Trauma and The Inner Critic

For anyone, silencing our inner critic can be very difficult, but for those that have past hurts or traumas, this can feel impossible. Believe it or not, there’s a good reason for this. Our brain’s job is to predict and all day long it is analyzing situations and asking two questions. 1) Have I been in a similar situation before? And 2) Was it safe or dangerous?

If the answer is that it was dangerous, fight or flight, freeze, or even shut down can happen as our brain assumes we may not be safe again. But what does that have to do with being self critical?

Well, “the critic,” if you will is a prevention strategy that was originally to prevent you from repeating negative patterns, but it can take on a life of it’s own and become how you see yourself or we can even convince ourself that being critical of ourselves is how we know we are a good person.

However, this results in feeling awful about ourselves and often increases our anxiety and depression. So what can you do to change this?

At it’s core, this is an issue of lacking the ability to have compassion for yourself, self love, and nurture yourself.

So what are some good ways to practice self love, compassion, and self nurturing?

1) Acknowledge your inner voice is trying to help and keep you safe. This often reduces the intensity of the feelings associated with the thoughts.

2) Address the thoughts from a more rational, grounded, and caring place. Remember this part of you is trying to help, it’s just misguided as it is based in the past. Then replace those thoughts with more helpful positive beliefs or if that feels too hard, neutral ones. You can also start a belief with “I’m learning to believe . . .” such as “I’m learning to believe I am good enough.”

3) Practice exercises like breathing or mindfulness while breathing in compassion, love, peace, and comfort while letting go and breathing out the criticism, judgement, shame, sadness, anxiety, etc.

4) Practice good self care and ways of nurturing yourself by doing things that soothe your body. This may be things like getting a massage, sitting in a hot spring, or everyday kinds of things such as resting when you need to, listening to soothing music, or soothing your five senses with soothing images, sounds, smells, flavors, or textures.

5) Try to work toward giving yourself grace when you make mistakes and try to work on forgiving yourself for past mistakes. This usually requires repetitive practice. Forgiveness is not a one time event, but a process.

6) Talk to a trauma therapist about ways to work on past traumas that are contributing to the pattern and to work more deeply on your self criticism.

I hope this information helps you understand how to work with your inner critic in a different way. I also hope it helps you feel like trauma therapy could be helpful to help you work on this more deeply. If you are interested in learning more about trauma work or EMDR in general you can find out more about the EMDR or other approaches I use here. If you are interested in the EMDR Intensives I do you can find out more about them here. If you are just feeling stuck and have questions, please feel free to call me at (707) 954- 7060 for a free 15 minute consultation. I’d be happy to hear about what is going on for you and to help direct you to the right person to help you.

Why Do I Get So Angry And Why Do My Reactions Not Even Make Sense To Me?

Have you ever had a quick reaction of anger to a situation that didn’t even make sense to you? Like you know your over reacting, but that doesn’t help you calm down! And how can you help people around you understand when they ask what is wrong, when you don’t understand it?

So What Can I Do?

1. The first thing you can do is figure out what the trigger is or what the anger is in response to. Anger at it’s root is a way of saying “no” to something or “stop.” It’s telling people you do not like something that is happening. This is also often connected to attachment hurts with important people in our lives where we felt rejected or judged. It also can often relate to boundaries or limits we have set being crossed.

2. Once you know the trigger, you can figure out what from your past connects to this. This is often helpful to do with a therapist as this can be hard to figure out sometimes.

3. Then you need to figure out what things can help to soothe your anger, but also the other emotions that you become aware of as you identify the trigger and memories connected to it. This may mean positive relaxing activities or soothing your five senses. Soothing your five senses is often very important as when we get upset we can become agitated or easily irritated and soothing sights, smells, touches, tastes, and things we can hear can really help. It can also be important to find ways to release anger through releasing body or emotional tension.

