What Is Trauma Really? We Misunderstand It, and You’ve Probably Experienced It.
A word we all misunderstand
You think you know what trauma is. We all do. It’s a word we’ve all seen and used.
But it’s not what you think. What our brain experiences as traumatic goes well beyond the popular understanding of the word.
And you’ve probably experienced trauma.
There, I said it. Now notice your reaction to that statement - “you’ve probably experienced trauma.”
Many of us quickly deny this. Why? Because it feels better to not think about it - painful stuff we’re skilled at pushing away. Because when we’re kids, we have no point of reference as to what’s healthy. Because even if things weren’t perfect, we doubt that childhood stuff could affect us now. And because the word “trauma” is widely misunderstood.
Why does our misunderstanding matter? Because even lesser-known forms of trauma can shape how we think and feel, our beliefs about ourselves and the world, and how we relate to others. And it’s usually outside of our awareness.
What trauma really is
Let’s define what trauma really is.
It’s an upsetting or stressful event (or a set of circumstances) that leads us to feel unsafe, afraid, helpless, overwhelmed, isolated, or lacking control over what’s happening. Our nervous system can get overwhelmed, which is a normal response to an abnormal circumstance.
Sounds very broad, right? As if it applies to so many things, right? Unfortunately, it does.
And the same set of circumstances affects each of us differently. It just depends on your subjective emotional experience.
Let’s get more specific with examples you’d expect, and many you likely wouldn’t.
Examples you’d expect
Most of us associate “trauma” with big events. So yes, it applies to surviving or witnessing the following:
A car accident.
A terrorist attack.
War.
A natural disaster.
A sexual assault or other violent crime.
The death of a loved one.
But unfortunately it goes way beyond that. Over several years working as an EMDR therapist in San Francisco, I’ve learned that a surprising variety of circumstances create the problematic patterns that appear in adulthood.
Examples you might not expect - in adulthood
Each of these can leave us feeling stuck, helpless, overwhelmed or lacking control:
Struggling financially.
Feeling behind at work.
Fearing you might lose your job.
Experiencing a panic attack.
Actually losing your job.
Worrying about COVID-19.
Hearing about upsetting events in the news, such as racial injustice.
Worrying about the state of our country or the world.
Being discriminated against.
Living in a high-crime area.
Worrying about a chronic health condition.
Having an intrusive medical procedure.
Being in a high-conflict relationship, with frequent arguing.
Going through a breakup.
Examples you might not expect - from school
For many of us, school was a place we didn’t want to be. Some remember it as downright scary. The following situations lead many kids to feel stuck, having to go back to the same place day after day, living through a situation that seems like it’ll never end, and feeling reluctant to talk to anyone about it:
Not feeling like you fit in with anyone.
Feeling different than your peers for any reason, be it race, ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, socioeconomic status, height, weight, body type, etc.
Struggling to assimilate into a different culture than your own.
Being teased for the way that you look or speak.
Being teased for a learning disability.
Being teased for a physical disability.
Being bullied.
Struggling to make friends.
Being rejected by a friend group.
Struggling academically and getting criticized for it.
Being laughed at for not getting the answer right in class.
Having ADHD and being labeled a “behavior problem.”
Changing schools, especially in the middle of the school year.
Examples you might not expect - from parenting
Many of us will say “I had a great childhood” and look back on it fondly. Even when that’s true, the brain is shaped by experience, especially when it’s first developing. The body is hardware, but the mind is more like software.
[For the sake of readability, we’ll use the word “parent” in the place of “early caregiver,” fully recognizing that the primary caregiver for many of us was someone other than a parent.]
Not only is a parent tasked with keeping a child safe and fed; their job includes tuning into how the child is doing, reading cues, and mirroring whatever they’re feeling (through facial expressions and voice). Even better is when the parent labels the feeling, and provides comfort.
Example: baby is hungry and makes an upset face. Parent makes a similar face, says “You’re hungry and you don’t like that,” and provides a hug.
Child is uncomfortable, parent notices, parent tends to child, child feels good again. The child in effect learns, “When I feel this thing, mommy notices, mommy says ‘I see you don’t like that’ and picks me up, I know it’s okay to feel this way, and I know that I’ll be okay.” In other words, the child’s emotions and body are returned to baseline.
