Trauma Therapy : Empathic Counselling

Trauma creates change you don’t choose. Healing is about creating change you do choose.” ~ Michelle Rosenthal

What is Trauma?

Trauma is an emotional response to distressing experiences, which can overwhelm our ability to cope. Traumatic experiences threaten our sense of safety and can leave us feeling helpless, exposed and vulnerable. Of all emotions, fear is most central to trauma. Fear is a response to the threat of being harmed physically or psychologically. There are many different experiences that can cause trauma and people can also respond to those experiences differently. 

  • Trauma is personal – if you feel the effects of trauma, then it is trauma.
  • Trauma is complicated – it can be obvious with a clear cause, or it can be buried beneath depression, anxiety and anger without any recognisable origin.
  • Trauma can affect you even if you don’t remember the event or experience.
  • The effects of specific experiences will be different for everyone – what is traumatic for one person might not be for someone else.
  • The more traumatic events you’re exposed to, the greater the risk they will have a significant effect on you.
  • You may not have a response to traumatic events until many years after you experienced them.

Trauma can affect:

  • How you feel and think
  • Your beliefs and understanding of the world
  • Your behaviour
  • Your relationships
  • Your physical body

“Trauma is not what happens to you, it’s what happens inside you as a result of what happens to you.” ~ Dr. Gabor Maté

Not everyone exposed to a traumatic event, will develop symptoms of trauma. The post-traumatic reaction is influenced by many complex risk and protective factors. Therefore, two people faced with the same extreme situation may react very differently, depending on their unique factors.

Trauma is often categorised in reference to whether the traumatic event was a single event, or if it occurred over a long period of time.

Some examples of single event trauma include:

  • Physical or sexual assault
  • An accident
  • The sudden death of a loved one due to illness, accident or suicide
  • A natural disaster such as flood, fire, cyclone etc
  • Birth trauma (including miscarriage, baby loss, physical and psychological injury)
  • Military combat
  • Severe illness or injury, medical trauma
  • Being a victim of or witness to violence or a distressing event

Some examples of complex trauma (prolonged exposure to traumatic situations) include:

  • Ongoing physical, sexual or emotional neglect or abuse in childhood.
  • Witnessing physical, sexual or emotional neglect or abuse in childhood.
  • Caregiver instability due to mental illness or substance misuse.
  • Intimate partner instability due to mental illness or substance misuse.
  • Domestic physical, sexual or emotional abuse.
  • Betrayal trauma.
  • Racial, cultural trauma.
  • Religious trauma.
  • Kidnapping, human trafficking, forced labour, torture, bullying, harassment.

Please note that there are many more examples that are not listed, and different labels to explain trauma. Empathic Counselling supports your unique experience, and does not focus on diagnostic labels or meeting certain criteria. As mentioned above, trauma is personal and is subjectively experienced by each individual.

Symptoms that survivors of single event trauma and complex trauma may share:

  • Re-experiencing the trauma through intrusive memories, flashbacks and/or nightmares.
  • Changes in mood and thinking, including feeling distant from other people and having overwhelming negative emotions and distorted thoughts and beliefs
  • Avoiding people, places, situations or thoughts that remind survivors of their trauma.
  • Hyperarousal; including sleeplessness, hypervigilance, irritability, angry outbursts, difficulty concentrating, and generally feeling on edge. Also includes behaving recklessly or in a self-destructive way’
  • Hypoarousal;  physical lethargy, brain fog, disconnected,  emotional numbness and not wanting to talk to people or carry out tasks you normally enjoy, shut down

In addition, symptoms of complex trauma may include:

  • Difficulty regulating emotions

Difficulty regulating emotions means that survivors may have a hard time experiencing, controlling, or identifying their feelings. These emotions often seem overwhelming and all-consuming. Explosive anger, persistent sadness, depression, or frequent suicidal thoughts are all common.

  • ​Loss of system of meanings or worldview

Loss of system of meanings means that a survivor has a contorted view on beliefs, values, the world and the people in it. They may be unable to hold feelings of faith or hope of any kind. They may also doubt acts of kindness and question the ulterior motives behind them. They may even believe they only came to this world to be hurt.

  • Interpersonal difficulties

Interpersonal difficulties mean that a survivor has trouble building and maintaining personal relationships, and may even avoid relationships all together. Lack of trust plays a large part in interpersonal difficulties, as do feelings of isolation that most complex trauma survivors face.

  • Alterations in consciousness

Alterations in consciousness include blocking out or forgetting the traumatic event, episodes of not feeling real, or feeling disconnected from one’s body, or mind; also known as dissociation.

  • Negative self-view

Negative self-view includes feelings of helplessness, hopelessness, guilt, self-blame, and shame. Most survivors believe that there is something fundamentally wrong with them. These feelings contribute to the isolation survivors feel from others and a sense that the survivor is “just different” than other people.

  • Cognitive distortions

Cognitive distortions are intense thoughts that don’t match with the present situation and include forms of thinking like: catastrophising, minimising, jumping to conclusions, emotional reasoning, and black and white thinking.

“Trauma robs you of the feeling that you are in charge of yourself. The challenge of recovery is to reestablish ownership of your body and your mind – of your self.” ~ Dr. Bessel van der Kolk

Some therapeutic goals of trauma therapy may include:

  • Safety and stabilisation
  • Psychoeducation and normalisation of symptoms
  • Rebuilding relational worth through the therapeutic relationship
  • Develop healthy self-soothing behaviours for emotional regulation
  • Making sense of and processing traumatic experiences
  • Challenging distorted perceptions
  • Restoring autonomy and self-efficacy
  • Reconnecting to self, others and the world
  • Creating relationships that are physically and emotionally safe
  • Post-traumatic growth: Exploring dreams and goals for the present and the future

Stages of Trauma Therapy:

Stage 1: Establishing safety and control, psycho-education, developing skills to manage symptoms, improve functioning and everyday life, support network, building the therapeutic relationship.
Stage 2: Processing the trauma narrative, integrating trauma experiences, traumatic memories and associated abuse dynamics, loss and mourning, challenging distorted core beliefs and restoring reality, grief and mourning.
Stage 3: Re-connection to self and post-traumatic growth, increased vitality and engagement with the world.

Recovering from trauma entails healing the self. There is no one-size-fits-all approach to trauma treatment. What works for one person, may not work for another person. Empathic Counselling draws upon a variety of evidence-based approaches that include:

  • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
  • Narrative Therapy
  • Cognitive Behaviour Therapy (CBT)
  • Emotionally Focused Therapy
  • Schema Therapy
  • Psychoeducation
  • Existential Psychotherapy
  • Somatic Practices

More important than any one specific type of therapy, is the therapeutic relationship between the client and the counsellor. Establishing safety is essential at the beginning of the relationship, and throughout the counselling process. Trust and a feeling of acceptance form the foundation of a positive working relationship.

“The pain of trauma can be the catalyst for personal growth, leading us to discover inner strength and resilience we never knew we possessed.” ~ Dr. Judith Herman

You can book your appointment through the Booking page.