Overcoming Trauma: 8 Steps to Healing the Past and Finding Peace Within

By Allison Smiley

How would it feel to step into a brand-new life, unburdened by the past?

When the body experiences trauma, it leaves an indelible – and often invisible – mark. Hidden deep within us, unresolved trauma usually plays out in destructive patterns that can leave a person feeling as though they are a failure at one (or many) areas of life.

Using a powerful combination of cutting-edge psychological approaches and spiritual healing exercises, Overcoming Trauma is a one-stop toolkit for anyone wishing to resolve past traumatic experiences and receive real and lasting transformation.

Learn how trauma affects us on emotional, mental, and physical levels, and how to spot the negative cycles that keep perpetuating when left unresolved. Using the powerful 8-Step program, learn to build resilience, self-love, cultivate forgiveness and let go of the pain you have been holding onto for so long.

• Language: English
• Publisher: BookBaby
• Release date: Oct 23, 2020
• ISBN: 9781098330002

Book preview

Introduction

"Your vision will become clear only when you can look into your own heart.

Who looks outside, dreams; who looks inside, awakes." – Carl Jung

I first heard the word trauma in reference to myself was when I was attending a week-long intensive outpatient program in order to deal with yet another crisis of the mental breakdown variety. Over the years I had experienced many of these. These experiences were anywhere from what I call mini meltdowns where I was having panic attacks, anxiety, and chronic overwhelm to full-blown mental breakdowns that left me hospitalized with suicide attempts or voluntary hospitalizations knowing I was heading in that direction. Having your stomach pumped is an unpleasant experience and I’d learned over the years that although it felt like I was going to die, I didn’t really want to die – I just wanted the pain to stop.

The intensive outpatient program I attended was one of those times when I had been hit hard by a life experience and didn’t have any positive ways to cope with it. At the time, my fiancé had just called off our wedding after I told him about an abusive situation I had experienced when I was a young girl, and he felt that it was too much for our relationship to handle. He was angry that I hadn’t told him sooner, and I was devastated by my worst fears coming true: his rejection of me because of my past trauma. I had only just started getting intense flashbacks and didn’t know how to deal with what I was experiencing. I was also dealing with the humiliation and embarrassment from having to call off our wedding after finally getting engaged ten years into our relationship. My parents had rented a house in Mexico for the wedding ceremony, friends and relatives had bought plane tickets, and gifts had already started arriving at our home. My feelings vacillated from anger and rage at the betrayal to despair and depression as a result the selfloathing and shame I was experiencing. I spent several days curled up in a ball crying and wanting to die. So, the gifts went back to the store and I went to treatment.

I do want to mention here that he and I are very good friends and have an amicable co-parenting relationship with our daughter. Many years later I’m grateful for that moment in my life. If he hadn’t had the courage to make the difficult decision to call things off, I may have never hit that bottom and had the opportunity to take a deep dive into my trauma issues. Intuitively he knew that we had both been significantly affected by trauma, and that we hadn’t dealt with it yet. We didn’t have the tools to handle the outer manifestations of our own inner demons much less navigate the tumultuous waters of our relationship. We were both self-medicating, he had been unfaithful to me with several women over the years, and neither of us could stay present for each other long enough to communicate effectively and build trust in order to make things work. We loved each other dearly, and truly wanted to spend the rest of our lives together, but it wasn’t enough.

I learned about trauma for the first time during the intensive outpatient program I attended after the breakup. I felt both baffled and relieved at the same time to discover that trauma was the underlying issue. I was baffled because when I thought of trauma, I thought of soldiers returning from war, drive-by shootings, or natural disasters, and didn’t see how I fit in with those folks. I was relieved because it finally made sense and things started falling into place like the missing pieces of a puzzle.

For over three decades, I had been trying to figure out what was wrong with me. I started reading self-help books when I was 12 years old. I went to a multitude of different therapists and therapy programs to address an array of issues I struggled with over the years – an eating disorder, overspending, depression, anxiety, OCD, relationship problems, impulsivity, suicidal ideation, and difficulty concentrating. Later, after years of living in such a high state of stress and anxiety (that I now understand to be called hypervigilance, a symptom of posttraumatic stress disorder or PTSD), my body began to break down and eventually fried out and I was diagnosed with multiple autoimmune issues including fibromyalgia and chronic fatigue.

