Hmmmmm. Very, very interesting questions, SoupDragon!

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Yes I can see that the word "unbearable" is significant and why this can lead to a coping mechanism of switching off those "unbearable" feelings - but is it the event that is therefore unbearable, or our feelings in response to the event, or are these one and the same?

If the unbearable feelings are a reaction to an event (or events - there can be cumulative trauma too) they kind of form a dyad that lasts until it gets untied in therapy. If the "traumatized" (keep in mind I have a broad definition of "trauma") person runs into the same or similar traumatizing event(s) later in life, they're what everyone calls "triggers." And they bring on recurrences of the unbearable affect that originally resulted way back in babyhood. I think your question is essentially semantic, is it the cause that we should call unbearable or the effect? Surely the effect is indeed unbearable feelings, but the cause that produces those feelings can also accurately be called unbearable. I don't think it matters.

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Also if two people are exposed to the same event, the outcome for them in terms of thoughts / feelings may be different - (although neither would find the event pleasant) are these differences therefore due to "nature", previous experiences?

One or the other or both, I'd say, depending on the person. Some people are temperamentally (i.e., genetically) more "reactive" than others, some more phlegmatic. Others may have had better mothering up to the time of the trauma, which might well give them more resistive strength when it comes time to deal with a traumatic event or events. And some lucky people may have both.

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So is the reason I am seeing T, not specifically because of traumatic events, but because I didn't have the capacity to deal with them. which is about me as a person?

Ummmm. I would bet an awful lot that there are plenty of traumatic situations, either single or continuing, that no young child is temperamentally prepared to resist and ride out safely without psychological harm. In your words, situations that no baby/toddler has the "capacity" to deal with. Nor do I think in any possible way that anyone's failure, as a baby/toddler, to safely survive trauma is a negative reflection on them as a person. Babies/toddlers are ALL delicate, needy little beings whom it is all too easy to damage. It is no one's "fault," by any stretch of the imagination, that they suffered trauma as a tiny human being.

I'm sorry. I went off on my own tangent there. My real answer to your question is this: the reason you're seeing T is neither "because" of traumatic events, nor "because" you didn't have the "capacity" to deal with them as a very young person. The reason you're seeing T is because the manner in which you dealt with traumatic events in childhood, as it continues manifesting itself in your adult life, limits you in what you can do, feel, think or enjoy. And what you're doing with T is cleaning things up so you can do, feel, think and enjoy with the greatest freedom possible. I think!!!