Trauma Informed Therapy

What is Trauma?

Trauma is our response to an experience that is so distressing and frightening that we become overwhelmed and unable to cope effectively. Trauma is not determined by the event or what happened but rather our experience of it. It is deeply personal and results from how our nervous system responded and recovered from a highly distressing experience. Trauma shows up in many forms and can leave lasting imprints on the mind, body, and spirit. There are three main types of trauma.

Types of Trauma

 PTSD

When trauma stems from a single overwhelming event or a series of identifiable incidents it is often referred to as Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD).

CPTSD

When trauma stems from a series of identifiable overwhelming incidents it is often referred to asComplex PTSD.

Developmental Trauma

When trauma arises from growing up in an unsafe or harmful environment, where neglect or fear was part of daily life, it is called developmental trauma. This form of trauma can shape a person’s sense of safety, trust, and self-worth well into adulthood.

What is Trauma-Informed Therapy: A Definition

Trauma-informed therapy is rooted in the awareness that healing requires more than talking about and analyzing what happened. It involves working with the body, emotions, and nervous system to release stored survival responses and restore balance.

At its foundation, trauma-informed therapy emphasizes three essentials:

1. Safety

   Healing begins when the nervous system feels grounded and secure, not overwhelmed or retraumatized. This is a primary component of trauma informed therapy that is not often understood in traditional therapy.

2. Connection

   Because trauma happens in relationship, repair and resilience also come through compassionate, supportive relationships.

3. Empowerment

   By moving stuck survival energy, individuals reclaim choice, personal power, and self-trust.

How Trauma-Informed Therapy Works: Understanding Bottom-up Healing

Unlike traditional talk therapy, trauma-informed therapy integrates mind-body approaches such as somatic therapy, EMDR, brainspotting, and bilateral stimulation. These are known as bottom-up methods because they reach deeper regions of the brain and body where trauma is held.

When we experience trauma the amygdala, often called the brain’s fear center, takes center stage. It records sensations and emotions at a raw, sensory level to help us survive. At this same time, the hippocampus, the part of the brain that tracks time, details, and context takes more of a back seat to conserve energy.  This survival response leaves sensory memories imprinted in the body and mind without clear details or narrative of the experience.

Bottom-up approaches help access and release these stored sensory memories by working directly with the nervous system. Body based techniques allow traumatic experiences to move from implicit (unconscious) memory into conscious awareness, opening space for healing, regulation, and resilience.

This differs from top-down methods which rely primarily on analysis, logic and retelling the story. These methods are valuable for bringing insight, but insight alone does not lead to trauma healing. Often this leads to feeling like understanding what happened should allow you to ‘get over it’, be positive or just stop being bothered by it. But trauma doesn’t work that way. It takes over your nervous system and overrides parts of the brain that allow you to feel calm and connected. You can’t talk you way out of trauma.

Ultimately, trauma-informed therapy is not only about reducing symptoms. It is about helping people feel safe in their own bodies again, repair broken trust, and reconnect with their innate strength and worth. It is a path that moves survivors from surviving to thriving and restoring balance, authenticity, and wholeness.

Understanding Trauma Triggers

If you’ve experienced childhood trauma or had painful past events, you know these experiences don’t just stay in the past.  They can live on in the mind, body, and nervous system impacting how you think and feel every day. It might show up as feeling high-strung, anxious, depressed, distrusting, self-doubting, agitated, checked out or a sense of ‘meh’ that won’t go away. Unhealed sensory trauma memories often are the culprit of mental health issues and life dissatisfaction.

Trauma sensitizes the nervous system so that it is ready to protect or defend at any time. Triggers are anything that feels remotely familiar or similar to the original experience, can reactivate emotional and physical pain. Until we access and heal the stored trauma memories they will continue to get activated with trauma triggers. Once we access them and allow them to be fully seen, felt and heard we free up this stress on the nervous system. This allows the nervous system to deal with the present not just protecting us from the past. Mind body approaches are essential to accessing and healing stored trauma memories.

3 Trauma Informed Therapy Techniques

1. Brainspotting

   Brainspotting is a powerful, mind body therapy developed by Dr. David Grand that helps you process and heal trauma and emotional distress. It works by focusing on specific eye positions and body sensations associated with the trauma or distressing experience. It helps access where unresolved trauma is stored in the brain and body. It supports the body and mind’s natural ability to release, rebalance and heal.

   Brainspotting therapy is effective in treating trauma, anxiety, depression, performance issues, OCD, addictions and other mental health issues. It can be used in conjunction with other approaches such as somatic therapy, EMDR, and CBT.

2. EMDR Therapy

   Eye Movement Desensitization Reprocessing (EMDR) is an evidence-based trauma therapy developed by Dr. Francine Shapiro. EMDR uses bilateral stimulation such as tapping, eye movements or sound to help the brain access and reprocess stored trauma, unresolved emotions and stuck memories.

   It has been shown to be effective in treating depression, anxiety, OCD, PTSD, developmental trauma and other stress related conditions. It allows you to move beyond the pain of difficult experiences with a greater sense of resilience and freedom.

3. Somatic Therapy

   Somatic therapy is a body centered approach that helps release trauma, stress, and unresolved emotional tension. Through a combination of body awareness, breathing, mindfulness and talking, somatic therapy supports the nervous system to release trauma and return to greater balance. Somatic therapy helps you reconnect with your natural ability to release, heal, restore and regulate.  Somatic therapy can be combined with other therapies such as EMDR and Brainspotting to help heal from trauma and other mental health issues.