Pain And Trauma Connection

[Chava]

Just curious who else experiences chronic pain and if you connect it to your trauma. I've been doing somatic-focused therapy for a couple years (somatic experiencing, etc) and have learned a lot, but the pain piece is still a puzzle. When it's bad I have crazy meltdowns, feel way more immobilized and trapped than I am, and also feel disconnected...like it's me and my pain being a separate part I disown (sounds kooky...best I can explain it for now). Sexual assaults happened later in life, after I already had problems, so I assume it's connected to early medical trauma and/or physical abuse and neglect. I've read only shreds on links between any of these. I don't have clear body memories (though I don't understand much about how body memories work), but my meltdowns bring me to a really immobilized, helpless, tiny place. I get time all glued together in a bad way.

This relates to a couple specific kinds of pain. I could probably break my arm and not notice. Or, like I flew off my bike and did some work around the house before going to ER for stitches. But upper back pain and cramping bring on panic attacks, dread, and trapped feelings. I've learned a lot about fight and flight reflexes but sense my back pain as really protective (like fight or flight aren't physically possible).

Without necessarily having to name your traumas, does anyone relate their pain to medical trauma? Or abuse? Or neglect? I think it's all rolled together and don't hope to perfectly unravel it for myself, but I'm just sort of interested in how this connection works. The bad stuff I can remember doesn't feel like the source of my deeper problems. It's more the stuff stuck in my body from what I can't remember...maybe just bits, or what I've been told, or just how I feel sometimes. I'm working with my doc, therapist, and sometimes physical therapists or Pilates teachers to do what I can to manage pain or just feel more empowered. But I'm kind of interested in the early trauma and/or medical or physical abuse (or neglect) and how it might still be part of "me." It's hard because I don't have the stories I can explain...makes me just feel crazy sometimes...(like I'm e-mail screaming at my therapist, the world is crashing down on me or I'm being destroyed, I'm burning myself to feel "okay", or I can't move or help myself appropriately sometimes, and I don't know why...this all spirals down with physical pain in these hyper-sensitive spots).

 

[KwanYingirl]

Yes, Chava, I can relate. The intense pain when there is no explanation for it is really puzzling to me. Then I might look at my legs and have bruises on them with no knowledge of having bumped into anything. Then I might cut or peel skin off my body to minimize the psychic agony I sometimes succumb to in a maladaptive way. I don't even realize I'm doing it until later when I don't heal quickly.
So you wonder where the body memories fit in to your meltdown mode? Don't you feel like it's a cascade of reactions that literally involve the entire body? I have trouble urinating and there's no explanation why except I have to admit that it's reliving rape and how horrifically painful it was. Also my abuser dug his fingernails into my pelvis to threaten me not to make any noise and I have always relived that too. I don't recall any medical procedures but I know from being a Radiographer that extreme care must be taken when trying to convince a sick or injured child to follow directions. A child with a broken bone is very quiet and submissive. A sprain is expressed very vocally. I had extreme difficulty working with ill or injured children. I couldn't stand to see them hurting. I managed to steer my career into mammography in large part to get away from doing kids. This is clearly abuse based avoidance.
What I get hung up on is why? I know there are gaps in my memory but why on some particular day or time does my body express such agony? What does somatic therapy do? Is it supposed to free you from these reliving episodes? Cuz if it does, sign me up!

 

[Chava]

Yes, @KwanYingirl sometimes it is my whole body, for sure. Other times it's a very clear spot in my back and the rest of me wants to just get away from it.

I can imagine it would be really hard to work with kids. I have some nasty memories of people trying to help me. Didn't matter how it was explained or whatever. But I do think it might have been different if I felt like there was some safe or comforting base, but there wasn't really. So that sort of isolation is hard to explain and probably hard to totally fix. I might always crave meaningful projects above meaningful relationships, but hopefully relationships aren't out. Once in a while I come across a good friend and it helps so much to have someone to laugh with.

For me, I prefer somatic/body-oriented therapy to talk therapy. It might be partly related to those gaps. I faired poorly in traditional talk therapy settings...lots of staring blankly and not speaking. Pre-verbal or trauma without narrative, I had nothing to say. Or like today, no way I want to put my experiences into words.

It's actually a little easier for me to talk in my somatic type therapy because I feel less cornered somehow. But also, I've just been so disembodied through everything, especially the stuff like anorexia and just total unawareness and numbness. But now I feel sensations (had to in order to recover from the e.d.), and it feels like too many are bad. Trying to also "feel" good feelings with my body, or in myself. I'm not sure yet if it can free me from these episodes or meltdowns. I have fewer panic attacks, but these meltdowns seem worse...not sure if it has to do with my low level of patience with the ongoing pain stuff or what. But I feel like I'm gaining a little more awareness. If I can notice when I'm feeling more immobilized than I actually am, then I can probably go for a walk, and that usually helps for my pain stuff and also helps me feel less trapped. So, it's probably little things, little steps, more time and patience than I imagined I had. Anyway, I feel more connected to myself and my body, some days that's good, some days that's not good.