the present, but because the situation shared elements with past experiences where being visible led to painful consequences.

Why Adult Experiences Trigger Old Shame

Several mechanisms explain why perfectly ordinary—or even positive—adult experiences can trigger profound shame responses:

1. Pattern Recognition Gone Awry

Your brain is constantly scanning for patterns based on past experiences. When it detects elements that share features with earlier trauma (even subtly), it can activate the same emotional and physiological responses:

• A boss’s neutral feedback might trigger the shame response originally connected to a critical parent
• Receiving appreciation might activate the shame originally tied to moments when praise preceded disappointment
• Making a minor mistake might trigger the shame response from when mistakes led to humiliation

2. Emotional Time Travel

Trauma can create what therapists call “emotional flashbacks”—where you emotionally time-travel back to how you felt during traumatic periods, even without specific memories. During these states:

• Your emotional age regresses to how old you felt during the original trauma
• Your perspective narrows to match the limited understanding you had then
• Your body responds with the same physiological stress reaction
• Your beliefs temporarily revert to the negative core beliefs formed then

3. Nervous System Conditioning

Your nervous system developed conditioned responses to certain types of situations. When similar contexts arise in adulthood, your body responds automatically before your conscious mind has time to evaluate the present reality:

• Physical sensations of shame (face flushing, chest tightening, stomach dropping)
• Urges to hide, disappear, or apologize excessively
• Overwhelming fatigue or sudden disconnection from others
• Harsh self-criticism that seems to arise from nowhere

How to Distinguish Healthy Remorse from Trauma-Based Shame

Not all negative feelings about your actions are trauma responses. Healthy adults experience appropriate regret, remorse, and accountability. Here’s how to tell the difference:

Healthy Remorse:

• Is proportional to the actual impact of your actions
• Leads to specific behavioral change and repair
• Passes with time and corrective action
• Feels clean and clear, not toxic and overwhelming
• Focuses on the behavior, not your worth as a person
• Empowers you to do better

Trauma-Based Shame:

• Feels disproportionate and catastrophic
• Leads to global self-condemnation (“I’m terrible”)
• Persists despite evidence or reassurance
• Creates physical symptoms and exhaustion
• Attacks your fundamental worth and right to exist
• Paralyzes rather than motivates change

Breaking the Adult Shame Cycle

When you find yourself experiencing shame about current experiences:

1. Name the time travel: “I’m having an emotional flashback. This overwhelming shame is from my past, not my present. This shame was never truly about me.”
2. Orient to now: Identify specific ways your current situation is different from your childhood—the power you have now, the resources available, the people who support you.
3. Address the younger part: “The part of me feeling this shame is young and scared. That makes sense given my history, but I’m an adult now and can respond differently.”
4. Check external reality: Seek perspective from trusted others about whether your action warrants the intensity of shame you’re feeling. Often, what feels catastrophic to you appears minor to others.
5. Practice exposure with support: Gradually increase your tolerance for situations that trigger shame (like visibility, making mistakes, or receiving praise) while maintaining compassion for your responses.

Remember that these adult shame flashbacks are aftershocks—they don’t reflect your current reality but rather the continued reverberation of past events through your nervous system. With practice, you can learn to recognize them as such, reducing their power to define your present experience.

When Shame Feels Protective: Why We Resist Letting Go

One of the most surprising aspects of healing from shame is encountering our own resistance to letting it go. Even as the rational mind understands that these shame responses are irrational and harmful, a deeper part often clings to shame as if it were vital for survival. This isn’t a failure of healing—it’s a normal part of the process that needs to be approached with understanding.

How Shame Became a Protection Strategy

In trauma-informed approaches like Internal Family Systems (IFS), these resistant parts are understood as “protectors” that developed for good reasons. Your shame response may have originally served essential functions:

• Prevention of further harm: “If I feel ashamed enough, I’ll prevent myself from ever taking a risk that could lead to criticism.”
• Connection maintenance: “Feeling shame when I stand out keeps me from threatening relationships with caregivers who were threatened by my achievements.”
• Identity coherence: “This shame has been with me so long that it feels like part of who I am—who would I be without it?”
• Moral compass: “My shame proves I care about doing the right thing and prevents me from making mistakes.”
• Control illusion: “If I blame and shame myself, I maintain the illusion that I could have controlled what happened to me.”

