I use to think of trauma as only post traumatic stress syndrome (PTSD). I now know trauma impacts more people than I ever imagined including me. When I was four I had an anaphylactic reaction to something in a penicillin shot. My throat closed up, I could not swallow and the emergency room said I got in just in the nick of time. At age 13 in an accident my grandmother and I were both thrown out of a car. This was before seat belt laws. I broke one collar bone and fractured the other. She was unhurt. I went into shock and remember only speaking gibberish no one could understand my words until I came out of it. Until recently I never considered either of these events to be traumatic. They were just things that happened to me. (In a side note my grandfather was not ejected. He looked over and saw we both had disappeared. The car door had closed after we flew out. For a moment he thought it was game over and we had gone to heaven and he had gone to the “other place”. This made for a good family story.)

The American Psychological Association defines trauma as an emotional response to a terrible event like an accident, rape, or natural disaster. Immediately after the event, shock and denial are typical. Longer term reactions include unpredictable emotions, flashbacks, strained relationships, and even physical symptoms like headaches or nausea. We are now learning the pandemic created a kind of trauma and witnessing a traumatic event, even on the news, can also create trauma. Intergenerational trauma is also being studied, it can be racial trauma or other systemic oppression. The effects of intergenerational trauma have been documented in descendants of refugees, Native American boarding schools and Holocaust survivors children.

Back when I was a psychology major I read perhaps just one page about PSTD trauma. In the last ten years many studies have looked at treating trauma with yoga. Last year I took a trauma informed Yoga Nidra training. In January I got a certification in Yoga for Emotional and Physical Trauma. Not only did this help me in teaching patients at the clinic but also to go deeper into my own trauma healing. If you have PSTD or severe trauma it is best to work with a therapist. Yoga can assimilate physical movement and restorative action patterns into treatment. Body oriented therapies like yoga make connections at a somatic level then use that as entry point to address emotions and cognition. If you want more information the book Overcoming Trauma through Yoga by David Emerson and Elizabeth Hopper PhD is a great source.

I was just in Key West and my goal was to find yoga on the beach. The only class we could attend was a somatic yoga. In each pose we did some very subtle movements to release tension. In the 1970s Thomas Hanna developed somatics the idea that all life experiences lead to physical patterns in the body. Somatic movement helps undo habitual learned movement patterns that can lead to pain. Then when I got back my online morning meditation teacher had changed the format. For just this week she had a teacher come in to add some somatic yoga. The universe appears to be guiding me to this practice.

My life has gotten better with new trauma awareness. For years and years I could not wear a back pack. The straps were just like the brace I had to wear on my shoulders to fix my fractured and broken collar bones. I thought it weird and something was wrong with me as it took so long to disassociate from that memory. I know now trauma is stored in the body. I also used to panic at the dentist. When I was tipped back in the chair I felt like I could not swallow and was sure I also couldn’t breath. I just suffered through each visit. After my first trauma training another teacher suggested I talk to the dentist about my trauma and it’s trigger. I had suffered all these years and powered through my appointments. At first it seamed like a sign of weakness to admit I had trouble with a plain old dentil visit. So my last crown I explained the situation to the dentist and assistant. They told me if I got panicky I could raise my hand and stop for a bit. Now it’s a much better experience.