drglenndoyle

You are not “stupid.”

You are not “stupid.” 

The fact you are struggling has noting to do with intelligence. Or “character,” for that matter. 

No amount of intelligence or character makes us immune to the impact of trauma. 

But: there are many survivors reading this right now who have been convinced they’re “stupid.” 

They’ve been convinced that if only they were “smarter,” they would suffer less. 

I hate to tell you this, but the absolute smartest people I’ve ever met have been absolutely tortured by their trauma symptoms. 

In fact, trauma conditioning has this way of actually turning our intelligence against us. Nobody overthinks like a trauma survivor who is being used to logic their way out of a jam. 

Especially when our trauma involved abuse or neglect growing up, it’s very easy to believe those things happen dot us because we were “stupid.” 

Growing up, people may have talked to us as if we were “stupid.” 

A primary tool in the arsenal of many mental and emotional abusers is the implication or accusation that we are unintelligent— that if we were only smarter, we should understand that the way they related to us was fine. 

That we would “get the joke.” 

Survivors of narcissistic abuse in particular may have been subjected to constant messaging about how smart we are not— because pathological narcissists actually do believe that everyone with whom they interact is significantly less intelligent than they are. 

Our beliefs about ourselves very often echo what we were told about ourselves most often growing up, and how we were consistently treated growing up. So you can imagine what growing up with a pathological narcissist does to our self-esteem. 

(Many of us, myself included, don’t have to “imagine” that, actually.) 

Even if we wanted to take a stand and declare that we are not, in point of fact, “stupid,” many of us have been conditioned to believe that standing up for ourselves is “arrogant’ or “prideful.” 

Yes, abusers would very much prefer if we just shut up and took their abuse without question or protest, thank you very much. 

For many of us, embracing our intelligence is daunting, because even if we know we may be smarter man average, we’ve been conditioned to doubt and distrust ourselves. 

It is almost impossible to build realistic, sustainable self-esteem when we are constantly doubting and distrusting our own judgment and instincts— and abusers know this. 

Hence why gaslighting is such a common, and effective, tool for them. 

You are not “stupid.” 

I’m repeating it for a reason. Because you are not “stupid.” 

I don’t care what kind of grades you got. 

I don’t care what messages you received from any teacher or parent or peer. 

I don’t even care what any IQ test you’ve ever taken says. 

(Sometime when I’m not publicly ranting about trauma, I’ll tell  y’all the truth about IQ tests. It’s not petty.)

The messaging you received from your bullies and abusers about your lack of intelligence was fake news. It had nothing to do with reality— and everything to do with their desire to make you feel a certain kind of way. 

There are many kinds of intelligence— and as we work our trauma recovery, we reacquaint ourselves with the many ways we are, in fact, f*cking brilliant. 

I will die on the hill of: trauma survivors who have survived the sh*t we’ve survived are very often secret geniuses. 

It’s time to stop denying and disowning our genius. 

It’s time to start making our intelligence work for us— one day at a time. 

drglenndoyle

Trauma recovery means realistic responsibility and radical accountability.

One of my biggest challenges in trauma recovery is not making excuses for following up with trauma recovery tasks and tools I can use— but Trauma Brain tries to convince me I can’t. 

We need to remember that Trauma Brain— the voices of our bullies and abusers we’ve internalized as programming that influences what we think, how we feel, and what we do— always wants us to NOT use our trauma recovery tools. 

Trauma Brain does NOT want us being mindful of how we’re talking to ourselves. 

Trauma Brain does NOT want us being purposeful about what we picture in our mind’s eye. 

Trauma Brain does NOT want us being intentional about how we breathe and use our body. 

At every turn, Trauma Brain will do its best to convince us that there are perfectly valid reasons why we shouldn’t, or shouldn’t have to, use our trauma recovery tools— and I know that one of my biggest vulnerabilities in recovery is just going along with its arguments. 

After all, Trauma Brain makes it easy to go along with it. It frames its arguments in seductive ways. It can be very persuasive. 

What Trauma Brain is not, however, is on the side of our recovery. 

