Complex trauma is about patterns and adaptations.

Complex trauma was trauma we had to adapt to. 

We didn’t WANT to adapt to it— we had to, because it was woven into our everyday life and relationships. 

Traumatic stress was normalized to the point that we didn’t register it as “traumatic,” and we barely even registered it as “stress”— it was just life. 

We had to continue “functioning”— such as it was— so we adapted. But not in the positive sense of that word. 

Adapting to chronic, pervasive traumatic stress rarely involves positive or healthy changes— because environments that produce traumatic stress rarely also include resources and support kids need to change in positive, healthy ways. 

It’s not that we lacked the capability of adapting or changing in positive, healthy ways— it’s that we almost surely lacked the safety and role modeling necessary to do so. 

So— we adapted the way we adapted. 

We dissociated. We self-harmed. We acted out. 

We developed ways of denying and disowning and psychologically distancing ourselves from an existence we couldn’t distance ourselves from physically. 

Why is it important to understand that complex trauma is all about adaptation? 

Because when we’re looking to change our patterns of feeling and functioning, we have to think in terms of reconditioning ourselves— changing patterns that have been reinforced due to their adaptive value once upon a time. 

For most survivors, it’s NOT the case that we’re going to realize something— have an “ah-HA!” moment— and then suddenly our symptoms and struggles will disappear. 

Breakthroughs and other “ah-HA!” moments are cool, and they can be important— but in my experience they are rarely the key to significant changes in how we feel and function. 

For our pattens of trauma-influenced emotion and behavior to sustainably change, we have to think in terms of interrupting old patterns, again and again and again— and replacing them with new patterns that acknowledge or meet the needs our old patterns did. 

This distinction can make the difference between recovery being realistic and sustainable— or not. 

 Asking about the “why” behind our patterns of feeling and functioning can be important— but at least as important is the question of “how.” 

How do we feel what we feel? What actually happens in our head, in our body? What is the sequence? What is the syntax? 

When we do what we habitually do, what is the pattern of thinking, feeling, and behaving that typically occurs? If we had to make an accurate flowchart of how that all worked, could we? 

We may know “why” we feel and do what we do, at least broadly (the broad answer is almost always some version of, “because trauma”)— but changing those patterns requires we get hands on and specific about the sequence of internal events that produce those feelings and behaviors. 

We can’t interrupt a pattern we haven’t thoroughly observed and analyzed. 

Changing how we feel and function requires us to develop understanding and respect for how our patterns of feeling and functioning worked to keep us sane (relatively speaking, anyway) and safe (relatively speaking, anyway) in chronically stressful circumstances over time. 

Those patterns served a purpose, and they had structure. We need to realistically understand both if we want to change them. 

We shouldn’t have HAD to adapt to traumatic stress. 

We should have had the safety and support to develop more positive, less harmful coping tools. 

The fact that we didn’t have that safety and support is not our fault. 

But we no longer have to be at the mercy of support and safety we didn’t have back then.