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Counseling for Trauma & PTSD

Trauma-informed therapy services in Kansas, Missouri, and North Carolina

Understanding How Trauma Works

When a trauma occurs, the experience is so intense that the cognitive and biological information about the event can literally overload and override your brain. As a result, your mind can feel stuck in the moment. Long after the traumatic event is over, your body may still continue to experience similar symptoms to the ones that may have occurred during the event. Until a traumatic event has been psychologically processed, the mind and body can literally be trapped and stuck in a traumatized loop. 

The impact of trauma

The impact of trauma and the intrusive symptoms it often causes can have a significant, long-term impact on an individual’s mental, physical, and emotional well-being. For someone who has experienced trauma, even day-to-day tasks and standard relational interactions can be extremely triggering and exhausting. 

Fortunately, trauma is not the end of the story. Post-traumatic growth is possible, and many people who have experienced severe trauma can still go on to live meaningful, joy-filled lives. To this end, trauma therapy has proven to be effective at treating the symptoms of trauma and helping individuals process and resolve what happened to them.

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Types of trauma

Trauma is an intensely distressing experience where your ability to cope, process, or respond to the situation was out of your control. Trauma often leads to severe, long-term emotional, psychological, and even physical wounds. There are many different types of trauma, however, most trauma falls into one of these seven categories:

Big T trauma

Extremely intense, life-threatening events involving violence, natural disasters, near death experiences, war, etc.

Little t trauma

Disturbing events that leave a profoundly damaging impact on someone’s wellbeing such as emotional abuse, grief, loss, harassment, or bullying. Don’t let the term ‘little’ fool you. Research indicates that little t trauma can be just as harmful if not more harmful than big T trauma, especially if the little t trauma occurred during childhood or developmental years. 

Acute trauma

Trauma that resulted from a single, isolated incident.

Chronic trauma

Trauma that involved continual or repeated occurrences, such as abuse.

Complex trauma

If someone has experienced more than one type of trauma, then the collective impact of the events would be classified as complex trauma. 

Generational trauma

When a group, community, or family experiences trauma, the impact can be so severe that future generations are influenced through a variety of biological, environmental, social, and psychological factors.

Vicarious trauma

Vicarious trauma is when exposure to someone else’s trauma causes you to internalize their suffering as if it’s your own. 

Symptoms Of Trauma

While the impact of trauma can influence every area of an individual’s life, the specific symptoms of trauma will vary depending on the type of trauma experienced. In general, the trauma symptoms are wide-ranging, long-term, and typically do not improve on their own. Trauma symptoms are often so intense and highly triggering and intrusive that psychological intervention is needed.

Common trauma symptoms include:

  • Severe difficulty sleeping
  • Intense emotional triggers
  • Nightmares
  • Flashbacks
  • Inability to concentrate
  • Feeling on edge constantly
  • Easily startled
  • Increased heart rate
  • Chronic muscle pain and tension
  • Chronic illnesses
  • Chronic headaches
  • Mood swings
  • Relational isolation
  • Feeling overall ‘unsafe’ in the world
  • Intense anxiety or depression
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We offer many different types of trauma therapy, including:

  • Trauma-Focused Play Therapy (TF-PT)
  • Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR)
  • Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT)
  • Prolonged Exposure Therapy (PET)
  • Acceptance and Commitment Therapy (ACT)
  • Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT)
  • Trauma-Focused Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (TF-CBT)

How to Heal Trauma 

The process of healing trauma is largely guided by Polyvagal Theory – a neuroscientific paradigm that provides an explanation for how trauma impacts the body and the brain. In short, research shows that traumatic experiences can override the brain’s ability to function properly. With the mind-body connection severed, the cognitive information about the event gets stuck in the body, specifically in the nervous system, which leaves the individual in a continual state of fight, flight, or freeze. 

Until the brain can access the traumatized information trapped in the nervous system, the traumatic event remains categorized as unprocessed by the brain. As long as an event remains unprocessed, memories and feelings about the event continue to wreak havoc in the body. This is why letting it go or moving on may feel impossible to individuals who have experienced trauma. As long as their mind and body are stuck in a traumatized loop, they are literally unable to ‘let it go’ without psychological intervention. 

