My boys were gaming and joking about “being triggered” a few years ago. They were lucky enough to not really understand it, and it was funny because of how extremely unfunny it is to anyone suffering from any kind of post traumatic stress. They were processing their world and making friends online, while I was coping with my own triggers. I caught the tail end of what they were saying as I was walking past their room. This was when I realized I needed to be far more involved in what they’re doing online while teaching them more about what I experience.

Triggers aren’t funny, if they’re yours. They are terrifying, frustrating, humiliating, crippling . . . but never funny.

Memories are somatic.

Somatic means it has to do with the body. Memories are stored in the body. Think of memories as your internal storage system. We experience something and we take that information in through our senses. We see something. We hear something. We feel something. We process this information and store it. In the short term, it’s kind of like a to-do list. We remember things chronologically. This is why you can often trace your steps back to remember what you did with your keys. Long term memories are stored in our bodies. Recalling older memories comes down to triggering that memory. One of the easiest ways to trigger a memory is through scent.

Wander Down My Rabbit Trail . . .

One summer when I lived in the garage at my Mom’s house, I bought a huge bottle of Dial Antibacterial soap. I used it all summer. I had a refillable bottle, and that soap smell can still take me back to that bathroom with several wine bottles draping pothos plants, and the candles I decorated with orphaned stud earrings on my windowsill. I learned plumbing, tiling and did some electrical. I felt so empowered by my garage. It was before I was raped in that garage, and the thoughts were still happy at that point. My happy memories in my dark blue bathroom are tempered by my date rape later in that garage. I will never buy that soap again.

We can try to trigger one of your memories together.

Think of your earliest memory of feeling scared or happy. It really is up to you, but a strong memory is easiest. Can you remember what you smelled? Don’t imagine, but try to remember what you might have worn. Did you feel cold? Was it hot? Were you left alone? Feel the fear. Live in the joy. Whatever happened that day is your memory to pick up and examine again. Really get in touch with that memory, and hold onto it.

Now see if you can feel it in your body. Is it in your hands? Are you clenching your fists or your jaw? Is it in your stomach, your legs, or your back? Are you feeling it in a stiff expression on your face? Can you taste something specific? Can you remember a sound?

When I’m having a moment of being triggered by my C-PTSD, those memories take over. I don’t have to think about it, because I can’t stop thinking about it. I’m surrounded by the smells. I sink back into myself, because that’s what I did to protect myself at that time. I feel it between my shoulder blades, and in my tense stomach. My legs feel stiff and sometimes will cramp up with the tension I hold there. I’ve been unable to hear what is going on around me, because I can only hear the echoes from the past.

What is the point of memories being stored in our bodies?

The memories we’ve stored in our bodies are there to help us face similar things in the future. Our bodies create a warning system for every moment of pain we’ve experienced, and it’ll do it’s very best to master pain avoidance. Think about that first time you touched a hot surface and how you likely haven’t repeated the experiment. You avoid the pain of getting burned as much as you can.

What about that one astrological sign you dated? Let one Aquarius screw it up for you with how easily we detach once we decide we’re done, or the confidence of having all the right answers, and you’ll never date another one of us again. Every Taurus, Libra, and Leo and Sagittarius will have to prove themselves just a little harder because my past will try to convince me that there is no future I’d be happy with.

Our bodies and minds are incredibly capable of doing what it can to protect us from pain. During my more traumatic experiences, I felt numb. I was dissociating from what I was physically going through. My mind checked out. I have no memories of the more traumatic times in my life. Some people experience this as floating above their bodies, or feeling like a narrator, telling the story from a different perspective. I just don’t remember some things. For what I do remember, I can tell you about what happened, but I’m not really sure I could tell you how I feel around it. I am still numb about some things.

When faced with something similar to that original situation, our minds will trigger us into self preservation. These triggers could otherwise be entirely harmless, if not tied to a memory filled with pain. As I’m healing, these triggers will make me cry and tremble the moment I have the space to fall apart. Custody swap days are emotional for me. The kids walk out the door and that’s when I can face every memory or spark or imagination that made me its bitch all week. I have to push through these things so I can heal. I have to actively remind myself that I’m safe, and what happened before isn’t happening now. This is how I heal. I re-train my thoughts to acknowledge that the similar sensations aren’t going to lead me back to the painful past because there’s a new path ahead of me.

