About Trauma and Positive Growth

When there has been trauma or other overwhelming life experiences most people have to let go of parts of their authentic Self (dissociate) and adopt coping strategies in order to survive their specific circumstances as best as they can. While highly adaptive initially, because they block out the pain of these experiences at the time, in later life there are often great personal costs attached to these trauma-related, survival-based strategies.

While dissociated, the pain connected to your past experiences has not been able to process and integrate to become part of your whole Self.  This can cause very uncomfortable symptoms such as sudden intrusive, overwhelming images or memories; flashbacks and reliving experiences; nightmares; strong emotional or physical reactions, such as panic attacks; feelings of numbing or detachment; hypervigilance; safety behaviours; guilt, including survivor guilt; dissociative symptoms, such as feeling disconnected from life and many others. Often events in daily life, such as interactions with close people, such as a partner, can trigger and intensify these symptoms even more. 

However, often situations which confront us with great inner pain, such as past trauma or abuse or a current disaster or life crisis, can move us into a process of enormous positive inner growth and healing. This journey can be difficult to make on your own, especially when you are caught up in the midst of extremely distressing and overwhelming trauma symptoms, from which it can be difficult to see beyond. Our service aims to guide and facilitate your journey from trauma into positive growth and healing in a safe, paced and compassionate manner.