Trauma & Addiction Recovery Begins with "Being Gentle"

I thought I would make another post in keeping with the theme of trauma and addiction.

Trauma is much like a "3rd degree emotional burn" which can effect you long after you have "gotten out of the fire". The past does impact the present. Yet, whatever happened in your past you have survived the worst. Something about you, inside of you… a strength and perhaps sheer will to survive got you this far.

If you have had a heart attack and are still here, you have survived. If you have had trauma in your past and you are here now, you have survived it!

What is in your highest interest to create long-term health and healing for you? You cannot heal a physical burn or “emotional burn” by being brutal with yourself. It all starts with being gentle, by being aware of how your trauma experience affects you in the present.

Each time you might feel “triggered” just breathe and say to yourself: “Whew! It looks like I’m feeling a strong survival response as my body feels tensed up. It looks like I’m being triggered by something from my past. I understand this now and have choices and healthier ways of coping in the present.

I’m going to be gentle with myself and just breathe, write down what’s going on with me and what I need to do right now. It looks like I still have some healing to do and that’s ok. Disappointment is just a trigger, not a catastrophe”.

Best of health and warmest regards, Paul Radkowski

info@liferecoveryprogram.com
http://www.liferecoveryprogram.com/

Making the Shift: Trauma and Addiction

I had recently done an interview for a colleague outlining the correlation between trauma and addiction. I want to thank Michele from http://healmyptsd.com/ for the opportunity.

You can hear the entire interview in terms of how trauma is defined (it's probably not what you think) and how it impacts your beliefs, health, relationships etc.

You will learn about:
* Definition of trauma, plus its impacts
* Definition of addiction, plus how to recognize it
* Ideas for recovery

http://healmyptsd.com/2010/07/making-the-shift-trauma-and-addiction.html

Trauma is a dark, heavy energy. You will notice most children’s and adult’s drawings and depictions of trauma is usually colored in black and red.

Trauma gets encoded and stored in the body, essentially locked and frozen in a state of “survival mode”. The mind/body say’s “I don’t like what happened. I don’t ever want to experience this again and will be on red alert to make sure I don’t get as blind-sided again”.

When this happens, neural pathways and synaptic connections in the mind/body will work overtime to encode the memory, essentially to protect itself from future violation. However, that which will protect, will often imprison, i.e. getting stuck in the memory, feeling, and sensation of the trauma which I call “3rd degree emotional burn”.

The body is the sub-conscious mind. That’s why it usually takes a number of mind/body modalities like Cognitive Behavioral Therapy which alters the neuro-circuitry and challenges the core beliefs of the “world isn’t safe, can’t trust, I’m damaged etc”, which then alters the neuro-chemistry, i.e. mind/body releases feel good chemicals, growth hormones (vs. stress hormones), feeling less beat up etc.

You get more information on some of this with some of my recent blog posts http://recoveryourlife.blogspot.com/

Because the body is the sub-conscious mind, it also requires some form of energy psychology/somatic intervention, as well as addressing the sub-conscious mind (which often keeps playing out… “Don’t you try and tell me I’m safe, I know better and will continue to keep things on red alert”) through hypnosis etc.

Trauma effects us on many modalities so it often requires more than just one modality (i.e. “talk therapy”) to effectively address it.

You can download a rather comprehensive free ebook and get additional info. from http://www.liferecoveryprogram.com/

Best of health and warmest regards, Paul Radkowski

- Success is about progress, not perfection