The Body Remembers - How Trauma Affects You Physically
Most people understand the lasting impacts trauma can have on your mental health. However, it can also have a lasting effect on your physical well-being. Even if you experienced trauma many years ago, you could be dealing with the physical ramifications right now. It’s not uncommon for people who have been through a traumatic experience to try to “block” those memories out, but your body will always remember them.
With that in mind, let’s take a closer look at how trauma affects you physically and what you can do to overcome it.
Fatigue and Sleep Disorders
Fatigue can be the result of a variety of physical and/or mental health conditions. However, when combined with sleep disorders like insomnia, it’s important to consider what might be causing it. It’s not uncommon for issues like anxiety or depression to cause disruptions in your sleep habits, but if things like nightmares and flashbacks tend to keep you awake, it’s likely your trauma causing these issues. As you might expect, a lack of healthy sleep can lead to a host of other physical (and mental) health issues. It can impact your work, your relationships, and can weaken your immune system.
A Greater Risk of Chronic Conditions
Multiple studies have shown that people with unprocessed trauma are at a greater risk of developing chronic health conditions later in life. Some of the most common include heart failure, diabetes, and stroke.
Unprocessed trauma can also impact your gut health and cause digestive issues throughout your life. Think about times in your life when you’ve been anxious and have felt those “butterflies” in your stomach. Maybe you experienced it when you had to give a performance as a child or a speech as an adult.
Unresolved trauma can create a similar effect. The nerves never really go away, causing your body to produce more cortisol—the stress hormone. When that happens, you can start to experience far more than just a queasy stomach. It can lead to conditions like Crohn’s disease or IBS.
Chronic Pain and Headaches
Many people experience tension headaches. Stressful events or situations often cause them, but they tend to go away or at least ease when those situations are resolved. Unfortunately, people with unresolved trauma can deal with these headaches almost constantly. Because the stress caused by your traumatic experience stays with you, your body is continuously tense and strained. You’ll likely often deal with burnout because of that tension.
In addition to headaches, it’s also common to feel aches and pains all over your body, including your back and neck. Again, chronic pain can occur for many reasons, but if you’re holding onto trauma and experiencing other physical and/or mental symptoms, there’s a good chance your body is processing it through that kind of pain.
One of the best indicators to know if it’s trauma affecting your physical health or something else is to consider the consistency of how you’re feeling. If the pain and health issues are both persistent and consistent, it’s more likely that your body is struggling to deal with unresolved trauma.
A New Path Forward
Thankfully, you don’t have to continue to live with those physical effects forever.
No matter how long ago you experienced a traumatic event, it’s never too late to work through it—recognizing the signs is the first step toward healing, so don’t be afraid to reach out for help. Feel free to contact me for more information or to set up an appointment for trauma therapy. Together, we can go back to where the trauma began and work through it from the ground up so you can overcome the physical and mental health problems it could be causing in your life.
