About Triggers

A important part of effectively learning, practicing and utilizing grounding techniques successfully is learning to master the intrusive symptoms (Triggers, flashbacks and nightmares)

Mastering Intrusive Symptoms

1.)  Flashbacks and other intrusive symptoms are a automatic  reactions in which a survivor temporarily associates some trigger and the present with an aspect of their past abuse.

2.)  This results in dissociation from the comfort and security of the present and a re- experiencing of the past abuse.

3.)  The automatic reactions may be thoughts, feelings or somatic sensations that disrupt current functioning.

4.)  Automatic reactions are extremely common, insidious and often operate below conscious awareness, making the survivor feel confused, upset and out of control.

5.)  Common emotional reactions are fear, panic, terror, anger, sadness, shame, disgust, paranoia, anxiety, confusions, suspicion and emotional numbness.

Common physical sensations are nausea, pain, headache, tight stomach, rapid heart beat, chest pain, adrenaline rush, sweats, chills, cold, genital pain, flushed, euphoric , in appropriate sexual excitement, spontaneous orgasm, sleepy faint or physical numbness.

Common intrusive thoughts include abusive sexual fantasies, thinking partner is an offender, thinking the past is the present, thinking you are a child, thinking you are bad, thinking are unworthy of being loved for yourself, or wishing you were someplace else.

6.)  Some automatic reactions last of seconds. some for hours.  Automations usually occur in series, linked up so that one triggers another.  A chain of automatic reactions can trigger compulsive sexual behavior.

7.)  Your triggers may be known to you, dormant for years or difficult to identify.  Identifying and analyzing your triggers gives you power.  The triggers lose their secrecy and mysteriousness.  Once you understand them.

8.)  Reducing the numbers of triggers in your life may make it easier to deal with with automatic reactions.  Also, eliminating stimulants may help.  Counseling and support groups are essentail.

9.)  Questions to  ask yourself in discovering your triggers:

        a)  Where were you at the time of the abuse ?

        b)  What were you like at the time ?

        c)  What was the offender like ?

        d)  What was the offender like ?

        e)  What touch and sexual experiences did you have during the abuse ?

        f)  What was happening inside your body ?

        g)  What were your emotional experiences ?

        h)  Other sensations, feelings or feelings or thoughts you experiences at the time of the abuse.

10.)  The key to handing automatic reactions is to bring them into your awareness, understand them and find ways to cope.

11.)The following steps provide a format for you to analyze and master your intrusive symptoms:

        a)  Stop and become aware: Acknowledge what's happening.  Say to yourself, " I'm having an automatic reaction."  Assume you have hit a trigger.

        b)  Calm yourself:  Tune into your body.  What are you feeling?  Tell yourself something reassuring.  " I'm safe, no one can hurt me."  Take slow deep breaths.  Relax your muscles.  Go to your "safe place". 

        c)  Identify past situation:  When have you felt this way before ? What situation were you in the last time you felt this way?    Try to identify the trigger.

        d) Identify similarities: In what ways are this current situation and your past situation similar?  For example, is the setting, time of year, or the sight, sounds, sensations in anyway similar to the past situation when you felt the way?  If there is a person involved, how is she or he similar to a person from the past who elicited similar feelings?

        e)  Affirm you current reality:  How is you current situation different from the situation in the past in which you felt similar in the past in which you felt similar feelings?  What is different about you, your sensory experience, you current life circumstances and personal resources ?  What is different about the setting?  If another person or persons is involved, how are they different from the person(s) in the past in the past situation?  Affirm your rights: " The abuse was then. THIS IS NOW."

        f)  Choose a new response:  What action, if any do you want to take to feel better in the present?  For example. a flashback may indicate that a person is once again in a situation that is in some way unsafe.  If this is the case, self-protective actions should be taken to alter the current situation.  On the other hand, a flashback may simply mean the an old memory has been trigged by an inconsequential resemblance  to the past such as a certain color or smell.  In such cases, corrective messages of reassurance and comfort need to be given to the self to counteract old traumatic memories.

Adapted from " Resolving Traumatic Memories" (p 107) by Y.M. Dolan 1991