4. It is also important to find ways to address the triggers and memories and many types of therapy can help with this such as CBT, Somatic Approaches, or EMDR. One of my favorite is EMDR as it can really help connect a pattern in your life to all the triggers and memories and help you reprocess them from being very upsetting to not being upsetting and being part of the past rather than something that keeps showing up.

   I hope this information helps you understand how anger is about much more than simply being angry or losing your temper and often connects to triggers or things from our pasts. If you are interested in learning more about trauma work or EMDR in general you can find out more about the EMDR or other approaches I use here. If you are interested in the EMDR Intensives I do you can find out more about them here. If you are just feeling stuck and have questions, please feel free to call me at (707) 954- 7060 for a free 15 minute consultation. I’d be happy to hear about what is going on for you and to help direct you to the right person to help you.

5 Things Family and Friends Can Do To Help While I Work On Healing

Your first response might be to say they can’t help as healing is personal to each person and a journey we each have to do for ourselves. However, while this may be true in some ways there are actually things important people in your life can do to help.

Things That Are Helpful:

1. Gently support them and ask the person doing the work what would be helpful. Continuing through life as if the work they are doing is not difficult or taxing is not helpful. Validating the work they are doing as important and expressing being proud of them can help too.

2. Be understanding that the work they are doing may leave them tired. Especially if they are doing work like Eye Movement Desensitization or Reprocessing Therapy (EMDR) where they are reprocessing memories which means their brain is working hard to make sense of past memories and traumas. This is even more true if they are doing an EMDR Intensive or multiple hours of EMDR in one day.

3. Be genuine, if you are unable to be supportive, encourage them to be around others who can be supportive as you work on your own things.

4. Consider if doing a couples or family session may be helpful to better understand the work they are doing.

5. If there are relationship issues, it often makes sense to hold off on addressing them until after trauma work as doing it during trauma work just tends to trigger past traumas and makes it hard to resolve current issues.

I hope this information helps you understand how best to support a loved one that is doing trauma work or if you are the one doing trauma work, helps you explain to a loved one what you need. I also hope it helps you feel like trauma work is more doable with this support. If you are interested in learning more about trauma work or EMDR in general you can find out more about the EMDR or other approaches I use here. If you are interested in the EMDR Intensives I do you can find out more about them here. If you are just feeling stuck and have questions, please feel free to call me at (707) 954- 7060 for a free 15 minute consultation. I’d be happy to hear about what is going on for you and to help direct you to the right person to help you.

What Is An EMDR Intensive?

Have you ever wished for a faster way to work through past hurts and traumas? I am sure many people have. EMDR Intensives are essentially longer sessions of EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing Therapy), instead of an hour, they are often 3 hours or 6 hours which allows you to get more done in less time. Let me tell you about the four things I love about this approach.

Four Things I Love About EMDR Intensives and How They Can Help You Heal

1. The first thing I love about EMDR Intensives is that it allows you do to a large chunk of trauma work in one day. If you are wondering what EMDR is, it’s a type of trauma therapy that reduces how upsetting past memories are and has a body and attachment focus which can help calm your brain and body and help you feel more able to connect to others as you begin to heal. If you would like more information on EMDR, you can click here.

2. The second thing I love about EMDR Intensives is that by doing EMDR as an intensive, this lets you feel better faster, which I’m sure is something we all want. There is no need to wait to see the changes you have wished for so long.

3. The third thing I love about EMDR Intensives is that an EMDR intensive can be the big bang that gets everything moving or it can be in addition to what therapy you are already doing. It can also for some people be their preferred way of doing therapy. Either way, doing an EMDR intensive can provide the results that usually take months of individual weekly sessions in just a few days.

4. The fourth thing I love about EMDR Intensives is that there is time for a deep dive. You get to cut out all that pressure of doing everything in an hour. This allows so much more to be accomplished.

I hope this information helps you decide if an EMDR Intensive is right for you. It is also true though that each EMDR Intensive therapist may work a little differently so it is important to find someone that is a good fit for you in Eureka, CA. If you are still feeling stuck, please feel free to call me at (707) 954-7060 for a free 15 minute consultation. I’d be happy to hear about what is going on for you and to help direct you to the right person to help you. If you are looking for anxiety counseling, depression counseling, or trauma informed counseling, you can read more about how I help here. If you want to know more about my intensives, you can read more about them here.