Signs You’re Resisting Shame Release

You might be experiencing protective resistance if you notice:

• Intellectually understanding shame concepts but not feeling any emotional shift
• Finding yourself arguing with supportive messages (“That’s not true in my case”)
• Physical tension when trying shame-release exercises
• Feeling anxious or unsafe when imagining life without shame
• Worrying that without shame, you’d become selfish or careless

Building a Relationship with Your Protective Shame

Rather than fighting against this resistance, try approaching it with curiosity:

1. Acknowledge the protective intent: “I understand this shame feels necessary for my safety or identity.”
2. Dialoguing with shame: Ask your shame, “What are you afraid would happen if you weren’t here?” Listen for the answer without judgment.
3. Gradual release negotiation: “What would you need to feel safe enough to let me feel less shame in just one specific situation?”
4. Establish new protections: “Instead of shame, I can use discernment, boundaries, and values to guide my actions.”
5. Honor the service: “Thank you for trying to protect me all these years when I had few other resources.”

Building this relationship with your protective “shame parts” creates space for them to trust that you’ll remain safe as you gradually release their grip on your life. This is definitely not something to “power through.” This approach honors the wisdom of your whole self—including the parts that developed these strategies in response to genuinely difficult circumstances.

Breaking Free: Moving Beyond Childhood Shame

Understanding intellectually that you shouldn’t feel embarrassed about your childhood self is one thing. Actually releasing that shame is another. Here are some practices that can help transform these painful shame flashbacks:

Recognize the Flashback

When a memory ambushes you and that wave of shame hits, name what’s happening: “This is a shame flashback. This is my past, not my present.” Simply recognizing the process can help break its power.

Meet Your Younger Self with Compassion

When a memory surfaces, try this exercise: Visualize yourself at that age, in that moment. Now approach this child as the adult you are today. What would you say to them? How would you comfort them? Would you judge them harshly, or would you offer understanding? Practice directing the compassion you’d show to any vulnerable child toward your own younger self.

Challenge the Shame Narrative

For each memory that brings shame, ask yourself:

• What did I believe this said about me as a person?
• Who taught me to interpret it this way?
• How would I interpret this same behavior in a child I love?
• What context or understanding am I missing from my adult perspective?

Create a Reparative Witness

Many shame flashbacks persist because your child self needed a protective, supportive adult who wasn’t there. Now, you can be that person. When memories arise, practice saying (either silently or aloud): “I see you. This wasn’t your fault. You were doing your best. I’m here now.”

Practice Physical Grounding

Shame flashbacks often trigger the body’s stress response. When one hits, try:

• Placing a hand on your heart and one on your stomach
• Feeling your feet firmly on the ground
• Taking five slow, deep breaths
• Naming five things you can see in your present environment

This helps return your nervous system to the present, where you are safe.

Share Selectively

Shame thrives in isolation. Consider sharing your experience with a trusted person or trauma-informed therapist. Often, speaking our shame aloud in a safe space can diminish its power.

Develop a Mantra

Create a brief phrase you can repeat when shame flashbacks occur: “That was then, this is now.” “I was a child doing my best.” “I release all shame that was never about me, and isn’t mine to carry.”

The Self-Compassion Hurdle: When Kindness Feels Wrong

For many survivors, one of the most challenging aspects of healing is the practice of self-compassion. Despite intellectually understanding the concepts we’ve discussed, you might find that treating yourself with kindness feels:

• Fake or inauthentic
• Undeserved or unearned
• Selfish or self-indulgent
• Vulnerable or dangerous
• Foreign or uncomfortable

This resistance isn’t a character flaw or a sign that you’re “doing it wrong”—it’s a natural response when self-criticism was either modeled to you or became a survival strategy.

Why Self-Compassion Feels Threatening

According to self-compassion researcher Dr. Kristin Neff, there are several reasons why survivors struggle with self-kindness:

1. Familiarity with criticism: Harsh self-judgment feels normal because it mimics how you were treated
2. The drive for control: Self-criticism creates the illusion that you can prevent future mistakes or rejection
3. Identity concerns: If self-criticism has been part of your identity, compassion can feel like losing yourself
4. Misunderstanding compassion: Many survivors confuse self-compassion with self-pity or letting yourself “off the hook”
5. Fear of vulnerability: Self-compassion requires acknowledging pain, which can feel frightening

Easing Into Self-Compassion

Rather than forcing self-compassion (which often increases resistance), try these gentler approaches:

• Start with compassion for others: Practice kindness toward others, then toward your younger self, before attempting it for your current self
• Use the “good friend” perspective: Ask what you would say to a dear friend in your situation
• Begin with permission: “I’m allowed to be kind to myself about this specific thing”
• Acknowledge the discomfort: “It feels strange to be kind to myself, and that’s okay”
• Try physical self-compassion: A gentle hand on your heart can convey kindness even when words feel impossible
• Start with neutrality: If kindness feels impossible, begin with “I don’t have to condemn myself for this”

Remember that self-compassion is a skill that develops with practice. The discomfort you feel is not evidence that you’re undeserving of kindness—it’s evidence of how deeply you were taught that you were undeserving. And that teaching was wrong.

