Understanding Trauma and How Therapy Can Support Healing

If you are reading this, something in your life may feel overwhelming, painful, or difficult to carry alone. You may be struggling with anxiety, emotional numbness, flashbacks, grief, or a sense that you are no longer yourself. You might not even know whether what you have been through “counts” as trauma, only that something inside you does not feel settled or safe.

At Blue Butterfly Counselling, I work from a trauma informed, compassionate approach that understands emotional pain not as weakness, but as the nervous system’s intelligent response to experiences that felt frightening, violating, overwhelming, or inescapable.

Trauma is not defined only by what happened. It is defined by how your body, mind, and emotional world were affected.

For some people, trauma may stem from a single event such as an accident, assault, or loss. For others, it develops through prolonged emotional harm, abuse, neglect, domestic violence, coercive relationships, or experiences of powerlessness, shame, or betrayal. Trauma can also arise from grief, particularly sudden or traumatic loss, including bereavement by suicide.

What often follows is not “damage,” but adaptation. Your nervous system learned how to survive.

Symptoms such as anxiety, hypervigilance, emotional shutdown, people pleasing, dissociation, low mood, or relationship difficulties are not flaws. They are survival responses that once helped protect you.

Trauma lives not only in memory, but in the body and nervous system. Even when life appears “fine” on the outside, your system may remain in a state of alert, shutdown, or emotional protection.

You may notice:
• feeling on edge, anxious, or easily overwhelmed
• struggling with trust, boundaries, or self worth
• emotional numbness or disconnection from yourself
• intrusive thoughts, flashbacks, or nightmares
• grief that feels complicated or stuck
• patterns of people pleasing or self blame

None of these mean you are broken. They mean something inside you learned that the world was not safe in that moment.

Trauma informed counselling does not begin by asking you to relive what happened. Healing begins with safety.

In therapy, we first focus on helping your nervous system settle, building emotional regulation, and supporting you to feel more grounded in the present. Only when it feels right for you do we begin to gently explore what you have been through, always at your pace and with your consent.

Together, we work to:
• restore a sense of emotional safety
• understand your reactions without judgement
• reduce anxiety, overwhelm, and emotional shutdown
• rebuild self trust, boundaries, and self compassion
• integrate past experiences so they no longer dominate the present

Healing is not about erasing the past. It is about restoring choice, connection, and inner stability.

There is no hierarchy of trauma. What matters is not how something “looks” from the outside, but how it felt inside you. Two people can experience the same event and be affected in completely different ways.

You do not need to justify your pain here. If something left you feeling unsafe, powerless, ashamed, or disconnected, it deserves care.

Do I have to talk about what happened in detail?
No. You are never required to disclose anything before you feel ready. Trauma informed therapy prioritises safety, choice, and pacing.

Can therapy make things worse?
When therapy is trauma informed, it does not rush or overwhelm you. We focus on emotional containment and regulation first so that deeper work feels supportive rather than destabilising.

What if I do not know where to start?
That is completely okay. Many people begin therapy simply knowing that something does not feel right. We start from where you are.

What if my trauma was a long time ago?
Trauma is not bound by time. If past experiences are still affecting your emotions, relationships, or sense of self, they are still worthy of care and attention.

If you are seeking trauma informed counselling and want a space where your experiences are met with compassion rather than judgement, you are welcome to contact me by sending me an email using the contact form below or by sending me a WhatsApp message.

You do not need the right words or a clear story. You only need a willingness to begin.