Remember what Trauma Brain actually wants: it wants you miserable, it wants you paralyzed, and ultimately it wants you dead. 

The reason it wants those things is simple: Trauma Brain, again, is the internalized voices and attitudes and beliefs of our bullies and abusers— and THEY want us miserable, paralyzed, and maybe even dead. 

What Trauma Brain does, at least to me, is make it very easy to not use my skills. 

(Yes, my “damn” skills, even.)

It tells me it’s too much hassle to use my skills. 

It tells me my skills won’t make a difference anyway. 

It tells me I’m not worthy of the life I’m supposed to build in recovery in the first place, so it’s kind of laughable that I’d even want or try to use my skills. 

Blah, blah blah. 

So it gives me every opportunity to make excuses for not doing things that are, actually, within my ability to do— because every trauma recovery tool boils down to SOME combination of self-talk, mental focus, and breathing/body awareness. 

I can use all of those tools. Maybe not perfectly, maybe not profoundly— but I can use them.

Unless, that is, I’m letting Trauma Brain talk me into making excuses to NOT use them. 

This is what so many people— most of whom are NOT trauma survivors in recovery— misunderstand about trauma work and recovery: working our recovery is actually the OPPOSITE of making excuses or dodging responsibility. 

Trauma Recovery asks— demands— that we be more accountable and self-responsible than most of us have ever been in our lives. And way, way more accountable and responsible than our bullies and abusers are capable of being on their best day. 

I can make choices tonight, and every night, that support my recovery— but no one else can make those choices for me. 

I can choose to read things and listen to things and watch things that refine my recovery skllst— but no one else can read or listen or watch those things for me. 

I can decide that the worst night in purposeful recovery is better than the “best” night of letting trauma kick my ass— but no one else can make that decision for me. 

Trust me: I’ve tried every single angle imaginable to NOT be responsible or accountable for my behavior. And I’m a relatively smart guy; I can make certain excuses sound real good. For a minute, at least. 

But that sh*t never got me closer to meaningful recovery or a life worth living. 

Mostly it just ruined my relationships and cost me years of my life that I’ll never get back. 

So, now, my daily mantra in trauma recovery is: realistic responsibility and radical accountability. 

I will always be at risk for making excuses— I am, after all, a trauma survivor, and I will always be vulnerable to Trauma Brain— but I take seriously my responsibly to manage that risk. 

It’s not easy. 

But anything worth having, is worth fighting for. 

drglenndoyle

There are no “failures;” there are only results.

A lot of trauma recovery is starting over, and a lot of trauma recovery is reinventing ourselves. 

How many times? As many times as it takes. 

Trauma has this way of trying to convince us that we are limited in the number of times we can try again. 

That might be true in some specific contexts— but, in the grand scheme? We never actually run out of chances to work our recovery. 

That thing, where our trauma conditioning tries to convince us we’re “done” because we’ve “failed” a certain number of times? That’s just our trauma conditioning fishing for a way to discourage us and get us to quit. 

These “failures?” Aren’t even usually failures. Though, I must confess, I’m not an authority on the subject of “failure,” because I don’t actually believe in it. 

To me, there, are no “failures.” There are only results. 

They may not be the results we prefer, or the results we expect, or the results that are consistent with our larger goals— but we always “succeed” in producing a result. 

Trauma Brain, however, very much wants you and me to believe in “failure.” 

It wants us to believe that a bad day is way more than a bad day— it wants us to believe that a bad day is “clearly” indicative of the fact that we’re doing recovery “wrong.” 

Believe me, there are lots of ways to “fail” in trauma recovery— if you believe in that kind of thing. 

We’re gonna have days when our mood sucks. 

We’re gonna have days when our motivation is zero. 

We’re gonna have days when we cry in situations where we’d very much prefer not to cry. 

And, sure, we could process all of those as “failures.” But to me it’s just not that straightforward. 

There are lots of reasons why our mood might suck, or our motivation is zero, or the water works happened to be turned on in inopportune times or places today— and chances are we don’t actually have perfect control over all those reasons. 