Rebuilding Your Foundation: Long-Term Healing from Shame

Returning to our earthquake metaphor, healing from chronic shame isn’t about pretending the damage never happened. It’s about carefully assessing the structural damage to your foundation and systematically reinforcing it to withstand future aftershocks.

Understanding Structural Damage

Just as structural engineers assess buildings after earthquakes, trauma-informed therapy helps identify where your psychological foundation has been compromised:

• Connection circuits: Your brain’s capacity for safe relationships
• Regulation systems: Your nervous system’s ability to maintain equilibrium
• Identity structures: Your core beliefs about yourself and your worth
• Agency architecture: Your sense of control and efficacy in your life

The Rebuilding Process

Healing involves reinforcing these damaged areas:

1. Foundation stabilization: Developing basic emotional regulation skills and safety practices
2. Structural assessment: Identifying the core beliefs and nervous system patterns that were damaged
3. Reinforcement: Gradually introducing new experiences and perspectives that strengthen your capacity to withstand shame triggers
4. Architectural upgrades: Building new response patterns that allow you to respond to shame triggers with compassion rather than collapse
5. Regular maintenance: Ongoing practices that continue to strengthen your resilience and self-relationship

Living in a Rebuilt Structure

A fully retrofitted building doesn’t look damaged anymore, but it has been fundamentally changed by the experience of the earthquake. Similarly, healing from chronic shame doesn’t mean returning to some imagined state of “never having been traumatized.” Instead, it means:

• You recognize aftershocks when they happen, but they no longer destabilize your whole structure
• Your foundation has been reinforced with compassion and understanding
• You’ve built beautiful new rooms in your life that weren’t part of the original blueprint
• You understand the engineering of trauma in a way that helps you support others
• You appreciate the resilience of your structure in a way others might never understand

This is why many survivors, once sufficiently healed, speak of being grateful for aspects of their journey—not for the original earthquake, but for the person they became through the process of rebuilding.

Copyright Notice: This excerpt is from my forthcoming book. All content is © 2025 Worldwide Groove Corporation. Unauthorized reproduction, distribution, or use of this material without permission is prohibited. Thank you for respecting my work. 😊

Photo Credit: Author, Substack

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I ran across a link to the study titled “Family Experiences Study” when it came across a support group’s combined chat labeled something like PENN State University ACES questionnaire.

Seeing that title pop up on my screen (having a few minutes to kill), I thoughtwhy not?!  I already knew I had 7 ACEs, so I doubted this would enlighten me much, but I was curious about the “science” behind it. So, I answered the questions.

I think I was the third person to share my ‘score’ in response to the post. I did so as a way to communicate that I found the criteria for the study rather unrealistic–impossible even.

The divisions for the results were presented as follows:  

• 0-84 = Non-Clinical Range (unlikely PTSD)
• 85-167 = Subclinical Range (potential for PTSD)
• Greater than 167 = Clinical Range (likely PTSD).

My score was 319. Another member in our support group posted their number, and it was even higher (it smacked my gob good and well!).

I shouldn’t have been that surprised. The survey just confirmed what I already knew. The idea of going from 7 to 319 was a bit of a whiplash, but I recognized that different scales measured different things. Best to not get hung up on numbers.

The amazing thing about this combination of events, and the reason for this little foray, is not the number the test gave me (a score 45 times greater than the number previously in my head): it was the shockwave sent through our online support community.

As one might imagine, since we were all CPTSD types, we were data- and information-oriented. Thus, there was a lot of curiosity about how this survey worked.

*Ping. 245
*Ping. 303
*Ping. 287
*Ping. 333

And on it went. I’m surprised we didn’t freeze the server.

Along with the numbers were lots of jokes:

“What did I win?”

“Hey, I ACEd it.”

“Hold my beer.”

“Perfect Score!” 

Some of the humor got pretty dark.

However, it also provided a sense of validation.

“I feel seen.”

“That was on the nose.”

“I think it’s time to find myself some real support.”

However, we knew that these weren’t school grades and that there was no competition. None of us saw this as a race–and it certainly wasn’t something one might “win.” Overall, there was tremendous support for one another, and it was a beautiful thing to see.

Still, there was one thing that we largely agreed on: how was it possible for anyone to land in the Non-Clinical range?

The idea that there are ideal normal people out there running around with (I’m not sure how to say this) a supportive family, good childhood memories, a yard full of unicorns and bunnies–this was, frankly, unbelievable. Personally, I can’t imagine what it might look like. The concept is completely alien.

