Dr. Karma Guindon & Associates
Let's Get to the Root
of the Problem
Many mental health and relationship problems are caused by unhealed wounds from the past.
What is Trauma?
​We now know that many mental health problems, relationship problems, and difficulties with functioning in everyday life are largely influenced by traumatic or overwhelmingly stressful experiences in our past.
According to world-renowned physician and neuroscientist, Bessel van der Kolk, there are 2 sources of trauma: "Big T" and "small t" traumatizing experiences. 1) The Big T type are typically overt and extreme events, such as a car accident, a choking incident, violent assault, the death of a loved one, or witnessing violence, that can leave you feeling chronically vulnerable, in danger, worthless, or helpless. 2) small t trauma is different in that it is a result of more ongoing and sometimes subtle experiences that can create a sense of worthlessness, shame, incompetence, and defectiveness . Often these experiences occur in childhood. Small t trauma is also referred to as "developmental trauma", "attachment trauma", "attachment shock", "complex trauma", "childhood wounding", or "emotional neglect".
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Common examples of small t traumatic experiences include ongoing lack of affection, tenderness, or understanding from a caregiver, being ignored, 'crying it out' parenting, getting in trouble for having and expressing feelings, bullying by peers, mistreatment from a teacher, having a sick sibling, parental divorce, or experiencing poverty, mysogyny, racism, and/or homophobia. These sources of trauma can be as wounding or more wounding than Big T trauma.
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It's important to note that trauma, whatever the source, is not an event. Trauma is the term used to describe how the body processes an experience. "Trauma refers to an event stored in aloneness rather than within a safe connection" (Dr. Becky Kennedy).
Each person is impacted by traumatic stress differently, however our bodies respond to traumatic stress in mostly predictable ways. These responses begin to change the way the brain works at the brain stem level creating a cycle of overwhelm, anxiety, depression, and fear that greatly affect a person's sense of self and others, their relationships, and their quality of life long after the neglectful, abusive, or other overwhelming experiences have ended. Mental health and relationship problems are often a result of unhealed trauma wounding.
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Symptoms of trauma wounding include: negative beliefs about self such as "I'm worthless/bad/alone/helpless...", feeling numb, feeling spacey, lacking joy, few or no memories from childhood, black-and-white thinking, avoidance, frequent intense emotions, hypervigilance, mistrust, loneliness, insomnia, unexplained fatigue, rage, insecurity, unexplained physical pain, feeling sad a lot, feeling scared or nervous a lot, difficulty focusing or concentrating, feeling stuck, feeling unmotivated, sleeping too much or too little, low energy, lots of conflict, addiction and substance use, difficulties holding down a job or participating in school, difficulty developing or maintaining close relationships, or repeating the same problem patterns over and over again. Anxiety, depression, borderline personality disorder, ADHD, and other mental health diagnoses are often caused by unresolved trauma.
Unhealed trauma requires specialized therapy to heal the wound(s). Trauma therapy can't change the past, but it can heal the wounds, symptoms, and problems caused by trauma. EMDR is the preferred therapy for healing trauma, according to most trauma experts. Deep Brain Reorienting is emerging as a promising trauma treatment, too.
For more information on the various sources of trauma, you can search for information on "attachment trauma", "complex ptsd", Gabor Mate, Janina Fisher, Bessel van der Kolk , and Frank Corrigan.
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Here are some links to short (under 10 minutes), helpful videos that describe childhood trauma or wounding:
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• Attachment vs Authenticity - Gabor Mate
• Why Attachment is Everything - Gabor Mate
• What is Trauma? - Bessel van der Kolk
• Attachment Theory - How Childhood Affects Life
• Still Face Experiment - Relationship Between Infant Dysregulation and Parents' Facial Expression
• Trauma Treatment with EMDR - Bessel van der Kolk (Note: Being emotionally neglected is "horrific" for children.)
• 8 Signs of Childhood Emotional Neglect (a potential cause of cPTSD)
• Healing Attachment Shock with Deep Brain Reoirienting - Frank Corrigan