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I was fragile and tired. I’d just spent my weekend attending a 16 hour Trauma Informed Yoga workshop. Even though the workshop was about how to help other people through trauma using yoga tools and methods, I was taken back to traumatic events in my own life. I was there for a two-fold purpose, to further heal myself but mostly to help empower others to facilitate their own healing through yoga. It was heavy work.
Nothing bad happened to me. In fact, I spent my days with loving, kind, giving individuals feeling like part of a community.
However, I felt depleted. Perhaps it is a good sign that I recognize this now. Years ago I would have come home and started working on the next project. I would have ignored to feeling and powered through. I’ve been dealing with my own trauma for years and am beginning to know that I can handle being triggered and care for myself. That is power. That feels good in my body and soul. But it has been a long road to get to the point that I can find the balance between taking care of my responsibilities and still walk through feelings, care for myself, and recharge so I no longer feel depleted.
That night I recognized the pain I was feeling for others as well as myself. I felt deeply the gravity of the statistics regarding childhood trauma and the almost certainty of those experiencing that trauma also going through drug and/or alcohol addiction. The weight of the trauma experienced daily by those incarcerated and forced to work for free for companies or to harvest our potato crop, disgusts me.
That’s right. Forty percent of the potatoes sold in the US are farmed and harvested by inmates. And a large number of those inmates are people of color. It’s gross. These are just a taste of the trauma we force on our fellow human beings.
How are people to be reintegrated into society when they are constantly retraumatized and not allowed to heal from their underlying trauma? They aren’t. They will become part of revolving prison doors.
Many of these people are veterans. & We have around 1% of the US population are veterans but 8% of those incarcerated are veterans. Think there might be a correlation between what they experience and the disproportionate incarceration? Of course there is. Only recently are we beginning to address the incredible toll being of military service to one’s country takes on a man or woman’s life.
The two days also triggered a lot of my own traumatic experiences. I’ve worked through a whole lot of the consequences of being traumatized but that doesn’t mean I don’t still have work to do. I also am constantly finding new layers to past traumatic experiences. Also, there are some traumatic experiences that really don’t trigger me and never have. But they have left an impact on my behavior, so I will be healthier if I am aware of that. The two days was wonderful and I learned a tremendous amount with lots still to learn. But again, I felt depleted afterwards.
HOPE
There is hope. One of my friends who works at the VA took the class with me. According to her and the class instructors, more tools are being offered to vets to deal with the trauma they experience, such as yoga, acupuncture, and even Reiki. The 8% I reference above is actually a lower number than had previously been incarcerated. If you are interested, I just found this article, http://bit.ly/IncarceratedVetsDown.
I learned that there are studies linking yoga practice to a reduction in Parkinson’s and Alzheimer’s disease. I KNEW how powerful yoga is for stress reduction and dealing with anxiety, but not that it is more powerful that synthetic medications.
IMPORTANT: This doesn’t mean stop taking your medicines and go to a yoga class! This means talking to your doctor about yoga, specifically practicing with someone educated in trauma informed yoga, along with monitoring your medications. Do NOT ever skip your doctor’s advice in favor of yoga or some other wonderful practice. They can and often do go hand and hand. Stopping any medication without proper medical supervision can be extremely dangerous.
RIPPLE EFFECT
The ripple effect is powerful.
If I’m having a bad day, it’s likely to rub off on my children if I don’t take action to change my energy. I have my own trauma to work through. It’s my responsibility to change it and to be a more pleasant and effective person.
Who knows how many people I may touch when the people around me are impacted positively and they in turn impact others positively.
I’m finding that I’m resilient. I don’t know that I knew that about myself until recently. It’s empowering to recognize. And it is amazing to think of how resilient we are as humans.
That resiliency makes it easier for me to quickly come back to the present when I get triggered.& That doesn’t mean I never get angry or feel off and can’t quite put my finger on why I feel off. It happens. But I’m getting better at figuring those situations our too.
I believe I was born with a certain amount of resilience. I also know that my mind protected me in other ways when traumatic events happened in my childhood and I shut down rather than demonstrate resilience. That shutting down is what I’ve had to work on and continue to work on.
I’ve worked hard in many ways to develop a healthy response to being triggered. YOGA, YOGA, YOGA has saved my life many times. And that is what this training was specifically about so I’ll focus primarily on that. However, I’ve trained with many modalities and under different teachers. Find out what works for you to get yourself back in YOUR body. (running is a good one as well as swimming)
The more resilience I can demonstrate, even in the toughest situations, the more likely my light ripples through the world and does some good.
MY JOURNEY
There are events that happened to me that I can’t recall or that I can’t recall the details of what occurred. That was my mind protecting me.