Why Does Trauma Make It So Hard To Be Present With Those I Care About Now?

This is a great question. The answer though is a little complicated. When we have hurtful experiences we often develop anxiety or depression or we can even have memories intruding on the present or be having flashbacks where the past event feels like it is happening again. This, as you can imagine, makes it hard to focus or concentrate on the present moment, leaving the present moment feeling hazy, unclear, or unfocused. There may even be fight, flight, or freeze survival responses being triggered by reminders of the past event(s) that make it even harder to stay present.

It could even be you are experiencing something we call dissociation. Dissociation is a protective thing our brains do to “check out” of an overwhelming situation and limit how much information we take in. This often happens when survival responses are not an option. Such as when in danger and you want to fight or run away, but feel this would put you or someone you care about in more danger so instead you mentally “go away.” Children often do this as they often are unable to fight or run away due to their size or other elements. If you can’t get out, the only other choice sometimes is to check out. The difficulty is once your brain starts doing this, it continues to do it and it gets easily over time to quickly check out more often.

So What Can I Do To Not Check Out?

The good news is there are techniques to help you stay more present, but the bad news is they are hard to do on your own. I know I probably sound like a therapist saying this, but this is a complex issue that usually needs the guidance of a therapist. And not just any therapist, but one trained in dissociation. This is because it is hard to use a strategy when you are already checked out. For that reason, when working with someone with this issue, it is often important for them to identify a support person that can coach them on the techniques, at least initially. Later, after you have more practice, it becomes easier to do this for yourself. The strategies themselves are often easy to implement. They usually involve noticing your environment around you or how you feel in your body. This tends to bring you back. I suggest if you are going to try this though that it is done first with your therapist in case there are triggers you need to be aware of. For example, many who have experienced trauma have difficulty being aware of their body and this itself can be a trigger.

I hope this helps you better understand why it might be so hard to stay present, focus, or concentrate after having a hurtful experience. If you are still feeling stuck, feel free to call me at (707) 954- 7060 for a free 15 minute consultation. I’d be happy to hear about what is happening for you and help direct you to the right person to help you. If you are looking for anxiety counseling, depression counseling, or trauma focused therapy, you can read more about how I can help here.

Five Things You Can Do When The Past Doesn’t Stay In the Past

Have you ever had something happen to you whether it was a big event or small event, and felt “why am I not over this yet?” or “why does this keep coming up?” This is often because we feel others expect us to get over it or we expect it of ourselves. This is not surprising as many view mental health like physical health. If you break your leg , you wear a cast, heal, and move on. If you are hurt mentally though, your injury is invisible and others may think you are “ok” when you are not. Like a broken leg, people often think , “ok, you’ve been depressed for six weeks, now you should be healed.” Mental health does not work like this. There is no time table as everyone heals at their own pace. There also is no my “pain” is not as bad as someone else’s so “I should be healed by now.” Healing is more complex than than that and depends on things like your strengths, emotional wounds, and your support system.

So What Can I Do To Help Myself Heal?

1. Increase Your Support System Or Be More Open With Your Support System About What You Need. A good circle of support is essential to the healing process. A lack of a good support system is a contributing factor to people developing PSTD when they have experienced trauma. One thing that can increase your support system is a support group or self help group.

2. Work On Distinguishing The Past From The Present And Be Aware Of When The Past Is Interfering In The Present or Your Relationships. I often hear others say I “freaked out for no reason.” This is not really true, your past was triggered by a present event. Being aware of this pattern can help you to change it.

3. Learn Coping Skills To Help Regulate Your Emotions When You Get Triggered. There are many great coping skills that can help- grounding, deep breathing, learning to shift from one emotional state to another, learning to contain emotions that feel too big, and shifting from negative beliefs about yourself like “it’s my fault” to positive beliefs, just to name a few.

