The World-Changing Ability of Trauma-Informed Care

BY LAURA ZERA

Of all the advances in health over the past 20 years, trauma-informed care is arguably one of the most significant. Once the research-led understanding of trauma’s impact on mental health bloomed into a full-fledged canon, instead of approaching patient treatment from the query of “what’s wrong with you?” practitioners began to ask, “what happened to you?” For health consumers who have experienced incident-based trauma that created PTSD, or prolonged trauma that led to Complex PTSD (like me), this shift has been a game changer.

The Crisis and Trauma Resource Institute lists the pillars of a trauma-informed approach as the following:

• Awareness of the prevalence of trauma, and how common it is for all people.
• Recognition of the signs of traumatic impact and how the survival stances of fight, flight, or freeze may show up in the people they serve, support, or work with.
• Engagement in taking steps to avoid re-traumatizing people while supporting healing from past traumatic experiences.

Spotlighting trauma in this way has practical implications in both the clinical setting and everyday life. For example, for decades I received treatment for anxiety and depression that was focused on how to manage a brain gone awry. What could I do to stop the panic attacks? How could I change my thoughts? Even when I was prompted to name the emotion that was linked to a response, the root cause remained unexcavated.

But come the 21^st century and the recognition that trauma survivors have a threat-assessment algorithm on constant loop and brains and bodies that respond like ninjas, and suddenly my trauma became a roadmap. I found a therapist who could talk to me about C-PTSD’s add-ons of attachment disorder, fragmented identity, emotional dysregulation, and—the ultimate treasure trove—safety. We identified my triggers, which is especially handy dandy for boundary setting when choosing employers, friends, partners, and yes, even family.

Because the health care world realized the significance of trauma on mental health, I could finally learn about it. Hence where my efforts to connect the behavioral dots would once dead end, now they completed in the circle of a cul-de-sac. And who doesn’t want to live on a cul-de-sac?   

As part of this watershed, it’s been noted that trauma survivors may always live with its impacts in some form or another. PTSD can be a sticky and persistent condition. At the same time, the growth of trauma-informed care is a cause for hope. In addition to creating more self-empowered, shame-free survivors, the day will come to pass when employers, friends, partners, and yes, even family, are fluent in it, too. And when “what’s wrong with you?” becomes “what happened to you?” the world ultimately becomes safer for all.

Laura Zera is a writer, IT consultant and mental health advocate. She is committed to sharing stories and information about Complex PTSD so it becomes more widely understood in every arena. Her work has been featured in the New York Times, the Washington Post, DAME Magazine, Catapult, the Seattle Times and other places, and she is working on two books. After 17 years in Seattle, Laura recently moved home to British Columbia. Connect with her at laurazera.com or on Twitter and Instagram @laurazera.