Healing from childhood trauma can often feel difficult and messy, but with determination and the understanding of natural ways to go about it, it can also be one of the best things that you ever do for yourself.
Take Care of Your Body
Whether you are a new mom who is reeling after experiencing birth trauma or you’re a single adult who just wants to do the work now so that you’re a better partner for someone in the future, taking care of your body is essential for healing your childhood trauma. You might be asking yourself how the two are even related. They’re a lot closer than you might think.
When you aren’t getting enough rest, eating right, or exercising, you won’t feel your best. Chances are you’ll feel mentally and physically exhausted, be dehydrated, and just generally feel under the weather. Nobody wants to face their childhood trauma when they already feel crummy, let alone try to heal from it. By taking better care of yourself physically, such as by using a Thrive patch, you prepare yourself to take better care mentally and emotionally.
Seek Out Therapy
Seeking support from professionals or other people who have been in similar situations is essential for learning how to heal from your childhood trauma. There are many different types of therapy options.
- Individual Therapy – This is an excellent starting point if you’ve never been to therapy. Talk therapy allows you to begin speaking about your trauma in a safe, judgment-free zone. Your therapist will ask you leading questions to help you start opening up about your trauma and learning how it affects you as an adult.
- Family Therapy – Depending on your situation, the source of your childhood trauma, and your relationship with your parents or other family members, you may want to consider family therapy. These sessions are done in groups, as well individually, and may help you open up to members of the family about your experiences. This is often a vital starting point if you want to maintain and strengthen a relationship with your family members, even those who caused you trauma in the past.
- Group Therapy – Sometimes, it helps to open up to people who have had similar experiences as you in a group setting. A new mother experiencing birth trauma may join a support group for other new parents in the same situation. Someone who was the victim of an assault as a child may want to talk with others who had similar experiences. It helps to know that you aren’t alone.
Acknowledge Your Trauma and Reclaim Control
Before you can start to heal from your trauma, you need to be honest with yourself about what it is. People who had traumatic childhoods often spend much of their adult lives minimizing the situation or assuming they aren’t remembering things correctly. Think hard on your memories and acknowledge that something happened the way you remember it and that you were not the cause of the trauma. If you need to, write it down so that you can go back and reread it if you start to doubt yourself.
Once you acknowledge that you experienced childhood trauma, you can begin to reclaim control of the past and of your current life. Work with your therapist, your group sessions, or in other ways, such as journaling, to begin processing what happened to you and learn to let go of the past. Remember, there is no rule that says you must forgive someone who traumatized you in order to move past the trauma. You can simply acknowledge it happened and begin to live your life the way that you want it to be now.
Childhood trauma is a serious situation, but it doesn’t need to define you. By talking it out, being true to yourself, and taking care of your body, you can begin to move past it.
