What is trauma, and how does it impact our health?
What is trauma?
Trauma occurs when an individual experiences something scary, and doesn’t have a safe space, the support, or adequate resources to deal with it during or after it happens. An accumulation of unprocessed trauma and the associated, often maladaptive, coping mechanisms can colour every single thought, interaction and behaviour an individual has, until they are able to start healing.
An accumulation of unprocessed trauma and the associated, often maladaptive, coping mechanisms can colour every single thought, interaction and behaviour an individual has, until they are able to start healing.
How does stress & trauma impact our mental and physical health?
Traumatic experiences typically impact the mind and body in one of two ways. In some cases, the traumatic event occurs, your switch into fight or flight mode, your heart rate spikes, and mind and body are flooded with stress hormones (adrenaline, cortisol) to help you evade the metaphorical tiger. IF said tiger is easily evaded, and then leaves you alone, your body slowly flushes out the high levels of cortisol and adrenaline from your system, your heart rate drops back down to normal, you switch out of fight or flight mode, your mind works on processing the events that just occurred, and you return to feeling normal after a a few hours, or a day or so. Sometimes in these cases you may have "flashbacks" to the scary moment, as we see in Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD.
If that metaphorical tiger is not so easily evaded, as is the case in ongoing trauma (eg: childhood trauma, an abusive relationship, chronic illness, difficult living situations, etc.), your nervous system stays in fight or flight mode in an effort to try and help you manage the ongoing traumatic experiences. Your body can stay in this state for days, months or years, but there are repercussions. Over time the high levels of stress and cortisol will decrease your mental alertness, your memory and your ability to focus. You will probably feel tired more easily or more often, you might have poor resilience to exercise, or slow recovery after your workouts. You might get colds and flus more often, or find that your digestive system is hyper-sensitive and everything you eat makes you feel gross. Your body might struggle to regulate your metabolism and hormones and you might see weight gain, an under-functioning thyroid gland, difficulty with blood sugar regulation, or a dysregulated or painful menstrual cycle. The problems are unfortunately not only limited to your body though - during the ongoing period of trauma, your mind is doing the best it can to adapt to a difficult situation. As a result, you are learning coping skills, behaviours and perspectives that help you survive or get through the events, which may not be the most beneficial coping skills or behaviours for your long-term health and wellbeing. This awful milieu of physical and mental damage as a result of ongoing challenging or traumatic experiences is what we see in chronic Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder, or cPTSD.
How do I find a trauma-informed doctor?
Looking for some trauma-informed medical support? Not sure if you should start working on your mental or physical health struggles first? I can help. I am accepting patients both in-person at my clinic in Vancouver (Mount Pleasant) and virtually (for anyone in British Columbia).
Book yourself in for a 15-minute complementary consult to ask any questions and see if we'd be a good fit.
You don't have to to do it alone.
(Finances should not be an obstacle on your journey back to health. Sliding scale pricing available.)
Book in now, or contact me to get in touch.