Trauma-Informed Blog
New content weekly! Survivor Stories, Research Articles, Poetry, and more written by clinicians, coaches, survivors, and mental health professionals.
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What are Your Core Beliefs?
In this series on core beliefs, we are discussing how these self-imposed and self-defining thought patterns can either help or hinder you and your life. Because of childhood maltreatment, many...
Surviving While Trying to Thrive: Life with CPTSD
In the end, we all have the wish to heal, to thrive, to feel fully into our body and mind – and into the moment. We long to know what true love feels like and looks like – we long to trust another fully and let ourselves unfold. We yearn to know who we are without the shackles and memories of traumatic experiences haunting our every breath, and the words and actions of callous abusers creeping through our mind disguised as our own thoughts and beliefs.
CPTSD in the Workplace: An Inside Job
When I talk to trauma survivors about their experiences in the workplace, I often sense that they are more interested in changing their work environment than in changing themselves. This might...
Safe Places for Victims of Sexual Abuse?
The recent news of David Carrick's arrest sheds light on why it is so difficult for victims and survivors of violence and rape to disclose abuse. We are encouraged to call the Police but, very...
Reflection on Complex PTSD (Part 1)
Growing up in Japan with a workaholic surgeon father, an often-absent socialite mother, and two older brothers who were seldom around, I was mostly raised by a revolving door of caregivers. This...
Overcoming Threats From Your Abuser
My name is Elizabeth and I am a survivor of CSA and horrific trauma. Abuse and fear are all I can remember from my childhood. I was a sex toy, loaned out for the pleasure of my so-called father’s...
Negative Core Beliefs
All of us have core beliefs that we hold about ourselves. These beliefs shape who we fundamentally are and how we behave. This article, the first in this series, will focus on negative core...
I Think She Died of a Broken Heart
Mom died in July 1960 at the age of 42 when I was 9 years old. My father remarried a year later. They said that it was a heart attack. Later in life, my oldest brother, Mike, and I would...
CPTSD in the Workplace: Emotional Safety
Photo by Priscilla Du Preez on Unsplash One of the defining characteristics of CPTSD is severe and persistent problems in affect regulation. In my first article, I wrote, “Affect regulation,...
Healing Your Wounded “Inner Child”
A child that has suffered trauma and abuse in one form or other has had to adapt to the stressors and hurt. It doesn't matter if the abuse was emotional, physical, or sexual, that child has been...
Somatic Therapy and Finding Your Authentic Self
When I first heard the term “authentic self,” I rolled my eyes. But in the 17 months since getting diagnosed with CPTSD, I’ve learned how important it is to discover your authentic self. It never...
Why Relationships Are Important & Their Effect on Trauma Survivors
The most insidious thing about chronic childhood trauma is that it is often invisible
What is Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder?
“Complex PTSD comes in response to chronic traumatization over the course of months or, more often, years. This can include emotional, physical, and/or sexual abuses, domestic violence, living in a war zone, being held captive, human trafficking, and other organized rings of abuse, and more. While there are exceptional circumstances where adults develop C-PTSD, it is most often seen in those whose trauma occurred in childhood”.
