11 childhood trauma triggers (sage sessions #9)

Good morning, good afternoon, good evening, and good night, just kidding. Welcome to my TED Talk on... just kidding. I'm being sassy today. I'm not sure why. Trying to get my energy up because as a menopausal woman I do not sleep as well as I would like to. But today's video is really about these unknown childhood trauma triggers. And I was doing my walk this morning and quick aside I promise you that just putting your shoes on if you can and walking around your house on a treadmill up and down your stairs ideally outside in a blue or green environment will do wonders for your mental health and physical health. It won't fix everything but it can really help especially if you are an anxious person. So that being said I was thinking about how we go through life and one of the big pieces of complex trauma is this concept of emotional flashbacks. And if you're not familiar with that concept it's this idea that you have a flashback but it's a feeling flashback. It's a regressed state often in your trauma and childhood. It's like your feelings your brain and emotions just get transported back in time. So you might not have you may not have a visual flashback when you think about PTSD flashbacks but it's that sudden feeling of off like fear shame anxiety hypervigilance really being activated. It could be deep long deep and long sadness and grief inside. And that is what often happens when we're going through our day. And so I wrote down I think it's 11 things that I find that can be very transporting back to that chronic stress state of childhood and or adulthood relationship trauma. Number one is being disrespected. And this one gets really triggered when you become a parent because for so many of us we were not allowed to have a separate self or thoughts. It was disrespectful and it still is for many people and also frankly it depends on your culture and your particular family history. But when your kids start to sass you back and don't listen to you if you are not mindful it can trigger. This isn't about my child testing boundaries and trying to you know separate. It feels very personal and like you don't matter or you're being actively shamed humiliated punished made to feel small. And of course this can also happen in your relationship with your partner. So anytime you feel that way it's important to stop and pause and check in and ask yourself what am I really feeling right now. You know your kids are going to disrespect you. That's part of their job. They are teaching you how to help them become the best people that they are meant to be. And that is normal. But if you're not careful you can personalize all of that and lose it and then act out in ways that you don't feel good about especially if you don't want to blow at them. Number two passive aggressive jokes by friends colleagues of course family or friends. It's like that snide little ha ha ha where no one really says directly what they're you know what they're trying to say. But you sit there going wait a minute but you just like insult me but it's wrapped up in a package of like a compliment or a joke. I've told this multiple times I have this friend that really devastated me to lose. But I realized over time after my divorce they were just just it was just always something they said I had a baby shower for them and they didn't think I got the coffee out fast enough. And so they started like taking over which was embarrassing like it was a beautiful like shabby chic baby shower. They told me that I reminded them of Brandy on The Real Housewives and if you know who Brandy is and oh she said only in the best way so I was like what if you know me I might be sassy. I don't usually use a lot of potty mouth words here. I can occasionally have a potty mouth. I am very much from Texas but that type and no offense to Brandy like she is who she is but like that is not the kind of woman I am at all. So it's just like all these little little things that it took me years to finally catch up with. But these passive aggressive things it's not a compliment to be called that you are that you remind someone of someone who is acting I believe boundaryless and out of control on TV for example. So anyway I'm not sure what that was about. I think it was my growing like I don't give a F about things my growing independence and autonomy and and really tapping back in to my frankly unmasked self. I started unmasking more and more after my divorce because I was very masked and being the perfect wife and the perfect mother and when you lose all of that and it all crashes you do have to kind of start to rebuild your identity. So I'll maybe talk about that later. Number three watching other people have normal families. This triggers me all of the time still. I would just told my therapist like I'll be watching something and there'll be this like family on TV or something very like the Golden Bachelorette and her parents are still alive or her kids or are you know have like aunts and uncles and cousins and for me I'm an only child. Both of my parents very eggshell very toxic lost my dad very young. My mom and I have been in no contact for about six years. It was a very toxic relationship with my mom especially in our adult lives so much worse in some ways. The point is when I see other families that have what I feel like it's normal ish. It's not chaotic and bad. Yes all families have some drama but it's like pressing your nose against the glass to see other people have just like a support system like I just can't even imagine what that would look like to have a sibling to turn to and say yeah