By Nancy Hayes-Gary, Psy.D.
Almost everyone has some type of traumatic experience during their lifetime, and these can be anything that creates recurring sad or angry feelings or ruminating thoughts recollecting the event. Childhood traumas range from sexual, physical, or emotional abuse or neglect, divorce, loss of a parent, and alcoholism in the family, so services for Addiction Rehab is necessary. Since these occur early in development, they tend to have a more pervasive traumatic effect, often resulting in problems in relationships or identity. There are certainly plenty of traumas that adults experience as well. Divorce, traumatic illness, or death of a loved one are common examples. Some people have intense experiences like traumatic car accidents, rape, or robbery/muggings that cause them to have resulting traumatic symptoms.
Symptoms that can result from trauma are varied. Most commonly people may experience intense fearfulness, anger, depression, or anxiety related to the trauma. Sometimes PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder) can develop, either directly after the traumatic event or years later. This disorder brings with it symptoms that can have a difficult impact on many areas of life. People with PTSD sometimes have flashbacks, intrusive thoughts or pictures in their heads, of the incident, and they may have emotional numbing or intensely charged feelings. Complex PTSD can even cause problems tolerating closeness in a relationship or low self-esteem. Following an extremely traumatic car accident, a patient came to me with severe depression, sleep disruption, nightmares, and flashbacks, and she had begun to completely socially withdraw. Following ten months of trauma therapy, she was completely symptom-free and able to move on with her life. The important thing to remember, aside from the fact that the trauma was not your fault, is that trauma is successfully treated in therapy, and it is possible to alleviate the negative effects discussed above.
Dissociation is a defense used by many survivors of trauma. It is a sort of “blanking out” experience, where the person tries to protect himself/herself from the traumatic experience by “leaving the body”; that is separating the awareness of the event from one’s consciousness or memory. There are varying degrees of dissociation from a slight blurring of the some aspects of the trauma to complete amnesia. There are also different types of dissociative experiences in which a person may feel unreal or not in their body, or feel as though their experience is not really happening. These are called depersonalization or derealization. Frequent employing of dissociation may result in disruptive daily life experiences such as finding items in your possession that you don’t remember buying, writing that you don’t remember doing, or being told you said or did things you don’t remember. Losing time, that is not remembering various lengths of time, is also a symptom.
Although dissociation defends against painful memories or feelings, it can become a defense that gets used repeatedly, making a person’s identity and experiences fragmented. Unfortunately, dissociation often does not work completely, and the traumatized person may experience sudden leaks in the damned up memories and feelings. It is often disturbing to not remember parts of one’s life, or to have a sudden on-set of memories, rage or anxiety that seem to come from out of nowhere. Certain life events may trigger the traumatic memories, causing the trauma survivor to employ even more dissociation. Dissociative Disorders may develop from trauma; these involving the experience of oneself as chopped up into parts instead of a whole identity, such as child parts, or angry parts. In extremely traumatic situations, especially when these occur in childhood and are on-going, a person may develop a multiple personality, which is a disorder now called Dissociative Identity Disorder.
While trauma and dissociation can cause major disruptions in peoples’ lives, these are quite treatable with sufficient and effective therapy. An experienced trauma therapist will help you to process these experiences. Therapy can result in an alleviation of trauma-related symptoms, and a resolution of the traumatic events. No one should have to live with the symptoms of trauma when treatment is available. Trauma memories can fade into the background and take their place in the file of autobiographical life events, no longer disrupting a person’s awareness or functioning.
Feeling whole and having more in your life than survival is worth the time and effort.
For more detailed information on trauma and dissociation, visit the website if the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation at www.isst-d.org. There is useful information under the “For the Public” category and the “Child and Adolescent” part.
