Helping someone with trauma can be an intimidating and demanding endeavor. Providing the right kind of support can feel like a stressful balance of empathy, patience, and understanding. When someone experiences trauma, they may feel overwhelmed, vulnerable, and disconnected from the world around them. In helping someone through trauma, we may experience some of these same feelings. Through a greater understanding of trauma, and through certain proven principles, we may be able to better help those we care about in a more effective and impactful manner.
What is Trauma?
Often trauma is the result of an adverse event that is connected to an emotionally distressing or life-threatening event that has a lasting impact on our physical, emotional, and psychological well-being.
Trauma can come in many forms and can impact individuals, groups, communities, and societies. The lasting impacts of trauma can span days, weeks, months, years, and even through generations via intergenerational trauma.
Read more about intergenerational trauma.
Studies have estimated that about 70% of people will experience some form of trauma in their lifetime. Though many of us will experience trauma, how we experience trauma may differ depending on our own life experiences and tolerance towards such events. What may cause distress for one person may not have the same trauma impact on another. Furthermore, the impacts of trauma on individuals can also vary depending on the type and severity of the adverse event.
What Are the Impacts of Trauma?
Trauma can disrupt our emotional and physical well-being in various ways. Often, trauma will impact our relationship to others and to the world. Such experiences shape how we connect, trust, and love. When we experience trauma, it may fracture our sense of safety and trust in both ourselves and others. We may become hyper-vigilant, wary of closeness, or always anticipating danger.
Since trauma disrupts our normal patterns of coping, it is not uncommon for traumatic events to feel as though they repeat themselves in non-adverse or threatening experiences. An experience that previously may have felt safe and unthreatening may now activate a trauma response that elicits emotions, thoughts, and physical reactions that mirror our initial experience.
This is in part why trauma impacts our ability to regulate emotions. This often leads to cycles of numbness or overwhelming feelings. It may distort our self-image, leaving us with shame and a profound sense of brokenness.
Trauma is challenging due to its profound impact on our sense of trust and safety. It disrupts normal coping mechanisms, often leading to emotional dysregulation and difficulty in forming healthy relationships. Overcoming trauma can require extensive healing and support.
How Can I Help Someone With Trauma?
Helping someone through trauma can be an incredibly intimidating and confusing process. It is important to remember that unless you’re a professional with trauma-based training, your role is not to reduce or eliminate the impact of trauma. Instead, the best approach to helping someone going through trauma is first to recognize and identify that the concern is related to trauma, communicate as best as you can with that person about what they’re going through, and support them through empathy, respect, and encouragement.
Let’s break this down into three steps:
Identify:
Identifying someone going through trauma requires knowledge and understanding of the signs of trauma. Does the individual you care about seem withdrawn? Do you notice that certain circumstances or events cause the individual more distress than usual?
Identifying the concern starts with being aware of the circumstances. Remember, trauma can impact our emotional, physical, and psychological well-being. If you’re unsure, you can always ask: “How are you doing?”
Communicate:
Though it may feel like we have to say the exact right thing when helping someone through a traumatic event or the persistent impacts of trauma, often just being there is enough.
Remember, all good communication starts with listening. Your role is not to fix but instead to be supportive and encouraging. Communicating your care through words of kindness, solidarity, and encouragement is a great start. Phrases like “I’m here with you,” “We’ll get through this together,” and “I care for you just as you are” can be greatly supportive and meaningful to someone experiencing trauma.
Sometimes the best form of communication is non-verbal. Being present with someone in need of companionship can be a great way to support someone you care about.
If you find yourself unsure of exactly what to say or how to say it, being supportive of them speaking to a professional trained in trauma-based care is also a great option.
Support:
The role of supporting someone through trauma begins with trust. To help build trust, we never want to dismiss or invalidate the other’s experience. Since we all deal with trauma in our own way, attempting to change the other’s experience with trauma through our personal views and beliefs may push the person further away.
Instead, we can assure those we care about that we’re there for them, care for them, and want them to know that they don’t have to go through this experience alone.
Supporting someone through trauma requires empathy, patience, and validation of their feelings. Listen without judgment, offer consistent emotional support, and encourage professional help if needed. Respect their pace of recovery and provide a safe and understanding environment.
Above all, don’t forget to care for yourself! If we’re not patient and kind to ourselves, it can be incredibly difficult to properly support those around us.
What Next?
When supporting someone going through trauma, knowledge of trauma and Mental Health First Aid can help you navigate complex traumatic experiences.
Sometimes the best support is to be present, patient, and compassionate towards those we care about. When we feel that may not be enough, encouraging others to seek out professional help can be a great way to show your care and support as well.
Are you interested in exploring trauma-informed therapy? Reach out to myTherapyNYC to find out which of our therapists would be a good fit for you!
What additional tips do you have to help support others through trauma? Join the conversation in the comments below!
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