It was like playing whack-a-mole, the game at the amusement park where toy moles take turns popping up out of holes and you try to hit them on the head with a mallet, but they pop up and down so fast that it’s hard to get one. Or you do get one, but another pops up right after it, and another, and it’s impossible to keep up with all the moles popping up and down. That’s what dealing with the manifestations and symptoms of my trauma was like. I was focusing on one issue at a time and wasn’t getting any relief at all, or when I’d start to feel the pain easing just a bit, another issue would pop up. It became so overwhelming, and I was frustrated at the lack of results and often felt hopeless and helpless. And angry, but mostly just angry with myself because I couldn’t figure this thing out. I honestly felt like I had been dropped off on this planet by mistake and didn’t know how to live in this world.

I didn’t understand how people got up and went to work every day, came home to their families, went on vacations, and overall were basically happy. That wasn’t my experience at all. Every day for as long as I could remember, it was a struggle to wake up and get through the day without wanting to die. I could get my life in order and keep it together for a little while, maybe a year or two, but eventually my inner world would catch up to my outer world and things would fall apart again. Over the years I had quit or been fired from more than 30 jobs, had moved more than 45 times and many of those moves were across the country, attempted suicide and had my stomach pumped twice, voluntarily hospitalized myself for suicidal thoughts twice, attended an intensive outpatient program, been to countless therapists, went on spiritual retreats, and studied with various well-known spiritual teachers. While these experiences have been invaluable and I’ve learned a lot from them, none of them eased my pain – at least not with any long-lasting results.

So I was delighted when I learned that all I had to do was get to the source of the trauma – the root cause of my pain – and heal it in order to end the whack-a-mole life I was living. I was in graduate school at the time and I was working toward a PhD in clinical psychology, so when I became aware of this concept of trauma and the healing of it, I switched my specialization from addiction to trauma and crisis response. I had been on this mission to figure out what was wrong with me and how I could fix it for almost three decades, and I read every book or blog I could find about trauma, including peer-reviewed articles and research studies on the subject. I thought if I just learned everything I could, then I could fix it and the pain would go away.

I was always in search of the next class, the next book, the next workshop, the next healing modality, or the next degree to get the answers I needed to finally experience some peace and relief from the emotional and physical pain. I tried just about everything – from spiritual studies to hypnotherapy and energy healing, to understanding how the brain and body respond to trauma, and eventually earning a master’s degree in psychology with an emphasis on trauma and crisis. I studied with shamans, angel practitioners, energy healers, medical intuitives, new thought teachers, spiritual teachers, and holistic practitioners.

Prior to learning about trauma, I became certified in a number of healing modalities and felt called to help others, so I opened a private practice as a holistic practitioner and spiritual counselor. It was easier to focus on other people’s problems than my own. For a number of years in my practice, I worked with clients and helped them overcome negative situations and habits, addictions, weight and body image issues, career and relationship issues. I was passionate about helping people get unstuck so they could move forward in their lives and pursue their goals and dreams. I also taught Reiki, meditation, and selfhypnosis at a local community college, and authored and recorded six guided meditation CDs and one on positive affirmations. I absolutely loved the work I was doing, but I was exhausted – physically, mentally, and emotionally – and I decided to close my practice. It was time to focus on me and address the trauma.

Over the next couple of years, I diligently went to trauma specialists who I thought could help me heal. The process felt excruciatingly slow, but I kept at it. Even when I wanted to quit or run, I stuck with it. I went to Al-Anon meetings and learned to set boundaries and techniques for self-care. I learned to tolerate discomfort and to sit calmly and stay present with pain in my body or with painful thoughts and emotions. I learned to let go of control and perfectionism, my false concepts of safety and security. I learned to slow down and to take care of my body and my mind. I learned to accept my present circumstances, whatever they may be. I learned that I could forgive myself and others who had harmed or betrayed me in some way. I learned that there was no next big cure, no miracle solution to my problems, and that there were no answers outside of myself. I learned that the only way through is through, that the courage to keep going is worth more than its weight in gold, and that I won’t die from discomfort. But the most important thing I learned is that you can heal from trauma, even if you feel hopeless or helpless.

My goal in writing this book is to provide you with simple steps to help you overcome trauma and experience some peace in your life. When I started my journey to healing from trauma, I didn’t have a road map to this process, and there was a lot of trial and error to find what worked and what didn’t. I spent months focusing on techniques or healing methods that had little to no impact on overcoming and healing my trauma. I wish there had been an Allison’s Guide for Healing Her Trauma program that I could have attended and that it had these 8 steps included in it.

