In the latest episode of Work Mom Says, Chrissie Zavicar joined us for a conversation about sobriety and healing from trauma with somatic therapy. Many people use alcohol to numb their feelings and cope with their trauma.
Luckily, somatic therapy is a fantastic way to reconnect your mind and body in order to healthily process your trauma. Keep reading to learn what somatic therapy is and the research behind its power.
The Importance of Feeling Your Feelings
It’s extremely important to allow your mind and body to process your emotions using healthy coping actions.
“Feelings are not arbitrary. They’re real. They live in you, and you have to let them go in order to free yourself from them,” said Chrissie. “If you just stuff them down, they just fester and they create a state where your body is feeling the repercussions of not processing emotion or stress.”
Drinking only exacerbates this problem. It allows us to numb our feelings until we don’t feel them anymore, but all that does is prolong recovery. Numbing your trauma with alcohol doesn’t make it go away.
Somatic Therapy
Somatic therapy is an effective way to process your feelings in a healthier way than coping with alcohol. According to Psychology Today, somatic therapy is a type of body-centered therapy that treats post-traumatic stress, addiction, grief, and other mental health conditions. It uses both psychotherapy and physical therapies for holistic healing.
Chrissie explains that she uses somatic therapy instead of talk therapy because “if you research actual trauma, talk therapy doesn’t help with real trauma.” Talk therapy focuses on changing thought patterns, which can be ineffective at addressing deep-seated trauma that is held by the body.
The Body Keeps the Score
The book, The Body Keeps the Score, discusses the way our bodies store trauma. Bessel Van der Kolk, a leading neuroscientist and psychiatrist, wrote it about his research on the effects of traumatic stress on the mind and body.
During his research, Van der Kolk worked with Vietnam veterans and other individuals who had experienced different types of traumas. His team conducted brain scans while they were reading these people’s accounts of their own traumatic experiences, mapping the brain.
The most basic example of this theory in action is the war veteran who’s back home on the Fourth of July. When the fireworks go off, they can get triggered and may actually believe, for a moment, that they’re back in combat. Across the board, they discovered that this type of response happens with everyone. The studies found that when you’re triggered, your brain believes you’re actually back in the traumatic situation.
“If you’ve ever been in a situation where you’re wondering why you’re reacting so strongly to a seemingly inconsequential trigger, more than likely it’s because your mind is relating that little thing to a much bigger moment in your life, ” said Chrissie. “Your brain is acting like you’re back in that traumatic moment, and you’re faced with this threat again.
The way to get through that is to connect the body and mind through somatic therapy. Instead of being immediately taken to that brain response when you have that trigger, you can start connecting with your body. By grounding yourself in your body, you can recognize that you’re safe.