Thoughts on Healing

This is not medical advice, this is just a tome of personal knowledge.
I created this website to help share the knowledge I've gained in healing from complex trauma.

The DSM defines trauma as: Exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence. It does not address long term exposure to relational trauma. My own personal definition of trauma is any event that left a lasting impression on you, your self, or your nervous system. If you're still cringing about something you did in 6th grade, even if it's "not a big deal," that was a traumatic experience for you and would benefit from healing attention.
Like many families, my family has a great deal of trauma in it. What I once thought and had been taught were genetics and generational curses turned out to be primarily trauma related. My parents did the best they could with what they had emotionally but that left a lot to be desired. I experienced primarily emotional abuse growing up, but also experienced sexual, physical, and spiritual abuse. I then made a great deal of questionable decisions as an adult because I was experiencing deep mental health issues and wasn't taught the skills necessary to make better decisions. I caused myself and others harm and had to heal from the harm I caused as well.
As a young adult I was diagnosed with a constellation of issues, including major depression, bipolar II, and ADHD. I was prescribed a plethora of antidepressants, anti epileptics, stimulants and anti-psychotics over the years. My first Prozac prescription came at the tender age of 13. At no point did anyone suggest that I should consider trauma as a root cause of my issues. I think this was in part due to being from an upper middle class white family, where from the outside, everything looked ideal.
Approximately 10 years ago I found the book The Body Keeps the Score by Bessel Van Der Kolk and it changed my life. I've spent the last 10 years exploring various modalities of healing as described in this list.

  1. Time to Heal

    If you were raised in a traumatized family, you’ve effectively been in an abusive relationship your whole life. It won’t heal from a single treatment/session/book It will take years. It will feel cyclical at times. Bigger things will come up once your body learns it is safe, so it will feel like stepping back, but it isn’t. It WILL get better and you WILL get stronger with every step you take on your healing journey.
    * Reminder - rock bottom is really solid footing to walk on.

  2. Reading the books and web resources on the lists of this site to gain knowledge

    I recommend going with what sticks out to you. While I started with The Body Keeps The Score, I don't really remember what order I read the rest, I tended to go with what seemed interesting to me at the time. Sometimes I read 2 pages and came back 2 years later to finally get into the book. Go with what helps you most.

  3. EMDR

    Find an EMDR therapist here
    EMDR is a trauma therapy modality that doesn't require much talking. It is particularly useful for trauma that you don't have words for. Repeated images, sensations, thoughts and negative statements, can all be dealt with via EMDR even if you can't explain them in words. My layman's description is that it uses bilateral stimulation (moving your eyes back and forth, listening to a tone that moves from side to side, or holding small devices that vibrate) to keep both sides of your brain online so that trauma can be reprocessed into normal memories. I did several years of work with a therapist in office and eventually learned to DIY. Do NOT recommend DIY unless you genuinely know what you’re doing. 
    - If you do not resonate with EMDR, please consider investigating work with a Somatic Experiencing or Internal Family Systems therapist. They've not been part of my journey but they're proven trauma therapy methods I've seen help others in my life.

  4. Make sure your physical health/gut/hormones are in good shape

    If you're malnourished, dealing with GI issues, or your hormones are off you’re going to feel poorly no matter what you do. Don’t let your PCP tell you you’re fine if you’re not fine. If you're getting towards perimenopause, good HRT specialists are life savers if you’re having an issue. Men can also suffer from hormone imbalances, so consider ensuring your testosterone is at a healthy level.
    - Sometimes symptoms really are somatic so #3 (EMDR) is for that. 
    - Learning to advocate for myself medically was part of this journey and involved some EMDR.
    - Magnesium L Threonate, 5HTP, Evening Primrose Oil, and Fish Oil supplements have been helpful to me getting restful sleep, please do your own research and discuss with a qualified practitioner. 

  5. Learn about dissociation and Internal Family Systems/parts.

    I think dissociation is one of the most overlooked parts of how people who have experienced complex trauma respond to life. It is critical to address this, especially if you're experiencing feeling "dead inside" or detached from life/the present/reality.