With this fortunate experience, the child’s “window of tolerance” expands, meaning that they’re able to notice and tolerate a wider range of emotions, and still function well. And neuronal connections are formed and strengthened in the areas of our brain responsible for emotion regulation, healthy self-concept, learning and memory.
From the parent’s responsiveness, the child develops an inner working model of connection to others leading to relief and comfort. This forms the foundation for trust, empathy, healthy relationships and healthy communication.
As David Wallin, Ph.D. explains, “What also registers is a sense that the self - in expressing its full range of bodily and emotional experiences and needs - is good, loved, accepted and competent.”
But no one’s perfect. According to Harvard University’s Center on the Developing Child, “If an adult’s responses to a child are unreliable, inappropriate, or simply absent, the developing architecture of the brain may be disrupted, and subsequent physical, mental and emotional health may be impaired.”
This is often referred to as relational trauma or complex trauma, which can lead to “complex PTSD.” And because as young children we need our parents to survive, there’s no getting away, and no turning to them to make sense of the “unreliable, inappropriate, or simply absent” parental responses.
Here are those examples:
1. Parent’s responses are misattuned.
Even loving parents can unintentionally provide inadequate attunement, as when they’re:
Anxious.
Depressed.
Distracted or spaced out.
Not feeling physically well.
Not present enough (e.g. long work hours).
Overwhelmed by the tasks of parenting.
Uncomfortable with emotional or physical intimacy.
Confused by what the child is feeling, without attempting to clarify.
Unfamiliar with how to cope with their own emotions, because they were never taught.
2. Parent shames the child about emotions.
What’s even more harmful than insufficient attunement? When the parent makes the kid feel badly for feelings that the brain naturally generates.
Some examples:
Parent is in a bad mood, and not in the right state to provide attunement, so they threaten withdrawal (“if you don’t stop this tantrum then you can be by yourself!”) or punishment (“if you don’t stop crying, I’ll give you something to cry about!”).
Parent was taught to shut down their own emotions, so they casually dismiss or ignore what the child is feeling (“oh you’ll be fine!”).
Parent equates feelings with weakness (“don’t be so sensitive,” or “ be a big boy!”).
Parent is obsessed with how the family is perceived by others, so they shut down any emotional expression in public (“shush… someone may hear you!”).
3. Child senses they’ll get love and feel worthy if they “perform.”
Parent berates the child for not trying hard enough at school, with extracurricular activities, making friends, etc. Or over-emphasizes rewards for “succeeding” in these areas.
Parent criticizes the child’s appearance or behaviors, wishing they’d look or act a certain way. Or frequently criticizes the child about anything really.
Parent excessively controls what activities their child engages in, ignoring what the child actually prefers.
Parent expects “perfect” behavior, and shows approval when the child is agreeable or acts as if everything is okay. The child gets the message, “take care of yourself.”
4. Parent’s anxiety forces the child to adapt.
Think of a parent who’s anxious or overwhelmed, or even lonely. A young child intuitively senses that in order to survive, they need their parent to be okay. So the child instinctively develops ways to soothe the parent. In each of these examples, the child feeling anxious or needing to adapt gets in the way of that ultra-necessary mirroring.
Some examples:
Parent looks stressed or down; child senses this. In a role reversal of sorts, the child smiles, soothes the parent verbally, hugs the parent, etc.
Parent clings to the child, needing more together time than the child is capable of. Child is then “parentified,” working hard to “take care of” the parent.
Parent is overinvolved or overcontrolling, attempting to dictate the child’s every move. Child then depends on parent to make decisions and solve problems.
Parent is inconsistent. Sometimes they provide that mirroring, but too often they’re unavailable. When child is struggling, they may wonder if parent will be there, whether they’ll notice the distress, and whether they’ll be able to adequately soothe. Child then becomes negativistic or clings.
5. Parent-child mismatch.
Mismatches in temperament and other characteristics can lead a parent or their child to feel rejected or inadequate. This can leave the parent unmotivated to consistently attune.