A lot of war vets experience fireworks or loud booms as triggers. I do too. The Fourth of July holiday had me tense and on edge. At one point I was drifting off to sleep and woke from a memory of a drive by shooting. It wasn’t a dream, but a memory that needed my immediate attention because the booms meant I needed to get down, and I had to wake up for that.

A big trigger for me is when a seemingly safe situation is suddenly unsafe. This comes from knowing, trusting and even loving the men that hurt me. It can be a sudden hug from behind when I’m not expecting it. A few ex’s often felt like I was unromantic because I didn’t understand when they were trying to be sweet and surprise me. They had to be overt and direct to tell me what they were doing. They had no idea I was trying to fight the fear they triggered in me. I didn’t feel safe enough to share what was going on, so I often practiced masking. This is when someone changes their natural personality to fit in during social pressures, abuse or harassment.

The things that help you remember a long ago memory, might be random things. When you’re triggered, it is nearly impossible to control your body’s reaction completely. It could be the smell of cologne, or even orange juice. It could be the sound of heavy footsteps or a messy home. Or maybe it’s an immaculately clean home and the smell of disinfectant. A trigger could be some random object you saw while living through a traumatic experience.

Triggers in the body

Being triggered will make you re-experience the feelings you had the first time you experienced something similar. Your body will remind you of how terrible it was, so you can avoid what happened last time. The trigger can feel worse because if you are aware that it is a trigger, you face the humiliation of knowing how irrational you must appear to others. If you’re triggered, this is about you and your growth. The rest of the world doesn’t matter.

I had a boss that acted very much like my abusers did. I don’t know that he was an abuser. I don’t know if I could comfortably say that, but he acted very much like the abusers in my past, triggering me repeatedly and setting my growth back. It started before he started behaving in a controlling way with me. I was bothered by his homophobic, locker room conversations. As he asserted his authority as my boss, I tried to find my footing and own who I was.

Domestic violence often starts with emotional, verbal and psychological abuse. Most infographics for the cycle of abuse won’t discuss specific abusive acts. The cycle flows from tension building (where verbal abuse is intense), to an abusive incident, whether violent or controlling and hurtful, then onto the honeymoon phase where trauma bonds are strengthened and firmer expectations are established by the abuser. Clearly, there are types of abuse, but they all fit within the cycle of abuse. It’s first and foremost, psychological warfare.

My triggers around emotional abuse.

It starts with coercive control, isolation, gaslighting, intimidation, retaliation, humiliation, and regulation. In the last year, I had experienced all of these things. I stayed because I didn’t realize how bad it was, until I was no longer living in that situation. It had become normal and finding balance in it became a normal part of my existence. I was so used to it, I didn’t realize my survival instincts were kicking in.

I’m well versed in domestic violence, so I have the knowledge and the language to call out my experience. It’s part of my empowered focus in healing. Others might not have noticed. This means I saw things others wouldn’t, and I had the vocabulary to identify the behaviors. Emotional abuse isn’t meant to be overt, even by the people intentionally inflicting it. Most abusers aren’t narcissists (unpopular opinion, but it’s mine). Most abusers aren’t doing it on purpose to abuse their victims. They’re just pushing back to regain control. That’s the point of being a manager, right? Be in control.

Narcissism is a diagnosis, and not everyone fits that bill. Often, it’s learned behaviors that make people step all over someone else’s boundaries. People learn narcissistic behaviors as self preservation, often when their needs aren’t met by a primary care giver in their formative years.

• Coercive Control

  • In relationships, my role as a parter was used to slowly erode independence. I was expected to behave a certain way as a wife and mom. I was told a girlfriend shouldn’t be out on the town late at night.

  • In the office, the natural hierarchy of authority was used to keep me from growing and being promoted. The growth I achieved on my own was stunted and I was shown how insignificant I was.

• Isolation

  • In relationships, I was expected to be home and caring for my kids. I was told I was a different person around friends, and discouraged from being around friends.

  • At work, I was told to keep conversations within the team. I was monitored when I talked to other teams, even socially. I once received an accidental Slack message, detailing my location through the office (kitchen, bathroom, and support) reported back.

• Gaslighting

  • In relationships, I had my concerns and frustrations dismissed as my imagination.

  • In work, I was told my dead end job was “maximized potential,” and was expected to internalize and repeat the spin.

• Intimidation

  • In relationships, walls were punched, and cabinet doors were yanked off as an indirect threat to my safety. It was clear I could make someone angry enough for them to lose (self) control, and this was supposed to be my fault.

