Healing PTSD and Trauma Through Relationships
Please note: I am not a medical professional. I write only from my personal experience. When seeking treatment or help, refer to a professional. The following can also be triggering, so please take care of yourself and don’t read if you feel triggered and don’t have coping mechanisms.
When you have trauma it can be really hard to relate to others and maintain healthy relationships, especially romantic relationships. Oftentimes, trauma keeps us from opening up fully or being vulnerable. But our connections with others are incredibly important to living happy lives, so it’s vital to learn how to be in relationship while having trauma.
Not every event is perceived the same way by everyone. A certain emotionally-charged event can be considered traumatic by one by not another. However, there are certain universally understood experiences that are definitely traumatic, including, rape, abuse, and assault.
I have endured several traumatic events and suffered tremendously from PTSD. I didn’t feel safe in the world, or sadly, even in my own house. I was constantly on edge and was afraid of getting too close to people. To be honest, I still have episodes where these feelings are elevated, but overall, I have been able to find more balance in my mind and body.
Each new relationship brings a new set of challenges as it takes me time to become comfortable with another person, whether that’s just a friendship or a romantic relationship. However, I’ve learned that over time, trust builds and hope for a better existence is possible.
Trauma, Sex, and Intimacy
Having sex can either be pleasurable or not, depending if you have sexual trauma. As someone who was date raped and sexually assaulted, I find sex to be a complicated event.
Sex is not necessarily intimacy. While the act of sex is incredibly intimate, “intimacy” holds a different weight to it. To have intimacy with someone means sharing a deep part of yourself. It can be seen as the difference between having sex and making love. One is understood to be more intimate.
To be intimate, there needs to be a level of vulnerability. However, when someone has PTSD, being vulnerable often feels like torture. If you don’t feel safe with the other person, the chances are you won’t be able to be truly vulnerable.
Sex without intimacy can actually leave what is called an emotional hangover: a feeling of regret and remorse and a deep ache inside of breaking integrity. After sexual trauma, sex is approached differently. It is weighted differently for those with PTSD than those without.
Casual sex, which is touted to be carefree and fun in our society, can actually lead to the problem of sexual trauma getting worse. Because after a traumatic sexual event happens, there needs to be a safe space. Of course, you can still have casual sex, but the odds of feeling safe is unlikely.
To heal sexual trauma, you need to find a safe space, a safe partner, and the ability to explore whatever comes up, which in my experience is a lot of tears. Having someone who is willing to stop, hold you, and talk you through your PTSD when it arises is invaluable to the healing process.
If you are in a loving relationship, your partner will be able to support you through the difficult emotions that present themselves during intimate moments. And intimacy doesn’t always mean sex. You could be talking or just holding hands and the level of vulnerability might scare you.
PTSD can get triggered for any reason. It’s important to not continue with something that makes you uncomfortable because it won’t allow you to heal, it will only make it worse.
My former partner was so loving and understanding that when I was triggered during sex, he would stop immediately and hold me as I cried. This taught me that I was safe to feel whatever emotion came up and that there was no expectation or obligation when it came to sex.
Other moments of intimacy, such as just laying there and talking about our dreams of the future together became very vulnerable for me. I was slowly allowing myself to let go and feel safe with another person after years of building barriers.
Even though my partner and I are no longer together, I am grateful that I allowed myself to be vulnerable with him. He made me feel safe when dealing with my sexual trauma and gave me space to deal with it in realtime, not just in a therapy session.
Facing the trauma is the only way I have found it to heal. Just like exposure therapy is great to help people work through their irrational fears, getting into intimate relationships and slowly working through trauma can release someone from years of fear. But it’s really important that you find the right person to work with on your PTSD.
Finding a safe relationship
If you’re not ready to delve into a romantic relationship, therapy is a great way to work through PTSD. With a good therapist, you also create a vulnerable relationship that can teach you about safety and boundaries.
I’m a huge proponent of therapy. Once I found a good therapist—and I went through a few bad ones, like truly awful, first—I was able to build a rapport and create a healthy relationship. This was one of my first safe relationships in my life, where I could be completely honest without the fear of being judged.
I’ve had to learn the skills of what it means to be vulnerable in a relationship. It comes down to sharing about yourself in a healthy way, listening to the other person and being present with them, and allowing yourself to be seen in your good and bad.
Ultimately, I’ve learned that relationships take time to build. It’s not safe to be vulnerable with every person you meet, but over time, you’ll learn who are the people of value that are trustworthy. Opening yourself up to unsafe people can be dangerous and will never allow the trauma to heal.
In my experience, trauma heals through our relationships with others and ourselves. It has taken me a decade to work through some trauma and start to finally let it go. Naturally, the PTSD comes back whenever I don’t feel safe, but the episodes are much fewer and farther between, and more importantly, I return to a state of equilibrium quicker.
It has been my relationships that have built a deeper layer of trust. Definitely work in therapy has helped. But most importantly, my relationship with myself and my divinity have worked the greatest wonders in my life.
It wasn’t until I started reading A Course in Miracles and doing the daily lessons that I realized that I am safe in the world. I started to let go of my fears that would keep me up at night or seize me throughout the day. Slowly, I learned not to hold on so tightly to my worst-fear scenarios and to build a deeper trust in myself and Source.
Having some kind of spirituality is enormously helpful in dealing with trauma and finding ways to feel safe in the world. I also have found a great deal of relief in TRE (Trauma Release Exercises) by causing the stuck negative energy from the trauma to move throughout and release from my body.
Deepening my trust in myself has been a journey of overcoming trauma. I blamed myself for years for what happened to me and grew to believe I can’t keep myself safe, and therefore, anywhere I go in the world is unsafe.
Living in a constant and persistent state of fear dampened my ability to live life and I grew tired of it. That is why I created a spiritual practice of meditation, TRE, and developed safe relationships with others and myself.
Getting relief from PTSD
PTSD is not a fun experience. Constantly feeling on edge takes a toll on your mind and body. I still remember sitting in a movie theater, unable to pay attention to the movie because of all the strangers around. Or anytime I’m traveling alone on an overnight flight, I don’t feel safe enough to sleep.
Some of these examples are because of the fact that I’m a woman in a society dripping with toxic masculinity, but others are because I have PTSD from when I was getting off a public bus and had my crotch grabbed by a drunken man. I did nothing in that situation to attract attention, and yet, it still happened.
It took years for me to realize I was blaming myself for that experience, thinking that I had somehow “asked for it,” as they say. I couldn’t understand why someone would do that and so I started to think it had something to do with me personally.
Through therapy, self-help, and the support of loved ones I learned that I was not responsible for that assault. It was not my fault. And so if you’re reading this and have a similar experience or feeling, I say this to you from the bottom of my heart:
It was not your fault.
Accepting this was crucial on my journey, so I hope you find relief in this statement. Embody it, for it will heal you.
And when those moments come that you don’t know how to cope with PTSD, reach out to friends and loved ones who can hold you (either physically or emotionally) through the pain. Trauma cannot be healed alone. But it can be transmuted through love.
