S1:E1 What is trauma?

Cristina Ally, LMHC, will discuss the question - What is trauma?

In this episode, we will cover: 

1. Definition of trauma 
2. Signs of trauma

Resources 

• American Psychological Association - www.apa.org
• Bessel Van Der Kolk - www.besselvanderkolk.com
• Peter Levine - www.traumahealing.org
• The Art of Flourishing podcast hub - www.theartofflourishing.co 

Please remember this podcast is intended for educational purposes and is not intended to be a substitute for professional mental health guidance. I do urge you to seek professional help + guidance in your trauma recovery if any of this material resonates with you.

I acknowledge that each of you comes to this podcast with your own unique life experiences. It is fair for us to remind listeners that today’s episode will include content that may be triggering for trauma survivors, so listeners please be emotionally prepared ahead of time, as the content may be difficult to hear. Please remember you always have the option to step away and return when/if you are ready. 

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A podcast from Flourish Counseling Co. | www.flourishcounseling.co

Chapters

• 0:00 Welcome
• 0:30 Intro
• 3:45 Definition of Trauma
• 12:08 Signs of Trauma
• 16:39 Outro

Transcript

FINAL What is trauma - 2-23-24, 7.33 PM
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[00:00:00] Cristina Ally, LMHC: Welcome to the Art of Flourishing, a mental health and trauma recovery podcast. I'm your host, Christina Ali, a licensed mental health counselor and owner of Flourish Counseling Co. We're so glad you decided to tune in today, so let's get started.

[00:00:30] Well welcome to the first episode of The Art of Flourishing. I'm so excited to have some time with you guys today to kick off our podcast and really get this going. I have lots of things that are floating in my mind to share, so hopefully I'll be able to condense. All of my thoughts into amazing episodes and really look forward to, uh, sharing so many of these things that I share in session with you guys here, uh, on the podcast.

[00:00:57] So yeah, today, the [00:01:00] first thing that we're going to be talking about, the first topic, I thought it was appropriate. We're going to talk about trauma. What is trauma? What is the definition? How can we actually. Succinctly define trauma, there's so many definitions, so we're going to go through three various definitions, two, uh, semi formal definitions and then my kind of definition and what I see, um, in sessions and kind of how I explain it.

[00:01:26] We'll go through some of the signs that you might have trauma, so some of the things that might pop up that are indicative that you have something that you may need to continue working on or something that might be stuck in your psyche. I think that's going to be a great place for us to start today.

[00:01:43] Like I said, I have a lot of things rolling around in my head to share about trauma, but today I think going through the definition of trauma and some of the signs of trauma is a great place for us to start. So this is a, an educational podcast. I want to make sure that you guys [00:02:00] understand that. I am a big, huge proponent of personal and individualized psychotherapy.

[00:02:06] So if any of this content today resonates with you, please understand that this isn't my intention to replace your therapy, your therapist. There is so much value in this psycho education, and there's so much value in seeking help from a mental. Um, health practitioner in your area, no matter what country you're in, no matter what state you're in, make sure that you are finding somebody that is trained in your area.

[00:02:34] I do urge you to seek that mental health help, but that's just kind of a side note. And then also, of course, this is a trauma recovery podcast. It wouldn't be fair for me to start talking about trauma without a trigger warning. So I just want to make sure that you guys understand we're going to be talking about.

[00:02:51] Hard topics today. I fully acknowledge that each of you come into this trauma recovery podcast for various reasons, but [00:03:00] some of you are coming in because you want to heal from trauma and having that in mind, I want to remind you that today's topics might be difficult to hear and. Just the therapist in me has to, has to remind you that you have the option to step away.

[00:03:17] You have choice in this. You don't have to listen, but also just be prepared emotionally. This is going to be a little bit more of a hard topic. So if you already had a hard day, you're already going through something, I would say, let's set this aside and hop in at a different time. Okay. I think that's all of our housekeeping stuff.

[00:03:37] So I am ready to hop into the definition of trauma. Are you? Let's go. So the first thing I want to make sure that we talk about, of course, as I said, is a formal, semi formal definition of trauma, and the Oxford Dictionary is where I figured we'd start. The Oxford Dictionary defines trauma as a [00:04:00] deeply distressing or disturbing phenomenon.

[00:04:02] Experience. And I emphasize that word experience. As we talk about trauma, that word experience is going to be increasingly important. That right there is everything. So the experience, a deeply distressing or disturbing experience. It was simple but effective. All right, https: otter. ai official definition, which is the American Psychological Association.

[00:04:30] The APA is what they normally refer to themselves as, uh, there's APA. org, which is a great resource and website if you're interested. In some of these trauma topics and or some articles that are empirically validated, um, the APA is a great resource, but the APA and its most basic definition describes trauma.

[00:04:55] As an emotional response to a [00:05:00] terrible event. Thank you, APA. The terrible event is not the trauma. The emotional response is the trauma. So let's kind of, I want, I want to take some time with this definition to sort of parse out the difference between a terrible event and our emotional response. So in sessions, I will always emphasize this trauma is not.

