How Trauma Is Stored in the Body
Most have heard the phrase “the body keeps the score”. What this means is that trauma is not merely a matter of the mind, but rather the nervous system, which governs both mind AND body.
Effective treatment means clearing ALL the channels in which trauma is stored. Let’s identify what those are.
1. Sensory Stimuli (ex., an image, sound, taste, or smell)
We are sensory creatures. While often the most triggering sensory input is an image (what we saw at the time of the trauma) it can also be a noise, smell, or taste that elicits a trauma response when encountered following the traumatic event.
2. Negative Belief
When we experience challenging events, we “learn” something about ourselves or the world. While the belief may have been true at the time (ex., I am not safe) these beliefs get extrapolated to other contexts where they are inappropriate, causing problems in survivor’s lives.
3. Emotion
Traumatic events are typically marked by feelings of fear, panic, anxiety, grief, anger, or shame. A hallmark of trauma is that in some parts of the brain it feels as though it is still happening now. Because of this, the emotions associated with a given trauma tend to color survivor’s baseline experience.
4. Level of Distress
Not all traumatic events are created equal. Distress level indicates the intensity with which a given traumatic memory registers in the body.
5. Physical Location & Sensation
Often people identify the locus of their trauma as a tightening or turning in the throat, chest, or belly. However individuals whose trauma included a physical element may feel it in the effected area (ex., someone who had their hands bound may sense tightness on their wrists when thinking of the event).
EMDR (vs. traditional talk therapy) is so effective in transforming lives because it is able to target EVERY channel that trauma is stored in. The hallmark of trauma is that to some part of our psyche, the traumatizing event still feels like it’s happening now.
We can know intellectually that we’re safe and that the trauma is long over, but until our bodies and minds FEEL that it’s over… Well it just ain’t over.