4. If The People That Hurt You Are Still In Your Life, Consider If Limiting Contact Would Be Helpful. This may or may not be helpful given the situation, but especially when trying to heal it can be important as prior to healing their presence can be very triggering.

5. Consider If Counseling May Help. The above steps can also be done in counseling, but specifically resolving traumas you are struggling to get past or feel continue to impact you each day can be helpful to do in therapy. There are also types of therapy that specialize in this, including TFCBT (Trauma Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy) and EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) which you can find out more about here. My favorite is EMDR as it tends to work more quickly to resolve traumas and build strengths. TFCBT can also be helpful especially for children and their caregivers that want to know how to help support them.

   I hope this helps begin your healing process. If you are interested in counseling, I hope this helps you find the right therapist, whether you are interested in doing in person counseling or online therapy. If you are still feeling stuck feel free to call me at (707) 954- 7060 for a free 15 minute consultation. I’d be happy to hear about what is happening and help direct you to the right person to help you. If you are looking for help with anxiety counseling, depression counseling, or trauma or PTSD counseling, you can read more about how I help here.

What Is Trauma And Why You Probably Have Experienced Trauma Even If You Think You Haven’t.

You may not consider you life to have included trauma. Trauma is a highly misunderstood word. Many people think this refers to what I call “Big T” traumas, things like car accidents or abuse. But what about the small hurts that happen so often they build up and become a big hurt? These are the hurts that go unrecognized like being ignored or rejected by a parent or someone important to you so often it becomes normal, being told your not smart so often you believe it, feeling you do not matter to those you love the most, or that others do not like you. These too are traumas, but they are the unrecognized pain we live with daily that impacts how we feel, think, and interact with others. It can also be harder to heal from as it is often connected to so many memories and our relationships.

Trauma, to put it simply, describes anyone that has ever been hurt when that hurt lingers and continues to impact ours responses and relationships, which is most of us at one time or another in our lives. It’s not just for those with obvious injuries.

Trauma Informed Care means that the therapist is aware of the complex nature of pain, hurt, trauma, and relationships and how it can add to a person’s suffering and effect their efforts to cope with that pain. A counselor with a trauma informed approach incorporates this information into how they help. It means anyone saying their approach is trauma informed puts your emotional and mental safety as a priority while helping you heal.

Unfortunately, Trauma Informed Care is also a buzzword and people use this phrase too casually without really knowing what it means.

I want you to know what Trauma Informed Care is so you know what to look for in order to get good quality care with a therapist that is a good fit for you.

Here are some tips on how to find a trauma informed counselor that is a good fit for you. A trauma informed therapist will be aware:

1. That trauma changes how a person regulates thoughts and feelings and how we care for ourselves emotionally.

2. That the mind and body of a person with unhealed trauma is functioning in a different way. They may be easily triggered or have difficulty managing their emotions which can lead to either feeling too much or shutting down.

3. That it is important to not just focus on behavior, but on the underlying reasons for each reaction.

4. That people are often unaware of the traumas they have experienced and the therapist will need to help them recognize this so they can heal and rediscover the strengths they have.

5. That safety is important, both emotional and physical safety, and they will set the conditions or create a safe environment where healing can happen.

6. That self care, boundaries, and strategies that help you cope are important. They will talk often to you about how to use these skills.

7. That your behavior isn’t who you are as a person and how you respond makes sense given what you have been through. They will also teach you the new skills you need to manage your thoughts and feelings.

8. That they need to move at a pace you are comfortable with and will set up ways for you to let them know what pace feels best to you.

I hope this helps you find the right online or in person trauma informed therapist for you in Eureka. If you are still feeling stuck feel free to call me at (707) 954- 7060 for a free 15 minute consultation. I’d be happy to hear about what is happening and help direct you to the right person. If you are looking for help with anxiety counseling, depression counseling, or trauma counseling, you can read more about how I can help here.