Our Trauma Threshold

Course Cut-OutMoving Through Trauma
Written By Austin Cavaliere

Excerpt: Our Trauma Threshold - Trauma Session 2

Course: Moving Through Trauma

Speakers: Matthias Barker

Understanding Your Threshold: Neurobiology and Trauma Recovery

We've previously discussed how current struggles in our lives – be it in our marriages, relationships with our children, our jobs, or even our relationship with ourselves – can often be rooted in unresolved traumatic events from the past. These past experiences can fuel our difficulties in calming down, managing stress, and navigating moments where we might feel numb, distant, panicked, anxious, or overly self-critical. These patterns often have underlying features from our past that continue to influence us.

We've also explored different ways to define trauma, acknowledging its complexities and the various factors that contribute to what constitutes a traumatic experience. Now, I want to delve into the neurobiology behind these responses and highlight some crucial understandings that can empower us to gain insight and autonomy over our reactions.

Staying Within Your Capacity

The reality is, we all have a threshold. Below this threshold lies the realm of everyday stressors – challenging conversations, work deadlines, minor disagreements – things that might be stressful but don't typically push us into a state of alarm, triggering our fight-or-flight response, anxiety, or numbing. We generally feel capable of managing these everyday pressures.

However, there's a point where an external event or an internal trigger can push us over this threshold. Perhaps your child's defiance triggers an intense reaction, leading to yelling or name-calling that you later regret. Or maybe a seemingly minor critical remark from a parent causes you to shut down emotionally, feeling numb and wanting to withdraw.

When we cross this threshold, we often react in ways that we regret, making decisions or handling situations in ways that don't lead to positive outcomes and can even perpetuate feelings of being stuck.

Expanding Your Capacity

Therefore, our initial focus needs to be not just on staying below the threshold, but on raising the threshold itself. How do we expand our capacity to handle stress? This is a crucial first step, especially when considering processing traumatic experiences from the past – whether those are significant "Big T" traumas like abuse or neglect, or more subtle but still impactful experiences.

Many believe that the key to healing trauma is to immediately dive into the deep end, to force themselves to talk about everything that happened, as if "ripping off the band-aid" will magically solve everything. However, attempting to process trauma above our current threshold can lead to re-traumatization. We might become overwhelmed, triggered, fall into states of panic, numb out, dissociate, lose our temper, or become agitated and impatient. This can feel like a setback rather than progress.

Building Resilience for Trauma Processing

Therefore, step number one in navigating trauma is raising our threshold. This allows us to develop an expanded capacity to handle and hold stress. With a higher threshold, when we begin to address those deeply troubling events from our past, the associated stress is less likely to push us into an overwhelming state. We can approach these sensitive topics from a more grounded and calm place, which is essential for genuine healing and integration.

 

If you like the content, you can continue in a few different ways…

  • 1) See the outline below and check out other sections from the FFP course.

  • 2) Take the full small group course to your church community! The first course your church runs is free! Reach out to us here to learn how.

  • 3) Connect with a Share The Struggle Coach for one-on-one support. Let’s face it, some of us have tried kicking this thing, and we’ve had no luck. It’s time to start looking toward forms of support that can help us see and feel the beautiful life God has in store for us.

 

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Moving Through Trauma

〰️ Moving Through Trauma

Session 1

Session 2

Session 3

Session 4

Session 5

Session 6

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Session 8

 

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Share the Struggle Courses are topical expert led video courses to help you understand life’s greatest struggles and provide you with tools for navigating them. Moreover, STS courses create a space for you to connect with others struggling with similar things, experience belonging, and encounter God’s nearness in a place of wilderness in your life (pain, confusion, healing journey). Want to start a group at your church? Reach out to us here to learn how.

 

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We invite you to explore our resources, share your journey, and find the support you need to overcome the struggles you face.

Austin Cavaliere
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