Garth* was an army medic in Timor and Afghanistan, as well as several humanitarian missions, working in field hospitals. He has experienced years of nightmares but still works as a paramedic.
Pam* was sexually abused by her uncle from ages 7 to 10. The abuse stopped when her uncle was incarcerated for another matter. She had never told anyone else about the abuse.
Kris* witnessed a savage beating of a friend by a gang when he was 16. Over the last 7 years, he has rarely gone out at night.
The Good the Bad and the Ugly
Every few months a new client sits down and says a version of: “I read The Body Keeps the Score and… that’s me.” This bestselling book, by psychiatrist Bessel van der Kolk, has a compelling core message: trauma doesn’t only live in memory; it shows up in the body—in breath, gut, posture, startle reflex.
Trauma isn’t only “the worst thing that ever happened.” It’s a transformational process that occurs to our body and mind when events overwhelm our ability to cope. Good memories are good, bad memories are bad. Trauma memories are ugly: they intrude, take over, and make us replay the physical, emotional and behavioural patterns from the moment of trauma.
Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is one outcome—intrusive memories, avoidance, hypervigilance, numbing—but many people carry significant trauma symptoms without meeting full PTSD criteria.
Van der Kolk reminds us that trauma isn’t one-size-fits-all. There is single-incident trauma (a crash, assault, disaster) that explodes into a life and divides it into “before” and “after.” There is ongoing or complex trauma (family violence, war zones, coercive control) that trains the nervous system to live on high alert, often layering shame and helplessness. And there is early-life or developmental trauma, where threat or neglect in childhood shapes how the brain wires for emotion, attention and relationships.
Different paths, shared patterns: an alarm system that won’t switch off, a self that doesn’t feel safe, and a body that keeps kicking up signals when nothing “dangerous” is happening right now.
The Body
Traditional treatments for PTSD have been mostly talk-based—cognitive models like CBT that help you notice and reframe unhelpful beliefs, reduce avoidance and build coping. These remain valuable.
But many people need more than insight. Newer, more experiential approaches work through the body’s alarm system as well as the story:
- EMDR helps the brain process stuck memories, so they stop hijacking the present.
- Schema Therapy maps long-running patterns (schemas) formed in early relationships—like “I’ll be abandoned” or “I’m not safe”—and combines cognitive work with imagery, limited reparenting and experiential techniques to soothe the nervous system and meet unmet needs.
I’m a Schema and EMDR therapist, and I often blend CBT/ACT skills with schema and other body-aware practices (breath, grounding, posture) so treatment happens where trauma actually lives: in sensations, impulses and relationship. For Garth, the work began not with retelling deployments, but with learning to settle his body enough to be present with his memories.
Keeps
Trauma has a nasty habit of keeping us in an eternal present. A sound, smell or glance can collapse time so thoroughly that the body reacts as if it’s happening again. Despite being successful academically and in her career, Pam felt like she was a seven-year-old whenever she was alone with a man outside of work—heart racing, mind blank, body braced to freeze.
You can’t simply think your way out; you have to help the nervous system discover that now is not then. That might look like orienting to the room, feeling the chair under you, lengthening the out-breath, or safely revisiting a memory in tiny doses while anchored in the present. Over time, the past becomes past again. Kris practised this in small steps—standing on his front porch at night, feet planted, eyes scanning for ordinary cues of safety—until his world expanded beyond the fear.
The Score
Trauma extracts a fee across life domains:
- Body: sleep disruption, headaches, gut problems, chronic pain, fatigue, startle responses. The system swings between too much activation (panic, agitation) and too little (numbness, collapse).
- Mind: intrusive images, nightmare loops, concentration problems, irritability, shame and self-blame. Beliefs harden: “I’m not safe,” “People can’t be trusted,” “It was my fault.”
- Relationships: withdrawing from closeness, conflict cycles, scanning for danger, testing, or clinging. Trust is fragile; boundaries blur or become rigid.
- Work and study: reduced focus and memory, absenteeism, burnout, avoiding tasks that echo the trauma (authority figures, closed rooms, night shifts).
Understandably, people reach for coping methods that work fast but backfire: alcohol or other drugs, overwork, gaming and scrolling, self-harm, strict perfectionism, staying constantly busy, or total avoidance. These strategies numb or distract, but they also shrink life and keep the alarm unprocessed.
Good news: bodies learn. With consistent, paced support, the nervous system can relearn safety; memory can be integrated; relationships can feel more possible. Therapy aims for steady gains—better sleep, less reactivity, more room for values and connection—not overnight transformation.
If parts of this land for you, you don’t have to tackle it alone. At Hendriks Psychology (Maroubra; telehealth Australia-wide) we work collaboratively and gently—using CBT/ACT tools, Schema Therapy, EMDR and other experiential methods—to help your body and mind agree that the present is safe. Reach out if you’d like to talk about next steps.
If you’re in immediate distress in Australia, call 000 or contact Lifeline on 13 11 14.
*Names and key details changed.