Well, good for them, I guess. I hope they realize how fortunate they are. 

To wrap up this little news report (not really a proper essay, is it?), I guess I’ll give a shout out to the researchers at Penn State and a Thank You for providing a resource that let, at least, one CPTSD community laugh, cry, think, and come together in mutual support.

Photo credit: Unsplash

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog post do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

I wrote this poem a few months ago, drawing from the well of ancient, long-buried feelings about the first time my mom forced my mouth open and poured Dawn dish soap into it. I was four. Although I had received spankings with a variety of objects over the last year (when her new partner introduced physical child abuse to the mix), this was new. As I choked on the pungent combination of soap, snot, and tears, I grappled with confusion and fear. Soapy bubbles of snot popped around my face, and I struggled to breathe. The soap burned my throat and nostrils. My mom, who had never done anything this cruel, tightly gripped the insides of my elbows, screaming at me to stop crying. 

To this day, I am only half sure what I “did” to bring on that previously foreign punishment. I only have a flash of a memory and clues from what came after to guide me in making deductions about what motivated her to unleash a new brand of assault. It was the first time of many. Washing our mouths with soap became a go-to when a hard smack across the face or tightly gripping our cheeks didn’t suffice after we “said something we shouldn’t have.” Sometimes it was a curse word; other times, an opinion. The times when my mom suffocated my opinions stung the most. 

There’s a little part of me that thinks that the first time I “got the soap,” it may have been after I shared my thoughts about her new partner; I didn’t like him and didn’t want him there. I solidly remember saying such while living in the house where I first choked on soap; whether that statement led to my oral “baptism” or not, I will never really know. I only know that time and time again, my words fell silent. The person who should have listened to me and heard me instead again and again gagged me. Had she asked me why I didn’t like him, it may have saved me from nearly a decade and a half of the sexual abuse and mental abuse that he initiated as early as he did the beatings. 

She didn’t ask, though. Instead, she silenced me. I learned to shut myself up, closing off my thoughts and feelings from the world. I sewed them up tightly within, and over the years, I only allowed them to escape when safely veiled beneath the mask of my poetry. 

I learned to suppress the truth of my reality, even from myself. For the next three and a half decades, I downplayed the cruelty of some of the things I experienced. That’s not to say there weren’t parts of me that knew many of those things weren’t right…that they were downright abusive. Of course, I KNEW that. I just couldn’t allow myself to FEEL it for a very, very long time. If you’re reading this from a place of trauma yourself, I suspect you know exactly what I’m saying.

I didn’t want to feel these things for a simple reason: I love my mom. Despite the cruelty of what I just described, I want to emphasize that she’s not a horrible person. She did, however, do some very bad things. Sometimes, even worse, she didn’t always do the things she should have done to protect her kids…like listen to us when we needed her to hear us the most. I have a lot of very strong feelings around those things. Only in recent years have I allowed myself to acknowledge and truly embrace those hard feelings. Those feelings come across strongly in the poem above. There are parts of me that take issue with some of the lines that erupted from me because they feel too binary. I’ve come to learn that life truly is not and does not have to live on a pendulum of sharp swings from one extreme to another. And…despite my hesitation around this “black and white” perspective, I’m keeping those uncomfortable lines in the poem. Those uncomfortable lines are a part of my truth. I need to feel them just as they are so that I can finally work through them and move forward.  

For me, a key part of moving forward lies in putting words to my experiences and accepting my story for what it is. Sometimes I wonder where my ability to string words into powerful phrases originated. I think that maybe it comes from that place within that was time and time again suppressed, choked, and gagged. When I write, I experience a ferocity of feeling, both freeing and terrifying in its ability to help me find meaning in the meaningless. Again and again throughout my life, I have returned to the refuge of my words. Fortunately, there were some things within me that simply couldn’t be silenced. I clung to the life raft of the words no one could take from me. I disguised my feelings in the poetry I wrote relentlessly as a child and teenager, and even sporadically throughout my adulthood, until a year ago when the floodgates opened, and it ALL began pouring out in a river of emotions. These days, I have again begun to write poetry, and I am learning to write my story in a much more direct kind of way. I’m taking ownership of my words and story. We ALL deserve to reclaim the words and the feelings that were taken from us. 