But even if we do have some control over some of those reasons, and even if we could have made adjustments to how we managed our feelings or responses, I still don’t consider those “failures.” They’re results. They’re data. 

No more; no less. 

Your milage may vary about all of this. Maybe you really do believe in the concept of “failure.” The question to ask, always, is: “does the belief or way of thinking about this support or chip away at my recovery?” 

Most of the “failures” we think are devastating in trauma recovery are setbacks due to moments of exhaustion or confusion. Many of those setbacks are the result of a specific skill deficit in a specific moment. 

They do not represent a generalized “failure” in recovering from trauma. 

If you’re reading this right now, even if you’re coming off of an experience of “failure”— or, as I would call it, unexpected or unwanted results— you’re still in the game. 

I know this, because you have eyes to read this and a brain to decode it and another day to work your recovery. 

How we explain what happens to us, matters. The language we use matters. The metaphors we use matter. The labels we affix to unexpected or unwanted results, matter. 

If you’re still breathing, there is no “failure” catastrophic enough to disqualify you from starting over and working your recovery today. You don’t even have to wait until tomorrow. You can work your recovery for the rest of today. 

Oh, and one more thing: Trauma Brain is very likely absolutely howling at you as you read this. 

That should be an indication that we’re on to something recovery supporting here. 

Breathe; blink; focus; and do the next right thing. 

drglenndoyle

Recovery is our lifeline, not our burden.

You can think about all this in terms of, “I have to work my trauma recovery every single f*cking day for the rest of my life”— but I wouldn’t recommend it. 

Rather, I would recommend you think in terms of, “every day, for the rest of my life, the tools, skills, and philosophies I’ve developed in my recovery are there for me. I’m not alone in this.” 

Trauma Brain is going to try to get you to think of recovery as something you “have” to do— but which would you would’t choose to do if you didn’t “have” to. 

Here’s the thing: no one “has” to work a trauma recovery. 

We do “have” to somehow deal with what’s happened to us in our life, and we do “have” to somehow manage the feelings, memories, and reactions we’re experiencing. We don’t get a choice about any of that. 

But we do get a choice about whether or not to work a recovery. No one can “make” us. 

The only difference will be whether we’re trying to handle the overwhelming symptoms and struggles of trauma on our own, with no plan or coherent approach— or whether we’re meeting our symptoms with a blueprint, a realistic game plan, and tools for the task that we’re constantly upgrading. 

I know which alternative I prefer. Because for a long time I tried to wing it, and that got me exactly where it got me. 

As long as we think of recovery as a burden, instead of an opportunity, we are going to resent it. 

The truth is, trauma recovery is not a burden. Trauma is a burden. 

Flashbacks are a burden. 

Body memories are a burden. 

Dissociative splitting that interferes with our ability to function and relate is a burden. 

Recovery is nothing or less than a commitment to meeting our symptoms and needs with radical presence, radical compassion, and a realistic acknowledgement that we are, and probably always will be, vulnerable in certain ways. 

You don’t want to go into a fight not having trained, not having scouted out your opponent, and not having devised a game plan for when sh*t goes sideways. 

That’s what trauma recovery is: your training program for the fight that is your life. 

I would not wish traumatic experiences on anyone. If I had my druthers, my job as a trauma specialist wouldn’t exist. I’d be making a living helping people quit smoking or something. 

But: none of us, not you reading this nor me writing this, had the option of trauma not existing, did we? 

None of us asked for this. The very fact that any of us have to think about the words “trauma” or “recovery” is utterly unfair. 

We can’t change that. 

We can’t deny or disown the utter f*cking unfairness of all of this— nor can we deny or disown the reality of it. 

Trauma recovery is about embracing reality, because we have things to do with our life that have nothing to do with trauma. 

We have relationships that we want to deepen. 

We have have careers we want to advance. 

Some of us even have a world to change. 

If we’re going to realistically do any of that, we need a coherent, effective set of tools, skills, and philosophies that guide how we respond to our trauma symptoms. 

