Though it may not feel like it now, it’s entirely possible to get your life back after trauma. Holistic trauma treatment offers a safe, effective path to recovery.
Trauma can severely impact our lives, and being able to live fully requires us to heal on mental, physical and spiritual levels. That’s why The Sanctuary places so much focus on providing comprehensive care in a safe healing environment.
We’ll look at the effects of trauma and how holistic trauma rehab can help you reclaim your life after a traumatic experience.
Recognizing the Signs of Trauma
Trauma can manifest differently in different people. But it may not always be obvious that it’s the driving force behind your symptoms or behaviors. That’s why it’s crucial to recognize the signs of trauma, so you can start to address its cause and get back to living your best life.
Initial Reactions
Initially, it’s common to experience what are considered “normal” reactions to trauma. These include exhaustion, confusion, sadness, anxiety, agitation, numbness, dissociation and physical arousal. These reactions are your mind and body’s way of processing the traumatic experience. They’re entirely natural, and not a sign of weakness. They’re simply a sign that you’ve been through something significant and your body is reacting to it. They can, however, feel very overwhelming.
Severe Responses
Some people experience more severe reactions to trauma. Symptoms of this might include distress without periods of calm or rest, severe dissociation symptoms, and intense intrusive memories that persist even after you’ve returned to a safe environment. These symptoms can seriously impact your daily life.
Delayed Responses
Untreated trauma can lead to conditions like post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). PTSD symptoms can include:
- Intrusive memories
- Avoidance of things that remind you of the event
- Negative changes in thinking and mood
- Heightened physical and emotional reactions
These symptoms can interfere with your life, making daily activities challenging.
Trauma usually doesn’t go away on its own, which is why seeking treatment and support is so vital. At The Sanctuary, we understand the importance of healing trauma at its core, so you can overcome its lasting effects and get back on track to the life you truly want.
How Unresolved Trauma Can Lead to Addiction
Clients we see at The Sanctuary often come in for a condition that presents itself more obviously in their lives, but what’s really causing it is trauma. Unresolved trauma can lead to a number of mental health concerns – including addiction. That’s because trauma changes the way we think, and our relationship to the world around us.
One former client says this is why even when she got sober, she didn’t feel any better:
“I ended up cleaning up my addiction. I wasn’t an addict anymore, but I wasn’t better. As a matter of fact, it got worse because I found out what I was running from. I got my feelings back, and it was a lot, and there was no one to help me understand that there was a bigger picture.”
Trauma is a leading cause of addiction. A large body of research shows this, such as one study that found “there are high rates of lifetime dependence on various substances” in people with PTSD.
Trauma Changes Your Brain’s Reward System
One reaso for this is that trauma alters the brain’s reward system. When that happens, it’s harder to feel pleasure from everyday activities. As a result, many people who struggle with trauma turn to drugs or alcohol to feel good.
Trauma Affects the Way You See Yourself
Another way that trauma can lead to addiction is by creating a negative self-image. Often, people who have experienced trauma feel worthless, ashamed or guilty. They may also have a hard time trusting others and feeling secure in relationships. And because these feelings are so intense to deal with, they can lead people to cope by self-medicating with drugs or alcohol.
Trauma Activates Your Stress Response
Trauma can also lead to addiction by disrupting your body’s stress response system. When we experience stress, our bodies release hormones like cortisol and adrenaline. These hormones are designed to help us mobilize and respond to danger. But they’re not designed to be switched on all the time. If our stress response system is constantly activated, it can lead to a number of health problems, including addiction.
“Over time, repeated activation of the stress response takes a toll on the body,” say Harvard researchers. “Research suggests that chronic stress contributes to high blood pressure, promotes the formation of artery-clogging deposits, and causes brain changes that may contribute to anxiety, depression, and addiction.”
These effects interfere with your ability to live your life. And they can last for a long time if they’re not properly addressed.
“If we do not process trauma, ongoing life complications such as depression, anxiety, sleep disturbances, anger, feelings of betrayal, and trouble trusting and connecting in relationships can persist for years after the traumatic experience occurred,” says psychologist Tian Dayton in her book, Trauma and Addiction: Ending the Cycle of Pain Through Emotional Literacy. “Such are the symptoms that, when unresolved, lead people to seek pleasure or self-medicate with alcohol, drugs, food, sex, spending and other addictions.”
That’s why it’s so important to thoroughly resolve trauma. And a holistic trauma treatment program can help you do just that.
Holistic Trauma Rehab: An Immersive Healing Experience
Residential trauma treatment programs like ours at The Sanctuary play a crucial role in addressing unresolved trauma. If you’re finding yourself struggling to carry out day-to-day tasks and yearning for a safe place to heal, residential rehab can be a lifeline.
Benefits of Residential Trauma Treatment
- 24/7 support: You’ll have continuous support from team members with training and experience in guiding people through trauma healing. This is hugely helpful when coping with overwhelming symptoms seems impossible to do on your own.
- A fully immersive environment: Full immersion in a residential program allows for a more in-depth healing process. It provides the time necessary for healthy habits to take root and set a cadence for life beyond treatment.
- Tailored treatment: Because trauma and its effects are deeply personal experiences, it’s important that your treatment plan is personalized for your specific needs. Our clinical team creates your treatment plan based on detailed assessments and adjusts for effectiveness as you move through the program.
