You might have heard how trauma can blur our sense of time and place. We can be reacting to something in the present moment but really our reaction is informed by something that happened in the past. The lines can get really blurry between past and present when we’ve experienced a traumatic event. This is protective––it’s the nervous system’s attempt to help insulate your mind from too much awareness of a painful or harmful thing while it’s still fresh, when we don’t yet have enough safety on board.

It’s important to be aware of how past trauma can change how we react in the present, so that we can heal past trauma and begin to shift our present moment reactions into responses. A reaction is pretty quick, automatic, doesn’t usually involve much thinking or pausing. A response is more thoughtful, more grounded, a different pace that may involve a pause before speaking or making a move.

Often in trauma, our nervous system is activated into a fight, flight, or freeze response. These are strategic ways our system is trying to protect us from a threat (whether real or perceived). This is an important part of how we function and survive in the world. But with unprocessed traumatic events, sometimes we can get stuck in one of these modes (fight, flight, freeze). Or we might end up with a hypersensitive nervous system––easily triggered, emotionally sensitive, difficulty regulating, reactive. Think of it like a lens with which you’re seeing the world. Trauma colors your perception and everything that happens to you is getting filtered through that lens.

If we don’t attend to trauma, this can create a lot of stress and strain, as your nervous system is trying to keep you safe, but is perhaps stuck in a mode that is also keeping you from supportive and healthy relationships, from a whole and healthy life.

One way we might define trauma is as: too much, too fast, too soon. And conversely, too little, too late, in the form of neglect. As a result, if our nervous system is sensing something similar (a trigger), we may find ourselves reacting to the present situation as though it is a traumatic situation from our past. Again, here we see how our sense of time is getting blurred as a result of trauma and we may find ourselves in a familiar defensive posture of fight, flight, or freeze.

This underscores the importance of addressing unresolved trauma. Trauma processing involves creating safety––physical, mental, and emotional, teasing apart the past and present, and attending to what happened to you then, that might still be affecting you now.

If you’ve experienced trauma and you notice your system is especially sensitive or reactive, know there is a way forward in which you can shift from reactive to responsive by attending to the lingering effects of what’s happened to you and establishing new ways of being and doing. You can change your reactions to responses. You can feel more in control of how you respond to people, situations, and your self. It starts with facing what happened to you by turning towards your inner world with curiosity and compassion.

Because traumatic experiences are often laced with shame or guilt, this turning towards can be hard to do on your own. Sometimes we need a therapeutic companion to model the kind of curiosity and compassion that we need to learn to offer ourselves. If this resonates with you, reach out about how trauma therapy can help heal unprocessed trauma and begin to change your reactions into responses.

How Past Trauma Can Change How You React