(The white circles in these pictures represent PTSD associations and the importance of awareness and containment of them. For example, maybe one experienced a near drowning of self or other in a body of water last summer and a pool could elicit stress symptomology. Or, the news is focusing on a theme related to an incident in which a trauma was experienced, thus hearing about the theme and/or reading about it causes an increased trauma activation response. Perhaps the sound of a guitar creates an associative connection to a PTSD incident. With awareness of trauma triggers, the triggers can be tagged and bubbled allowing for navigational control of how much one allows the bubbles to penetrate the psyche.
This article describes PTSD and trauma spreading. It provides techniques for containment of PTSD fires and for decreasing the metastatic spreading of t t t t t t t t rauma. T-cell ....the immune response of T-rauma psyche).
If you have been severely Traumatized and/or you have experienced a continuation of ongoing traumatizations that continue to accumulate in your life, it is important to be aware of certain concepts that will help you create an emotional safety blanket.
Traumas are like wild fires or emotional cancers. Without putting the breaks on Ttrauma and surrounding it with that safety blanket, your PTSD tumor will emotionally, somatically and behaviorally metastasize. Without trauma containment, when exposed to seemingly neutral environmental conditions perceived by other, your trauma response will elicit a cortisol stress response of fight, flight or freeze specific to your trauma. This PTSD response is the equivalent to the cancer spread of psyche. You will either go further and further into social isolation of your inner world and/or you may aggressively act out to the external world. Regardless of traveled trauma response direction, an un-contained trauma will result in emotional death and resulting DSM-5, ICD-10 diagnoses of other accompanying psychiatric disorders.
PTSD or post traumatic stress disorder is not who a person is in his/her heart. PTSD is as if the personality, psyche and body have been hijacked. There is a loss of self that is experienced by the self regarding memories of feelings and ways of being and thinking from who the self used to be. While this change of personality can more easily be identified in the war veteran population after they return from combat, sometimes for others, it is not so easy to recognize.
Family, friends and colleagues may or may not notice a difference in a person who has Trauma or PTSD. Their awareness is partly dependent upon how much the individual's PTSD fire or tumor has spread, coupled with how in tune they are with respect to the person experiencing trauma.
Personal egos of family and surrounding support often get involved with manifestations of emotional traumas due to their taking trauma reactions personally. As a result, the trauma victim often gets blamed and further traumatized as s/he doesn't receive needed support. To have a relationship with a person who has endured severe trauma takes a lot of ego strength both of the victim and of the supporter.
So, as to not fall deeper into the rabbit hole of trauma responses including: heightened emotions, trauma mapped thinking patterns and resulting behaviors including reacting and/or withdrawing, please keep in mind the following CBT (cognitive behavioral therapy) trauma concepts that can be utilized:
(Keep in mind that some CBT trauma concepts may be be possible to utilize in certain scenarios while other may not be possible).
BODY
1. Bring awareness to breathing.
Inhale into belly and forcefully release or let go of exhale through the mouth holding absolutely nothing back. The concept is similar to a damn being removed from a river.
2. Consciously relax your muscles of body, shoulders and pelvic bones, hips and buttocks letting them fall away with gravity. ...almost as if you are a bird letting go of your puffed body.
3. With each inhale, notice your muscles of body rising or puffing (shoulders and chest) and as you exhale, let your muscles quickly drop again as you let go.
4. Also let go of myofacial tension and holding in the massater muscle and jaw. Notice any clenching of teeth. Relax your tongue. Perhaps bring your lower jaw and teeth to fall into an under bite position as you hang your head forward. You may feel your wisdom teeth resting on each other as the contact points may be change from your traditional bite.
5. Relax and unfocus your eyes.
6. If you need to hold and grip the earth with your toes or feet, do so but be aware that your toes are gripping so that the process is conscious.
MIND
1. Notice landmine words in which you internally react. Either verbalize these words to the person with whom you are interacting such that different words may be chosen, or mute the words out from the conversation in your mind. Either technique lessens the PTSD association to the word. You can mute or turn down the volume on PTSD associated words by breathing and/or focusing on other areas of the conversation. Recognize those words as emotional forest fire ambers or metastatic cancers. Don't feed them or they will grow. Don't allow for them to cause the internal or external increased PTSD reaction. Often, the awareness is enough to prevent the spread.
2. If you find yourself getting pulled into a PTSD reaction, you may tune into your senses:
Notice the breeze
Notice something pretty with your eyes from the surround
Rub, brush your hand or arm lightly with your finger
Smell a flower or aromatherapy
Sing a song in your mind (even if a person is talking)
Make fun of the person talking in your mind "Sense of Humor" hahaha
3. As you walk through your life, eliminate associated triggers in the your mind by redirecting thought and focus. For example, if you were T-boned by a red car and you experience a somatic response to seeing red cars, consciously focus on blue cards or silver cars. If there was a house accident that involved taking a family member to the hospital, and at the time you were eating on white and green plates when the accident happened, this dishware could be imprinted in the mind with an increased cortisol release and PTSD response. As you move into the future, the white and green plates could be equivalent to the PTSD 'a'version to the pavlovian dog salivating effect. The plates could elicit an activated nervous system response simply due to association at time of traumatic event. Get rid of the plates. Your health is worth a new investment. "Dish" out the money. Celebrate ... Mazel Tov.
SOCIAL
1. Box-cutter: be hyper-aware of not allowing others to carry you into their perceptions, thoughts or steering of conversations. Put on the breaks before you explode or withdraw.
If you notice you are being categorized, boxed in or carried into a false truth of other, don't participate or engage. Redirect the conversation, contain it, put boundaries or let the person know she is speaking for herself and not you. Cut yourself out of the communication boxes without exiting the conversation.
Or, if an assumption is made, for example: "What are you doing about your PTSD?" when you are dealing with something not related to PTSD .....don't let that comment take away your power in the situation by conveniently masking the questioner's issue into your "problem." Don't own what's not yours and don't allow for others to not be accountable for who they are in the world due to a PTSD deflection.
2. Fish net: people with Trauma and PTSD are super aware of incongruencies. They see through indirect conversational attempts at entrapment and control. They are often in tune with the assumptions guiding talk long before the talker has awareness. (Another perspective to this "hyper-alertness" is that PTSD breaks away human conditionings that are frivolous and non sensical resulting with the individual's ability to focus on the heart of what matters. After all, when one experiences a brush with life and death, it changes the relationship colors to life's picture. PTSD doesn't have to result in a bleak scape, though many people who have not experienced trauma don't know how to connect below the conditionings so the surface level talk of most limits the amount of possible real genuine connections. Many people don't know hot to let go of egoic mind and connect beyond social and academic logic within the space of the heart). Don't get caught in defense for the result by default is net entrapment. Just swim forward. Many people have become cold and calloused fishes. Don't let their scaled words hold weight in your psyche.
2. SITS: SUDDEN/subtle INSTANT TRAUMA SITUATIONS: Be aware of environments including: parties, sounds, restaurants, times of day, driving highways, speeds, work etc. that may trigger your PTSD response such that you can be more patient and gentle with yourself and your responses in these scenarios. Give yourself an emotional break.
3. Accept and enjoy living at a slower pace. Allot for more time to not only SIT but to slow down in both in talk and travel. Most people are too rushed anyway. Keep your cortisol low and your steps slow.
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