[00:05:24] What has happened. Trauma is actually our perception or our feelings of what happened. Does that make sense? I hope that that makes sense. Trauma is such a big buzzword these days. I'm not trying to make everything trauma. That is not my intention. That cheapens the experience for both the trauma survivor and trauma experts or trauma therapists.

[00:05:47] But what I am trying to say is we cannot. Compare objectively apples to apples. It's more like apples to oranges with everybody's experience, because let's take a [00:06:00] car accident, for example, that is a traumatic event that is an objectively traumatic event. However, as we look at somebody having a trauma response.

[00:06:10] to a car accident, not everybody that goes through a car accident is going to be traumatized. There are so many factors that will impact somebody's processing in an event. So it is not so much what happens, but how we respond to what happens. So I use this as an example, the circus. Let's just say we all went to the circus.

[00:06:31] Let's go hang out. Everybody's sitting down. We have different views of the same show. And after the show, we leave. And I say, you know, I really loved the elephants. Did you see how great those elephants were? And they said, what? There were no elephants. I didn't see any elephants. And it was because there was something that was blocking their view.

[00:06:51] Right? So we have one event with many experiences. And as I look at trauma, especially in [00:07:00] families, we have to understand that. Everybody is going to experience that same event in a different way than the other person. Again, the circus example, we both were at the same show, but we had different views. So one event, many experiences.

[00:07:17] That's why I love this APA definition because it really does highlight that trauma is an emotional response to a terrible event. Trauma is, in other words, our seat. at that terrible event. It's our perception of that terrible event. So I really love that. Thank you, Oxford. Thank you, APA. When I'm working with trauma, one of the best ways that I have found to describe trauma is when we perceive no choice and no voice.

[00:07:46] And again, that word perception is such a big deal because perception is everything. Perception is our reality. And I say that because that is how we inform our [00:08:00] emotional responses is through our perception. Bessel van der Kolk, he's a traumatologist, and I absolutely, absolutely love him. One of the things that he says that I find to be so valuable is he says, I'll say this twice because you need a second for it to sink in emotions never defy logic because emotions assign value to experience and experience is the basis of our logic.

[00:08:30] It's private logic, but it's logic. I told you I'm going to say it again. Okay. So emotions. Never defy logic, emotions assign value to experience, and those experiences become the basis of our logic. So we have in each of our psyches, This mishmash experience that we have put together in our [00:09:00] brains, and in some way, shape, or form until we revisit those beliefs, those perceptions, those experiences, that will stay stuck in our psyche, and that's what I deal with every day.

[00:09:13] I'm trying to figure out where did somebody get stuck in their psyche? Where are they stuck in that emotional response? Where are they still? Reliving that emotional response or belief in the world and living that out through their own private logic. Again, that's why counseling many times, we can't help you find the answer because the answer has to be subjective.

[00:09:36] That answer in many ways has to be based on your experience, your emotion, your perceptions. A good therapist will help you to figure out where you're stuck or where you feel you're stuck. And help you move through that. That is our job. So the way that I define trauma, again, no choice, no voice. It is our perception of the event, which brings me to [00:10:00] this point.

[00:10:01] Please don't compare your trauma apples to apples. A lot of times, especially with people who are seemingly well adjusted in life, maybe their physical needs were taken care of, but there was maybe some emotional neglect or abandonment, which we see this in maybe. Higher socioeconomic status and or middle class upper middle class families where the physical needs were met, but everybody's like, well, you were so pampered.

[00:10:26] You had everything you needed. And how could you be traumatized? Don't you're not traumatized. Well, let's just look at that person's life experience and how is their emotional response to that? emotional abandonment or neglect, how is that impacting their life? How are you, as somebody who's outside of their life, going to judge if that was traumatic response or not?

[00:10:50] Please don't compare your trauma. That is damaging to everybody. That's damaging to other survivors. That's damaging to people who are trying [00:11:00] to heal from their trauma. Can we please just make space for everybody's experiences? And, and acknowledge and say, I'm sorry, that was hard for you. I do think that there is a lot of benefit and value in just making room for other people's experience.

[00:11:16] So that is kind of my soapbox on trauma, the definition of trauma. Trauma is. Absolutely a subjective experience. It is not an objective, um, definition. We saw that through my experience. It's the perception of no choice, no voice. The APA says that's an emotional response to a terrible event. How is that objective?

[00:11:38] It is not. And even the Oxford dictionary saying it's a deeply distressing or disturbing experience that is also subjective. So trauma is subjective. Absolutely. It is a personal experience. And when we look at trauma, that is what I want to emphasize in this podcast, as we're starting off, you may or [00:12:00] may not have trauma, but it is your personal experience.

