Freedom From Childhood Trauma Part 3: A Guest Blog by D.P

Freedom From Childhood Trauma Part 3: A Guest Blog by D.P

Freedom From Childhood Trauma part 3

By DP

With guidance from the 12 steps, help from my AA sponsor and from my grand sponsor I chose to go with Plan B. I would take any and all proceeds from an impending financial windfall and use it to go into treatment.

I returned to therapy and asked her to hold me accountable for the decisions I was to make about my life, help me find a treatment program and have complete access to all my records during treatment. I did not want to leave treatment until there was full agreement between my therapist and the counselors on staff that I was done, that I had done the work to resolve my trauma. I did not want to leave treatment on my own accord.

With the help of my therapist I found one of the best trauma programs in the country, one I would never have been able to afford in this lifetime. I’m just a poor white boy, born on the wrong side of the tracks and would never, never have had the opportunity to go into this type of treatment program without AA’s Promises coming true for me (Google AA’s promises).

I went into treatment sober, stayed sober and left sober.

So off I went, absolutely prepared for what I thought would be the Olympics of The Mind to find a way to release my childhood trauma once and for all and experience freedom!

This was a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity for me. I realized that. I arrived in treatment ready, willing and able to do the work. And I was excited about it.

It’s really atypical, probably extraordinary that an alcoholic, addict or co-addict would be thrilled to have the opportunity to go into treatment. But, as a trauma survivor I told you I was a little bassackwards about things, but there it is, I did it backwards. No one was forcing me to go, no one was even suggesting it.

I was so highly motivated it was difficult for my other brothers and sisters in treatment to be around me. Most of them were struggling with their first exposure in recovery with process addiction (food, sex), substance addiction (alcohol, drugs) or co-addiction (co-dependent).

I learned something quite revolutionary right away; the trauma I sought to resolve was not in my mind but in my body! This was not to be the Olympics of The Mind. Although I had done a lot of work, trauma is a medical problem. I needed a medical solution to a medical problem. It never occurred to me to look somewhere other than my mind.

But I did have a very serious problem in my mind, one of over–thinking to extremes. You might say that I was an over-thinkers’ over-thinker. My AA sponsor almost banned me from thinking. The solution to this is actually in the 11th step – meditation. Fortunately I had a reasonably solid meditation practice. My sitting meditation took me to a place inside of myself I describe as, “the place before words.”

So I began treatment by getting out of my own way, taking down my walls to intimacy (being known)… excuses, defenses and quieting all the noise that would come out of my mouth whenever it was open.

The treatment counselors were on to something that none of us could understand. We struggled to connect with our emotions (egad!) and our body sensations. “What are you feeling?” This is a difficult question for an addict.

Fortunately I received guidance from the voice inside of myself, the voice that we learn about by working the steps, the voice of a power greater than myself. That voice said, “Stay present.” My only responsibility in treatment was to stay present. Be emotionally available, physically available, and spiritually available for whatever was to happen every minute of every day.

I had no idea addiction counselors were trained to be confrontational. They push every button you’ve got. With my years of preparation I was ready for them to “bring it on.” The most surprising thing that happened to me, and it happened more than once, was when a counselor I never met before would sit next to me and in the space of two or three minutes tell me more about myself then I knew about myself. Shocking.

Well my time finally came, my primary counselor pushed a button and I went nuclear. Although I didn’t show it at the time, man I was outta there. Ready to pack my bags, tell this b** off, and be done with it. Forget my years of preparation.

Then.

Then… I sat down, took out my tools and started working out what was going on inside of me. Where had I failed to communicate where I was coming from, misunderstood what was being asked of me, or failed to mirror back my understanding or misunderstanding of this conversation? That night, it took me several hours to work this out. I had a private session scheduled with my primary counselor the very next morning and was very apprehensive. We began this private session, and I think it took me not more than a minute or two to put this issue on the table. Then we spent most of the remaining hour laughing and enjoying the humor in our misunderstanding. This is the first time in my life, ever, that I was able to work out a major difficulty with someone face-to-face and resolve it in such an esteemable way.

Little did I know that I was also on my way toward an end date. This was growth.

One treatment that overwhelmingly enhanced my recovery was EMDR (look it up). I had several sessions of EMDR with my therapist before entering treatment and discovered another gift – an aptitude. I actually enjoyed EMDR sessions! Some time in my third month of treatment I was trying to find the source of my codependency issues and went in for an intense EMDR session. At the end of the session my counselor suddenly jumped up and said, “Oh wow, you did a 600! What the heck was a 600? So I asked and it is probably some kind of big deal. But it’s not as big of a deal as knowing that you’ve done the deal – when your counselor gets really, really excited about the results. Yeah, I was on my way.

Treatment was so busy that we really never had time to think about what our experiences would be like afterwards. We worked about 12 hours a day six days a week and barely had a day off. Actually we were still doing the work while sleeping. My primary counselor said it was a 24-hour a day program.

I still had work to do, and the energy to do it, and continued to stay in treatment. Once again I was very, very committed. This was a once-in-a-lifetime deal for me and I was going to get everything out of it I could. Around 90 days it became obvious that most of the staff thought that I was done, that I had done the work so I began inquiring as to my transition back into the real world. I set an end date. I was thoroughly exhausted. This was the most intense experience of my life and I feel that I got everything out of it that I could.

I slept for almost 30 days straight after treatment just to recover from the intensity. I really had not spent any time discovering internal changes or checking to see if I had released the energy behind my trauma.

I spent the next three months amazed, absolutely amazed at the differences inside of me. I felt 90% lighter. There was no need to over-think things, actually no need to think at all. My family of origin story literally vaporized. No need to go back because being in the present moment was so new. Every minute was new. Every minute was fresh. Every minute was a discovery. I was present for my life.

For those of you who’ve done therapy and sat in a session painfully recalling an event from your life only to hear your therapist say, “That’s interesting.” Well that’s what happened to my story. It’s “interesting,” but not relevant at all. My family of origin story isn’t about me at all.

I no longer re-experience trauma when a thought about my family history comes up. Instead I am sad at how sick they were and sad they never chose to get help. But that’s still not on me, I have healthy boundaries in place.

I think it’s important to do adequate family of origin work to take away the power story has over our lives. I think AA and Al-Anon’s middle steps 4,5,6,7,8, and 9 are immensely helpful. But there does come a time when there is no further benefit to go back and try to figure out the past with the past. I now look at my family of origin story like a fun-house mirror. Ultimately, there is no sense to be made out of this level of dysfunction.

Two years later I am still relatively trauma-free. Not a perfect recovery, but damn good enough! Most every experience is actually quite new. Today I am learning to be comfortable living in the question. If I’m living in the answer I’m not present, I am somewhere else, usually my head, and that’s not healthy.

I haven’t recovered to some mystical state of perfection. I describe my recovery as ordinary. I’m now an ordinary person with ordinary problems who makes ordinary mistakes. Who wins some, loses some and really is okay with pretty much everything that’s happening.

My relationships with other people, particularly women improved drastically. I hear some words frequently, words I never heard before in regard to me; “Thank You”

Really? You’re talking about me?

People like having me around! I love to be present for myself and for other people around me without condition as long as I’m connecting with safe people with healthy boundaries. This is what life is like for me today.

I really became the change I wish to see in the world.

Oh, and what about the question, “Do you know anyone who has worked through trauma and is now a happy functional adult?

Well, yes. I do.

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