  6. Learn about problematic family dynamics and how you may be applying those to yourself internally

    This includes learning how to reparent yourself and internally developing the parenting skills you needed but missed out on. It also includes learning how you may be using poor parenting or emotional abuse tactics on yourself.
    Concepts such as boundaries, self care, cleaning a house, moving your body, eating correctly for your body are also important as you may not have been taught these skills growing up and may cause frustration. This is normal and there's lots of websites, books and YouTube channels to teach you everything you never learned.

  7. Learn about internal empathy and talking nice to yourself

    8. I don't care who you are or what you've done, you deserve empathy and you deserve to heal. You have to learn to be empathetic towards yourself and a great place to start is learning to talk kindly to yourself. I used to say horrible things to myself all the time and it didn't help, I was never once able to shame myself into healthier behavior long term. Brene Brown's books have been very helpful to me in learning this, as has Pete Walkers work.
    - Acknowledging your inner critic(s) as parts that are trying to help keep you safe can be helpful in calming angry parts or dealing with imposter syndrome.
    - Learning to identify your feelings can be very useful. The feelings wheel is a helpful place to start.
    - This is a great video on sympathy vs empathy to help learn to distinguish between the two.

  8. Connect Pelvic Floor Fitness

    Connect Pelvic Floor Fitness by Caroline Packard DPT teaches you how to breathe correctly and neuromuscular connection between breath and physical work

  9. Learn to make gratitude reflexive and focus on the good.

    10. I don’t mean this in a bypassing way, don’t bypass! Sometimes things are bad and it's completely ok to acknowledge that. However, we can get stuck in patterns of black and white thinking where we aren’t able to see the good in much of anything. I start every single morning of my life by thinking of at least 5 things I’m grateful for before I check my phone or get out of bed (start with 1 and move up if this is difficult). Even if it is as simple as “I have clean water to drink this morning” this is a powerful way to begin to rewire your brain to look for things to be grateful for and acknowledge them instead of focusing on the negative around you. This Jocko Willink podcast set to music was very helpful to me in learning to focus on the good.

  10. Recovering a connection to something larger than myself/spirituality

    This took a lot of EMDR, self forgiveness, surrender and time.
    - There are a wide variety of books on spirituality that helped me on my journey that cover a wide array of spiritual and religious traditions. I found Dr. King Jr. and Dr. Tutu had particularly wise perspectives on forgiveness and nonviolence which eventually influenced me towards Christianity.
    - Surrendering to the idea that you cannot control everything and sometimes need help is powerful in itself.

  11. Body Work/Massage Therapy

    - Myofascial release massage - lots of trauma gets stored in our fascia and can keep us in muscular/joint pain. This technique is incredible and changed my life by helping me stop jaw clenching.  
    - Craniosacral/somato-emotional release - this body/energy work helped bring out some deep seated issues that I had trouble accessing with EMDR. 
    - Ashiatsu massage - if you struggle with getting a massage that feels deep enough, this may be helpful
    - Reiki - I practice reiki on myself

  12. Acupuncture

    more freeing stuck energy, grief, etc from the body. Really helpful with insomnia IMO. 
    - ear points have been helpful to me for trauma/grief release

  13. Rebirthing breath work

    This helped release stuck emotions/energy/trauma in my body

  14. Yoga

    I personally stick with Hatha and Yin since they tend to be gentle and restorative.
    - Yin yoga is particularly useful for fascia release

  15. Somatic exercise

    Somatic exercise can help release trauma in the body and reduce cortisol
    - The Workout Witch has a variety of gentle somatic exercises available on her platform and I found them helpful to releasing stuck emotions in my body.

  16. Meditation

    Meditation took me awhile to get comfortable with and I didn't do much of it until after a significant amount of EMDR, this widely varies by person, but don't feel guilty if it's difficult for you at first.
    - Tonglen meditation was a particularly impactful form of meditation to me for finding triggers. I like this guided Tonglen track on Insight Timer.

  17. Sound Healing

    I listen to various sound healing frequency tracks on Insight Timer

  18. Plant Medicine/Hallucinogens

    I wouldn't just go this alone, consider working with an integration specialist or therapist to ensure safe experiences.

  19. Stop watching porn

    Especially if you were sexually abused and you tend to watch content that is disturbing or makes you feel ashamed about watching after. Consider reading erotic stories for a substitute.

  20. Clean up the content you watch

    Constantly exposing yourself to drama that is not a direct part of your life is unnecessary and keeps you focusing on negative experiences.