How do I do “processing”?

[barefoot]

How do I do “processing”?

I know ideas around “what is processing?” have come up here plenty of times before.
I’ve just done a bit of a search. But I feel quite lost at the moment so I’m hoping someone might be able to help.

I have been doing talk therapy for the past four years or so.

There are things that we have talked about. Trauma stuff. And I’ve shared all the facts so she knows what things have happened. But if we ever dipped a toe into anything deeper/more meaningful/more focused on the impact on me or my feelings about it, I would dissociate badly. So, we stepped back from that for quite a while.

I dissociate much less now. I can certainly still get very spacey at times but it hasn’t been as severe, it doesn’t happen very frequently and I feel I can now stay present and tolerate much more before my head starts sliding around.

I don’t think I understand the difference between just talking about stuff and processing it.

With trauma...I have talked about it with her to tell her things that have happened. But I feel like I can’t have processed the experiences/memories because they still show up in the here and now in disruptive, bothersome ways. And then they kind of leak out sideways.

A lot of related themes come out in my sleep...dreams, nightmares, Parasomnias etc... It’s really full on at the moment. It feels like my psyche is working hard to process stuff while I’m asleep - historical abuse and my mum’s recent sudden and unexpected death - and I want to try to process these things consciously.

But I’m stuck on how to do that. In therapy, for instance, what would I/she/we be doing differently if I am “processing” and not just “talking/telling her about...”?

I know there are other modalities for trauma processing (eg EMDR and somatic experiencing) but just now I’m most interested in finding out what I would be doing differently in talk therapy if I am processing rather than just simply talking about it.

I feel I want/need to take the next step to working on this stuff, so that I can put it in the past, not keep getting caught up in it, not having it keep biting me on the arse, so that I can move on and draw a line and not have it impact me so much in terms of anxiety, sleep disturbances etc...so that I can make more progress on my healing journey, I guess, ultimately.

But that next step just feels so intangible. What is the next step and how do I do it?! What do I need to start doing differently in my sessions? Or even on my own?

Thanks in advance for any thoughts or suggestions. I’m feeling pretty stuck at the moment and could really do with some help.

 

[Freida]

For me processing means getting out of my own way and letting my brain do its thing. No fighting it, no trying to distract myself, no self-judgement. Just letting the thoughts/feelings/emotions and what not run amuck and trying to stay present while it happens. I do feel kind of like it's something "seperate" from me - like my brain is an alien and it is sorting stuff out on its own and I'm just along for the ride. Then when its done I can step back and look at what has changed, stayed the same, has feelz attached, all that stuff.

 

[NightSky]

I just finished a book called Journey Through Trauma by Gretchen Shmelzer and I found it so helpful. It identifies various stages we cycle though in processing and healing (cycle through vs linear) and although she speaks in metaphor a ton and likens her book to a trail guide, I feel like it answered a lot of questions I had about the abstract nature of processing and what it looks like and feels like in each stage.
For me, I feel like I cycle back through and talk about aspects of the trauma that are currently interfering and each time we come back to it I go a little deeper and have a wider window of tolerance and make more connections. This book talks a lot about how we are taking puzzle pieces and forming our narrative. And the same sentence spoken in one phase of healing can have a different significance in a different stage of healing.
If I were you I would take whatever the most intrusive symptom is that week, and hash it out with my T. The more we do that the more we recognize themes that emerge and put things together. And she helps me come at these flashbacks or whatever from every angle. That seems like processing, to me anyway.

 

[Sandstone]

From a mechanical point of view, I understand processing aims to move traumatic experience from being stored in the "here-and now" part of the brain to its correct storage location, in the past. I believe it is achieved by having one foot in the trauma and one in the present. So it can be done via many protocols, but they all work by focussing briefly on the trauma, then coming back to the present, usually to observe our response to retelling or recalling. Repeated oscillations back and forth from then to now enable the brain to shift the memory and reduce the power it holds.

From personal viewpoint, I have little experience of it, because therapists tend to think I'm too unstable or too dissociative to do it. My three sessions of EMDR fit with what I've described - focus on the memory, come back to now to discuss and calm, then back to the memory.

I'm always reminded of my husband's comment that it's called POST traumatic stress disorder because the reaction is deferred. So for me I suspect there is a lot to do with actually experiencing emotional reactions for the first time, because I didn't encounter much distress at the time. That's why recounting it cold, or spitting it out in anger, or reciting it through a dissociative fog aren't processing.

I think my current T is sliding processing in under the radar. She will usually ask one or two very direct questions about a trauma during a session, then move off to something else. That way, I encounter it briefly, but then move back to the present. Or maybe she just has a butterfly mind. I still haven't worked her out.

Have you asked your T if she works with any sort of formal processing? From my experience, I suspect the UK has far fewer specific trauma therapists working with a particular modalities, and far more general psychotherapy.

