Trauma: More Common Than You Think!
Trauma can keep the brain’s alarm system stuck in overdrive, leaving the body on high alert and storing memories in fragmented, emotional form.
Emotionally-Focused Individual Therapy (EFIT) creates a safe space to connect with and transform these experiences. Through this process, the brain can begin to “update” old trauma responses, allowing you to feel safer, more connected, and more in control.
Research suggests that around 60% of adults have lived through at least one major traumatic event. While not everyone who experiences trauma develops Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), the effects of trauma can still linger—sometimes for years.
The good news? With the right kind of support, healing is possible. People can move through their symptoms and begin to feel safe and whole again.
In Emotionally-Focused Individual Therapy (EFIT), the focus isn’t on labels or diagnoses. What matters most is how your experience lives in your body and your story. When I sit with a client who has been through trauma, I’m listening for the moments that left a lasting emotional mark—especially the ones that seem to keep them stuck.
Many trauma survivors experience things like:
- Intrusive thoughts or flashbacks
- Nightmares or sleep problems
- Strong emotional or physical reactions to reminders of the event
- Avoidance of places, people, or topics linked to the trauma
- Self-medicating to numb or cope
- Memory gaps or missing pieces of the story
- Feelings of shame, self-blame, or disconnection from others
- Symptoms of depression, anxiety, or intense anger
These experiences can shift how people see themselves, others, and the world. Survivors may feel damaged, unsafe, or like they can’t trust their own emotions.
In therapy, we gently unpack these stories and begin to understand how your nervous system and emotions are protecting you—even if those strategies no longer serve you. From there, healing begins.
Trauma Hijacks Your Stress System
When something scares us, our body’s stress system kicks in right away. Hormones, nerves, and brain signals work together to get us ready to fight, flee, or freeze. This built in safety net is called the Instinctual Trauma Response (ITR).
Most of the time, once the danger is over, our body settles down and we feel normal again. But after severe or repeated trauma, that “off switch” can break. Even small hassles can feel life threatening, and the stress response keeps firing long after the real danger is gone.
How Traumatic Memories Get Stuck
Right after an event, the hippocampus files the memory as short term. Later it should move to long term storage in the thinking parts of the brain. Severe trauma disrupts that hand off. The memory stays locked in the right side of the brain, where words can’t easily reach it. Over time, these “stuck” memories can shape how we see ourselves and how we relate to others.
The good news is that memories can be updated! New research on memory reconsolidation shows these painful traces aren’t set in stone. Under the right conditions—often in therapy—they can be “re-edited” with new, safer information, shrinking their power and helping people reclaim their lives.
Emotionally-Focused Individual Therapy Helps Heal Trauma
The model I often use for trauma is Emotionally Focused Individual Therapy (EFIT). Trauma memories often get “stuck” in the body and brain. Even long after the event, certain triggers can make it feel like the danger is happening all over again. EFIT helps shift those memories—not by retelling the story in detail, but by changing how the emotional experience is held.
In EFIT, healing begins in a safe relationship. It’s my job as your therapist to stay present and attuned as you connect with your deep emotions like fear, shame, or grief—often for the first time in a supportive setting. This new emotional experience sends a powerful message to the nervous system: This time, I’m safe. I’m not alone.
This process helps “update” the trauma memory through something called memory reconsolidation—where emotional responses attached to past experiences are transformed. The pain doesn’t have to be erased to heal—but how we carry it can change.
If you would like help processing your past, let’s get the process started together.
