What Does "processing Trauma" Really Mean?

[maddog]

We often talk about "processing the trauma" as being the ultimate goal of therapy and indeed of effective recovery overall, and yet sometimes, I wonder what we really mean...

Much like the terms "flashback", "dissociation" etc, I think we all have an idea in our minds of what we mean when we talk about it, but I suspect that those definitions vary widely.

So what does "processing trauma" really mean? For those who feel they have achieved this goal, how did you get there, how did you know you'd gotten there, and what actual practical steps did you take (both in therapy and in life generally) along the way? I don't mean the actual forms of trauma therapy undertaken, but rather, how did you utilise these approaches to "process" your trauma??

To try to provide some context for what might seem like a strange question, a few examples of trauma processing components which seem relevant to me include:

Coming to remember/understand what happened to the best of your ability;
Correctly identifying and accepting matters of blame, responsibility, causality, consequence etc;
Identifying and experiencing the emotions asociated with the trauma which may or may not have been known or experienced at the time;
Identifying and addressing the ways in which the trauma has impacted on your current life/functioning/interpretation of the world;
Identifying and, to the extent possible, "rewriting" the cognitive distortions and other maladaptive thoughts and feelings arising from the trauma...

The above list is a starting point only - what are others' thoughts?

And is talking about the trauma event(s) in detail necessary to achieve processing in all instances? I know the theoretical debates for and against recounting trauma in detail, but what are peoples' personal experiences?

Maddog

 

[VDWngr1355]

I have been wondering about this as well. As I don't quite get how one can identify if they have processed the events as well.....

 

[anthony]

Processing trauma, in its absolute simplistic infancy, is about changing a negative emotional connotation into a neutral / positive one. Remove the negative to either one, neutral or positive emotion.

When confused, swap out trauma for emotion instead. Processing emotion.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

This probably isn't what you're looking for, but it's my take on processing... And yes, this approach is VERY new, with only a couple of treatment centers in the states taking this approach.

I literally processed my main traumas in a two week time span, five days a week, seven hours a day of individual therapy. Yes, it came with a hefty price tag as it wasn't covered by insurance, but it literally was a last resort for me.

You say you don't want to know about treatments or therapies, but to not say what helped me would gloss over the question of whether processing is necessary. I believe it is... But I can see why others say it doesn't work. Processing via traditional therapy would have taken YEARS. Let's do the math!

My processing... Ten days X six hours a day (chop off an hour each day for opening up, closing down) = 60 hours of processing

In traditional therapy... One session a week X 30 minutes a session (chop off 15 minutes for opening up, closing down) = 2+ YEARS to get in the same amount of processing time that I got in two weeks.

No wonder people argue that processing (ie talking about their trauma) doesn't work. Constantly opening and attempting to close pandoras box seems fruitless. Plus my calculations above didn't account for mini-crisis' that inevitably pop up from time to time and delay processing while in once a week therapy.

So for me, it literally was opening pandoras damn box for two weeks, then moving on. (I'd say the box is closed, but that's a bad analogy as pandoras box cant be closed).

The important part of processing? Putting trauma on a continuum. Our minds get stuck IN the trauma. My processing gave me a happy before, traumatic event (middle), and happy after. This was KEY! My mind now diverts to the happy after pretty much automatically.

I view my processing as over. In the three step model of 1) safety & stabilization 2) processing 3) reconnecting with the world, I most definitely consider myself to be in the third stage for the most part. Although I'm floundering ATM, I'm most definitely there.

Is talking in detail necessary? How detailed? Well I think some therapists are cruel when they tell their patients to write out every painstaking detail. Sights. Sounds. Smells. I think it's overkill. I had to visualize my trauma, then I had to draw out my trauma scene by scene, then my trauma story was read back to me as a story, and finally I had to communicate with all my inner thoughts and feelings via dialogue. Yes, it was intense (hence the name intensive trauma therapy), but for me it worked. It's a shame that insurance won't cover such a program as a cost/benefit analysis would likely show savings vs years and years and years of regular therapy. But that's another discussion for another day.

Yes I've gone on tangent, but feel it was necessary as it illustrates my stance on why I believe processing is beneficial whereas others may not. (and tbh, I'd be arguing the opposite if the only option was to process via traditional therapy once a week...that damaged me! I was spun into horrible dissociative episodes, with much of the blame ultimately attributed to the simple time crunch!)

 

[intothelight]

When confused, swap out trauma for emotion instead. Processing emotion.

This pretty much hits the nail on the head!