 

[nomorefear]

Have you gone through the PTSD workbook? It is very helpful in processing, not just talking. Also, have you ever gone to a support group? Celebrate Recovery is a good one and they have chapters all over.

 

[grit]

First and foremost how amazing you are tackling the “processing”…this is like milky way size…like someone asking you how big is the milky ways…but at least the first step is asking the question.

I know you are grieving so no doubt this is a part of your resistance or fear getting into it. You need to keep healthy to do other stuff – work, relationships, eating, cooking, walking etc so you cannt afford (no on can) to just get lost in therapy to process and end up in the hospital. Baby steps and baby bites.

I can list some stuff similar to what I went through to push myself through this hazy and ugly road to get glimpses…I am still getting glimpses that are becoming a bit more permenant.

• Start to respect and even like your dreams. This is one of the areas to process the ugliest things in childhood or adulthood that the brain refuses to open in the daylight. Write them down and try to see a pattern and write feelings when you wake up in the morning. Annoyed? Tired? Anxious?
• Maybe (just maybe) entertain feelings of hate toward your mother or anger or rage (please take this to your therapy not alone at home) and you may be resisting to feel those things. There is a saying what resists persists. It is better to feel the hate and “process” and find love than stay at the door and dissociate in order to avoid it. Maybe as an infant you hated your mother or father or whatever – it can go either way and both are dangerous to process especially if you truly love your mother today. Actually if you love your mother today, no wonder you may rather die a little (dissociate than allow this feeling to come out of the body to the mind and the brain)…obviously.
• This is your journey (there is no we). The therapist of course can act as function of Here and Now when you are out and dissociating, but that is temporary. He or she will not do this for you forever….and actually what breaks the therapy relationship is when clients expect the therapist to carry on this heavy function forever!!!!!! It like have to carry 20 yrls child on your back once a week forever. So admit you depend on your therapist for this function of keeping the reality when you are out but for how long? Talking about it helps and may clear some arteries.
• Basically to me from your dream like psychosis, dissociation in therapy, and your need to process tell me you are avoiding much deeper level emotions – rage or shame or hate. Just imagine a child experiencing those feelings, what do you think he or she will do to survive?
• If you allow anger, rage, hate or shame (and their possible target – and that person must be a dear dear person not a ex husband or ex lover) to show up in your language vernaculars, you may feel ease with them and your body may get used to them and then grieving starts.
• Also look into something called the dark night of the soul and see if your dreams are taking you there and you are resisting…

Good luck.

 

[Abstract]

Dob't have time now and others have given good input. Will quickly say that I initially spent all my energy trying not to feel. And I was very dissociated. I didnt; realise that. I spoke about things from an intellectual dissociated view point. If I spoke about them at all. I sounded and felt logical and the trauma I discussed was a bit like a written title of a story sitting in my brain. A story about a fictional someone else. Nothing attached to it. That basically got me nowhere. When I started being present, whether verbally speaking about, writing it down or thinking of it, and experiencing emotions and feelings and building a bit of a coherent narrative, accepting things more into myself rather than keeping it separated then I started improving. My symptoms around the experiences that I managed to do this with, improved. Essentially trauma happens when we separate ourselves from what happened and it isnt experienced as a normal memory that happened to us. And our brain doesnt view it as being in the past. Its still stuck trying to deal with it and the files keep falling off the bookshelf randomly. Until we take it out, look at it, then put it away properly.

 

[EveHarrington]

But I’m stuck on how to do that. In therapy, for instance, what would I/she/we be doing differently if I am “processing” and not just “talking/telling her about...”?

Processing is how we get our mind to stop thinking the trauma is still happening and understand that it is in the past. Processing is how we stop reliving the past. Talking alone won’t do this. This is why processing therapies exist such as EMDR and exposure therapy.

but just now I’m most interested in finding out what I would be doing differently in talk therapy if I am processing rather than just simply talking about it.

Processing therapies vary so there is no one way to advise you on what to do. If your therapist doesn’t do anything but talk therapy, I’d advise finding someone who can walk you through processing. There is a reason why trauma therapy is a specialty. There is a reason why these therapists oftentimes command more $$$.

What is the next step and how do I do it?! What do I need to start doing differently in my sessions? Or even on my own?

Trauma therapists walk you through processing. If you don’t have a therapist who will guide you through this process, there’s not much you can force yourself to do in order to move your mind forward. Yes there are workbooks you can use, but given your level of dissociation, I’d advise going it on your own. You could make things much, much worse.

 

[anthony]

And I’ve shared all the facts so she knows what things have happened. But if we ever dipped a toe into anything deeper/more meaningful/more focused on the impact on me or my feelings about it, I would dissociate badly. So, we stepped back from that for quite a while.

You are talking about it, as though distant without meaning or feeling. From admission, the moment you begin to get into it, to process the trauma, really pull it apart, understand it, resolve it, you step back. You are not processing your trauma, you are ignoring it.