mom is crazy or to have an aunt or uncle for my children that I felt was a really safe great human being for them or having parents alive at this age like I just don't. I don't get it but that can trigger our childhood trauma and our wounds in major ways. All of the things we longed for and if you got those in adulthood great it can still trigger you but if you never get them in your life it's even more triggering. Number four being alone. Now I talk a lot about I love being alone and isolating but there can be a sense of feeling your aloneness. It's not that you are physically alone so much but feeling the loneliness like I was just saying in the last one that you really don't have anyone to raise your kids if something happens to you. You don't have an inheritance coming from family you're financially completely on your own. Things like that just feeling alone in the world and it can bring up these conflicting feelings because for many of us being alone and isolating actually I believe can be good for our nervous systems but this is about when you really feel it not just like I'm saying the physical space but really tapping in in these moments sometimes where you realize how truly alone in the world. Maybe you always were as a child and maybe now you still are. Number five classic holidays. This fantasy about what holidays should look like and be like and what you hope for and watching other people kind of you know like I stop decorating a lot. I used to start as my dermatologist. Tomorrow I'm getting like a basal cell thing biopsied so you might see me with a band-aid on the next few days and even more if I have to get the whole plastic surgery thing. It's that little thing I got right here. Anyway so when you stop decorating I was going to say like when my kids were little I had this fantasy of my Martha Stewart life. It was quite a lovely life in many ways. But once I became a divorced mom really raising four kids alone like I just I would do Christmas but all the decorations and having a storage unit in California. So just watching people have whether it's their home the holidays themselves the spirit of the season we all know this one can be very triggering for the things that you longed for in childhood. And like I've said when you when you think your adult life is going to fix your childhood like this perfect marriage. I'm going to give my kids what I didn't have. And then you find yourself not able to do that. It's a there's a lot of trauma and work. It's taken me a lot of time to work on that. Number six watching other people get things easily. So it's like you know why do I have to try so hard. Why do why does it seem like other people things just come to them when you suffered so much. And so if you've had a pretty difficult childhood or even you know difficult adult life we all know that things are not what they seem. But oftentimes it feels like why why is it me like why do I have and I do believe some of us have more bad luck than others or more crazy things happen. I just I know this to be true. And so everyone has their thing. You know I always have cat hair here. But but it's like it can once again feel like what's wrong with me. Why is life so hard. Why do things not come to me in the same way. And that can really bring up a lot of wins. Number seven is having I first put anger. But really it's watching anyone have big feelings in any regard especially if big feelings were a sign of danger. So you had a parent with their big angry feelings. They raged and yelled and screamed. Maybe it was when they were manic and really happy that bad things happen. Even seeing people be like excessively happy can be triggering because it might bring up the fact that you don't feel that way. It could be a sensory response to what's happening for them that you're triggered by like why are you being so loud. It could like I said mirror a parent's big feelings in some way that triggers this fear often this hypervigilance in you. The next one is driving. I mentioned this yesterday is that really I truly believe that driving creates this massive projection. This experience of projection all of the time. Someone cuts you off. They don't look out for you. They you know they almost pull into you. It really becomes about so much more in so many cases. Yes it's frustrating when someone almost hits you. There's no doubt about that. But I do believe that driving in and of itself and then for me or for you maybe in your childhood I know with my kids being in the car was terrible. I don't know what happens in the car with kids. It's like they lose their minds and from the time they were pretty young I had like a three row car and I started putting my oldest son in the front one in the front two in the middle and one in the back to space them out. So there can be actual trauma in the car maybe for you. It was with you and your siblings and your parents lost it. It could just be that other drivers trigger you. But I think that can bring up a lot of things like like all of this. It's not about the thing. It's about the feeling state the wound the trauma the repeated traumas that you have. The next one is just good things when good things happen. It feels like it's not real. Your first thought is often well I can't hold on to that because I never got to have good things or good things happen. That means bad things will happen. I have a lot of clients that talk about the evil eye and I know there's a like a history to all of that. But this idea that if I put out my own joy in the world it will come back to me in a bad way and I think it's important I've always told my kids to read the