[ThingWithFeathers]

Trigger - childhood abuse

My t and I have started working through some of my childhood trauma (csa), and we're taking things slowly. We spent a long time working on coping and emotion regulation techniques and my medication is working well to keep my severe anxiety and depression symptoms to a minimum. Now we are mapping out some memories - in a non-detailed kind of way - to make a trauma list, which I assume we will work from. We won't talk csa every week (maybe one week talking trauma, one week talking other things), it just depends how I go.

I'm wondering how others who have worked (or are working through) trauma with their t have done this. What process and approach did your t take? What was the hardest thing or part about it? Did you find you needed your t more while working on trauma? Any experience in this you'd like to share would be greatly appreciated. Thank You!

[Syra]

Mostly just taking memories as they came up. Nothing as organized as this. And emotional regulation was sort of just included in the remembering.

[HazelGirl]

Good luck. Trauma work sucks.

We talk about trauma as it comes up. So as I go through life and it gets triggered, or as I talk about things in therapy and it enters my mind, we talk about it. It is extremely difficult.

[ThisWayOut]

When I worked with the sa therapist, it was a bit more structured because that was specifically why I was there. With other therapists, it's less structured: we talk about things as they come up, we don't have a plan.
I'm definitely more needy and on edge when working through the trauma stuff, but previous t's gave me plenty of skills to fall back on, especially helpful because current t is not really available outside of session.
I've found the hardest part is the remembering (which for me comes in unrelenting flashbacks) and telling for the first time... but as hard as the telling is, is Also really helpful eventually for me.
Good luck. I'm glad you have a good t that seems to know steps to tackle that stuff.

[junkDNA]

i try to avoid talking about trauma. i compartmentalize it so much that i forget it happened and then when i do think about it , it seems like it didnt happen to me, like it happened to someone else. but this system doesnt work cuz when i am in denial about it the symptoms of not dealing with it come out sideways and disrupt my life. i have talked about some of the traumas with T and he is gentle and reminds me to take it slow. but yeah. sometimes i wonder if its even worth processing all that ****. but soemtimes i see the necessity in it.

We've just let whatever comes up in the room to surface. Took me 10yrs to actually speak about it.... Still struggling now...the unconscious trauma has its own time table... Trying to make it happen doesn't really get to the real feelings... It all ends up slightly contrived and imagined otherwise

[sweepy62]

I fill out a scuds sheet like a pre trauma , in order to start baby steps into c s a trauma therapy. We did a steps assignment . Where I drew a long staircase , every step representing , anything relating to c a a and violence ect. It's a long staircase .

Due to stressors we have not approached any steps.

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[nottrustin]

T knew that I had a csa history but didn't know details. We took it slow. She would start the appointment with something relaxing. She told me she never needed to know full details as she did not believe it was necessary. I didn't give her the whole story for a while because of the pain. She also told me if there was anything she asked that made me uncomfortable to just say so. She learned to read my body language and facial expressions. When it became to painful she seemed to know and would back off a bit and even change the subject. It sucked though...

[ScarletPimpernel]

I have always been the one to initiate the topic of trauma. My T has never pushed the issue. I seem to do it as a way of self-sabotage. First 2 times, I emailed her. That turned out bad because I did it right after a session so she couldn't fully reassure me for 5-7 days. This last time, I actually verbalized it in session. I wasn't planning on it. It just happened. My T tells me that she never knows what to expect from me, and I surprise her every time I have done it.

I guess we're technically not processing trauma, but just allowing it to come up when it does and then processing however much I am able to. Both my T and I agree that I'm nowhere near ready to fully discuss/process it; that it's more just me letting her into my life at this point.

[ThingWithFeathers]

My t also believes that talking through the details isn't necessary for everyone. For some people it is what they need and for others it would not need to be gone over in detail. Pat of the reason we are going forward with this is because I have (complex) ptsd, with the typical avoidance, intrusive thoughts and flashbacks that occur in ptsd symptoms. Also, there is no statute of limitations for the type of abuse committed where I live and, if one decided to report, one would have to be able to speak in detail about what happened without becoming re-taumatised

I know this process is really hard. It has taken a long time to get here. I'm wondering though whether it's true that things gets worse before ithey get better in this work? Am I going to need my t more and, if not her, who will I lean on?

I've had two therapists and both of them (even the bad one) said there was too much trauma and it was too horrible to really deal with in detail. (I'm not saying that what anyone else went through wasn't horrible. This was just how personally I couldn't deal with it.) I was okay with that. I wanted to work on living in the here and now more, but with the last therapist it was very validating that he acknowledged the past and the huge effect it has had one me and he expressed sorrow and anger for me.

I also don't think it is necessary to go over details and go back too much. Some, maybe, but for me it would have probably pushed me beyond what I could handle.

[incandescence]

i have just recently started talking to my T about a past relationship that was sexually/emotionally abusive. she says that how much i tell her is totally up to me, and even though it's painful, sometimes i feel better just getting it out of me. unfortunately since we've been talking through this, i've had a lot of trouble with nightmares, flashbacks, and hearing his abusive words constantly playing in my head. she has recommended a DBT group for me to join in addition to seeing her weekly. maybe she just is tired of dealing with it, i don't know. anyway, that's been my experience, albeit limited.