That s to say: we need to work a recovery. 

How long will we need to work our trauma recovery? I honestly don’t know. I don’t know if I’m ever going to be able to live my life without learning into a recovery paradigm for my own safety and stability. 

Your mileage may vary. But I’m not sure “how long will have I have to do this” is a particularly useful question. 

Instead, maybe try, “do I need to work my recovery today?”

In my experience, if you need to ask, the answer is very often, “yes.” 

And that’s okay. 

Recovery is not your burden. Recovery is your lifeline. 

Don’t get it twisted. 

drglenndoyle

Recovery isn’t recovery unless it’s realistic & sustainable.

Something that holds many survivors back in trauma recovery is, we can’t imagine a recovery that is consistent with the life we’re living now. 

I know, we’re working a trauma recovery to create a new life, that doesn’t particularly resemble the life we’re living now. 

But in the short term, if we can only envision trauma recovery as something that entails a drastic departure from our current reality, it’s likely going to affect our levels of motivation and belief. 

We’ve been around long enough to know that dramatic leaps rarely happen. They do happen, sometimes— but they tend to be the exception, not the norm. 

We’ve been around long enough to know that tomorrow is probably going to look a lot like today. Much like today looked a lot like yesterday. 

In trauma recovery, we are always swimming upstream against hopelessness and our vulnerability to becoming overwhelmed. Trying to envision our recovery as a whole new life, entirely incompatible with or removed from what we’re living now, makes us especially vulnerable to both. 

This is is why I sound like a broken record when it comes to taking baby steps. 

This is why I sound like a broken record when it comes to focusing on .01% shifts. 

This is why I sound like a broken record when it comes to setting recovery goals so small they feel stupid— goals so small it’d almost be harder NOT to achieve them. 

The truth is, I very much want a dramatically different life for you. That’s the only reason I do this work— because I love watching people completely remake themselves and their lives. 

But I want that transformation to be realistic. I want it to actually happen. I don’t want it to remain a fantasy that sounds awesome and is temporarily motivating— but which evaporates when it’s exposed to the pressures and obligations of our current life. 

Something we know very well in the behavioral sciences is that change that takes us dramatically out of our comfort zone is usually unsustainable without a massive level of support. 

I don’t know about you, but I don’t know many trauma survivors working our recovery who have a “massive level of support” handy. 

So: when I say start small, I’m not just talking about making changes you already have the strength and skill to make, although that’s obviously part of the equation. 

I say start small to avoid freaking out your nervous system. 

(If you’re a survivor working your recovery, chances are your nervous system exists at a baseline level of “freaked out”— we don’t particularly need to add to that with unrealistic expectations of recovery, you know?)

What I want for you in your recovery is to make consistent, manageable changes over time. I want, in six months, you to be able to look back on changes that you’ve made in how you think, feel, and behave, and realize, huh, it’s been six months— I didn’t think I could keep any of that up for six DAYS. 

What we think, feel, and do has a lot to do with neural pathways that have been shaped and conditioned over time. If we try to rip out every neural network we have all at once, our nervous system is going to respond to that feeling of chaos and unfamiliarity by reverting back to and doubling down on its old programming. 

That is to say, trying to make too many changes, too fast, not only won’t serve our trauma recovery— it’ll likely set us back.

Again, I don’t know about you, but I don’t have time to be set back in my trauma recovery. 

So: if you want to make radical changes in how you think, feel, and behave in the long term, I’m gonna ask you to make teeny, tiny, barely noticeable— but very consistent and very purposeful— changes in how you talk to yourself, direct your mental focus, breathe, and use your body day by day. 

This is how we realistically rebuild ourselves and our lives. 

This is how we sustainably recover. 

This is how we actually make it happen. 

drglenndoyle

“Should” & shame make us feel like sh*t.

Your mileage may vary, but I’ve never, ever gotten anywhere useful by telling myself I “shouldn’t” be feeling this way. 

There are lots of things we’re going to feel in trauma and addiction recovery that we would rather not. 

