Traumatic events and incidents that cause extreme physical, psychological, and emotional harm, can happen to anybody. If you go through these, it can significantly impact your life in more ways than one.
As with many mental health issues, trauma can physically affect you, but your mental or psychological state gets hurt the most. One of the main issues you may develop is PTSD or post-traumatic stress disorder.
Once you’ve moved past the initial shock, you might experience long-term or delayed responses like repeated flashbacks of the event, nightmares, anxiety, depression, insomnia, and have difficulty concentrating.
While it can be challenging to function normally with all that going in, you can work through it. Trauma therapy has a wide range of treatments that can help you process, and potentially heal from your trauma.
In this article, we’ll go through some of the types of therapy that can help you work through your trauma.
What is Trauma Therapy?
Trauma therapy is a form of therapy that helps people deal with and manage their emotional responses caused by a traumatic event. This type of therapy is ideal for people who cannot healthily cope with their trauma or it affects their ability to function.
4 Ways to Overcome Trauma Through Therapy
PTSD is serious and a difficult mental challenge to go through. However, there are several trauma therapy modalities that can aid you in overcoming it.
- 1. Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT)
CBT is among the most popular and most effective form of psychotherapy, not just for trauma. But TF-CBT specifically centers or focuses around the traumatic event or events in the treatment.
Patients will work with a licensed therapist who will use various methods to reduce traumatic symptoms and improve the patient’s daily functioning. Sessions will focus on recognizing, identifying, understanding negative behavior and thinking patterns to modify them into healthy and balanced ones.
Additionally, CBT is an active treatment. This means it requires regular in-clinic appointments, as well as outside engagement where you apply the skills that you’ve learned to the symptoms or triggers.
For more severe cases, intensive trauma therapy is recommended.
- 2. Prolonged Exposure
Prolonged exposure involves exposing you to the trauma or source of your fear until you are not afraid or affected anymore.
First, therapists will go over the treatment with you and understand your situation and past experiences. They will continue with psychoeducation to help you better understand and cope with your illness. They will also teach you how to manage anxiety with breathing techniques.
Then, the exposure begins. This kind of activity is very sensitive because it’s highly anxiety-provoking. That’s why it’s crucial for the therapist to establish the environment and their relationship as a safe space to experience terrifying stimuli.
The two types, imaginal and in vivo exposure, are utilized with the pace agreed upon by the patient.
- 1. Imaginal exposure
In these sessions, you will describe, in detail, the event in the present tense and with the guidance of the therapist. Together, you will talk about and process emotions brought about by the exposure.
The therapist will record you while telling the story so you can listen to and go over it in between sessions to further process your emotions and practice breathing techniques.
- 2. n vivo exposure
In vivo exposure can be considered homework because you confront the feared stimuli outside of therapy sessions.
During the session, you and your therapist will identify a range of possible stimuli associated with the trauma or fear. After agreeing on the stimuli to confront, both of you will come up with a plan to expose you to it and manage it.
This kind of exposure encourages you to challenge yourself. But because your therapist is not there to guide you, do this in a graduated fashion. That will allow you to achieve some level of success in confronting your fear and coping with the associated emotions.
- 3. Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT)
CPT aims to challenge your perspective on why the event happened, as well as the beliefs, thoughts, and behaviors you’ve developed. Then, you learn new, more positive ways of addressing trauma-related thoughts, emotions, and actions.
More often than not, an inaccurate perception after the traumatic event can prevent you from recovering, keeping you “stuck.” CPT lets you look at why the trauma occurred and the impact it has on your thinking.
Moreover, this type of therapy focuses on learning and developing skills that help in evaluating your thoughts, clarifying whether they are supported by facts or not, as well as seeking more helpful ways to look at your trauma.
- 4. Eye Movement Desensitization And Processing (EMDR)
EMDR is a type of therapy that utilizes repetitive eye movements to block and re-pattern some trauma-related memories.
The treatment begins with an evaluation, as most therapies do. You talk about your history, focusing on the traumatic events. You and your therapist will then choose a memory that’s particularly difficult for you.
As you remember the details of that event, the therapist will guide you through a series of eye movements, mainly side-to-side. Doing so lets you process the memory and bring up associated thoughts and emotions. You’ll then gradually be able to reshape that memory into a more positive perception.
Trauma victims don’t just suffer during the event. Often, adverse emotional and psychological effects are delayed, manifesting later and can become long-term. But even so, they can overcome these adversities and heal from that experience. Trauma therapy and the many modalities under it can help you recover and get you back to normal functioning.
Are you looking for a place that offers TMS for depression and has people committed to your long-term recovery? Choose to Roots TMS. You can visit us at 3939 Atlantic Ave Suite 102, Long Beach, CA 90807, United States. You may also contact us at 562-203-0567 or go to our website rootstms.wpengine.com.
Disclaimer: This post serves a strictly educational use. It does not reflect the services, products, or therapeutic approaches of this establishment or its healthcare practitioners. This blog aims not to advertise the products, services, or therapeutic approaches of any other establishment that may be associated with this site. On the subject of safe or legal services, products, and appropriate therapies, recommendations ought to be given by a qualified professional on a case-to-case basis.