Posts Tagged ‘trauma’
Joanne and her accident
Thursday, October 14th, 2010 by adminIt had been several months since she had gotten her car back - repaired and shiny again. However, Joanne was noticing that the panic attacks she had been having ever since the accident were getting worse, and they were happening more often.
In fact, Joanne had not been able to drive herself anywhere for the past 4 weeks because as soon as she was behind the wheel, her heart rate increased, her vision blurred, a cold sweat came over her and her breathing became difficult. When driving a car or in any circumstance this is incredibly frightening and debilitating.
She had been to her doctor who had prescribed antidepressants and he had advised in a matter of fact tone that she was having panic attacks. She didn’t find that particularly helpful because all that she wanted was to have them STOP. His suggestion for counseling was quite typical; unfortunately our family physicians are stretched to the limit and are simply not aware of all of the different options people have to aid them in their struggles. They also don’t have information or resources to be able to offer direct assistance when the person requires more specialized intervention or care, nor should they be expected to!
Joanne had heard through a friend that I might be able to offer her some options and so she came to see me (after finding someone to bring her to the office.)
I have seen a number of people who suffer through anxiety and panic attacks and some have lived with them for years. There is such a stigma around a person’s ’strength’ and ‘inability to just get over it’ that many times a person become very isolated in their embarrassment as well.
Joanne and I took some time to explore the characteristics and the different aspects of her physiological experience and her thought processes before, during and after an ‘incident’ as she referred to them. As we did so, I began pointing out similarities in her patterns to other areas of her life that she struggled with. Sometimes when we have a ‘problem’ in one area it replicates itself in another context like simple decision making or being in relationship with a ‘particular personality type’.
Joanne was grateful for the insight but from my perspective we were only beginning. I then helped her to explore some of the fundamental triggers and needs that were at the base of her panic - which for the interest of someone who has never explored in this way before, had very little to do with the accident that seemed to cause them in the first place. The accident was a useful time for them to manifest in a very uncomfortable experience for Joanne though!
We worked together for a total of 3 sessions, with the final being mainly for follow up. Joanne was thrilled to have ‘gotten over’ her panic attacks and felt as though a load had been lifted from her. She now has new patterns and skills that she can apply in future scenarios that used to previously cause her fear and discomfort.
How people find themselves stuck
Thursday, September 9th, 2010 by adminWhen pain intrudes unexpectedly, our ‘reality’ gets shaken up.
Pain or painful episodes can be the result of common life experiences, accidents, personal relationships, illness, disappointments or extraordinary experiences like violence, abuse, terrorist attacks, war or natural disasters.
I recently did a presentation on Trauma and Recovery and one of the interesting comments made by an audience member was- "This (the process of recovery) is interesting because it’s relevant to any painful event - How many of us took 10 years before we could say we were over a bad highschool experience? If only we had some different skills or tools back then!"
What various traumatic and painful events or situations show is that the external world is not always controllable – regardless of how much we know or what resources we may have.
If someone has a painful experience, the scope of the perceived control tends to quickly shrink from a large umbrella outside of ourselves to a focus on our internal world.
We hear people explain in words what happens to them:
- I felt like I was kicked in the stomach
- My world fell away
- I wanted to curl up in a ball
- I’m so disoriented -I can only see with tunnel vision
- In a world of my own
- No one else could ever understand
Pain may have begun on the outside, but it lives on on the inside in the form of painful memories, difficult emotions, negative thoughts, unpleasant urges, and/or automatic reactions.
That is often the problem and how people find themselves stuck – they get stuck in the internal scope of where the pain lives on. The initial event is likely not still occurring as it was a moment in time - and so the suffering is in the ongoing pain that is related. Hence the phrase "Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional."
In my practice, I teach that a life is to be lived with a past exactly as it is since we have no ability to change it, but with a future as open and broad as your deepest core values.
When we learn to feel feelings as feelings and think thoughts as thoughts, instead of turning them into destructive behaviour we can learn that feelings and thoughts alone cannot hurt us unless we let them. They are just feelings and thoughts.