Life of trauma

[Neverending2020]

Is there anyone else who has gone through life experiencing trauma after trauma after trauma? Who has always tried to do the right thing - be a good child, study, work hard, pay your bills etc but due to circumstances beyond your control has just never had peace?

@springydaff god, can’t really summarise this book. It looks at decades of trauma research. He’s Dutch and went to the states for research initially if I remember right. And noticed that the Vietnam veterans were killing themselves in droves, none of the treatments available at the time helped them. Because they were receiving treatment for the effects the trauma had on them.
He made a link between their physical and mental afflictions because the treatment was just making them relieve the trauma. That’s where it all started, he opened the trauma centre and incorporated mindfulness and yoga into it. So instead of reliving what happened to them, they were taught to acknowledge it’s a memory, not happening in the present moment.
It’s worth going back to the book :)

springydaff

Maybe you could try "overcoming trauma through yoga" (David Emerson?) - it's based on the research covered in "keeps the score" and covers lots of the same ground, but in a much easier to read way! Plus it has stuff you can try (it's not yoga in the sense of a gym class).

I think Emerson and van der Kolk may have worked/researched together at some point. I can't remember exactly off the top of my head.

This book: www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0067AZ8HC/ref=dp-kindle-redirect?_encoding=UTF8&btkr=1&tag=mumsnetforu03-21

Keeps the score is amazing, my therapist lent it it me. I read it all in one night. Christ it made me cry but the research and the theories he puts forward are incredible.

So the solution, the cure, is yoga? Is that what he's saying?

@Honsandrebels - are you referring to the same yoga book @user53976478853 has linked to?

No, I don't think he's saying the cure is yoga.

I think they're saying that reconnecting with your body in a safe way can help, that using it to learn to speak to yourself differently can help, that learning to identify and make choices can help, that being safe in the company of others and in your own body can help, and that working with the whole body not just the mind can help.

It's not the kind of yoga people do in a gym class to tone up and learn perfect poses and meditate and push your body and whatever. It's nothing like that at all and there are no ideal shapes or poses you're trying to achieve.

I think it might have been better if "trauma sensitive yoga" had been called something other than yoga, because it seems confusing and off putting. It's not what I used to imagine people meant when they referred to it, and if you sat and watched it without knowing what it was I doubt you'd think, "oh yes, this is yoga I see here".

Of course, I don't know what I'd actually call it instead!

Yup. No choice but to keep putting one foot in front of the other.

@Dishingoutdone, no the book linked to is solely about trauma sensitive yoga. The book I referred to was mentioned up thread and is called The body keeps the score. Yoga is one chapter in that book but there is a lot more besides, including more traditional talk therapies. The idea behind the yoga is you need to bring your body into the therapy as well as the mind, which is traditionally the focus of the more common talk therapies.

Could dancing do the trick? Cycling?

Thanks I will google @Honsandrebels

@springydaff no there is something about the yoga movements, tbh I never read that chapter of van der Kolk as have never liked yoga. But the book user linked to looks interesting so I might follow it up. There will be neuroscience behind it, I just don’t know what it is.

Mindful movement, maybe? Instead of calling it trauma sensitive yoga?

@springydaff, lovely, you can do whatever feels good and helpful to you. I promise you that half an hour of exercise every day will help tremendously. You’ve been hurt and your body is on high alert, whatever eases off the tension in your muscles is good, be it pilates, swimming, dancing, whatever you feel comfortable doing. Try doing it in a group, it’s good to be amongst other people.

Buddha, have you experienced trauma?

Yes, I have. :)

"Mindfulness" is everywhere, the new "cure all" and is promoted alot, especially for MH issues and stress.

However, there is some new research that suggests it can be unhelpful and even dangerous for some people with MH issues.

