Trauma Counselling:

Helping You Overcome Wounds Of Your Past

To Live Fully In The Present

Trauma counselling helps people who have experienced trauma by helping them to process the traumatic event, recover from it, and reinstate their quality of life.

The experience of any type of trauma can be a devastating and life-changing experience. The memory of the trauma brings about emotions that are overwhelming and debilitating. These may lead us to feel out of control, fearful, powerless, confused, and severely anxious.

Some of us may feel as though we are frozen in time, incapable of functioning or doing the simplest everyday tasks. We experience a diminished quality of life. Our inability to cope brings conflict to our most important relationships. Our inability to focus at work threatens our livelihood.

Help for Past Trauma; PTSD; hyper vigilance; anxiety

What is Trauma Counselling?

Trauma Counselling helps individuals who have experienced an aggressive, fearful or violent situation, whether physically, emotionally, or mentally.

Some of the following scenarios may sound familiar:

– You’ve been in a motor vehicle accident (or MVA – read about ICBC post-MVA support), and you have been experiencing intense anxiety when getting behind the wheel and on the road, in the weeks and months following.

– A victim of domestic violence, you are in a toxic relationship and you do not know how to get out of your relationship with your abuser. You live in constant fear for your life and you desperately need help.

– Physically and/or sexually abused as a child, you are feeling stuck and confused about who you are and where you belong. You struggle with controlling your emotions and you have a hard time maintaining relationships.

– The victim of a crime, you’ve been living in constant fear since. You can’t help looking over your shoulder, and you can’t trust anyone.

– A witness to a death, you have been struggling to live a normal life without recurring nightmares, lack of sleep, and a fear of people.

– You were targeted at work, the victim of harassment or discrimination, and you’ve been having a really hard time getting to work and doing your job.

– The victim of road rage, you’ve been lashing out and losing your temper with your family and friends.

How Trauma Counselling Helps

There are many reasons why some of us don’t get the help we need right away. It may be a feeling of shame, guilt, embarrassment, perhaps even a belief that we deserve some of what happened to us.

Whatever the reason, know that in trauma counselling and therapy, no one is criticized, judged or blamed. That is not the role of counselling, nor therapy.

Your Trauma Counsellor’s job is help you feel better, and to help you achieve a certain quality of life. There are various therapies that could help you heal from your trauma. You may have heard of Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing or EMDR, an evidence-based experiential therapy that has been very successfully used in the treatment of trauma.

From our experience, this is what some have revealed to us when they finally did find the courage and strength to seek help.

“It’s hard to talk about. No one understands. I feel all alone in this.”

For many who have experienced it, trauma is a difficult thing to talk about. The consequences seem to last a lifetime, and have a profound effect on your life. As a result of the inability to talk about the trauma, isolation and loneliness are constant companions.

You may be experiencing post-traumatic stress, or you may be living with constant fears and worries that are having a negative impact on your quality of life.

“I don’t want to feel so alone anymore.”

You may also experience feelings of being detached, or an overwhelming desire to be left alone. This has led you to isolate yourself from family and friends. You may also have trouble falling asleep or sleeping through the night, or you may experience insomnia or nightmares.

With very poor or excessive appetite, you have a love-hate relationship with food. You may also find that you are easily irritable for no reason, and that your behaviours towards people close to you are pushing them away.

“I can’t cope with this. It’s just too much!”

You may have looked for ways to cope on your own, and some of these coping strategies, you have realized, have not been the most healthy decisions you could have made for yourself.

You may have turned to alcohol and/or drugs, and you may be experiencing unhealthy adult relationships, and issues with securing or maintaining a job.