A young woman who spent years in an abusive situation told her friend recently that she didn’t believe she was worthy of love. Too many people had hurt her in the past, and she assumed that the issue must be something about her. She felt she was simply too broken to be loved.
This is not an uncommon emotion to stem from trauma, particularly when that trauma has been prolonged over time and occurred at the hands of someone you knew and loved. The important thing to remember, however, is that you, the victim, are not the problem. You are not broken. You didn’t “deserve” it. You are worthy of so much more. But also, the way you are feeling is a very natural trauma-response.
Trauma upsets your body’s natural equilibrium. This can freeze an individual in a state of fear. But while a person may feel like they will forever be buried beneath their trauma, healing is possible. Your pain can be transformed into personal growth. The important thing to remember is that you are not broken, and all hope is not lost.
The Path to Healing
Healing takes time, and it will look different for every individual, but healing is possible when paired with the right methods and thinking patterns. A licensed therapist can help you discover which modalities for healing are most effective for you and guide you toward freedom from the emotional scars that resulted from your traumatic experience or experiences.
How can I grow after trauma?
Much study has been done on the long-term outcomes of those who suffer trauma. There is always potential for positive growth to come out of negative life circumstances. Some people need more time than others to see these positive effects, and many require the guidance of a trauma-informed therapist to help them navigate the emotional waters of a traumatic experience.
Growing After Trauma: Five Key Areas of Positive Change
How one grows after trauma will look different for every individual. But studies do show that negative experiences can spur positive change. Strength and emotional fortitude are often forged in the fires of difficult circumstances. Here are five ways in which an individual might experience positive growth after trauma:
Education: Post-trauma, an individual may have to learn how to live under a new set of life circumstances. Perhaps it is a health crisis that turned their lives upside or the death of a loved one. Maybe it was a single event that challenged their notion of safety, or a recurring set of circumstances that affected their lives. Whatever the case, someone walking through trauma must learn the truth about their life-changing event and reevaluate how they will live moving forward.
Emotional Regulation: The mind is a powerful tool. It has the power to set the course of your day. Learning to set yourself in the right frame of mind allows you to better understand and respond to the people and events that have shaped you. Meeting with a trauma therapist trained to help you reframe negative thoughts and emotions into something positive is the first step to healing from trauma. When you learn to regulate your emotions, you can face daily stressors and problems head on.
Disclosure: Learning to talk about your experiences, both negative and positive, gives you the strength to face them. This is where a therapist is beneficial to the healing process. When you learn to openly discuss the things you’ve experienced with someone you trust, you begin to pull those experiences out into the light where you can examine them for what they were and develop strategies to keep those traumatic events from dictating your emotions and actions.
Narrative Development: Working with your trauma therapist, you will begin to reshape the narrative of your life. Once you’ve openly discussed your experiences and have come to an authentic understanding of what occurred in the past, you can develop a new narrative for the future. You will find ways to imagine and shape a better future for yourself, and to walk toward that future with confidence.
Service: People grow when they serve others. Taking the pain of a traumatic experience and transforming it by helping others turns the heartache into action. With healing and time, an individual who has walked through trauma can then be the catalyst for helping someone else walk through a similar life event. This has been proven through study to lead to further healing.
The Importance of Compassionate Support
At Christian Counseling of Tampa, we believe in walking clients who have experienced trauma through the healing process step by step in a way that is individualized to each person’s unique needs and experiences. We do not take a one-size-fits-all approach but rather assess each of our clients for their individual needs. Our trauma-informed specialists are highly trained and will guide you step-by-step through the murky waters of trauma healing. Call us today to schedule your first appointment.
Read more on trauma healing in our trauma blog series!