You’ve been knocked down by the negative thoughts and feelings following something scary and unimaginable.

There are many times in life that can cause people to feel traumatized. Trauma can be triggered by moments where your life is being threatened, when you’ve witnessed a disastrous event, or been neglected of love. Trauma causes people to feel less-than, broken, and undeserving.  The guilt and shame of what happened to you causes physical changes and uncontrollable emotions.

PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) usually occurs when an individual suffers a single traumatic event, such as a serious traffic accident, a traumatic medical experience, or an instance of assault. C-PTSD (complex post-traumatic stress disorder) usually occurs when significant trauma happens at a young age, involving someone close to you, or involving persistent amounts of trauma. CPTSD events include abuse/neglect as a child, ongoing domestic violence, repeated exposure and witnessing of violence, and the torture of having to see your abuser on a regular basis.

You’re living proof that time does not heal all wounds!

For a while you were able to push the pain and memories deep inside. You worked hard to strive for a life beyond your past. Emotions were ignored and ridiculed as a crutch to embrace failure or an excuse to behave badly. Your efforts were recognized at work for being a top performer yet you were never able to appreciate the success.

You had it all together and even enjoyed life a bit. Out of nowhere, you are shocked. You no longer experience life as yours, and everything seems slow. You feel on edge, unable to relax, and you overreact. You live in a fog and cannot shake the looming grey cloud that follows you.

You didn’t realize it at the time, but you got triggered. Even though you are far away from the destruction of the past, the trigger sent you right back. And you feel it as your body responds like you are re-experiencing the events all over again. Your mind is unable to make a coherent thought. Your emotions and mind are at war!

The desperation for you to be able to get back to how life once was continues to grow and eat at you. You struggle to maintain jobs, friendships, and you cannot trust anyone enough to start a relationship.

It feels like everything is being swept out from under you.

​You try to silence the anxiety, run from the depression, and ignore reminders of your past by indulging in risky decisions and quick fixes to feel alive and numb the pain. But no amount of alcohol, drugs, shopping, or other dangerous behavior helps you feel like yourself again. Despite your best effort, the trauma and triggered responses remain unresolved and uncontrolled. It’s like your emotions are all over the place and trying to control them is harder than herding cats. 

Throughout the fight to regain control, you have become paralyzed, stuck in constant anxiety, despair, anger, and confusion. ​Instead of continuing to feel out of control, you want to get stronger than the anxiety and reactivity. You want to finally understand why your emotions rip through you like a category 5 tornado. 

Through therapy you will be able to realize that you, at one time, had to disconnect from your emotions to survive your traumatic experiences. As you attempt to experience the good in life, you want to not be overrun by the negativity. Trauma focused therapy can help you build the emotional capacity to experience emotions in a controlled way.

​You ready to put the past where it belongs?