In fairness, there are lots of things we feel long before we start working our trauma or addiction recovery that we’d rather not— hence us choosing to work a recovery at all. 

But even after we get into recovery and start working it day to day, we’re often beset by feelings we just wish didn’t exist. 

Notably, a lot of grief tends to surface in trauma and addiction recovery. 

Trauma and addiction recovery work is, at its core, grief work. 

We grieve opportunities lost, relationships lost, old coping tools lost, old beliefs and illusions lost. 

We don’t productively process or move past anything in trauma or addiction recovery unless and until we’re willing to wrap our head around the grief that we’ve been desperately trying to avoid feeling. 

That said: who on earth actually wants to feel grief? No one. I surely don’t. 

So we do everything we possibly can to avoid feeling that grief. I personally have done backflips upon somersaults upon moonsaults to avoid feeling grief. 

But— if we’re honestly working our recovery, we’re going to feel that grief. We’re going to be asked to reckon with that grief. We’re going to have to make choices about how to meet that grief. 

Lots of us are used to greeting that grief, along with other feelings that surface as e work our recovery (or live our lives, for that matter) with shame. 

Many of us are real good, real practiced, at telling ourselves we “shouldn’t” be feeling a particular way. 


As a rule in recovery, every time your brain tries to “should” at you, it should raise a little bit of a red flag. 

It’s usually a sign that old conditioning is trying to influence our behavior. Trauma Brain is trying to get us to do something or not do something— and it’s trying to short circuit our conscious decision making to make that happen. 

Whenever Trauma or Addict Brain try to “should” at us, they often curiously neglect the “why” part. 

If they do try to tell us “why” we “shouldn’t” feel a thing, it’s usually kind of abstract. “You shouldn’t feel that thing because…well, you just shouldn’t.” 

Sometimes they’ll tell us we “shouldn’t” feel that thing because a “good” person wouldn’t feel that thing. 

Or maybe they tell us a “strong” person wouldn’t feel that thing. 

Or maybe Trauma or Addict Brain try to tell us we don’t have “permission” to feel that thing. 

Let me tell you the truth: you have “permission” to feel whatever the hell you’re feeling. 

(Actually, the real truth is, you don’t NEED anyone’s “permission” to feel anything.) 

We don’t ask for feelings. Feelings do not represent some deep fundamental truth about our “character,” our “goodness” or “badness.” 

Feelings just are. They represent an amalgam of our understanding, our conditioning, our values, and quirks of our neuropsychology. 

If we shame our feelings— these things we didn’t ask for, and which we frequently have difficulty regulating if we’ve been through trauma— we kick our self-esteem in the gut. 

“I shouldn’t be feeling this” is a statement that gets us nowhere. We ARE feeling this. Telling ourselves we “shouldn’t” usually only leads to feeling ashamed and helpless. 

I get it. Nobody wants to feel many of the things we feel int trauma or addiction recovery. 

But watch those “shoulds.” 

Maybe swap them out for, “It’s a complete drag I’m feeling this way, I don’t WANT to feel this way, I HATE that I feel this way;” then maybe follow up with “…but the fact that I feel this way makes sense, somehow, some way, even if I don’t understand it now.” 

Swap out judgment and shame for curiosity and acceptance. 

Yes, easier said than done. 

But that’s true of literally every recovery task and tool. 

You’re up to this. 

drglenndoyle

Rock Bottom and Step One.

This situation is what it is. 

Okay, I know. That sounds obvious. 

But you’d be surprised how often, in trauma and addiction recovery, survivors and addicts in recovery devote all kinds of energy to denying and disowning that this situation is what it is. 

That this situation is exactly what it is.

We don’t like that. We don’t want that. 

We very often believe that if we were to accept that this situation is exactly what it is, we’d somehow be making this situation worse. 

Believe me when I tell you: accepting a situation is exactly what it is will not make it worse— but refusing to accept this situation is exactly what it is will absolutely make it worse. 

I can’t say it often enough: acceptance is not “liking.” 

Acceptance is not “approving” of a situation. 

Saying “I accept this situation is exactly what it is” is not saying, “and there’s nothing I can do about it.” 

