Hous­ton may be a fan­tas­tic city where the gleam­ing sky­scrap­ers of the Ener­gy Cor­ri­dor stand in stark con­trast to the gen­tle beau­ty of Buf­fa­lo Bay­ou Park. Still, it’s also a place where many women silent­ly bat­tle the effects of trau­ma. The sources of trau­ma are as diverse as the city itself. From the hor­rors of domes­tic vio­lence to the unpre­dictable scale of nat­ur­al dis­as­ters, trau­ma exists every­where you look. That’s why trau­ma-informed ther­a­py is such a big deal and why near­ly 600 peo­ple are search­ing for “trau­ma informed ther­a­py near me” each month. Empow­er­ing women who have expe­ri­enced trau­ma to heal and build resilience is what trau­ma-informed ther­a­py is about.

Here’s every­thing you need to know about it.

 

Women Counseling

While not all women expe­ri­ence trau­ma, quite a few do. Trau­ma defined, is an emo­tion­al response to a deeply dis­tress­ing or dis­turb­ing event that over­whelms an indi­vid­u­al’s abil­i­ty to cope. Although trau­ma often occurs after a life-threat­en­ing event, it can also be trig­gered by con­tin­u­ous events like ongo­ing emo­tion­al or sex­u­al abuse. Sur­vivors of trau­ma have often asso­ci­at­ed feel­ings of shock, flash­backs and anx­i­ety with it—an over­whelm­ing sense of being small and help­less. Like liv­ing in a night­mare you can’t wake up from.

Only a tiny per­cent­age of women devel­op post-trau­mat­ic stress dis­or­der (PTSD) as a response to trau­ma. Most oth­ers devel­op men­tal health issues like depres­sion, hyper­vig­i­lance and anx­i­ety dis­or­ders. Although some women can deal with and recov­er from the effects of trau­ma on their own, it’s cru­cial to seek ther­a­py if you find your­self strug­gling with it.

 

The unique risk of trauma for women in Houston

Hous­ton’s dynam­ic envi­ron­ment presents spe­cif­ic chal­lenges that can con­tribute to trau­ma:

1. Natural disasters

The mem­o­ry of Hur­ri­cane Har­vey (and a host of oth­er dis­as­ters) still lingers, caus­ing anx­i­ety and PTSD for many.

2. Urban crime

Despite improve­ments, crime rates are still high in Houston(the total crime rate is 146% high­er than the nation­al aver­age) and being a vic­tim of any of such crimes can cause trau­ma.

High crime rates also cre­ate a per­cep­tion of inse­cu­ri­ty, fur­ther caus­ing anx­i­ety prob­lems.

3. Cultural adjustments

As a melt­ing pot of cultures—over 145 lan­guages are spo­ken in the city—many women strug­gle with iden­ti­ty and belong­ing.

4. Domestic violence

Unfor­tu­nate­ly, this remains a sig­nif­i­cant issue in our com­mu­ni­ty — espe­cial­ly for women. 18% of homi­cides in Hous­ton hap­pen through domes­tic vio­lence.

Although there’s no way to tell for sure, these sense­less encoun­ters prob­a­bly induce trau­ma more than any oth­er kind of expe­ri­ence.

 

The essence of trauma-informed therapy

Trau­ma-informed ther­a­py rec­og­nizes the impact of trau­ma and under­stands that the path to recov­ery is sen­si­tive and must be trod­den on with utmost care.

It acknowl­edges the impact of trau­ma on each client and responds by ful­ly inte­grat­ing knowl­edge about trau­ma into poli­cies, pro­ce­dures, and prac­tices.

You’re prob­a­bly won­der­ing how that’s dif­fer­ent from tra­di­tion­al ther­a­py. Let me explain.

Tra­di­tion­al ther­a­pists may know about trau­ma, but they don’t nec­es­sar­i­ly acknowl­edge it dur­ing treat­ment. They don’t avoid con­ver­sa­tions about a trau­mat­ic event or wor­ry about the con­tri­bu­tion of this event to your cur­rent men­tal state.

Trau­ma-informed ther­a­py, on the flip side, tries to see and under­stand how much of an impact trau­ma has had on your men­tal health. It asks, “What hap­pened to you?” not “What’s wrong with you?”

Trau­ma-informed ther­a­pists oper­ate by cer­tain prin­ci­ples.

• They pri­or­i­tize a safe and sup­port­ive envi­ron­ment. They estab­lish clear bound­aries, only dis­cussing top­ics you’re emo­tion­al­ly equipped to dis­cuss.
• They col­lab­o­rate. They act as part­ners in the heal­ing process.
• They are par­tic­u­lar about under­stand­ing your trau­ma and the trig­gers behind your response to it.

As a trau­ma-informed ther­a­pist myself, I know that approach­ing each client with the under­stand­ing that their expe­ri­ences are unique is vital.

Only when there’s a safe and trust­ing envi­ron­ment cre­at­ed by trau­ma-informed care will heal­ing begin.

 

Techniques of trauma therapy

In my prac­tice, I offer ther­a­py tech­niques suit­ed explic­it­ly for trau­ma heal­ing:

1. Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)

   This pow­er­ful tech­nique uses “bilat­er­al stim­u­la­tion” to help process trau­mat­ic mem­o­ries and reduce their impact. Learn about what EMDR is, the process of EMDR, or how it works here.

2. Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (CBT)

   CBT is anchored on the idea that our thoughts, feel­ings and behav­iors are inter­linked. By chang­ing neg­a­tive thoughts, we can pos­i­tive­ly influ­ence our emo­tions and behav­iors.

It’s an amaz­ing tech­nique that teach­es you how to reframe neg­a­tive thoughts.

 

Trauma therapy Houston

Trau­ma-informed care is a potent tool for trau­ma heal­ing. Trau­ma recov­ery is a jour­ney, and every wom­an’s path is unique. The com­mon thread, how­ev­er, is that heal­ing hap­pens faster when trau­ma-informed prac­tices are both adopt­ed and imple­ment­ed. Look no fur­ther for your trau­ma-informed ther­a­pist, you’ve found me. As a trau­ma-informed ther­a­pist, I offer online ther­a­py to women in Hous­ton who have expe­ri­enced trau­ma.

I have pur­sued spe­cial­ized train­ing and have had years of both study­ing and clin­i­cal­ly treat­ing trau­ma. To learn more about how I can help you with your sit­u­a­tion, you can con­tact me here to sched­ule a free con­sul­ta­tion.

What­ev­er you’ve been through, know that it is entire­ly pos­si­ble to be trau­ma-free again.