That is fine... we all do it. You reach a point where you fight the symptoms of processing and tough it out.

 

[Abstract]

@barefoot just wanted to add a big "good for you"! that you are now ready for the next stage. Sometimes the first is a matter of finding enough trust to do what comes next. Therapy has been a tricky process for me too.

 

[Mach123]

I read a book. Judith Hermans "Trauma and Recovery," or, I was able to read it. I knew what it meant and was able to intuit even in that battered state that it was me.
It put labels on things and gave them meaning so I knew what they were. I read lots of stuff after and kept learning. (As I was able to withstand it)

I have found my process is getting to "it" by talking about it over and over. Each time it's easier and more and more comes out or I move to different levels.

Most of my life I couldn't think about it. I could, but I didn't know what it was.

Then I realized it was CSA and someone did that to me, I wasn't just "like that."

Then I tried to get rid of me. (That part)

Then I was still here.

Then I saw how I hated part of myself and tried to eliminate it so no one would ever see. I saw why I felt like I did and how I tried to compensate. How I'd lived a fake life, or I tried, but I wasn't very good at it.

So I kept going to therapists and trying to set the record straight. I guess I've accomplished a lot of that now. Some of it at least.

You are doing so well and congratulations.

 

[barefoot]

Thanks for your replies and sorry it's taken me a while to respond. I've been feeling a bit overwhelmed and am finding it difficult to focus.

@NightSky - thanks for the book recommendation. I like the sound of it and have ordered a copy.

I feel like I cycle back through and talk about aspects of the trauma that are currently interfering and each time we come back to it I go a little deeper and have a wider window of tolerance and make more connections. This book talks a lot about how we are taking puzzle pieces and forming our narrative. And the same sentence spoken in one phase of healing can have a different significance in a different stage of healing.

This is interesting and helpful, thanks.

If I were you I would take whatever the most intrusive symptom is that week, and hash it out with my T. The more we do that the more we recognize themes that emerge and put things together.

Yes, I think I will try to do this. I think I need to start planning more before sessions again - I'm in waffly, unfocused mode quite a bit lately, so thinking of specific things that are really bothering me and getting deeper into that is what I need to do at this point, I think.

I suspect there is a lot to do with actually experiencing emotional reactions for the first time, because I didn't encounter much distress at the time.

Yes, I think that may be a good point. The key historical traumas...I now know that I dissociated at the time. I have never really been able to get any real, tangible sense of how I felt at the time. I don't remember feeling anything much at all.

Have you asked your T if she works with any sort of formal processing? From my experience, I suspect the UK has far fewer specific trauma therapists working with a particular modalities, and far more general psychotherapy.

I don't think she does. And, yes, I agree with you - I think "trauma therapists" are less common here than in some other parts of the world. I know she has a lots of experience working with clients who have experienced child abuse and adult sexual assault. And I know she has done some specific training in trauma. But she does not define herself as a "trauma therapist".

First and foremost how amazing you are tackling the “processing”

"good for you"! that you are now ready for the next stage.

You are doing so well and congratulations.

Thanks for the encouragement. Though I have to admit that I have been here many times before...determined that I want to get stuck in and do all the processing - though not really knowing what to expect/what that really means - and then failing miserably!

entertain feelings of hate toward your mother or anger or rage

It is better to feel the hate and “process” and find love

Not really sure what you mean by this and why I should be trying to summon up such strong feelings (hate, rage) towards my mother who has recently died. We didn't have a bad relationship. she was not a bad woman - not at all. She wasn't perfect, as none of us are. But I have always loved her and known that she has loved me. So, I'm not sure why I would be trying to create feelings that go against that?

I spoke about things from an intellectual dissociated view point. If I spoke about them at all. I sounded and felt logical and the trauma I discussed was a bit like a written title of a story sitting in my brain. A story about a fictional someone else

Yes, this resonates very much. Sometimes in therapy, I feel like I'm telling a very familiar story...it's a story I know very well but it's like it's about something else, not really anything to do with me...

When I started being present, whether verbally speaking about, writing it down or thinking of it, and experiencing emotions and feelings and building a bit of a coherent narrative, accepting things more into myself rather than keeping it separated then I started improving.

Do you know how it was that you were able to be more present? Was it just a keep showing up and chipping away and over time you became more tolerant to staying present? I think this is how it has been for me. Or did you specifically and consciously work on staying more present? And, if so, how did you do that?

Yes there are workbooks you can use, but given your level of dissociation, I’d advise going it on your own. You could make things much, much worse.

Yes, that's what I've always been concerned about...I'm happy to read a book (though I never made it through The Body Keeps the Score as I got too spacey to remember anything and to focus enough to continue every time I tried to read it!) and I used to journal quite a bit, usually as part of my prep for a therapy session. But working through a workbook, which is encouraging digging around quite deeply...and doing some exercises on my own...although my dissociation has improved a lot, Id be a bit worried about accidentally triggering myself into a bad dissociative state.