It’s true that there’s nothing we can do about the fact that we are where are, right here, right now— but this is just a starting point. 

How are we going to realistically get anywhere if we can’t even acknowledge our starting point? 

When I tell you everybody’s starting point in recovery sucks, I mean it— if it didn’t suck, we wouldn’t be in need of recovery. 

Our starting point— this situation, right here, right now—is very often gnarly. 

It very often includes consequences of decisions we’ve made, which can be really, really tough to accept. 

It also very often includes consequences of “decisions” we made, that weren’t, actually, free “choices”— but rather “decisions” that reflect the kind of pressure we were under and the lack of resources we were experiencing at the time. 

(None of that is an “excuse”— it’s an acknowledgment of reality.)

Why am I spending time writing about this? Because, in my experience, one of the most broadly destructive habits survivors and addicts in recovery— including myself— have is slipping into denial. 

And make no mistake: we live in a culture that absolutely supports denial. 

The internet is full of toxic positivity influences who want us to believe we can “manifest” our way into a better starting point. 

Don’t get me wrong: I agree with those influencers that attitude matters, and is often more or less under our control. 

But I am not a fan of straight up denying sh*t is as f*cked as it is, and we are feeling as sh*tty as we are, and our lack of tools and resources in this moment is exactly what it is. 

In recovery we have a concept called Rock Bottom. I’m sure you’ve heard of it. It’s exactly what it sounds like. 

Accepting that we are at Rock Bottom is entirely necessary in recovery— and one of the hardest things we’ll ever do. 

It’s scary. Rock Bottom can feel hopeless. In fact, Rock Bottom almost always feels hopeless, by definition. 

But we have another saying in recovery, too: that Rock Bottom can become the solid foundation on which we build a lasting recovery. 

That only happens if we accept we are where we are. That this situation, this starting point, is exactly what and where it is. 

There’s a reason why Step One in the Twelve Step tradition is the one focusing on acceptance: because without it, no recovery is possible, let alone realistic. 

This situation is what it is. We’re starting where we’re starting. We have exactly what we have to work with. 

And that’s enough. 

I promise you, that’s enough. 

Rock Bottom sucks— but accepting we’re there is actually the good news. 

Let’s get to building something that’s gonna last. 

drglenndoyle

Cry if you need to. Really.

When we need to cry, we need to cry. 

There’s nothing shameful about it. 

There’s nothing “weak” about it. 

And, believe me when I tell you, if you’re feeling the need to cry, you absolutely “have something to cry about.” 

Lots of us grew up with lots of explicit, negative messages about what crying means. 

We don’t like to cry, for a lot of reasons— chief among them that many of the things that make us cry are sad, upsetting, or otherwise overwhelming. 

But it’s more than that. 

Crying feels to a lot of us like an uncontrollable experience that we don’t understand very well— some kind of hate it. 

Trauma survivors in particular hate things happening to us or inside of us that we cannot control or understand. 

Many of us went for years feeling like we had to hide our emotions to be safe. 

Revealing our emotions often left us vulnerable to people who might use our emotional reactions to manipulate or mock us. 

So, we got really good at “masking,” hiding what we’re feeling or experiencing, often behind an unbothered poker face. 

But crying— crying has a way of cracking the ol’ poker face, doesn’t it? 

Crying is famously one of those physiological reactions that can betray our inner feelings— especially fear or pain— to people around us. 

So— it makes a lot of sense that many trauma survivors absolutely hate that feeling that we’re in danger of breaking into tears. 

For some of us, getting tearful represents a “failure”— a failure to maintain the illusion that what’s happening to or around us, isn’t affecting us. 

Some of us decided that we weren’t going to cry, ever, because we weren’t going to give our bullies or abusers the satisfaction. 

Make no mistake: crying isn’t some sort of “failure’ or capitulation to our bullies or abusers. 

Keeping ourselves from crying isn’t particularly “sticking” it to our bullies or abusers. Believe me when I tell you, they couldn’t care less whether we conquer our urge to cry or not. 