  • In work, I tried to talk to HR or other managers. This always resulted in me being pulled into an office to be reprimanded. My social media was brought up as a talking point, when it was never an issue previously within the company.

• Retaliation

  • In relationships, cheating became punishment for an imagined slight (it’s a form of emotional abuse).

  • In work, I tried to tell my team that leaving for vacation would affect other teams. I was dismissed, so I let other teams know I would be out. Other teams then went to my manager. I embarrassed my team because they had no idea what I did. I then had those responsibilities stripped because bringing up what was unknown about my role became an embarrassment to my manager.

• Humiliation

  • In relationship, I was teased for the things I liked or the way I looked. I was insulted for my love of reading.

  • In work, it was having someone made my manager, when I had seniority in our field, and at the company. At the time, I made more than two others on the team, including my new manager.

    • Side note: The Black Lives Matter movement didn’t make me see this for the first time. It made me feel my anger about it was finally an acceptable reaction. Stopping someone’s growth based on appearance is a form of institutionalized racism. But maybe it was just a personality clash.

• Regulation

  • In relationships, I was told how to parent my kids. Through financial abuse, my spending was regulated by being called home when I was gone too long, or having my receipts checked. It was not being allowed a separate bank account.

  • In work, with my new manager, I was told I was expected to be in my seat every day. This was something I was never told in my nearly three years at the company. I was suddenly reprimanded for the tone of the emails I sent company wide, every month for well over a year. I was told I couldn’t let customers know when I planned to be out of office as an FYI to an upcoming vacation.

Work life felt like the start of every single domestic violence situation I had been in. You can learn more about domestic violence gray areas here, and coping with psychological abuse here. It is impossible to ignore the similarities between the emotional abuse I experienced in relationships, compared to what happened over the last year. It makes sense that I was triggered and emotionally battered to the point of seeking out a therapist in December. The space I’ve had since being laid off has allowed me to really unpack what I had been living through and how I had been trying to cope. I’m looking at the spending and drinking I did. I’m looking at how I gained weight and started to hate going to work. I looked at the friendships I formed, and how our common thread was being in a situation we were unhappy in. I’ve come to terms with the idea that I still love the company for all it’s done for me, but I hated my job because I had a terrible boss.

The experience I had at work walked over old relationship triggers, reinforcing the neural pathways that told me I was in danger of being harmed. At first, I’m sure it insulted my manager, but toward the end, I’m also certain he enjoyed making me shrink. Our distaste was mutual.

Neural Pathways

One of the ways our brain is able to do the millions of things we do every day is by creating neural pathways to automate how we react to certain things.

Some things are automatic. Think back to getting burned again. That first painful touch will make you reach back reflexively. At the same time, you’ll continue to reach for hot things, making sure to use a pot holder next time.

Our goals, desires and habits can modify these automatic pathways. Eventually, repeating the same behavior will define a new brain pathway.

Abuse will change the physiology of a person’s brain. This will affect impulse control and self regulation. Parts of the brain will grow and others will shrink. Some really interesting articles can be found here and here. Abuse victims and survivors will learn new ways to live based on trauma survival. (I did mention I’m a Warrior Dragon Slayer. Wrote a whole book and everything.) What is uniquely sinister about childhood abuse is that children will learn how to navigate their world in this way, and be expected to mask their personalities to fit in. A child of abuse will have to intentionally re-learn healthy relationships with a brain structure that is constantly wired for fight or flight.

Let’s dial it back a bit. Think of the nail biter that stops biting their nails. It might take time, but new habits can be formed around what to do with their hands while trying to self soothe through stress.

For a long time, my job was an amazing place of personal growth. I was retraining my brain to expect different outcomes from what I had known my whole life. The last year was reinforcing what I had known previously and it wasn’t a safe place for me anymore. I was triggered constantly, but the behaviors that triggered me were so benign that to the average person, it just looked like I hated my boss. To someone that had never been in a domestic violence situation, it might have been a little toxic and frustrating, but they wouldn’t have reacted the way I did.

Triggers can be retaught. It’s a painful experience, but I’ve done it before. It only happens in safety. I have to know a situation is safe in order to teach my body that I’m safe. I have to push through and I can’t tap out (like I did with that last guy that thought I was pretty.) I also have to pull myself through this. I can’t expect true growth by following someone out of my trauma.