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hey there everybody and welcome to this video on empowering people with trauma I'm your host Dr Dawn-Elise Snipes I had initially thought about calling this empowering patients with trauma but
then I thought you know what most people who experience trauma never become patients most
people who experience trauma don't go on to develop PTSD or cptsd but it's important in
the aftermath of a trauma whether it's a sudden death or an accident or a natural disaster or
whatever the trauma is it's important in that immediate aftermath to help people regain a sense
of empowerment these tools can be effective in that immediate aftermath period as well as years
later working with people with PTSD or cptsd and helping them re-establish a sense of safety and
personal power so let's start at the beginning what is trauma trauma is any event that causes a
person to feel unsafe and Powerless and overwhelms their ability to cope now you can think of times
in your life that something happened that was just completely overwhelming and it made you
feel powerless which when we feel powerless it kind of goes hand in hand with feeling unsafe
many trauma survivors develop behaviors like inattentiveness irritability or social
withdrawal in the immediate aftermath their stress response system is still on overdrive they're
hyper Vigilant they're trying to regain a sense of safety if it persists then they may even develop
more problematic behaviors like addiction or stress-related physical or mental health disorders
when symptoms are caused by feeling unsafe and Powerless which is kind of the core
feature of trauma then a core feature of recovery is safety and empowerment
and I've created this mnemonic to help you remember the things that we need to do to help
people unpack their trauma and start feeling safe and empowered so obviously the trauma
the mnemonic is unpacks you stands for understand symptoms might be caused by trauma as a clinician
as a loved one or even as a trauma Survivor it's important to look at your symptoms and say all
right in what way is this Behavior or this feeling maybe keeping me safe because I feel unsafe in
what way is this situation maybe reminding me of the past that trauma and triggering
me to feel unsafe in the present we want to help normalize people's experience of trauma everybody
experiences trauma in their life not everybody develops PTSD but everybody experiences trauma and
people's reactions can be very very varied for children for example they may become much clingier
they may regress in age if they are eight years old chronologically they may start acting like a
three or four-year-old again they may become very clingy or they may become very disengaged we don't
we can't predict how people are necessarily going to respond but we want to remember that behavior
is communication and what that person is doing is representing their best way to stay safe from
being victimized from feeling vulnerable from feeling overstimulated whatever the case is
P stands for Pace is set by the client or the person I should have said person here
when processing a trauma even in the immediate aftermath it's important to
get support immediately within the first 24 hours ideally in order to help have the best resolution
but that doesn't mean necessarily processing the trauma during that point in time during
those first few hours the person needs to regain a sense of safety but they need to set the pace
about how how quickly and how in-depth they process the trauma
our neighbor a few months ago lost their house in a very terrifying fire and I Can Only Imagine
what was going through her mind but sitting down and saying okay this happened let's talk about it
you know that wasn't for me to do that wasn't for anybody to do that was for her to decide when
it was appropriate when she was ready to start processing exactly what happened and figure out
okay how can I feel safe ever again becoming aware of the triggers and tools to cope with
those triggers is also important for a lot of trauma survivors they may smell something hear
something feel something and it reminds them of that trauma but it's not a clear memory it's just
they're triggered they encounter that stimulus and they start having this feeling of Panic or Terror
or desire to just withdraw and leave the situation or they get angry for example and they may not
know where it's coming from they're like I don't know where this is coming from I'm just being so
short-tempered and impatient lately okay let's look at that and figure out what's triggering
that and as people start to become aware that their behaviors their responses the changes
that occurred after that trauma makes sense and their responses in the present do have a trigger
which may be related to that trauma that's helpful then people once people have can diagnose what's
going on they're like okay I know when I hear this sound in my car it means that the brake pads need
to be changed okay I feel safe same thing with our emotions I know when I start having this feeling
it may be because I was triggered so this is what I need to do to stay safe
control is identified and that's your C we help people who've experienced trauma identify what
they do have control over if it's after a tornado for example they don't have control over how
quickly stuff gets rebuilt they don't have control over a lot of stuff but what do they have control
over and helping them identify no matter how small it is the things that they can control in the
present the ways that they can keep themselves and their loved ones safe in the present
K stands for kindness towards self we want to encourage that a lot of people who've
experienced trauma are very hard on themselves they may carry shame with them and and feel like
they're not worthy of Love they may feel like they don't measure up they may fear rejection
um or they may fear that okay this is my fault that this happened so I need to fix it and they
wear themselves into the ground there's a lot of reasons people who've experienced trauma may
not be kind or compassionate to themselves but it's important that we try to encourage
them to be willing to do that to be willing to allow themselves to heal to be willing to allow
themselves to not have a good day and say you know what today is not a good day and I'm going
to get up and show up I'm going to do as much as I can to the best of my ability today but
it's not going to be my best work being kind to one another or and being kind to themselves
and sometimes even saying you know what I just can't I just can't today I need to take a day for
me to heal and finally s stands for safety safety is defined and developed by the individual for the
individual they need to identify in what ways did this trauma make me feel unsafe physically
emotionally mentally in my relationships in my environment in what ways did it make me feel
unsafe and how can I feel safe again what do I need to do and that along with feeling safe
means addressing some of those triggers it may mean um removing certain pictures or I don't know
but figuring out what is it that helping them figure out what is it that I can do to feel
safe and empowered in my skin in my home in my car and then eventually branching out to at work
and maybe even wherever the trauma occurred if they have to go back there with regularity
how can I feel safe going into a store again after this or going into the bank again after
this so the person defines safety and figures out what they need to do in order to feel safe
under undertaking the tasks that are important in their rich and meaningful life
survivors did not anticipate the traumatic event this may leave them feeling anxious
about when is the next shoe going to drop I didn't expect that so you know who who am I
to say that something else bad isn't going to happen right now or 10 minutes from now
and I didn't expect the last thing so I didn't have the power to stay safe so how do I know that
I can stay safe in the future so that contributes to that feeling of persistent unsafeness and
powerlessness which is why it's so important in the immediate aftermath if possible to help people
re-establish a sense of equilibrium of safety okay tornado destroyed the house that's awful
what can I do where can I stay safe what resources do I have that I can call on in
order to have a roof over my head empowerment Begins by helping people understand the logic
behind some of their symptoms feel in control of their treatment or their progress develop a sense
of safety in the present and kindness towards themselves all of this unpacks their baggage