Living in a traumatised mind means that your everyday reactions aren’t always about the present.
More often than not, for traumatised individuals now in a safe environment, we are frequently being triggered back to a time that wasn’t safe. And your body responds accordingly in a heroic attempt to save you.
This can be somatic: muscles tightening without you realising, headaches and nausea or restlessness for example. Or display emotionally, filling you with an overwhelming sense of fear as your sympathetic nervous system cranks up its fight or flight response (freeze, fawn, submit, attach also). Sometimes it can be both.
For me, that often leads to impulsive, irrational behaviour as I try and get myself out of that panicked state – my mind and body senses immediate danger. Afterwards, when my nervous system has downregulated, I’m left with a mess I have to clear up and confusion at why I reacted in such a knee jerk way.
My gorgeous, wonderful body has built up a supersonic defence system. It’s very good at what it does, I’ll give it that. (How heroic are you for looking after yourself like that?!). BUT.
It doesn’t realise that I am safe now. I am not being threatened, but triggered.
In learning this, I have developed a ‘Regulation Station’. An emergency list that I can go to for all the great things that will help my nervous system regulate itself until I can see the situation more clearly.
Fighting against the biological urge to ‘GET OUT NOW’ is a very very hard thing to do. But it’s a huge step to living a life that doesn’t feel quite so impossible.
What’s at your regulation station?
LYL xoxoxo