Trauma is a blanket term that covers different stressful events from an accident to ongoing anxiety from childhood. Trauma can make someone feel helpless or overwhelmed during their everyday life.
It isn't easy to cope with trauma. When a person suffers from trauma, the brain holds on to these memories and stores them away. Sensory inputs trigger these memories. These sensory inputs include smell, sight, or hearing.
Many believe they can tuck away trauma into the deep recesses of their brain, but if the trauma is left untreated, it can lead to anxiety, depression, phobias, and other mental health issues. Trauma can also lead to physical problems such as fatigue, high blood pressure, or gastrointestinal issues. Let's take a look at some of the different categories of trauma that someone could suffer from and ways to treat them.
Childhood Trauma
Seeing or being the victim of a traumatic event can scar a child for life. These events can be frightening or violent, primarily if the trauma stems from someone the child believed would keep them safe. Trauma can come in the form of bullying to a car accident. Unfortunately, a lot of childhood trauma can come from inside the family unit itself with domestic violence or even physical abuse.
Not treating childhood trauma can lead to challenging and difficult adulthood. Childhood can affect different aspects of adulthood from who they engage in relationships with to where they end up living. If childhood trauma is left untreated, it may lead to mental health issues that could have them end up in jail or mental health centers. The worst part about childhood trauma is that the sensory inputs can never go away if left untreated. Touch, smell, or sounds could trigger physiological responses like an increased heart rate or an overactive fight-or-flight response.
Emotional Trauma
Childhood trauma can go hand-in-hand with emotional trauma, but not all emotional trauma is childhood trauma. Post-traumatic stress disorder (or PTSD) is a form of psychological trauma that can get triggered by various sensory inputs. Those who have PTSD have issues functioning daily, as the smallest stimuli can trigger symptoms.
Many people attribute PTSD to the military, but anyone can develop PTSD, including children and teenagers. An event can be traumatic for anyone from a natural disaster to domestic violence. Even the sudden death of a family member can cause PTSD in a person. It's normal for someone to struggle with an upsetting event. PTSD can lead to getting startled easily, mood issues, high blood pressure, difficulty sleeping, or even violent behavior.
Head Trauma
Not all trauma is mental or emotional. Trauma can be physical, as well. Damage to the head, skull, or brain causes head trauma. Many times, head trauma can lead to a concussion. A concussion is a brain injury that occurs after taking a hit to the head. The scary part about a concussion is symptoms may not show for days or weeks. Symptoms of a concussion are headaches, fatigue, confusion, or nausea.
Keep in mind that head trauma doesn't just mean a brain injury. It can be a lesion on the scalp, a crack in the skull, or other physical injuries. Those who survive severe trauma can suffer from hypoxia, low blood pressure, or swelling.
These different types of trauma don’t have to go untreated. There are some non-invasive alternatives to help.
Talk Therapy
There are talk therapists who focus solely on trauma. Talk therapists can help children avoid mental health issues, addiction, or other health problems that can arise from untreated childhood trauma.
Psychotherapy (another word for talk therapy) can help someone who suffers from PTSD process their emotional trauma. Finally, psychotherapy and cognitive behavioral therapy can help with acute or chronic pain following the recovery process after head trauma.
Craniosacral Therapy
Finally, craniosacral therapy is one of the best non-invasive treatments for trauma as it focuses on releasing past trauma from your system. Craniosacral therapy helps the body’s natural ability to heal itself.
If the body is having issues healing its own physical or emotional stress, then the gentle hands of a craniosacral therapist can guide the body in the right direction. Craniosacral therapy focuses on the body as well as the mind. The deep sense of relaxation you feel during the craniosacral therapy session can help the pain, emotions, and trauma flow as the healing fluids run through the body.