- Intensive therapy: With higher levels of individual therapy and personal attention, you’ll have more opportunities for advancement and personal growth. The Sanctuary offers far more clinical hours per week than a typical rehab program, so your time with us is optimized for progress.
- Structure and routine: Residential treatment programs provide a structured and predictable environment. This can help people to feel safe and secure, and it can also help them to develop healthy coping mechanisms.
- Community and peer support: Connecting with others who have shared experiences reminds you that you’re not alone in your struggle. In recovery, peers play as big a role as therapists in creating opportunities for breakthroughs and giving you a chance to practice your new skills.
- Practical skills to take home with you: In addition to the deep self-exploration you’ll get to do as part of your recovery journey, you’ll learn strategies and techniques you can apply in real-life situations.
“I now have the tools, the strength and the courage to heal my trauma.”
As our former client says, “I am so grateful I made it here, because I now have the tools, the strength and the courage to not just live in that trauma. I finally see some of the beauty in life.”
Healing trauma isn’t just about remedying symptoms. It’s about fundamentally changing your relationship with yourself and the world around you. This holistic approach ensures that you not only heal, but thrive in your journey toward recovery.
Therapeutic Approaches to Trauma Healing
The treatment experience at holistic trauma rehab consists of three types of therapy: individual therapy, group therapy and complementary therapies.
Individual Therapy
In one-on-one therapy, you’ll talk to a therapist about what you’re going through at that point in your healing journey. They’ll help you connect with yourself and understand your true feelings underlying your challenges. Therapists hold non-judgmental space for you to express what you’re going through and receive helpful guidance.
Group Therapy
In group therapy, you’ll hear from others with similar experiences and have a chance to share your story. The relationships you form through group work support your healing progress in rehab – and can lead to lasting friendships. At The Sanctuary, clients attend group therapy every day, and groups center on either learning about a topic or processing what happened since the last session. They can be a valuable way to connect with others who understand what you’re going through.
Holistic Therapies
Healing can be challenging, and holistic therapies help soothe your mind and body as you take on the journey of recovery. This can make it more comfortable to be in treatment and help you feel energized for your sessions. Therapies like massage and bodywork can also ease some of the physical tension that comes with processing intense emotions.
Tension & Trauma Releasing Exercises (TRE)
Trauma isn’t just a psychological experience – it also gets stored in our cells. Tension & trauma releasing exercises (TRE) are a way to release blocked energy in the body. The Sanctuary’s Program Administrator Janie explains:
“When animals in the wild have a near-death experience, they shake and shiver for a short amount of time and then move on with their lives. But we as humans have forgotten how to do this, and tend to store trauma in our bodies. TRE helps the body recognize that there’s locked energy. Through specific exercises that trigger our natural, physical trauma response, TRE helps to release that stored energy, work through trauma on a physical level and allow the body to come back to balance.”
Energy Medicine
It’s often said that when healing from trauma, the only way out is through. The healing journey can be a challenging process that requires us to confront shadows. That’s why it’s important to do so in a supportive environment with the utmost guidance and care. At The Sanctuary, we use methods like energy medicine to guide you as you dive into your inner world.
As humans, we each have our own energy field. This field interacts with what’s around us and picks up information from our environment. The quality of that information, and what our body does with it, is important to our ability to recover from trauma.
Our energy medicine practitioners tune the human biofield so it’s closer to its natural state. When we have trauma and stress, it compromises our energy. Energy medicine is all about refining our energy field, so we feel better and more at peace as a result.
Other trauma-specific therapies we offer include:
- Ketamine-assisted therapy (KAT)
- Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR)
- Sexual trauma therapy
- Somatic experiencing
- Sound healing
- …and more
Through these and other methods, holistic trauma rehab gives you tools to support your well-being throughout life
“It’s been 3 years and this is a tool that I always go back to. I wouldn’t be where I am without The Sanctuary,” says one program graduate.
Holistic trauma treatment should also prioritize creating a safe environment to heal. At The Sanctuary, our practitioners dedicate their lives to doing just that.
Creating Safe Space in Trauma Recovery
The Sanctuary is a purpose-driven, heart-centered rehab. We’ve spent years evolving our treatment program to create a different model of holistic, integrative health. Our model revolves around healing, community, purpose and ethics. It’s our way of giving back to the world: showing our clients what healthy, recovered lifestyles look like.
On our campus, clients and staff are part of the same community. They share meals together and spend all day together. Clients have access to staff at all times, not just in session. This creates an all-encompassing environment of life change.
We get to know you and cultivate inner safety before beginning any vulnerable work. That’s why we treat you with dignity and respect your needs for your own healing process. Our team sees you as whole and healed, and empowers you to see that in yourself.
Our former client describes her experience of healing in our community:
“My experience at The Sanctuary was important because it was real; it was raw; it was honest; it was compassionate; it was loving; it was messy; it was beautiful. And all my parts could be seen there. I felt a love for myself that I didn’t know anymore.”
Finding Joy in the Journey to Reclaiming Your Life
By healing with the full support of our team, you can embrace your journey to reclaiming your life after trauma. You can move beyond victimhood and into empowerment. And you can not only get your life back, but create the life you truly, deeply want.
“Hang on, because it does get better,” says one alum. “It doesn’t have to stay bad. And if you just keep up the work, it gets good.”
Learn how it can get better for you and take the first step toward your new life: connect with us today.