Parent and child differ in how physically active they are, how sensitive they are, what their dominant mood is, how loud or intense they can get, how easily they get frustrated, how quickly they warm up to new people, whether they’re introverted or extroverted, etc.
Parent and child have different interests or hobbies, leading parent to show little interest.
Child has undiagnosed ADHD or a learning disorder, parents misunderstand the behavior, and are triggered by the child’s distractibility, hyperactivity, impulsivity, cognitive differences, etc. and respond with harshness or a lack of understanding.
Parent secretly wished for another gender for their child.
Parent was not ready to have a child.
Child senses that parent favors or gives more attention to a sibling.
Difficult pregnancy or traumatic birth leads parent to feel disconnected or apathetic.
6. Parent inadvertently scares the child or stresses them out.
From birth, we’re biologically primed to attach to our parents. It’s shown right away in infant behaviors such as smiling, approaching, clinging and crying. But sometimes the source of our nurturance is also a source of stress or fear.
Some examples:
Parents’ mannerisms, behaviors and moods are inconsistent or unpredictable.
Child is sensitive from birth, and doesn’t know when the parent’s voice might get loud, or the parent’s face will be overly expressive.
Child can’t predict when they will be reprimanded or spanked.
Child witnesses repeated, hateful arguments between parents (whether violent or not).
To cope with something so scary, the child’s reptilian brain (fight-flight-freeze) leads them to close their eyes, hide, shut down, or dissociate.
How these 6 dynamics can affect us in adulthood
As you can see, even when parents have good intentions, so much can get in the way of a child feeling seen, feeling heard, feeling worthy. So many dynamics render the child unfamiliar and uncomfortable with emotions. But we feel all day long; this comes from our limbic system.
Rather than being stuck alone in a painful emotional state, the child’s brain brilliantly devises ways to get by, to survive. This is usually automatic and outside of awareness. If we were to verbalize the subconscious thought process, it would sound something like, “I get such a bad reaction when I feel that. I don’t want to feel that. Because I depend on my parents to survive, I need to keep them happy. So I will do something with these feelings.”
These survival strategies become encoded as neutral pathways in the brain. Once they’re used repeatedly, they’re more accessible in the future. They then show up In adulthood as ingrained patterns, affecting how we relate to others, and how we function in the world. They’re often accompanied by negative messages that get trapped in our system… beliefs about ourselves and the world around us.
After receiving misattuned responses or shaming about emotions, the child becomes an adult who might:
Reflexively adopt strategies to minimize or numb themselves from feeling: over-relying on substances, disavowing their own needs, struggling with communication.
Be more likely to be thrown off balance (out of their “window of tolerance”) in stressful situations, either going to a place of anger or reactivity, zoning out or shutting down, or both.
Become overly analytical, overly intellectual or distant in communication. Without a rich emotional life, they may feel empty, lonely, hopeless or depressed. They’re more likely to fear emotional or physical intimacy, and distance themselves in relationships.
After subconsciously sensing they have to “perform” to get love and feel worthy, the child subconsciously receives the message “You’re worthy because you fit my sense of who you should be,” and tells themselves, “How I feel doesn’t matter… to get the attention or recognition I need, I just have to be a certain way.” That child becomes an adult who might:
Struggle to find purpose or meaning in their life, or experience disillusionment, perfectionism or burnout.
Experience low self-esteem, seek out attention and social status, and feel dissatisfied with how they look, who they associate with, how much money they make, etc.
Distance themselves from loved ones, needing tons of alone time, appearing detached.
After having to adapt to a parent’s anxiety, the child becomes an adult who might:
Take on the parent’s anxiety and carry that into adulthood. This may be accompanied by a harsh inner critic.
Need frequent reassurance in relationships, that the other person cares and views them as important. They may need more closeness than their partner is comfortable with. They may fear abandonment.
Become a “people pleaser,” forgetting about their own needs, overlooking self-care, struggling to set healthy boundaries, even wanting to “rescue” or “fix” others.
Excessively depend on others, remaining in one-sided relationships for too long.
Struggle to contain strong emotions, sometimes lacking inhibition.
After growing up with a parent-child mismatch, the child becomes an adult who might:
Develop a belief that they’re unworthy or unlovable, which persists into adulthood.
