Are you feeling trapped and stuck in a situation that is causing you to feel anxious or angry or even causing you to look for unhelpful solutions to help you tolerate how you are feeling?

Have you done your best to manage your feelings in ways that no longer work for you? These ways might include frequent exercising, maintaining a clean house, staying at work for long hours, collecting things, buying things or using food, relationships, sex or alcohol, or other substances, to help you feel better.

When we’re managing our feelings in this way, this could be a sign that we have experienced trauma. The bigger the trauma, the unhappier we feel. This might be a single event trauma such as being involved in a road traffic accident, or this might be chronic trauma where we have been exposed to difficult circumstances over a period of time.

Many of us experience trauma in our lives and our bodies and nervous systems are made to heal from these occasions just as they are made to heal from physical illness and injury. However, sometimes our healing slows down and we seem unable to fully recover from hard times. We can identify when this is happening if we notice our thoughts drift off into difficult memories or future scenarios, where we replay conversations and critically review our actions and the actions of others. In this blaming place, we can feel angry, sad and lost and our relationship with ourselves and others deteriorate.

If unhappiness like this lingers and we find we do not recover in a timely, reasonable, fashion, it might be time to think about finding some support from a counsellor or therapist to heal and feel better.

A good therapist, just like a good doctor, will help you heal and feel better so you can lead a healthier life.

It might help to know that counsellors will answer the question, “What’s happened to you?”, rather than asking, “What’s wrong with you?”

“What’s wrong with you?” suggests you’re malfunctioning.

“What’s happened to you?” says that your feelings are a rational response to things you have experienced.

This understanding can be the first step in recognising your journey and planning your healing with your counsellor. If this article has resonated with you and you’re ready to take the first step in working with a counsellor, I’m here to help you. My practice is based in Burley, New Forest, if you live in the Hampshire, Bournemouth, Poole or Southampton area; please do get in touch to discuss the next steps. Any communication is of course confidential.