room. You know like as I've said don't talk about things intentionally to people that you know are suffering or don't have what you have like just be mindful. But at the end of the day good things can really feel like unsafe especially if you didn't have a lot of those or they were minimal or there was always a price attached to something good happening in your life. And then the last two are really this is that someone repeatedly not acknowledging you. What do I mean by that. I have a couple of neighbors like where I live now. Do a whole video on Orange County and California. It's generally not my vibe but Laguna used to be a very open loving accepting artsy community when I first met my ex husband here 100 years ago and I moved back here with my kids and it has actually become a lot more like Newport 2.0. It's not Newport if you know there's a thing like we have bumper stickers that say if you're not nice or would be nicer go back to Newport when you're in Laguna. But the point is that it happens with women and so it's interesting because with men if they don't acknowledge me on a walk and I know a neighbor like I don't really in some ways I feel a little relieved because of just being a woman in the world and when a man notices you there can be stuff around that. But this idea that when I have neighbors I have a couple of neighbors like the husband is super so sweet and the wife is just a straight up just like we'll look at you and not wave back and not smile and I have and I saw one this morning I was walking down where I walk at the beach and she doesn't live in my neighborhood I don't think but lives nearby and she never acknowledges me and I'm not saying I acknowledge everyone but growing up in Texas you know it's like a thing where you make eye contact and you might smile. P.S. that did not go well when I went to school on the East Coast. They were like what are you looking at. But the point is someone intentionally just not acknowledging you like it pisses me off in a way that is stupid like why do I care. But it can feel like rejection. It can feel even though you can know up here this isn't about me or maybe they're shy or they're distracted but when it happens again and again and again and nothing's happened between the two of you that can be very triggering and I do think it's about something about women and I'll talk more about that maybe in a video with my mom issues and female friendships that can make that difficult. And the last one is being left out not being included. You know so many of us and I do think this is really even more common if you have something like neurodivergence and autism is that you're very familiar with not even necessarily bullying though that can be definitely a thing but just not being accepted for who you are. And watching my youngest child my kids go through school here to be honest they have all struggled in different ways socially all of them and I do think that you know being a single mother being raised in an affluent community where your mom is on the low end like there's a lot of that stuff that goes on here and it's also high school and middle school we all know I don't care what decade you went to school and for most of us those are difficult years. But this idea of maybe you're at work and your co-workers are laughing and telling a joke and you walk up and they disperse and maybe there's nothing about you but it feels like rejection or there's a party and you weren't invited or whatever I mean and you don't have to invite everyone to everything. I get that but the feeling state of not being included especially if you felt rejected in your own family can be massive. So I think that's a huge one. Anyway those are I think I think that's 11 of the most common I think sort of subtle triggers that you might not be aware of. What can you do about it really quickly. This video I know is going longer. You want to pause and maybe do some grounding where you start to you know what can you notice with your eyes. What do you see. What do you smell. What can you touch. What can you taste. You know that kind of 5 4 3 2 1 or really just noticing all of your senses because all of your senses can trigger these things to sense memories around smells and and visual things that remind you of all of these things can make it worse. And then you want to really separate and ask yourself what's really happening right now. Maybe do like a butterfly top where you you know you pause and you rock back and forth do some breathing. You really want to ground yourself in that this feels like the past but that's not happening right now. Where am I. Who am I. What is this about. And often naming it that name entertainment by Dan Siegel where you say I am feeling frustrated. I'm feeling scared. I'm feeling anxious. Even just putting a label to that can help calm and soothe and identify what's happening inside. And so any of those kind of classic techniques and then distraction techniques even just moving on to the next thing. But I will say it's important to try to pause and honor identify what am I feeling. What is this about. Is this sort of old stuff that doesn't really apply to me anymore and to really actively work on separation because the last thing I will say is that for many of us enmeshment in our parents feelings and the behaviors we were such a part of that we weren't separate selves can make us take on feelings sometimes where we're not really sure well what belongs to me and what belongs to you. And that's really important. So that's it. Thank you so much for being here. Please take good care and I will see you tomorrow. Have a good day.