Are You Carrying the Pain Of the Past Within You?
If you’re considering trauma therapy, chances are you have tried everything you can to escape the past, only to have it continue disrupting your life in complex ways.
You might wake up with a dull, pervasive sense of dread or find yourself avoiding
places, situations, or even imagery that connect with the past. Perhaps all you want is to feel balanced and able to enjoy daily life.
Trauma Doesn’t Stop at Fear and Worry
At its core, trauma is like a bruise that life keeps bumping into. That’s why you may find yourself easily agitated and frustrated by little things—like getting angry when someone seems inconsiderate or when your child doesn’t follow directions completely.
Maybe you feel bad because you recognize this behavior, sometimes even as it’s happening, but feel powerless to course correct. So…you end up withdrawing from loved ones or thinking, "I’m not lovable" or "I'm not worthy of happiness."
All the while, anxiety is churning in the background, robbing you of the sleep, patience, and emotional flexibility you so desperately need. That’s why therapists frequently describe trauma as a vicious cycle.
Fortunately, it is possible to interrupt those unhealthy patterns and heal in ways that transcend merely finding relief. By leveraging the strengths, wisdom, and resilience that have kept you alive thus far, trauma and PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) therapy can help you heal, imagine new possibilities, and thrive as you move forward.
For Many, Trauma is an Invisible Wound
All of us experience highly stressful situations, but sometimes those experiences leave a bruise—a sore spot we end up carrying throughout our lives.
Those sore spots often stem from childhood. Maybe you endured bullying, abuse, or the death of a loved one (including pets)—or maybe it involved parental infighting, substance abuse, or mental health issues in the family.
Like a bruise, few can see it, but you can feel it each time something grazes it. This pain can be overwhelming and might look to others like anger or sadness, but inside, it's about feeling hurt in a tender place.
Why is it So Hard To Manage Trauma without Therapy?
Without proper training, it’s really difficult to connect the dots between past trauma and current challenges.
For instance, how might getting angry at a child for not cleaning their room relate to a parent's own experience with childhood trauma?
Maybe that early wounding involved feelings about not being heard, seen, or believed. A child’s messy room could easily hit that sore spot, but without knowing why it triggers such a profound response, the response remains automatic and unchallenged.
Working with a trauma/PTSD counselor helps you understand where the fear, negative thoughts, and overreactivity come from and how you can interrupt those patterns. Instead of always waiting for the other shoe to drop or flying off the handle, trauma counseling can help you develop healthier ways of responding to stressors that put you—and not your pain—in control.
What Are Trauma/PTSD Counseling Sessions Like?
To get started, we’ll look at the concerns that bring you into therapy and how prior experiences continue to shape, limit, or disrupt your life today. Next, I’ll provide you with practical skills for coping with anxiety, hyper-vigilance, catastrophic thinking, and other hallmark symptoms of trauma.
That usually includes some basic education on how our brains manufacture worry, even when there is no real danger, and how to lower stress levels comfortably and effectively. Then, we can explore what a particular "sore" spot is made of—the feelings and thoughts about yourself that you may be carrying as a result of early experiences.
In addition, I’ll ask you to imagine how life could be if that sore spot were much smaller or disappeared altogether. That insight is often extremely motivating because it shifts the focus from the limitations of trauma toward actively building a future that feels positive and achievable.
Some Tools Used in Trauma and PTSD Treatment
Frightening or shocking experiences tend to supercharge our freeze/flight response, so, in our early sessions, we’ll focus on helping you feel less triggered and more in control of your surroundings.
That includes exploring guided meditation, deep breathing exercises, and muscle relaxation techniques that directly communicate with the fight/flight part of the brain.
To reduce triggering in a more lasting way, we will likely use one or more of the following well-researched strategies:
· EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing). EMDR therapy utilizes eye movements or other bilateral stimulation to reduce the “size” and sensitivity of a sore spot, essentially assisting the brain in “digesting” trauma.
· CPT for PTSD (Cognitive Processing Therapy) to help you gently challenge negative beliefs about yourself—beliefs you may have unknowingly abided by for years.
· Flash Technique, an offshoot of EMDR that uses positive memories, thoughts, or images that help defend against the brain’s emotional response to a traumatic memory.
Still Have Questions or Concerns About Trauma Therapy?
I worry that working with a therapist might worsen my trauma.
Avoiding things that might prompt sadness, anger, or memories of prior events is completely natural. However, avoidance tends to create more avoidance, which causes people to miss out on fully enjoying life.
The good news is that you don't need to dwell intensely on the past to feel better, and I’ll never push you to talk about anything you’re not ready to. The real benefit of psychotherapy comes from creating a new narrative that empowers you, gives you a voice, and focuses on moving forward, not backward.
I doubt that just talking to a therapist will help my PTSD.
You’re right! But trauma and PTSD treatment involve more than just talking. Much of the important work happens between sessions as you practice new skills and new ways of responding to stressors. Techniques, such as EMDR and Cognitive Processing Therapy for PTSD, are well-researched and known to be highly effective. In fact, the more impactful the experience on your life, the more significantly you are likely to respond to trauma treatment.Learn practical techniques to manage stress and improve your overall well-being.
What if I want to try trauma counseling but money is an issue?
That’s a very real concern, and I don’t want finances to be the reason you go without support. A good first step is to contact your insurance company (or, if you prefer, authorize me to reach out) to see whether you have out-of-network benefits. After that, we can look at the numbers together. If your coverage doesn’t make sessions manageable, I’m happy to talk through adjusted rates, as I keep some reduced-fee slots.Discover constructive ways to express and manage anger, and improve your relationships.
See How Life Can Be When Fear Isn’t Holding You Back
Controlling your emotions in the face of reminders, being fully present and engaged in your life, reducing flashbacks and negative thoughts that leave you on edge—all of it is possible.
Whether you’re struggling with a recent experience, childhood trauma, or even complex PTSD, counseling truly can help you sleep better, have more energy, feel safer and more optimistic about the future – and more connected to the present and joys that life can offer.
For my clients in therapy, trauma recovery is about imagining what life could be and building upon that vision. It’s about healing and transformation.
If you are tired of missing out on some of the best things life can offer — and find yourself guarding your sore spots and worrying that the past will repeat itself—my compassionate and evidence-based approach to trauma and PTSD treatment can jump-start a major shift in your daily experience and your future.
If you would like to set up your free 30-minute phone/video consultation, call 845-305-6547 or use the contact button.
Sonia Wagner, LCSW-R, offers online and in-person trauma and PTSD psychotherapy in New City and West Nyack, NY, with virtual therapy sessions also available to those throughout States of New York and Florida.