Your mileage may vary on whether crying is or isn’t a particular problem for you. No one, including me, can tell you whether it is or isn’t the “right” thing to do to cry. 

What I can tell you, though, is that it’s real important to our trauma and/or addiction recovery that we not shut our “parts” or inner child down in our attempts to avoid crying.

It’s real important we not shame or mock ourselves for wanting to cry. 

It’s real important we not reinforce our bullies’ or abusers’ narrative that we “don’t have anything to cry about.” 

(Many of us remember, with chilling clarity, the declaration, “Stop it, or I’ll give you something to cry about.”) 

It’s real important, in sum, that we meet our need to cry the same way we meet any and all of our emotional and physical reactions in recovery: with compassion, with patience, with radical acceptance. 

I know. Crying is very often no fun. (Yes, I know, there are such things as tears of joy and tears of laughter— but you know that’s not what I’m talking about in this blog.)

But the essence of recovery is meeting our “no fun” moments with compassion, patience, and acceptance. 

Even if we don’t feel like it. 

Especially then, actually. 

drglenndoyle

What emotional regulation in recovery is & isn’t.

When we talk about “emotional regulation,” we’re not talking about tamping down our feelings so we barely feel anything. 

I don’t know about you, but I’m a particularly emotional person— and I’ve come to understand that’s a feature, not a glitch. 

I wouldn’t be who I am, without my highly sensitive nature— and I’ve come to believe that my ability to help and support people, as imperfect as that ability may be, is due to that highly sensitive nature. 

Does it cause me pain? Sure, sometimes. Does it cause me inconvenience? Sure, maybe more than sometimes. 

But what we need to understand when we talk about emotional regulation is that it’s not about making us “less emotional.” 

Our emotions represent important facets of who we are and what we’re all about. 

Attempts to deny or disown our emotions necessarily end up being attempts to deny and disown who we are— and that’s literally the opposite of what we’re trying to do here in trauma and addiction recovery. 

What emotional regulation actually is, is understanding our emotions and being on good enough terms with them that we don’t experience them as overwhelming, threatening, or “bad.” 

Just like the essence of trauma and addiction recovery is forging a new, honest, compassionate, communicative, cooperative relationship with our self, the essence of emotional regulation is getting on speaking terms with our emotional self. 

That’s not easy, when we’ve been shamed or punished for being “sensitive” or “emotional” growing up— which an overwhelming number of people are, whether or not they grew up in environments most of us would call “abusive” or “neglectful.” 


We live in a culture that celebrates and glamorizes emotionality on the one hand— but then turns around and demonizes and shames it on the other. 

Almost all of our catchiest pop music is about emotion— yet when we hear about the tumultuous love life of our favorite pop star, many of us roll our eyes at the “drama.” 

Yeah. We got lots of mixed signals about emotions from the very beginning, don’t we? 

Most of the great art and literature we’re ever exposed to is about dissecting and experiencing emotions— yet when we have reactions to that art and literature, we often feel silly. 

I’ll be the first to admit, I cry at movies. I cry at some songs. And, if you’re like me, and you do that too, you probably experienced what I experienced for a long time: a pervasive feeling that we need to shut that reaction down. That crying at popular art was a mark of immaturity, or lack of self-control. 

My ass, it is. 

Learning to regulate our emotions most often boils down to the three tools that, as far as I’m concerned, make up the nuts and bolts of trauma recovery: self talk, visualization and focus, and breathing and body language. 

How our nervous and endocrine systems understand and process emotions depends on how we use and integrate those three tools. 

But it’s real important we not try to use those tools to completely shut down our emotional core. 

We need that emotional core. 

One of the reason we need to regulate it is BECAUSE we need it. 

We NEED access to those emotions, because those emotions are who we are and what we’re all about. 

If we try to deny and disown our emotions in the name of “emotional regulation,” those emotions don’t just go away— very often they get split off into “parts” of us, where they remain until the burden of keeping those emotions out of consciousness becomes too great. 

That’s when “the body starts keeping the score,” to coin a phrase. 