Scrubbed Innocence

You lit a lava fire that blazes in my throat
Its flames engulf me in fear 
They rage, burning the broken bridges
Between then and here 

In silencing my words, you murdered my trust in you
Violent echoes of the past
Color my eyes in lonely shades of blue
Your mutilation of motherhood 
Cast my world in shadows
A violation of my childhood
left me alone, bearing too much to handle

You suffocated my sense of safety
Left me drowning in my tears
Instead of saving me from my hell
You trapped me in yours

Your cruelty choked my confidence
The scorch of my tears ran through rivers of snot 
You scrubbed away my innocence
Nightmares bubbling to the top

You stood center of some of my darkest hours
You were supposed to be my soft place
You were supposed to be my mother
Instead, I’m left with smoldering embers of an unnamed guilt
The parts of you that loved me
No longer felt

I’m still choking on your brutality
Buried beneath suffering remembered
Your conscience stands empty
After all that I endured, after all the pain you rendered

Photo by Alex Shute on Unsplash

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog post do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

Filicide (n): is the deliberate act of a parent killing their own child. In 1969, Dr. Phillip Resnick published research on filicide and stated that there were five main motives for filicide, including “altruistic,” “fatal maltreatment,” “unwanted child,” “acutely psychotic,” and “spousal revenge.”

You know the houses that end up in the newspaper where a parent kills all the kids, and everyone is shocked? I come from one of those; I just made it out alive. There were numerous threats, even what could be considered an attempt, on my life while my brain was developing.

Several of Dr. Phillip Resnick’s categories fit the household I grew up in. Two stand out the most to me: acutely psychotic and fatal maltreatment. Acutely psychotic filicide occurs when a parent in the throes of acute psychosis kills his or her child with no comprehensible motive. Fatal maltreatment filicide may occur because of child abuse, neglect, or Munchausen syndrome by proxy. In fatal maltreatment killings, the goal is not always to kill the child, but death may occur anyway. Acutely psychotic is a match for many of our childhood experiences, such as being chased with a knife or threatened with death in the car. But fatal maltreatment (with Munchausen syndrome by proxy) is a match for what occurred over the course of my sister’s 43 years of life, a form of filicide in slow motion.  

Rose’s life was tragically stolen

I do believe the pain of helplessly watching my sister, Rose, tormented for decades as an adult, culminating in a devastating loss, was worse than anything done directly to me in childhood. My sister was the kindest person I’ve ever known with a heart of gold. She was beautiful and smart with all the potential in the world. It was not my sister’s fault. Sometimes I feel like I’m the only one who truly understands that. It’s incredibly hard to heal while financially ensnared with the source of your childhood horror. Rose’s life was tragically stolen. 

My name is Victoria, and I live with my husband of eleven years, Jack, and my 9-year-old son, Owen. I’ve essentially been in therapy and mental health treatment my entire adult life. I was left with numerous humiliating symptoms and no believable story for how I came to have them. When I told the truth, I would usually be interpreted as the delusional one. I was thrown out into the world with no life skills and a wicked case of CPTSD. I don’t even want to know what I’ve spent on therapy or treatments by now. Probably a couple of hundred thousand. I spent a long time wondering what was wrong with me. Now I wonder if I simply had a perfectly rational response to perfectly irrational circumstances.

I’ve created an anonymous website to raise awareness about surviving life-threatening abuse perpetrated by primary caregivers in childhood, to show how this abuse can continue into adulthood, and to improve treatment outcomes for survivors. After years of research, I have discovered there are no studies on the experiences of adult survivors of this specific pattern of abuse.

www.filicidesurvivor.com documents a lifetime of severe financial, psychological, physical, and coercive control within a family system that ultimately contributed to my sister’s death. It offers a personal perspective on clear blind spots in the mental healthcare system, and the resources in place meant to protect us, such as Child Protective Services and Adult Protective Services. I’m sharing this experience so that others in similar homes may recognize the signs earlier, trust themselves, and find a way out.

Thus far, I’ve only met one person in my life to report life-threatening abuse from a parent. She is much younger than I, and likened her lived experience to dying inside a little every day, invisibly. And I’ve never met anyone whose mother told them to kill themselves or told them, as well as their siblings, that they deserve to die. But I do believe and know there are people like me out there who probably feel all alone in this as I do. So here I sit, writing to you. 

I was 40 years old when I first learned the word “Filicide.” I was in search of community. I wanted to know if what I was telling people was, in fact, reality. I couldn’t easily track down individuals with similar life-threatening childhood experiences. I learned the term, but I quickly realized I was right. There is no community that I could find. I found one small study of seven live children of attempted filicide. The children either had to have wounds to prove it, or the parents had to admit it. I wouldn’t qualify. My injuries are invisible, and the idea of my parents admitting fault in the slightest is laughable. I promise, I HOPED and TRIED for a long time to get through to them. It’s impossible, and no psychologist would tell me to speak to them. 

