Does talking about your trauma help?

I think it helps to talk about it, but with a couple of cautions.


First, if you're a very sensitive person who is easily affected by things, but you grew up in a family that shamed or punished the expression of emotions like sadness, anger, fear, guilt, need, and shame, then you probably have TONS of stuff you have bottled up over the years. If that's the case, you have to G-O S-L-O-W-L-Y when it comes to talking about and processing anything traumatic, stressful, or emotional in therapy. It took my t and I a very, very long time to figure out that we had to pare down what we were doing in therapy to a much smaller, slower pace or else I simply could not tolerate the way it affected me. I would get way too upset to where I could not calm down...or I would be unable to put the distress away at the end of the session, and the traumatic feelings would jab me and trigger me for hours or days afterward...or I would feel overwhelmed and exhausted, to where I had to go home and just sleep because I was completely drained.


Second, if you have a tendency to ruminate and dwell on things, then talking about painful things or thinking about them repeatedly, can become a repetitive cycle where you have trouble paying attention to anything else going on in your life because all you can think about is what you went through in the past, or what you are going through now. It's so important for me to limit how long I focus on traumatic stuff. It's vital that I learn how to "contain" it when the session is over so I can go out and "do life." I can't let it eat me up.


One other caution: Be extremely careful who you choose to talk to about traumatic events and your emotional or mental health struggles. I made the mistake of trusting and opening up myself to a friend, spilling the most vulnerable, painful parts of myself and my past, and it ended up extremely bad for me. Led to rejection and abandonment, which only made the earlier rejections and abandonments even more solidified. Took YEARS for me to process and accept the total betrayal of that friend and accept what happened, and learn from it.


My advice is if you talk to a person who is not a professional therapist or counselor, be general about it and don't go into too many details about what happened then or how you feel now. Don't make the mistake of thinking that a friend can be like a therapist or a parent who will understand and love you, and know how to help you heal. They can't! Unless they have a background in mental health education, their efforts to help you can actually harm you further. A friend is fine for an occasional listening ear, a hug, or just someone to be around to remind you that you are cared about and not alone. But a friend is not equipped to help you heal your traumatic past.