For most of us, we tend to be adults once we learn that we have Complex-PTSD. And as adults slammed with this diagnosis, we also tend to be busy handling our adult responsibilities. We have jobs, home maintenance, errands to run, and if we have kids, we have even more adult responsibilities. We certainly want to heal our trauma but we face the great conundrum, how to make room in our life for healing those past wounds. Add to it how not all of us have access to therapy. Then we start to worry, “Will I ever heal these childhood wounds?”
Well, relax. On this site, my targeted audience are for those whose health insurance does not cover mental health, or you have been once bitten, twice shy by a bad therapist. Because while there are great therapists out there, bad ones also exist. So, as the wrap-up article in this series (I will link the others at the end) on healing fundamentals, let’s explore what it means to heal and why it’s so important.
Doing Life vs. Living Life
Trauma keeps us stuck in just “doing life” (survival) such as juggling the job, home maintenance, etc.. Obviously, we must survive by doing life before we can experience living life (enjoying life). But particularly for childhood trauma survivors, we are unsure what living life means. Does it mean going out and partying? Or maybe it means relaxing in front of the television? While doing pleasurable activities responsibly and without excess are great ways for recharging our batteries, there are ways we can make room in our life for healing while we are living life. The trick is living life via reparenting.
Don’t worry, I’m not talking about wrapping a blanket around yourself while holding a stuffed animal close to your chest. (Not this time, at least.) What I mean is using the basic rights that were denied you in child development.
- Explore: Where would you like to go? What is it you would like to do? Unsure? Then just observe until until you find something. Or proceed to number 2 and then see if you can explore.
- Curiosity: What about your world makes you curious? Make a list of things you have always wanted to try and then find one thing on that list that’s worth learning more about. Bonus if you can interact with it.
- Hobbies/Interests: Discover something you enjoy doing and dare to find others who also enjoy it. Learn from them and dare to let your skill level develop.
That’s it? Well yes, how else do you think our peers found their cliques (tribes) and explored what they wanted to be when they grew up?
“But I never felt like I belonged anywhere and I’m still not fully sure of who I am.”
Let me assure you that this is the normal result of being raised in an abnormal environment. When raised by Cluster B disorders (Trauma Glossary 1) our curiosity was thwarted and we couldn’t explore ourselves and the world like other children. That’s because our parents were forcing us into a role of who they wanted us to be instead of allowing us to be ourselves and know ourselves without shame. And so, naturally we have all these experiences that “confirm” we are an island unto ourselves. But we only believe we are fatally flawed because we never had the freedom to get to know ourselves. That’s why exploration, curiosity, and finding a special interest, nurturing it and sharing it with others is a great way of teaching our system that it is now free.
Because in case this is your first time hearing this, trauma impacts more than just our cognitive programming. It also impacts our nervous system, body, and brain chemistry. It’s our biological science that tends to be the last to get the memo that we are finally safe. And our science is also the reason we can’t just snap our fingers and adapt better cognitive beliefs. And so, we have to teach our system new experiences so that we can eventually escape what I like to call, our trauma matrix.
5 Habits Worth Developing That Will Accelerate Your Healing
The more we practice these five habits, the more we help our system get the message.
Support System (friends, support groups, etc.) Each time we practice being seen and heard, we stimulate the VVC (half of the Vagus Nerve). This also helps our dopamine and oxytocin.
Rest is important for melatonin. Good sleep is good for GABA, dopamine, and serotonin.
Nutrition because the same hormones that impact our mental health also impact our physical health. Amino acids, Vitamins B & D, Omega-3, and tryptophan, just to name a few!
Exercise because it stimulates the vagus nerve, ANS, dopamine, and endorphins. It’s also somatic work, how we can use our own bodies to contradict or master how we felt in our original trauma.
Incentive and Reward because each time we celebrate our little wins or appreciate a positive encounter, we build confidence and trust. This helps our entire system!
Sometimes life happens and we can’t maintain these five habits. For example, some of us are prone to nightmares or insomnia and that renders quality sleep impossible. Or we are grieving a major loss and our energy is too low for exercising or eating healthy. That’s okay. Be kind and patient with yourself as you work through the problem. See the 5 Habits as goals after you work through whatever problems are holding you back.
Memory Work for the Win
Remember when earlier I said that one of our major problems is that we have all these negative experiences that “confirm” our childhood programming? The human brain is wired for remembering the bad memories more than the good ones. It helped our species survive when it was more important to remember dangerous areas to avoid than a tribe member who complimented our stone carving. Our brains still function the same as they had in primitive times. So, childhood trauma causes our brain to remember the negative experiences and forget the positive ones. You would be surprised by the positive feedback you are currently experiencing and the number of small wins that can easily add up to bigger wins over time if only you weren’t forgetting them.
So, by taking the time to record your experiences with the fifth habit (incentive and reward) you are helping yourself remember these little wins and positive encounters. You don’t have to write a thesis on your day, just single line notations on each positive experience. Just enough to help jar your memory as you reflect on the week. By the end of the week, we tend to forget the happenings at the beginning of the week. So, by reviewing your notations of the week, you will be suddenly reminded of it and think, “Oh yes! I forgot this good experience took place.” If you can make room in your life for this one, you’re on the fast-track for developing your confidence and self-esteem.
If You Can Spare One Hour a Week, You Can Make Room in Your Life for Healing
How to make room in your life for healing is easier than you think. For starters, if you can spare one hour a week for healing, you are already making room in your life. Think about it, therapy sessions for us tend to be once a week for one hour. So, one hour a week for self-therapy time is ample. However, if you can’t spare one hour a week, it might be a good idea to review what’s overtaxing your life right now and what sort of adjustments you can make for yourself. We all need breaks and none of us are super-human. And not all healing work has to feel like actual work. After all, self-care is also part of our healing “work”.
What sort of healing work or self-care should we do in one hour? It’s all up to you. If reflecting on your week isn’t your thing, the other articles in this series on healing fundamentals may give you ideas. Five articles in all. Why so many? Because when we first embark on our healing journey, it’s daunting enough.
Make Room in Your Life Using Other Articles in This Series
First in this series is your “starter pack” so that you have a foundation in place. From Pete Walker’s book, to answering the no contact question – “should I or shouldn’t I?” What you should know before choosing a therapist and how you can still heal when therapy is not an option. That article is (here).
Next is understanding the overall “landscape” of the journey itself and why it takes longer than we would like. The abuses our parents inflicted on us have taught us to perpetuate those same abuses on ourselves. There’s a list of cognitive distortions we tend to have and it’s why we must practice self-compassion and patience with ourselves. It also explains the importance of self-discovery in our healing and why self-improvement thinking is dangerous when we already lack confidence and self-esteem. That article is (here).
The human connection has been reiterated as important healing work in itself. You might be interested in understanding why. Interpersonal trauma, why childhood trauma survivors have a harder time recovering when other people hurt us. It creates a “confirmation bias” in our programming (our cognitive distortions). That’s why many of us tend to isolate but that’s the worst thing we can do for our healing. That article is (here).
Mindfulness, grounding, and the window of tolerance. Why all trauma survivors despise mindfulness and how we can make it more palatable. That article is (here).
Finally, finding the right tools for your unique needs. All tools and trauma-informed therapies can be beneficial. But until we are open to them, they tend to be the right tool at the wrong time. I break down the main therapies and tools, what each is for, and how to know if you are ready (or not) for them. That article is (here).