I’ve also been responsible for some of my own traumatic experiences. I think, for me at least, experiencing trauma had two very different looking outcomes on my life.
At first I was a victim. I played that roll well. I also was the strong one, carrying on in the face of difficult circumstances. I think that went along with being a victim. They were two sides to the same coin. I can fall back into “victim mentality” at times. But usually now the information informs me rather than disempowers me.
The other outcome is developing that resiliency I talked about above. The other outcome involves letting go of control and trusting that I will be taken care of, even in the worst of situations. This is the outcome that has allowed me to grow and to find joy in life, even when things are extremely difficult.
I titled this section, “my journey”.& But really, it is just a tiny glimpse.
I don’t recall exactly when or exactly what happened when my mother first abandoned me but I was around 4 or 5. The details that I do remember are still too fragile and even untrustworthy in my own memory to recount here. But something happened. She adored me one minute and the next, I was a female to be jealous of or angry at.
As an adult, I first tried to control everything and put on a pretty picture. I was going to create the absolute “perfect” home and family life. I would make her so proud she couldn’t help but approve of me and thus, love me. It was a lie. I was a lie.
The truth about those days, when my children were tiny: I LOVED IT. But I also was hiding from pain because I knew it was a lie. I didn’t want to see it. For the first time in my life since I was 4 or 5, my mother was in my life. I gobbled it up.
I had her attention.
It didn’t work though. & Like when I was a teenager, my “achievements” and outward appearance were things she spoke to other people about with pride at the same time so tore me down at home. Then she moved in to claim my daughter as her own.
She did this with my father’s full knowledge and support. He was as much or more to blame than she was. Christine looks like me and acted a lot like me. At first it was dear. Then it became sick.
There was always jealousy and even greed, as well as guilt and shame in the air. This was undissipated trauma. It destroyed everything between us.
And that is okay. I got my children away from them and started breaking that unhealthy cycle but I was left traumatized and my children carry their own trauma.
This workshop brought a lot of that up. I knew it would. It brought up the trauma of car accidents and assaults and even the trauma of not being seen or heard. Trauma comes in all forms and runs through a spectrum of severity.
I’ve always compared my traumatic events and how I’ve dealt with them and thought that other people had more of a “right” to have a difficult time with their events. They went through war. People that had a right to have a difficult time were assaulted and reported the assault; maybe even having to go through a trial.
I’m a privileged white woman living in the US. I don’t deserve to suffer from traumatic events. My trauma isn’t big enough. So I sat in silence for years.
Aren’t I special?
Experiencing trauma is also a subjective thing. I’ve been through lots of traumatic events that don’t seem to have a significant impact on me. But there are several that are impactful and do influence my daily life. Some I share with my audience and some are still too raw; and that is just as it is supposed to be.
My trauma DOES matter. I do have the responsibility to heal my trauma. Maybe the better way to describe it is to use my tools to manage it.
I can also use my platform as a privileged white woman to become more informed and to work to heal myself and that ripple effect will work its’ magic throughout the world. I can also teach trauma informed yoga.
RIPPLE EFFECT
The ripple effect is powerful.
If I’m having a bad day, it’s likely to rub off on my children. So if I don’t take action to change my energy, they are perhaps not going to have the best energy and that energy might just rub off on lots of other people.
If I change my energy; if I do the work to ground myself and remember that I am first and foremost a soul and that we are all connected; if I do a short yoga practice and nourish myself with a healthy breakfast: I’m more likely to start a ripple of loving energy that can influence many other people.. It’s my responsibility to change my energy and to be a more pleasant and effective person.
Who knows how many people I may touch when the people around me are impacted positively and they in turn impact others positively?
The ability to change my energy when I get triggered and to be a positive ripple in this world of ours didn’t come quickly nor am always good at it. It is a form of resiliency.
RESILIENCY
I’m finding that I’m resilient. I don’t know that I knew that about myself until recently. It’s empowering to recognize.
That resiliency makes it easier for me to quickly come back to the present when I get triggered.& That doesn’t mean I never get angry or feel off and can’t quite put my finger on why I feel off. It happens. But I’m getting better at figuring those situations our too.
I believe I was born with a certain amount of resilience. I also know that my mind protected me in other ways when traumatic events happened in my childhood and I shut down rather than demonstrate resilience.
I’ve worked hard in many ways to develop a healthy response to being triggered. YOGA, YOGA, YOGA has saved my life many times. And that is what this training was specifically about so I’ll focus primarily on that. However, I’ve trained with many modalities and under different teachers. Find out what works for you.
The more resilience and healthy responses I’m able to give, even in toughest situations, the more likely my light ripples through the world and does some good.
To understand that the dark informs the light is to make gigantic leaps into living a full and active and meaningful life full of joy and happiness.