Find it difficult to trust others, and may avoid closeness in relationships or end healthy relationships prematurely.
After fearing their parents’ mannerisms, behaviors or moods, the child becomes an adult who might:
Be hypervigilant, needing to be “on guard” against slights or perceived mistreatment. The adult may experience anxiety, flashbacks, irritability or aggression.
Have trouble regulating their emotions, which can lead to overuse of substances, and instability in relationships.
Space out, freeze or shut down when stressed.
So what’s the solution? How do we address these patterns? How can we heal the stuff that (until now) we may have regarded as benign, “normal,” no big deal?
EMDR therapy in San Francisco
EMDR is an evidence-based treatment for trauma. Attachment-Focused EMDR tailors the standard EMDR protocol, in order to alleviate the effects of relational trauma.
How does EMDR work? When a stressful event (or set of circumstances) overwhelms our nervous system, it also disrupts our brain’s natural capacity to stay present, understand what’s happening, and integrate the experience into long-term memory in an adaptive way. EMDR is believed to unfreeze that integrative capacity, so that unresolved material can be processed as non-traumatic memories would be processed… with clarity and context..
If you have more questions, or want to learn what EMDR can help with, the neuroscience behind it, and how it all works, check out my blog post, “What Is EMDR Therapy: Frequently Asked Questions About EMDR.”
Additional methods for treating trauma
Earlier we discussed survival strategies that encoded as neutral pathways in the brain, which after repeated use become ingrained patterns or parts of us. Internal Family Systems Therapy (“IFS”) is an evidence-based method of working with those parts, preventing them from hijacking us, and restoring balance in our lives.
Because these patterns are often linked to the body, somatic psychotherapy and sensorimotor psychotherapy can be helpful, along with the neuroaffective relational model.
Healing is possible!
If you’ve identified with some of the dynamics in the lists above… If you can sense that some of this stuff may be affecting you these days, just know that healing is possible. Whether it’s through EMDR or a different model of treating trauma, you can conquer these patterns, and feel stronger and freer again. Let’s get it started!
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Andrew Kushnick is a Certified EMDR therapist in downtown San Francisco, and was trained by the Parnell Institute in EMDR and Attachment-Focused EMDR. As a former practicing attorney, Andrew’s approach is practical and concrete, using science-based and evidence-based methods. Video and in-person appointments are available during afternoons and evenings. To schedule a complimentary 15-minute phone consultation, email andrew@andrewkushnick.com.
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References
Allen, JG. Mentalizing in the development and treatment of attachment trauma. London: Karnac Books; (2013).
Bretherton, I., Gunnar, M., & Sroufe, L. A. (1991). Minnesota Symposium of Child Psychology.
Davis, E.P., Glynn, L.M., Waffarn, F. & Sandman, C.A. (2011). ‘Prenatal Maternal Stress Programs Infant Stress Regulation’. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, and Allied Disciplines, 52(2), 119–129.
Lyons-Ruth, K., Dutra, L., Schuder, M. R., & Bianchi, I. (2006). From infant attachment disorganization to adult dissociation: relational adaptations or traumatic experiences?. The Psychiatric clinics of North America, 29(1), 63–viii.
Rees, C. (2007). Childhood attachment. The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners, 57(544), 920–922.
Serve and return. Center on the Developing Child at Harvard University. (2020, January 27). Retrieved June 28, 2022, from https://developingchild.harvard.edu/science/key-concepts/serve-and-return/
Shonkoff, J. P., & Phillips, D. A. (Eds.). (2000). From neurons to neighborhoods: The science of early childhood development. National Academy Press.
Signal-Perspectives in Infant Mental Health Articles Revisited: A Paper by Daniel Siegel, The Developing Mind: Toward a Neurobiology of Interpersonal Experience, from The Signal (1998).
Sroufe, L. A., Cicchetti, D., & Beeghly, M. (1990). The self in transition: Infancy to childhood (1st ed.). University of Chicago Press.
Van der Kolk, B. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind and Body in the Healing of Trauma (1st ed.). Penguin Books.
Wallin, D. (2007). Attachment in Psychotherapy (1st ed.). The Guilford Press.
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