Instead, I created that program myself, combining my master’s degree in psychology where I received information on the latest neuroscience and techniques for healing trauma, with my holistic and spiritual training in clinical hypnotherapy, neurolinguistic programming (NLP), mindfulness and meditation, law of attraction principles, and various yogic practices. I started working with clients who began to see improvements in their symptoms almost immediately. I then offered an online trauma healing program where I guided people through the steps each week, provided weekly healing and group coaching sessions, as well as a private Facebook support group for trauma healing. The results have been amazing, and I wrote this book so that I could share the process with more people. The truth is, I used to believe that trauma healing was more about managing symptoms rather than truly being free of them, but I’ve experienced that freedom firsthand and it is delicious. I don’t want anyone to suffer or struggle like I did, and I’m passionate about sharing this method for healing trauma so that you can experience that freedom too.

My hope for you is that you will use these steps to guide you to a calmer, more peaceful and joy-filled way of living. If you’ve been on this journey for a while like I have, you’re probably worn out, ready to give up on ever feeling better, or are experiencing tremendous inner pain and turmoil. Your life may have become overwhelming or unbearable from living in a chronic high state of stress, trying to control everything around you, living with chronic physical pain or illness, or numbing the pain with substances or unhealthy behaviors. Hang in there and keep going because I know from experience that there is a way through it.

Thankfully, the topic of trauma has become more mainstream these days. There’s less of a stigma around it and there are a lot more resources available for receiving help. If you’re reading this book, then you’ve probably been informed about trauma in some way – whether it was mentioned by a therapist, brought up by a friend or family member, or you’ve been researching it on your own. Perhaps you know exactly what the problem is, but don’t know how to deal with it or nothing so far has worked very well. Or perhaps this is all new to you and you don’t know where to start. This book is written for all levels of trauma survivors, whether you are well versed in the concept or just dipping your toe in to see what it’s about.

I’ve broken the book down into two sections: the first part provides a definition and the symptoms of trauma, the different types of trauma and survival responses, disorders that often occur with trauma, and how trauma affects the brain and body. I’ve also included chapters on toxic shame, perfectionism, and attachment because I’ve found these issues play a big role in the lives of trauma survivors. The first section gets a little science-y, but I feel that it’s important to understand the connection between how trauma affects the mind, body, and spirit and how this disruption can have a devastating impact on people’s lives.

The second section is where all the juicy material is and where healing can begin. It includes a chapter on building resilience – an important aspect of handling difficult situations and events in life. It also provides my proven method for overcoming trauma, which I’ve outlined in the 8 steps. Each step is then described in detail in its own chapter and exercises are provided to help you master each one. There is also a link to free material that you can access on my website that provides additional tools such as guided meditations, breathwork and yoga videos, and downloadable worksheets.

Take your time with each of the steps and work through them as thoroughly as possible. There is no need to rush, you are doing this for you. Be patient with yourself. Take your time. Sometimes you’ll find that things might feel like they’re getting worse before they get better. Just hang in there, go at a pace that feels right and trust me that it DOES get better and it is definitely worth it! If you’re the kind of person who likes to read a book all the way through first, do that and then come back to the steps and spend some time working the exercises in each chapter. Some of the steps may come easily to you and may not take you much time, while others may be challenging and take you longer. You also might feel resistance to some of the steps and this is perfectly normal. Just remember … what you resist, persists. So, acknowledge your resistance but do the exercises anyway.

My experience has been that what I resist is where I really need the most healing at that time, and I’ve learned that if I avoid the issue then it will make itself known on a much grander scale until I deal with it. If you are really feeling a pushback, don’t force it – you’ll know when you’re ready to work through it. There is no right or wrong way to working through these steps, so you can do one at a time or several at once. Do them in order or out of order. Whatever feels right to you.

I probably just sent all the perfectionists and rule followers running for the hills with that last statement – I know because I struggled with that too and preferred clear, concise instructions that I could execute easily, and yep, you guessed it, perfectly. Don’t worry, we’ll cover perfectionism and control in chapter 5.

Section I:

How Trauma Affect Us

Chapter 1

Trauma Overview

Challenges are what make life interesting and overcoming them is what makes life meaningful. – Joshua J. Marine

About five years ago, I was in my psychiatrist’s office for my monthly 15-minute appointment where I tell her how I am doing, and she writes me a prescription for