[00:12:03] I give you permission to define if you have trauma or not. So let's go to the signs of trauma. All right. Well, you've made it through the definition. Let's check out some of those signs. Feeling unsafe. Even though you are safe is absolutely a sign of trauma, um, engaging in harmful behaviors, um, we might have anger or aggression.

[00:12:28] We see this, especially in children who don't know how to express their traumatic experience. We kind of default instead of feeling the helplessness and sadness, we'll default to that secondary emotion of anger or aggression in order to protect ourselves. Anger, that aggression is normally a response to help us protect ourselves in a boundary violation or a perceived threat, danger, or when we're feeling that vulnerability or sadness, anger becomes an amazing tool for us to [00:13:00] use, but we can kind of get stuck in the maladaptive or unhelpful anger at times.

[00:13:06] So feeling hopeless or helpless, being hyper aroused. What we mean by that is sort of your senses are keyed up. So we're kind of feeling like our startle response might be a bit keyed up, or we might feel like a deer in headlights at times. So that hyper arousal is our senses sort of being heightened because at any moment we, um, Our body and brain might be expecting something coming, which leads me to our next symptom, which is hypervigilance.

[00:13:41] Hypervigilance is when we start to feel in our bodies like something bad is coming, and so we're constantly looking for Something to go wrong, or we're constantly looking for that threat. [00:14:00] Peter Levine, who is another amazing traumatologist, he says that we always try to localize the threat, and that is part of why trauma survivors Engage in hypervigilant behavior is because we're trying to see where the threat is coming from.

[00:14:17] We're trying to localize it. I thought that was such a great example and hyper arousal and hypervigilance can tend to be sort of like siblings. You know, they're similar, but different. Let's go to the next one. Okay. So having trouble managing your emotions. Your emotions might just feel overwhelming at times.

[00:14:37] And maybe part of the overwhelm is that for you, it might not even make sense because there might be these triggers that happen and you're not sure why that's happening. And so we can tend to feel, and this is another sign. Overwhelmed, confused, or depressed that something just feels wrong that can also be really [00:15:00] confusing and overwhelming and we might struggle with depression and we're like, I don't, I don't know why I had everything that I needed, but you did physically, but did you emotionally and so again, you know, There is some objectively traumatic events like we use that car accident as an example, but at the same time, there are some other things that can be subjectively traumatizing because remember, trauma is subjective.

[00:15:25] Trauma is a personal experience. So one of the last things that I'll give you in terms of signs is our inability to. Uh, experience a future or imagine a future for ourselves. And what we call that is a foreshortened future. Um, what we want our lives to look like. We have trouble crafting that for ourselves.

[00:15:48] And so sometimes that can be a sign of trauma. Now, this is not an exhaustive list of trauma. This is not, or signs of trauma. This is not. Intended to be, [00:16:00] uh, if you have any of these things like hopelessness or depression, anger, that you are a traumatized person, but these are some of the things that could lead us to understand a little bit better your experience.

[00:16:16] Trauma response. These are signs and symptoms that absolutely can help us put together this picture of what are you struggling with? We have to know what is going wrong in order to understand what we need to make right. So, I think that that's probably a good place for us to stop today. I went through the definition and some of the signs of trauma, and I'd love to take some time in future episodes to cover any other things that you guys might have as questions about trauma.

[00:16:51] So in future episodes, I would love to cover what you guys have questions about. In terms of trauma, trauma recovery, mental [00:17:00] health. So any of your questions can actually be submitted either through the comments. If you're listening on our YouTube podcast, or if you are listening on your favorite podcasting platform in the description box, there is a link to a form.

[00:17:15] Where you can submit a question and that will help me as your podcast host to collect those topics and really kind of dig into the topics that I'm hearing the most about. Um, okay, well, I'm so glad that you were able to join. me today for a chat about trauma basics, the definition of trauma, and some of the signs of trauma.

[00:17:40] Again, I didn't even go through an exhaustive list, but this is just kind of a one on one. We'll get a little bit deeper into some of those topics like PTSD, acute stress, ambient or developmental trauma. Guys, we have some good stuff coming, so I want you to definitely subscribe, tune in. We will absolutely, [00:18:00] um, hopefully cultivate this community where we can kind of have this ebb and flow of what are you needing to hear?

[00:18:05] What do I want to share? Let's do this together. Let's do it. I am very passionate about educating the public on mental health, and this is something that I felt I could contribute to the general wellbeing for the public. I hope that if you found this podcast helpful, that you will not only subscribe, but share this with somebody, share this mental health.

[00:18:27] Information with somebody who could benefit. I really want to make sure that we connect. So yeah, you can join me at the art of flourishing. co. That is a website we are currently developing, but right now you can check out our links for our social media, for our YouTube and. This podcast. So, uh, eventually we'll have a bunch of the different show resources, affiliate links and different things, but right now we're just getting it started.

[00:18:51] So join us there. And I hope to connect with you in the future. Don't forget to submit your questions to that D box and [00:19:00] I'll see you next time. Thanks for listening. And as always, happy healing.