Few can wrap their heads around biological “parents” who would do this. It is very hard to be believed. Further, my “father” was a top executive at an international food/beverage company, an arrogant millionaire, and 6’5”. It’s impossible for me to explain to others how a 5’5” woman with no job completely controlled him. I don’t understand it myself. Sometimes I think I’m interpreted as arrogant simply for stating his job title, but I’m not saying it out of ego. I believe his career is how they got away with a lifetime of abuse, and why my sisters and I have rarely been believed. People do not expect child abuse like what we went through to come from a household like mine with wealthy, educated “parents.” Socioeconomic status and professional credibility can act as a shield that prevents abuse from being recognized. Multiple clinicians have described my “parents’” behavior as consistent with severe personality pathology and psychosis. 

There are many severe traumas in the world, and my heart goes out to each one of you. People who work on and overcome traumas are warriors. Because no matter what, you’re facing a painful uphill battle. And other trauma survivors have been the people who carried me through my darkest days. Severe traumas certainly include fighting in war, sexual abuse, having alcoholic, abusive parents, parental abandonment, racial trauma, and more. I have not directly experienced many of these severe traumas. I cannot speak to the impact all these traumas have on individuals as I feel it’s comparing apples and oranges. What I will say is that I’ve often felt alone in my trauma being understood. While we all have our own powerful and unique stories, I often feel some of the broader categories of severe traumas have more community access to others who have experienced the same, more understanding of the impact, and perhaps more general acceptance in society. However, society’s understanding of the effect of trauma on individuals with CPTSD is still staggeringly inadequate.

So now I’m asking, where’s my comparison on who knows what it’s like to have your “mother” threatening and/or attempting to kill you while your brain was developing?

One critical aspect identified in the study I found of seven children is the theme of “I’m alive thanks to my siblings.” I discovered after decades in therapy that I had been living with a severe case of Survivor’s Guilt over my sister, Rose. I feel like this could have been identified far sooner if this topic were researched. Survivor’s Guilt in a Filicide Survivor is likely to be significant due to the unique sibling bonds under lethal threat. 

Please be aware that www.filicidesurvivor.com contains descriptions of severe parental abuse, psychological trauma, and death. Some content may be triggering, so it is important to prioritize your safety and mental health. If you are able to relate to this content, please consider processing this information alongside a qualified mental health professional.

The site includes our story, redacted evidence (family messages, witness statements, police statements, and counselor reports), and resources. Most people do not believe me without evidence, so this is unfortunately necessary to tell our story. Over time, I hope this space can also serve as an anonymous platform for others who want to safely share their experiences.

One lesson I learned throughout this process is the nature of the psychological double bind. If I stay silent, I betray myself and my sister. Speak, and feel conditioned fear, guilt, and shame. I choose the path of speaking. I choose truth. My loyalty is to my sister, and my heart is with survivors. If even one person recognizes their own family in mine and breaks free, then our story will have made a difference. 

If you are a mental health professional interested in researching this topic, I welcome the opportunity to speak with you.

Names in this story have been changed for anonymity. 

Source: https://jaapl.org/content/33/4/496

Photo by Kane Reinholdtsen on Unsplash

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog post do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

The sudden death of my mother when I was fifteen was the primary event that fractured my sense of safety, but it was not the only one. I grew up in a chaotic household dominated by my father’s severe alcoholism. Over time, I also experienced the premature deaths of my brother, sister, and longtime best friend. My life included domestic violence, police brutality, being struck by a truck while crossing the street, and a near-fatal reaction to medication. Of all these experiences, profound loss and abandonment cut the deepest.

I was eventually diagnosed with complex PTSD. For years, I lived with symptoms that shaped every aspect of my life: nightmares so intense that I had to scream myself awake, panic attacks, intrusive thoughts, and severe depression that led to suicidal ideation. I lived in a constant state of hypervigilance, plagued by anxiety and somatic symptoms, particularly digestive issues. I never felt safe.

The pain I carried felt unbearable. When it tried to surface, I did everything I could to suppress or escape it. Fantasy, emotional withdrawal, and constant movement became my coping strategies. Throughout my twenties and early thirties, I moved from place to place, believing that if I just kept going, I could outrun what lived inside me. Fear kept my pain alive, and fear kept me running. Even after I eventually settled down, the struggle continued. I tried to escape my pain by leaning heavily on others—calling, crying, seeking relief outside myself. Over the years, I explored a wide range of therapeutic approaches, both conventional and alternative. Slowly and often painfully, I moved from a life ruled by fear, addiction, and suicidal ideation toward learning how to sit with pain, integrate it, and ultimately meet it with compassion and love.

