Overcoming Childhood Trauma

 

This last week, I've been listening to AVAIYA University's Overcoming Childhood Trauma series with 35 trauma experts and therapists. I identified with the parts concept. I also found a video by Teal Swan on the topic of Loneliness - caused by rejecting the parts of ourselves we didn't want anything to do with like fear, shame, anger, rage, and more. We lock them away.

On page 36 of a book I started to read (for the second time), God is a Verb: Kabbalah and the Practice of Mystical Judaism, Rabbi David Cooper wrote:

"Assuming each individual is a composit of many subpersonalities, each time we express a part of ourselves in reality as we know it, our counterpart is being activated in other realities. The lover is there, the conniver, the little child, the judge, our inner strengths, and our inner weaknesses." 

Subpersonalities - another term for parts. 

I read The Emotion Code: How to Release Your Trapped Emotions by Dr. Bradley Nelson and downloaded their free pdf file which includes charts so I can experiment with this method on myself. It involves using muscle testing which I am already familiar with. I have been doing the 5-minute sequence of Eden Medicine exercises. I read Soul Mind Body Medicine by Dr. Zhi Gang Sha, and he includes a divine numbering system. Louise Swartswalter, one of the speakers in the trauma series, offers what appears to be a combination of these, and it seems that many of the trauma therapists have created unique methods by pulling from a variety of what already exists.

Meanwhile, I ordered the book No Bad Parts: Healing Trauma and Restoring Wholeness with the Internal Family Systems Model by Richard Schwartz, PhD and put several other books on my Amazon Wishlist. I received Schwartz's book today.

Then I entered parts in the search bar of my blog. In 2019, I wrote Parts: Internal Family Systems.

I don't know if it is possible for me to remember what I've processed, listened to, read, and wrote about in past years. I love having the search option in my blog and book files to find out. I'm sure I must have the following information filed somewhere in the supercomputer of my brain.

As far back as being in the womb, we can become terrified of dying if our core survival needs are not met. I've known for a number of years now that I have issues with abandonment. Now I know the extreme of abandonment is, 

"I will die if I am left alone to fend for myself."

Some parents have adopted the style of teaching babies to self-soothe - alone. They need to sleep. They have to get up in the morning to go to work. Imagine you are the baby left alone in a crib without the skills to get a drink if you are thirsty or to be held when you're scared.

"I will die if I am left alone."

Instead of self-soothing, you scream louder. You get yourself worked up until your inner survival instincts take over, and you disconnect.

Our defense mechanisms allow us to disconnect from those emotions, but they become embedded in our body. They get filed away into subpersonalities. They affect our immune system. They affect our temperament. We suffer from PTSD every time a situation arises that reminds us of those terrifying moments. 

"I will die if I am left alone." 

We can become terrified of our mother's fears. We bring these fears into our DNA from previous generations.

And then we wonder why people, including ourselves, have meltdowns. 

"I don't feel safe right now. I'm going to die. Since I'm going to die, I'll kill you first - with words, with my fist, with my gun."

Get a group of people together who don't feel safe and wars break out like the one right now between Russia and Ukraine.

It doesn't matter how good your home life was, you will still be affected by this fear. 

The bad news is no one escapes being traumatized. The good news is, there are tools you can learn to deal with it. I am thirsty to learn what these tools are. 

There are numerous ways to tap into the 'parts' of ourselves that were scarred by the trauma we endured and find a sense of safety. A kitchen sink soup full. Information overload full. 

Now I will read a few more books.