If we don’t want the body keeping the score— which we don’t— we need to be on good terms with our emotions. Speaking terms. Compassionate, understanding terms. Cooperative terms. 

We start that process by listening to how we talk to and about our feelings; paying attention to what we visualize and focus on when we’re experiencing feelings; and paying to where and how our feelings intersect with and are shaped by our body language and breathing. 

Lots of us survivors make emotional regulation and lot harder than it needs to be— and that’s not our fault, given how we were conditioned to think about and respond to strong feeling states. 

But it doesn’t have to be that way. 

None of this has to be that way. 

We can start repairing our relationship with our emotional core and body today.

Maybe start with breathing. 

Blinking. 

Maybe focusing inward— with compassion and patience. 

Try it out for a few minutes after you’re done reading this. It’s free, you’ve got nothing to lose. 

drglenndoyle

Bullying can be a complex traumatic stressor.

Bullying, in childhood and adulthood, is one of the most common complex traumatic stressors humans endure. 

Complex trauma is trauma that endures over time; that is functionally inescapable; and that entwines around our important relationships. Bullying very often checks all three of these boxes. 

Childhood bullying in particular can leave deep wounds, insofar as children are usually schooled within the same cohort year after year. If a kid is identified as a target for bullying, they’re very often bullied year, after year, after year. 

Children who become frequent targets of bullying often become isolated at school, insofar as other children don’t want to also become targets of bullying by associating with them. 

Children most often don’t get a choice whether to continue attending school with their cohort, making the situation functionally inescapable. 

Adults frequently assure children that, if they’re being bullied, they can reach out to teachers or other adults for help— but adults cannot supervise children 100% of the time at school, and reaching out for help can actually make bullying worse for kids when adults aren’t around. 

In addition, kids who are being bullied at school often aren’t getting a lot of support at home, either— they may be reluctant to tell their parents what is going on, and even if they do, parents are limited in what they can do to support their child at school. 

As a result, bullying is very often a traumatic stressor that a kid endures functionally alone— very often for years. 

Our culture often sends mixed signals about how seriously it takes childhood bullying. 

On the one hand, anti-bullying campaigns are an easy way for educators and other adults to virtue signal about how seriously they take kids’ health and happiness. 

On the other hand, how many times have we been told versions of “kids will be kids?” 

Or “everybody gets a little bullied, it builds character?” 

Or “that was so long ago, people should be able to get over common things that happen in childhood?” 

That last one— “it happened so long ago”— has always really, really annoyed me. 

If we sustain an injury a long time ago, but the injury never gets appropriate treatment, then all the time that’s passed since is actually a reason the injury HASN’T healed— or has gotten worse. If you walk around for years on a broken leg that was never appropriately set and rested at the time it was broken, it’ll get worse, not better, with time. 

Anyway: it is my belief that many people are walking around with complex post traumatic symptomatology that began or was exacerbated by childhood bullying— but they very often do not have the support or resources to recognize what’s happening or what they can do about it. 

Our culture has an absolutely toxic relationship with the concept of bullying. 

Plenty of people pay lip service to bullying being “bad”— but then they get all coy and philosophical about what behavior actually constitutes “bullying.” 

It’s my experience that if we have to ask whether a behavior is “actually” bullying or not, almost always, it is— and almost always, someone is trying to play the “devil’s advocate,” because, well, they kind of like bullying. 

And although the patterns of bullying are very often laid down in childhood, bullying of adults by other adults can also be a complex traumatic stressor— one which many adults are loath to address, because we have this belief that “bullying,” like ADHD, isn’t a problem that persists beyond childhood. 

My ass, it doesn’t. 

I recommend anyone in recovery from complex trauma to look at situations in their life when they’ve been subjected to bullying behavior. Don’t ignore it or minimize it just because the culture sends mixed signals about it. 

We may not love the fact that we were vulnerable to or impacted by bullying— but trauma recovery is about getting real and honest about what hurt us and how it hurt us.

We don’t have time for denial in this “recovery” thing. We have a life to get back to.