Trauma Therapy
Has A Distressing Experience From Your Past Compromised Your Quality Of Life?
Are you experiencing mental health symptoms—including anxiety and depression—but can’t detect where they are coming from?
Do you feel unsafe, on-edge, and dysregulated in otherwise normal, everyday situations?
Have you developed a negative view of yourself or others following a distressing or dangerous experience?
Perhaps anxious, hopeless thinking dominates your mindset. You may experience intense emotions, including rage, fear, and self-blame, despite not having anything to be abjectly angry about or afraid of. And the distress you feel is likely to impact your relationships or ability to enjoy your life.
Have You Survived A Traumatic Experience?
If you have a hard time identifying exactly where your symptoms originated, it’s possible that an unprocessed trauma from your past is affecting how you feel right now. Though trauma certainly encapsulates dangerous or life-altering situations—including an attack, injury, or child abuse—it’s more widespread than you think.
Trauma can result from any situation that makes you feel unsafe or out of control, including a breakup, move, or death of a loved one. Many common human experiences create feelings of instability and challenge resiliency, which can leave you with a negative perception of yourself and the world around you. When trauma undermines your basic needs for trust and safety, the consequences can extend into your relationships, functioning, and everyday experience of life.
Instead of avoiding the trauma, it’s essential to give yourself permission to heal. Working with our trauma-informed therapists at A New Day Family Counseling, you can learn to grieve your losses, find meaning, and process your experiences in a healthy way.
Women are you suffering from trauma?
Check out our Sisters’ Circle group!
What Is Trauma And How Does It Affect Us?
Over the span of 20 years, researchers at Kaiser Permanente and the Center for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) conducted studies on a wide range of participants across gender, race, and socioeconomic lines. They found that a resounding 69.9 percent of American adults survived one or more of eight categories of childhood trauma—otherwise known as adverse childhood experiences (ACEs). This research also demonstrated a significant link between childhood trauma and the onset of disease, depression, anxiety, and addiction in adulthood. ¹
Trauma can result from a wide variety of difficult experiences. Whether the experience is severe—like an assault, serious accident, or violent situation—or considered more “low intensity,” our bodies enter a fight, flight, or freeze response when we feel the threat of danger. Our brains can get “stuck” in this traumatic pattern, producing a host of uncomfortable mental health symptoms that keep us feeling dysregulated for months or years after the event.
The impact of trauma greatly depends on the perception of the person experiencing it. A number of factors influence perception, including age, physical characteristics, and level of support. Moreover, symptoms can worsen when survivors feel too ashamed or guilty to discuss their experiences. And though we are continually chipping away at the mental health stigma in this country, many people still feel like they are undeserving of or disqualified from meaningful trauma treatment.
No one deserves to be haunted by their trauma. By working with an experienced, skilled trauma-informed counselor, you can learn how to regain agency over your life and improve your mindset along the way.
Therapy Can Help You Process Trauma
Therapy takes the painful, disruptive thorns out of a traumatic experience. Instead of being something that dominates your life, therapy can teach you how to integrate trauma in a way that feels healthy and hopeful.
At A New Day Family Counseling, we offer trauma treatment to clients of all ages. Depending on your needs and goals for therapy, we will customize trauma-informed methods to ensure that you experience symptom reduction and relief. Once you complete a standard assessment with your therapist, you can work together to create a treatment plan that honors your unique goals, values, and experiences.
What To Expect
Initial therapy sessions will be used to cultivate feelings of safety and trust between you and your counselor. While there is a misconception that you have to relive your trauma in counseling, the truth is that re-traumatization can easily happen without the guidance of a skilled, trauma-informed therapist.
Our goal is to create an environment where you can securely process intense emotional and physical experiences while primarily focusing on what you can do to feel better today. We are careful to learn your triggers and help you gently observe your thoughts, feelings, and beliefs. With this approach and the other evidence-based methods used in treatment, you can transform your trauma narrative from one of hopeless negativity to one of peaceful wisdom.
Our Trauma-Informed Approach
Peter Levine’s Waking the Tiger: Healing Trauma is foundational to our approach, with its focus on how the body holds onto trauma. In guiding you to clear the unhealthy stored energy manifesting as sleep disturbances, hyperarousal, flashbacks, and emotional avoidance, you can feel more relaxed and in control. As another body-based treatment, Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) can help to resolve stored trauma in the brain and body. And the Safe and Sound Protocol (SSP) can be used for clients frequently experiencing social anxiety, overwhelm, and sensory difficulties.
For clients with acute trauma symptoms, Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT) is a structured approach that focuses on how trauma has shaped beliefs and outlooks. Though this 12-session treatment is intensive, it is powerfully effective in promoting more balanced, realistic thoughts among the individuals who use it.
In addition, Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT) may be integrated into treatment for children and adolescents in particular. This 8- to 25-session counseling approach is highly effective for targeting symptoms of PTSD in youth populations and can improve other mental health conditions—including child/teen depression and anxiety—as well.
Bad things may have happened to you, but you are capable of maintaining a rich, full life. By committing to trauma treatment at A New Day Family Counseling, you can improve your outlook, relationships, and overall health.
Still Unsure If Trauma Treatment Is Right For You?
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This is a common concern, and we want to assure you that, as qualified trauma-informed counselors, we will make this a safe and gentle process for you. Instead of focusing on what happened, we will pay attention to your feelings and reactions. By slowing down to grieve, taking control of the narrative, and learning lasting coping skills, you can develop a new relationship with your trauma.
In addition, it’s important to note that we often use nonverbal approaches in treatment. EMDR is one example of a therapeutic approach that targets trauma on the body-based level without requiring you to discuss the experience at length.
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We are certainly willing to work with you on scheduling and financial concerns. We have many therapists on staff who offer flexible hours, and online trauma treatment is available for those who don’t have time to commute to therapy.
If cost is a concern, note that many insurance plans cover a large portion of treatment when we’re in network with your plan, and some portion will be covered by out-of-network plans. If our services are not covered by insurance, we have many self-pay options ranging in price from $85 - $150/session. You can contact us to find out more.
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A lot of valuable work can be done in individual counseling. Our therapists will guide you in strengthening your communication, practicing trust, and establishing meaningful boundaries. By helping your partner better understand how to support your trauma experience, you can facilitate deeper healing and connection.
Heal Your Trauma, Find Peace
Trauma may have compromised your quality of life, but you don’t have to be stuck in counterproductive and unhealthy patterns. In therapy at A New Day Family Counseling, you will have an opportunity to take back the control your trauma has taken away. To schedule an appointment, visit our contact page or email us.
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