Fortunately, achieving post-traumatic growth is possible. 

Trauma therapy, trauma counseling, and trauma-informed therapy are all different names for the type of therapy associated with treating the unique symptoms of trauma. Trauma therapy helps you get unstuck by interrupting the traumatized loop. Our trauma-informed therapists will work with you to help your brain process the event and heal your mind-body connection so you can feel safe again.

Common questions about trauma therapy

How is trauma-therapy different than traditional talk therapy?

Trauma therapy is far more diverse and goes much deeper than traditional talk therapy. Also, because trauma is stored in the body, we’ll use somatic techniques such as EMDR and expressive movement therapy to help you process the trauma and heal your nervous system.

Our trauma-informed providers understand how the world can feel like a minefield of triggers. We know that the idea of trauma therapy can feel intimidating. Please know that we are highly sensitive to the nuances of trauma. While certain aspects of trauma therapy may be triggering, our trauma-informed therapists are trained to help keep you feeling as safe, comfortable, and grounded as possible. Trauma therapy is designed to be a deeply comforting, healing, and empowering experience and has been proven
to help lessen or even resolve the symptoms of trauma.

No. The techniques we use in trauma therapy do not require all the details. In fact, many experiential forms of trauma therapy such as EMDR do not even require you to remember or be able to articulate everything that happened.

Trauma therapy can untangle years’ worth of emotional wounds, but it takes time for healing, processing, re processing, and cognitive integration to occur. That said, we understand that everyone’s timeline and resources vary. While we are willing and able to work with any timeline, we have found that most clients begin feeling a significant, positive shift after around 8 sessions. And the most lasting healing transformations we have seen occur within 6-12 months of routine therapy (approximately 24-50 sessions).

Our diverse team of trauma therapists allows us to treat clients ages 3+. Whether you are a child, adolescent, teen, or adult, we have several providers who can work with you to help you process your trauma in an age appropriate way.

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Benefits of Trauma Therapy

Clients who have participated in trauma therapy have experienced many benefits, including:

  • Increased confidence and self-trust
  • Lessened or resolved emotional triggers
  • Lessened symptoms of anxiety and depression
  • Greater fulfillment in social and relational interactions
  • Increased feelings of happiness and feelings of calm
  • Less anger and irritability
  • Improved ability to emotionally self-regulate
  • Greater levels of emotional stability
  • Higher levels of hope and optimism
  • Restored sense of eagerness and curiosity about life

Is Trauma Therapy Right For Me?

Trauma therapy goes much deeper than talk therapy and includes somatic modalities designed to heal the disconnect between your nervous system and your mind. If you’ve participated in traditional talk therapy and still don’t feel the relief you crave, then trauma therapy may be the next right step for you. Our compassionate, highly skilled trauma therapists have worked with individuals of all ages to help them achieve post-traumatic growth.

Trauma therapy sessions may be right for you if…

  • You’ve tried traditional talk therapy, but it hasn’t helped as much as you hoped. 
  • You’ve tried traditional talk therapy, but you felt re-traumatized.
  • You feel like you carry the weight of your past everywhere you go. 
  • You feel controlled by your triggers.
  • You want to welcome inner peace back into your life.  
  • You know that the only way out is through, and you’re ready to ‘do the work.’
  • You don’t want to just ‘talk’ about your pain. 
  • You want to experience true healing so you can feel safe in your body again. 
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Trauma creates a change you don’t choose. 
Healing is about creating change you do choose.

― Michelle Rosenthal

Overcome past pain. Heal the present hurt. Build a brighter tomorrow.

We know that finding a therapist who is the right fit for you is essential. We invite you to browse our list of providers at the link below. To learn more about how trauma therapy works at our practice or to request help in being matched with the right provider please submit a therapy inquiry and contact us at: 816-974-7378

Therapy Inquiry
Meet Our Therapists