There's a fine line between processing the trauma and re-traumatising yourself. For many people, talking about the trauma is cathartic because they've not been able to share their experiences. Over time this can allow for exploration of the emotions that haven't been felt and are disrupting the person's life in lots of ways. Many people find relief on expressing the emotions and this can also lead to understanding where a lot of their surface difficulties and behaviours stem from i.e difficult relationships, addictive behaviour.

Sometimes, though, talking about the pain over and over just digs you in more and more deeply and doesn't actually shift you to a more functional state. This can be because the T hasn't worked with you enough on grounding and the pain just feels overwhelming. But other times it's just keeping you in a place of pain whereas it's more helpful to find new ways that could help you move forward -maybe processing the pain in other ways i.e through art or writing.

Processing is the key. You can talk constantly about something but never process it.

Sometimes, too, you need to experience something differently and this will cause a shift. If T gives you something you deeply needed, like empathic understanding or a more specific reaction to something you needed years ago you didn't get, this can often be enough on a neurological level to help you move forward. I'm not great on biology, but I think new experiences lead to new neurological pathways being created and this allows for different experiences.