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Shock & Trauma: Finding Hope and Healing for us and Those We Love
March 21, 2022 @ 6:30 am - 9:30 pm
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Trauma: it is one the most prevalent and crippling of emotional illnesses. It is almost guaranteed that every day each of us is interacting with someone suffering, perhaps invisibly, perhaps unknowingly, from historic or recent trauma. This 2-part workshop series will bring us much-needed insight to the healing pathway out of trauma, equipping us for our own journey and to respond supportively to others.
As an emotional response to a severe event like an accident, abuse, or disaster, trauma can linger, often undiagnosed, for many years, impacting not only the person themselves but also everyone close to them. Sometimes it will appear healed, until it is later awakened by similar circumstances. Such post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) seriously affects one in five Americans at some point during their lives.
Trauma comes in many different forms. Acute trauma follows a single incident, whereas chronic trauma is a result of a prolonged situation. There is also complex trauma – being exposed to varied and toxic events, often both invasive and interpersonal. Also, let us remember that sometimes trauma can result from very beautiful moments, e.g. the birth of a baby.
For some, trauma can also occur as a result of watching traumatic experiences that others are experiencing. There is, for instance, no doubt that the tragedy of the war in Ukraine is going to multiply trauma around the world.
Part of the challenge presented by trauma is that each person responds differently to their own experience, with a unique mix of physical and emotional consequences. At its most severe this may include volatile emotion, fear and rage, traumatic dreams and flashbacks, or hyper-vigilance. Some become very disconnected and experience a sudden change in character, or make unusual decisions.
Such characteristics can be accompanied by headaches, vomiting and nausea, or a resistance to recovery from injury and disease. Relationships will often become very stressed, so that one person’s trauma quickly ricochets around the family.
In this workshop, Dr. Peter Holmes and Dr. Susan Williams will introduce a foundational understanding of trauma and its consequences. We will consider what happens in the brain that leads to trauma getting trapped, and the way our feelings, cognition, behavior and relationships are all impacted. This will equip us to identify and respond compassionately to trauma in our own lives, and in the lives of others, while understanding more about its symptoms and consequences. In our second workshop (May 2022), we will use this understanding to describe the elements of a healing journey, how to press deeply into this journey for yourself, and how to bring hope to others.
The workshop will be held in-person at The Commons in Bozeman and also live-streamed. If you attend in-person, light refreshments will be available from 6:00pm. We look forward to welcoming you!
