Trauma and Adverse
Childhood Experiences
Trauma isn’t just abuse or neglect
One thing I’ve discovered in over a decade of working with trauma is this: “Most people have experienced trauma, but very few of them know it.” People often think that their trauma was just how things were and they normalize it. The problem of course is that we’re not treating trauma the way it needs to be addressed. We will often suffer unnecessarily for years before we seek help. The good news is that recovery is possible, especially with professional help and effective treatments. I provide a therapy called Cognitive Processing Therapy(CPT) which is a therapy designed to identify, challenge, and change how you process your trauma in more adaptive and productive ways.
How do I know if I’ve experienced trauma?
I like to think of emotional trauma as physical trauma. Trauma has many definitions but one that I use is “Trauma is something that doesn’t heal on its own”. Sometimes we refer to the trauma as big T and little T trauma. While it’s easy to identify trauma like physical or sexual abuse, severe neglect, or witnessing someone die, here are some lesser-known but very common ways that my clients have experienced trauma:
-Having a parent overreact to mistakes
-Having an emotionally absent caregiver
-Being bullied by your classmates
-Being forced to be an adult or provide for your family at a young age
-Unrealistic expectations growing up
-Witnessing your parents verbally fight often
-Favoritism being shown to a sibling
As a general rule of thumb, if something has had long-lasting negative effects on you, it might be time to talk to someone about it.