What Didn’t Work

Along the way, I tried many healing modalities that did not help me. These included energy-based practices, such as Reiki, which aim to balance the body’s energy centers. I tried homeopathy, based on the idea that “like heals like” through highly diluted substances.  While these practices may help others, they were ineffective for me. Some talk therapy experiences were also unhelpful, particularly those with counselors who were not trained in trauma-informed care. I spent years talking about my pain without learning how to process it. Each unsuccessful attempt left me more discouraged, reinforcing the belief that I was broken or beyond repair.

What Worked

One therapy that made a meaningful difference was EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing). EMDR involves processing traumatic memories through guided eye movements, allowing the brain to refile them in a less distressing way. I was able to enter the altered, almost hypnotic state this therapy requires with relative ease. During sessions, my mind would move fluidly between memories, linking past experiences in unexpected ways. Often, an older, wiser version of myself would appear, offering comfort and re-parenting the younger me. In this sense, EMDR allowed me to retell my life story. While EMDR helped me significantly over time, in the short term, my symptoms intensified, especially my nightmares. Healing, I learned, is rarely linear.

Medication was another critical piece of my healing, though I resisted it for years. Doctors, friends, and family members encouraged me to try antidepressants, but I was in deep denial about needing them. When I finally started Prozac at twenty-nine, it made a profound difference. It quieted my relentless mental loops and helped me to feel a sense of calm and clarity. I was fortunate not to experience significant side effects. Of the medications I’ve tried, Zoloft—the only SSRI FDA-approved for PTSD—has been the most effective for me. In more recent years, I participated in a guided psilocybin journey that helped me in ways that feel almost beyond language. It softened a deep, pervasive fear that had lived in my body for decades. Importantly, this experience did not replace my medication; it complemented the foundation I had already built.

Alongside professional support, I developed personal practices that continue to sustain me: meditation, prayer, exercise—especially yoga—time in nature, and nourishing my body with whole foods. I learned to see food as medicine, cut out alcohol and caffeine, limit sugar, and listen to what my body truly needed.

My Insights

My healing truly began when I stopped searching for one magical answer. I let go of the fantasy that there was a single cure, healer, or method that would make me whole. Instead, I accepted that healing from complex trauma is complex—it requires many tools, used together, over time. I stopped viewing conventional and alternative approaches as opposing camps and began embracing whatever genuinely helped. Even as psilocybin brought profound insight and relief, and as I continue to do occasional self-guided psilocybin journeys, I chose to remain on Zoloft, resisting the cultural pressure to abandon medication. Healing, I learned, does not have to follow someone else’s ideology.

For a long time, I believed I needed to be fixed. I was chasing perfection, a common trait among those with CPTSD. I wanted my pain to disappear, as if a magician could erase it and leave me unscarred. Eventually, I realized that my pain was not a defect—it was a part of me shaped by survival. I no longer demonize my pain or run from it in fear. I meet it. I sit with it. I listen to it. I love it. In doing so, I’ve become more whole—not by erasing the broken pieces, but by assembling them into something meaningful. I see myself now as a mosaic: fragments once shattered, carefully pieced together into a work of art that symbolizes resilience, growth, and transformation. A dragonfly mosaic. Healing is no longer something I’m trying to “get over with.” It’s an ongoing, living process—one I’ve learned to honor and even cherish.

Closing

I hope this post has offered comfort, insight, or a sense of companionship on your own journey. If you’d like to explore further, please visit my website, where you can read my latest post on the therapeutic value of Siddhartha and Slaughterhouse-Five for those living with CPTSD.

Photo by Rohan Makhecha on Unsplash

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog post do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

We hear about trauma this and trauma that. The word trauma is used so much that it’s almost lost its true meaning. If you have been affected by real trauma, you know how much it hurts. 

Trauma doesn’t go away on its own. Trauma doesn’t just stop existing once the traumatic events have ended.

Trauma carries on long after it happened. 

In the case of PTSD, or Complex PTSD, triggers can keep following survivors 24 hours a day. I know this by personal experience–I’ve lived it. And you might be living like this, too, right now, or know someone who is.

News and media report traumatic events like popping corn. Story after story is broadcast to the world about one horrific event after another.

Who reports on the aftermath? Does anyone care anymore? Who is bold enough to stand up and talk about trauma victims after a harrowing event? Not many of us. We hear nothing but crickets. Radio silence. Yet, there are those of us who live with trauma every single day. That is why I write–because our voices matter. Everyone matters.

For many trauma survivors, it is a struggle to get through a single day, because that trauma impacts how people carry out even the simplest daily tasks. It is hard to connect with other people.