I can talk about the events, those I remember and those that I only have fragments of, and rationally I KNOW that is in my past. But there is a disconnect between what I know and what I feel (emotions).

So to me processing trauma is focused on "emotion" and the things in the present that create an emotional response that is out of line with the reality of the situation, person, or object. It is learning to recognize the emotion and what lies behind it. If I can identify the source, then I work on putting it into perspective and using tools that I have learned to make the emotional response appropriate.

This is so hard to explain in words as there is such a broad range of emotion and mood. The sources are varied, but the most important thing I have found is identifying the "mood" or "emotions" that start me spiraling into severe depression, internalized rage, extreme anxiety, etc. If I can redirect my thoughts, I have gain control over the emotion and can keep from going off the deep end.

I don't have a lot of memory about my trauma and I haven't had years of therapy, just around a year and a half; but I have spent the past two years really working hard to get a handle on the PTSD symptoms that were making my life miserable and also those around me. So much of the time, I end up processing emotions that seem to come from "no where" in the reality of the present. I have a long way to go, but I have also come a long way.

 

[Ice_Fire]

I agree with ITL and Anthony. It's about processing the emotional responses to everyday life that are linked with the trauma.

I can get the details of what happened out, but, it's how those events make me feel about myself now that needs to be worked through. Identifying why my current emotional reactions are way out of proportion to events in the present and working through the trauma that made/makes me feel as I do is the key IMO.

 

[Hashi]

I think my take on things might be a bit different from many other people's (it often is!). I think processing happens on two levels - the literal level and the level of power and meaning.

The literal is remembering, letting it be real, facing it, voicing it and looking at the effects on everything since then. It's also somatic - my body working through and releasing trauma energy as well. With all of this I feel like the trauma has been there all this time but it's only now that I'm digesting it so it can be assimilated into myself and my life, rather than separate and fighting me.

The other aspect is about changing the power it has over me. Every time I work on the literal, this is affected. When I speak about what happened, for example, what happened has a little less power over me and I have a little more power over it. I also work directly on being stronger, ie more powerful - for example, through grounding, work on safety and protection, visualisation, expression, being validated and creating more supportive thoughts and beliefs.

I'm not sure how much it's necessary to talk in detail about traumatic events in order to process them, but I think doing this to some extent is essential, at least for me. If I've talked about some thing/s that made me feel shame, for example, and doing that has led me to a realisation, new understanding and more compassion for myself, I don't think I need to go on to talk about more and more details to do with shame. If I'm still stuck on the meaning I'm giving to my feelings of shame (eg I'm worthless, I deserved it, I'm ruined) then I probably need to talk more about things that felt shameful and their effects.

I think talking about the details has to be done carefully and safely though, or it isn't processing at all, it's just retraumatisation.

 

[Tinyflame]

I agree with your whole post Hashi 101%.

 

[maddog]

Oh, me too me too!! I think this is exactly the missing element that was niggling away in my mind, the aspect of the power that the trauma has over you. Somehow that was the part of processing that I knew was critical, yet couldnt' quite put a label on, and I also agree totally with all that you wrote Hashi, including the need and purpose of talking about events in detail and the need to do so very safely and constructively.

For me, I'm pretty good at analysing and resorting the trauma memory into its various parts. I'm less good, but chipping away, at working through the emotion. But there was always an additional element that I knew I had to achieve for the other work not to be merely token and conditional, and that's where the power came in.

Truly, I just can't add anything much to what you wrote!

MD

 

[BlueOrange]

Excellent question, and so many excellent responses. SOL points out my biggest concern on this issue - there is contention/debate about what we are supposed to be doing. We know in a lot of detail how to have PTSD, but trauma without PTSD is poorly understood. If we understood the non-disorder response in more detail, we might be able to adjust our trauma response onto a non-disordered path (I think there is more than one, and selection of a path needs to take individual circumstances into account).

 

[Elizabeth-Ann]

These fast and intese therapies sound interesting to me. But what about the danger of re-traumatization?

My psychiatrist tells me every time that I have to be careful about this. When I am about to getting to upset during a therapy session we stop and let me calm down. My heart races and I want to trow up or faint.

He tells me only to go as far as I can bear at the moment and to be patient. Even if I dit want to try a more intese therapy, I think for me it would not be possilbe to be in therapy several hours a day and every day of the week.

 

[Tanishq]

These fast and intese therapies sound interesting to me. But what about the danger of re-traumatization?

I think shortcuts are always dangerous and they can heal you. no doubt, but only for short period of time. Everything takes time to grow up. I agree we all have to take small steps and go at turtle speed. Win is guaranteed.