People can feel themselves "lost" in the emptiness of the Western concept of mindfulness. I am not a Buddhist but Buddhism is a rich religion, full of spiritual figures, traditions and religious community. So-called mindfulness has stripped all of those inconvenient spiritual aspects because it makes it more palatable for atheist Western consumption. It makes it rather a dull thing though, and I have never been convinced by it though I have a lot of experience of it, as it is taught everywhere now, even in the British army. I know I am in a minority of 1 in a million in thinking this - though Suzanne Moore did write a very good article on this, and there have been a couple of others, plus some more recent research that shows its dangers for people struggling with their mental health.

If it helps people, fine. But I think its endless promotion as a simple cure-all is totally OTT to be honest, and I just wanted to add that as a caveat for those people who do not find it helpful and supportive, and indeed may find themselves having the experience of it making them feel more lost or distressed. They are not doing it "wrong" - they may be realising something true.

We have to be careful generally of all these people promoting cures and treatments in the wellness and MH fields, as like the diet industry, there is also money and reputations to be made. There are lots of people about who think they have the "answer", and promote these endlessly. But, like it or not, life is more complex than that, and some things that are promoted are positively damaging. I try to get the insight I need from what I read or experience, but apply my own common sense and sense of what works for me, and what doesn't.

I'm just about to start a Christian mindfulness course, pin. We shall see! (I notoriously baulk at most philosophies somewhere along the line usually at the beginning )

I think eg mindfulness and cbt are an NHS quick fix, a way of making it look like they're addressing mental health cheaply but I think it's quite dismissive. I've always said these disciplines are good basic skills in our armoury on which we can build. Rather like scales to a musician.

Mindfulness is not advised for people with trauma but many trauma specialists, it can end up being retraumatising. Yoga is considered more beneficial as there's a sufficient focus for the mind.

www.goodtherapy.org/blog/mindfulness-meditation-and-trauma-proceed-with-caution-1021154

Oh my goodness! When I posted this thread there were a couple of replies that trickled through and I thought to myself that I had posted a silly question - too vague - too strange.
I was so surprised when I came on the relationship board tonight and saw so many replies - I thought that can't be the thread I started...but it was!
Sometimes you think you are the only one that has endured such ongoing trauma. Then you understand that - no - it's many, many of us out there. I believe a poor start in life, if we are unlucky with the parents to whom we are born, is where it usually begins. So often, despite our courage, we inevitably make wrong choices/attract the wrong people etc
When your family of origin are highly narcissistic and actively seek to destroy their child, it truly must be the worst start in life. Everything that follows is a direct result of that (Well, I think anyway).
I'm sorry for all the pain endured by those who have posted and we are such courageous people.
I think our day will come, somewhere, some time.
Until then, I find gratitude for all the good things and all the little pleasures life brings. Oh...and for the inner strength which enables me to deal with the hand that fate gave to me.

Also wanted to add, although I can be very outgoing, I need a lot of time alone to self care and keep myself grounded. I like people but I love being by myself too. I need a lot of space.
I remember a poster on here saying that when you have had a lot of trauma, you can't compare or measure your life in the same way as those who have had 'normal' lives. I agree with that. For one thing, I don't know about others, but I don't talk to anyone about my life because a) it's too much b) they just wouldn't begin to comprehend so what's the point and c) it would be too exhausting and emotionally draining. So - it does set you apart.
I have heard good things about schema therapy and amazing things about EMDR.

Neverending I'm exactly the same re self care and time alone. It's essential and I start to struggle very quickly without it.

Totally agree re conversations. I'm no good at small talk, and I struggle to engage with others who are stressed by comparatively tiny issues, even though I know it's big to them. It does set you apart a bit.

Does anyone else also look totally knackered and stressed without a fair amount of make-up?. I had a colleague at work who I see ocassionally say "goodness you look like you've been in the wars" when I thought I was having an ok day!

I definitely look better with makeup but am in 40s so to be expected! People at work will ask what is wrong eg has something terrible happened if I go in without makeup- not realising it is just that they are seeing the real me.
I have been thinking about my early life, have often wondered if I have bpd or am not neurotypical- just that sense of being different and not fitting in. Always had it.
I feel like I sleepwalked through until my 20s- wasn’t conscious in a way. And I am wondering if it was down to trauma.
I think I am much more awake now, and the effects are better controlled.