What is Trauma?

Stress vs. Trauma

Dr. David Berceli, trauma therapist and creator of TRE®, defines STRESS as any experience that disrupts one’s normal coping mechanisms. The symptoms of stress are temporary. TRAUMA, on the other hand, overwhelms one’s normal coping mechanisms. The symptoms linger long after the traumatic event passes.

On the stress end of the continuum, you might experience a temporary upset stomach when you’re running late for an important meeting. On the trauma end, you might experience PTSD after a natural disaster.

The difference between stress and trauma is the emotional intensity you attach to the event, the degree to which your body physically contracts, and whether or not your nervous system remains activated.

Trauma is an unconscious and instinctual response. Without any thought on our part, changes occur in our brain, hormones and body.

Types of Trauma

1. Vicarious —

• we are affected by what happens to others we care about

2. Compassion Fatigue

• We work in a helping profession and need to suppress our emotions to do our job, or we are caregiving for a family member.

3. Cultural —

• We live in a society or country that collectively experienced a shared trauma (i.e., COVID-19 pandemic).

4. Individual

• We may experience a one-time event that continues to haunt us years later (i.e., surgery, car accident, combat, etc.). We may suffer from flashbacks, nightmares, feelings of detachment, difficulty concentrating, irritability, rage outbursts, and insomnia (PTSD).

5. Childhood/Early Development

• We were abused as children emotionally, physically, or sexually.

Unresolved Trauma Hijacks Our Happiness

If we haven’t processed past traumas, we can experience emotional distress even when nothing life-threatening is happening. How? Something in the present triggers our amygdala — a primitive part of the brain that regulates emotion, memory and our stress response to perceived threats. Our nervous system then kicks in to protect us as if the scary event from the past was happening RIGHT NOW. This happens quickly and without our conscious awareness of its connection to the past.

When we’re triggered like that, our thinking brain wants to make up a story about why we feel the way we do based on what’s happening now. Maybe you’ve thought, “My spouse left the chips out on the counter AGAIN … clearly he doesn’t love me!” or “My boss ignored me in the meeting — I just know she’s going to fire me!”

Then your nervous system goes into high alert. You’ve probably heard of the stress response “F’s” — Fight-Flight-Freeze? A more recent addition is Fawn, which is common for women who protect themselves subconsciously by trying to please and appease others.

Once we’re triggered like that and we respond with our default “F”, we freak out about the false story our mind MADE UP!

It’s a very chaotic and confusing way to live. You may even feel emotionally out of control at times.

Relief from Trauma Is Possible

In Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises (TRE®), we do not decide which trauma or stressor to let go. In fact, we don’t talk about it at all. Instead we let the body do the work.

Your body decides what to release through neurogenic tremoring, usually starting with superficial tension. Over time, the tremors work their way through the muscle and fascia (layers of connective tissue that sheath our muscles, bones and organs). Sometimes after a TRE® session, you might experience a dream, memory or synchronicity that shows you what the body released. Sometimes not. It’s mysterious! Either way you feel better.

Dr. David Berceli, trauma therapist and TRE® founder, explains it this way:

• the TRE® exercises bypass our thinking brain (neocortex), which
• gives us direct access to our reptilian brain (brainstem), which
• evokes the tremors, which
• interrupts the hypothalamus-pituitary-adrenal axis (limbic system of the brain), which
• produces physical relaxation, which
• reduces our stress, and
• brings about neuroplasticity changes — and rewires your brain.

All this without needing to consciously control or even be aware of the releasing process! While we may never fully be free of our past traumas, we can minimize their impact on our day-to-day lives.