Survivors who have suffered from prolonged trauma (over months and years) are more prone to struggle with regulating emotions.

For example, a small passing comment or a certain tone of voice can trigger an involuntary flashback that can derail an entire day. We don’t talk about it because we can’t. It’s too painful and, even if we could, it’s private. Instead, trauma survivors nod and agree even when we are screaming inside. We abandon ourselves to please others and keep things going. We push far past our own boundaries. But there is no one to stand up for us and help, because no one sees our struggles. It feels like nobody cares. We become invisible.

Trauma survivors don’t exist in the world: we get tucked away in the news— buried by noise.

Who decides what’s important?

Breaking Free

I’m a trauma survivor, and I escaped childhood abuse and harrowing trauma. I was a teenager when I left everything I knew and started again.

After a life riddled with abuse, survivors usually have no idea how to live and take care of themselves–or how to be around other people.

Social events are awkward, and even a visit to the food market can be frightening because we are reminded of the threats from our abusers. The echoes of trauma still ring loud and clear inside our heads. Even though we have broken free, that “voice” is still in our minds, dictating our every move.

It can take years for this voice to go away. I realized quickly that if I was to survive alone in this world, I had to start thinking of myself first. So, how do you do that when you have never before been in control of your own life? I soon discovered that living free gave me my answers over time. It was a matter of survival.

Taking Back Control

I was an avid reader and enjoyed watching movies and people. I could sit on a park bench for hours observing others, taking invisible notes of how people behaved. It fascinated me to see how they interacted, and reacted to things–and to each other.

Watching people like this gave me ideas about how others socialized without the presence of abuse. I have always been hyper-vigilant, and I learned to put my skills to good use.

I noticed that people did not shout hurtful words at each other. Parents hugged their kids instead of being cruel, and there were no raging insults or fights. Something stirred within me–curiosity, mixed with desire.

I started to hope that the world was really like this. The more I saw affectionate and smiling people, the happier I became. I started smiling, even though I still felt emotionally raw.

With each passing day, I set myself small goals to achieve. These were goals that may have seemed silly to someone who has had free will, but to me, they were enormous. I started being more mindful of my body, and once a day I tried to just sit and breathe.

It may seem weird that such a small change would help, but it turned my life around. By paying attention to my body, I was able to notice when I was tense–or relaxed.

Once I had a feel of what tense and relaxed “felt like,” I could do something about it and follow through appropriately with what needed to be done next. I had been doing “research” by watching others, to see how someone might act. This helped me understand that I could actually choose how I felt, and not just let trauma-related reactions overwhelm me and take over.

Setting Goals

One of my first goals was to never go hungry again. I also promised myself that I would try to eat the best I could with the money I earned. I would choose carefully to eat foods I enjoyed, while making sure I had a balanced meal. I introduced more vegetables and fruit into my diet, and I started to feel more energy. Better nutrition made me feel good, and I noticed I didn’t get sick as much.

My second goal was to shower every day because it made me feel better. I took time to shampoo my hair, and I allowed myself to stay under the water for as long as I wanted. My complexion started to change quickly. My skin was looking less grey, and I had a new brightness in my cheeks.

My third goal was to buy myself better-fitting clothes so that no one would tease me anymore. I bought jeans and shirts that fit my body type. I also got a few more pairs of shoes so that I had choices, and could have shoes for exercising that were different from my shoes for work.

These three simple changes may seem silly and basic to someone who has not been abused. Yet, for me, these changes signaled the start of my life as a free woman. I took responsibility for my choices, learned to prioritize what I needed, and woke up to life beyond just survival. I felt great.

We don’t have to let trauma make our decisions for us. There are small–and very effective ways–to start taking our power back right now. 

My name is Lizzy. I’m a trauma survivor, a wife, a mom, a teacher, and an author.

For more about me: www.elizabethwoodsauthor.com

Support your fellow writer:
https://ko-fi.com/elizabe69245484here.

Here are a few links to my top articles:

How to Explain Complex PTSD to Loved Ones
https://medium.com/illumination/how-to-explain-complex-ptsd-to-loved-ones-769f81d437ab

Looking for a Change?
https://medium.com/activated-thinker/looking-for-a-change-f391e85abbd7

A Search for Identity
https://medium.com/beyond-lines/a-search-for-identity-893df7c970c2

Are You Searching for Peace?
https://medium.com/illumination/are-you-searching-for-peace-cd54d76231c8

Are You Dealing With Burnout?
https://medium.com/illumination/are-you-dealing-with-burnout-374f774141b4

Photo by Jon Tyson on Unsplash

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog post do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.