How Trauma Counseling Can Help You with Dissociation Symptoms

Dissociation is when you can easily detach from emotions, experiences, or your identity, often without even realizing it. It is typically rooted in a traumatic event. If you have been through counseling before, and it did not help your symptoms of dissociation, it may be because your counseling was not trauma-informed.

Trauma counseling is when a counselor helps you revisit traumatic experiences so that the emotional responses you still feel, even if it has been many years since your trauma occurred, can be overcome. This helps you move forward in areas of your life where you may feel stuck.

Specifically, if you struggle with a dissociative disorder or with dissociation, trauma counseling can be transformative. Your healing journey may be stunted by trying to push the feelings associated with your trauma down or just avoiding it altogether.

There are several types of dissociative disorders, but some dissociative behaviors include:

• Not being able to remember a portion or season of your life.
• Experiencing sadness or other unexpected mood shifts for no reason.
• Feeling like you are watching yourself live life but not truly experiencing it.
• Anxiety and depression.
• Feeling like the world around you is not real (even though you know it is).
• Being confused about who you are and struggling with different sides of your personality.
• Forgetting how to do something you know you’ve learned.

Trauma counseling can be particularly helpful if you sense that there are shifts in your mood for no apparent reason or if you are unable to remember parts of your life. It can also be helpful if it is tough for you to know how you are feeling in your physical body.

Survivors of any kind of abuse may struggle with emotions and physical awareness because of a traumatic event they experienced, whether the event was over a prolonged period or a one-time occurrence. Some abuse survivors do not even remember the trauma, but they may recognize its influence in their lives.

Trauma counseling can help because a trauma-informed counselor will be a gentle guide as you begin and go through the healing journey.

What to expect in trauma counseling.

When you are exposed to trauma, your brain is triggered to respond in some way – emotionally (or unemotionally) and in the part of your brain where your memory functions reside. That is why people who have undergone trauma may recognize its symptoms in their emotional responses (or lack of) but may experience fuzzy memories related to it.

One of the first aspects of trauma counseling is making sure you feel comfortable with your counselor. They will introduce themselves, and try to get to know you, and you will likely spend some time just building trust. This will include sharing about parts of life that are normal, such as your current relationships, your career, and your everyday experiences.

As your comfort level grows, and you are confident you can be honest with your counselor, they will likely ask some questions related to why you sought counseling. Likewise, they will want to hear about your lived experiences that prompted you to want to seek trauma counseling. Then, they will create a treatment plan for you.

What therapies are used in trauma counseling?

While many different types of therapy can be incorporated into trauma counseling, they usually involve some form of revisiting the traumatic event. However, well-trained, trauma-informed counselors know how to help their patients move at a gentle pace, progressing when they are ready.

One type of therapy you may experience is cognitive behavioral therapy, which works to help repair the damage done during the trauma. By gradually taking steps to revisit it and then slowly learning new belief systems or coping mechanisms related to the experience of trauma.

Some of the patient’s belief systems about their world, themselves, and others may be rooted in the disorientation caused by the traumatic event. A good trauma counselor will be able to help the patient recognize this and embrace new beliefs.

Another type of therapy is narrative therapy. This therapy involves you retelling a traumatic experience, where you are able to share your story of the trauma within the context of your life. When done, the retelling can help reveal the traumatic events from a different perspective.

Narrative therapy does not dismiss the trauma or change its impact. However, it helps patients to see themselves and the world around them in a different light.

A third kind of therapy is EMDR, or eye movement desensitization and reprocessing therapy. EMDR uses talk therapy and rapid eye movements or buzzing sensors, known as bilateral stimulation, to impact how the traumatic memories are stored in the brain. The goal is to help patients associate something positive in their memory rather than simply the negative impacts of the trauma.

How do I know if I need trauma counseling?

Every person experiences and displays trauma differently. Some have a hard time moving forward from a one-time traumatic experience and may find themselves overburdened with emotion.

Others, however, may seem to pop back from traumatic experiences that took place multiple times over a long period. However, they may find that processing the life they are in later becomes difficult. They may struggle with expressing their emotions, and knowing where they are in their bodies, or begin to have triggers or flashbacks.

Everyone is different.

Some of the symptoms you may notice include:

• A struggle with anxiety, depression, or both.
• Inability to fall asleep or having nightmares.
• Forgetting how to do something you once knew how to do.
• Not remembering the names of those you knew before the trauma occurred.
• Having extreme reactions to mild life events that you feel should not merit the emotional dysregulation you are experiencing.
• Feeling attacked when you are not in vulnerable situations.
• Feelings of isolation or disconnection either from yourself or others.

Types of traumas that counseling may help patients overcome.

While trauma can be experienced as a one-time event or over a prolonged period, its impacts may last a lifetime. The result of trauma may mean you cannot move forward and continue to experience the same areas where you are stuck in relationships. You may lack contentment because of a struggle with addiction, anxiety, or depression.

Trauma counseling can help you process a wide variety of traumatic events. What is considered a traumatic event? Any sort of abuse, physical, emotional, or sexual, that you were a victim of or witnessed firsthand would be considered a traumatic event. However, so also is the death of a primary caregiver, experiencing accidents or natural disasters, life-threatening illnesses, or witnessing violence of any kind.

How does trauma impact dissociation?

When a person dissociates, he or she may struggle to make connections with themselves or their bodies, with others, or with the world around them. Dissociating in everyday life can look a lot like numbing. Whenever a strong emotion arises, you try to avoid the emotion. That emotion could be associated with the trauma you experienced, and therefore, you want to avoid it.

Another way that dissociation and trauma are related is that you can struggle to understand where you are in your body, particularly if you are a survivor of some kind of physical or sexual abuse. This can impact your relationships even into adulthood with the opposite gender.

Dissociation can also cause a person to forget parts of their own life. If you have a large gap in remembering your upbringing or in a specific time, it may be related to a traumatic event you experienced. Trauma counseling can help you discover what may be contributing to those lost memories.

How to find trauma counseling.

If you feel you are ready to see a counselor who is trained in trauma therapy, you have already made a brave choice. Deciding to work through trauma with the therapist is a powerful step toward healing.

Take a deep breath and pause. Remind yourself that you are worth the healing process, and you and your relationships will benefit from trauma counseling.

Our offices specialize in helping you find a counselor who will meet you where you are. You do not need to fear trauma counseling because the counselors are well-trained and have a great deal of practice helping people process what they have been through. Call us today and we will help you get started on your path to a transformed life.