STEPS TO DISCHARGE TRIGGERED FEELINGS
What follows are a few quick steps to discharge chaotic feelings as a result of & traumatic triggers that work for me. The first two are the most difficult. When we are triggered our sympathetic nervous system goes into overdrive. That makes it more difficult to follow what appear to be simple steps.
You CAN do it though.
- Awareness: This is the hardest step. You need to know your triggers. Is it loud noises or closed rooms? Is it people not making eye contact with you? Is it certain smells or words people use? I say it is the hardest step because many of us are used to powering through our triggers by ignoring them or acting out somehow. This really could be a “pre-step”. It takes a LOT of practice and work.
- Pause: This can be almost an instant once you start becoming aware of your triggers. Take a moment and remember that your mind reacted in a way to keep you safe, no matter what triggered you. So it is trying to protect you
- Thank your mind: Sounds a little crazy but respecting where the trigger comes from and that it is there to keep you safe, even though you aren’t in a dangerous situation, takes you out of a place of shame for feeling triggered. (I get triggered in cars because of car accidents. I can go to a place of shame for trying to control someone else’s driving until I remember that I have experienced what can happen with car accidents, personally and up close. My mind is trying to help me even though I don’t really need the help.)
- Breathe: You had to know this would be a step if you know me at all. Depending on your situation (where you are and who you are with), there are various types of breathing techniques. According to my instructors this weekend, the breathing techniques (pranayama) are often the yoga that appeals most to the military personnel they teach. This is an incredibly easy and useful tool to reengage the parasympathetic nervous system and start the calming response.
- The simplest way is to simply deepen the breath and to make the exhale longer than the inhale. We relax on the exhale.
- Ujjayi breathing is one you may be familiar with if you take yoga classes that use this breath. I no longer emphasize it when I teach regularly since I attended a workshop with Rodney Yee and Colleen Saidman Yee on “Sequencing for the Breath”. It is a valuable took however to break free from a trigger. It is one I use without even realizing it. This is the breath that is through the nose and sounds like an ocean in the back or your throat. It is a gentle breath that is often descried as feeling li ke you are drinking a cold drink through a straw.
- Alternate nostril breathing: This one realigns the left and right hemispheres of the brain and is the breathing technique that I have been steered towards in every yoga workshop on trauma or co-dependency or addiction. Yoga as a powerful healing tool. The science is there and becoming stronger.It is closing off the right nostril with your right thumb, breathing in through the left, gently; closing off the left with one of your fingers of you left hand (I like the index finger), taking a breath out with your right nostril and then back in, closing of the right nostril with that right thumb. Breathing in with the left and out with the left; then back to the right side. Repeat this for a few round or even several minutes.
- Get into your body: This may be hard as well, depending on the circumstances. This may require removing yourself from a situation momentarily. You can do a little “dance.” One way is to put the right foot down and connect to the earth in your mind. Start moving the foot from side to side. Take the movement up your leg and then to the other side. Move the whole body for a few moments, shaking out the feeling, even while respecting it. And of course, asana yoga practice is a great way to get back into your body. It can be as simple as a few movements in a chair.
- If you have a “talisman” a “worry” stone or a bracelet or tattoo that you can see (or imagine) that has the attached meaning to it that it is a symbol of your resilience, you can use that as a quick way to break free of a fear based trigger.
If you are in a conference room and get triggered, you probably “SHOULDN’T” do Ujjiya breathing and then get on the table and do a dance. Though that might make for a more fun meeting and everyone might learn something. You might not have a job afterwards. But you can quietly pause; lengthen your exhale; plant one foot under your desk and gently move it around and then the other foot; and you can do some gentle shoulder rolls. MAYBE you can even take a moment to close your eyes and thank your fear for protecting you; but reassure it that you can handle this one on your own.
Having A Toolbox Is Power
Last night I was extraordinarily in touch with my vulnerability. There are several populations I want to work with and all are going to take special preparation. I’m ready. I want to be of service. I need to be of service.
But that felt overwhelming last night.
So I did exactly what I just wrote above. I took those steps with the addition of asking for support. I got it. And my energy was recharged. I felt safe in my body and didn’t feel overwhelmed anymore. I could write this blog post.
My hope is that this article gives you hope. My hope is that this leads to finding good teachers and reading informative articles. My hope is that you find connection; for connection is what we all crave and trauma severs that connection. My hope is that you seek professional help and find the support you need to put that professional help to work for you. And yes, I hope you find some simple tools to use from this article in working through your triggers right now.
The most difficult problems can be solved often by simple means. Don’t underestimate your own body and mind and your ability to heal. I have done that in the past and that made me a victim. Now I KNOW I have power and I make a choice to use it.
My ripple effect may touch thousands of people. I may never know it, other than in my soul. That is enough. What ripples are you creating?
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