drglenndoyle

You are not your trauma– you’ve been hijacked by your trauma.

We are not ourselves when we’re triggered— we become who we think we need to be to survive. 

Trauma responses are not “choices.” 

It really matters that we understand this— because Trauma Brain, the internalized voice of our bullies and abusers, will effortfully try to get us to believe that us triggered is the “real” us. 

That our behavior when we’re triggered represents “choice.” 

Here’s the thing about that: choices, in order to be true choices, need to be meaningfully free. 

That is: the alternative “choice” needs to be realistic and survivable. 

Does anybody reading this experience triggers and trauma responses as true “choices?”

When we’re tossed into a fight, flight, freeze, fawn, or flop response, we’re doing it— reflexively— because our nervous system truly doesn’t believe the alternative is survivable. 

Trauma responses represent survival instincts, not free “choices.” 

And for that matter: what we think, feel, and do when we’re triggered has virtually nothing to do with our goals and values— you know, those things that make us, us. 

Triggers and trauma responses do not “reveal” our true personality— they obscure it. 

When our nervous system flips parasympathetic to sympathetic dominance, all of our internal resources get shunted toward staying alive— not being our most authentic self. 

So many survivors get so down on ourselves for how we are when we’re triggered. 

The culture around us doesn’t exactly help, either— many of us have plenty of people in our lives who are only too happy to tell us that our trauma defenses actually represent our “real” personality. 

Something I strongly believe about trauma recovery is that it is about rediscovering our authentic self— that our authentic self has been hijacked and/or buried by our trauma patterns, and recovery is essentially a search and rescue operation.

In some cases, recovery is a rebuild-from-the-ground up operation, for that matter. 

But one thing I know for absolute certain is that our triggered “self” is in no way our real self. 

I don’t care how long it’s been: there IS a “you” in there, underneath it all. 

I know it may not feel like it right now, but humor me and start out from that assumption. 

That you are NOT your trauma responses— you’ve been hijacked by trauma responses. Maybe for years or decades. 

Trauma recovery is emotional archeology— and emotional alchemy. 

Breathe; blink; focus. 

drglenndoyle

Regret, amends, and trauma recovery.

You don’t have to love who you were or what you did, in order to forgive yourself. 

I say this as someone who has struggled with enormous regret for years. 

Regret is literally the biggest challenge in my own trauma and addiction recovery. 

I don’t love who I was or patterns of behavior that defined my life for…decades, actually. 

I look back and I cringe. Maybe you can relate. 

In my trauma recovery, I’ve come to understand that some, maybe many, of the situations that I hate thinking about now, weren’t actually my fault or my “choice.” 

But that doesn’t always help, does it? 

I still don’t love who I was or how I responded to those situations. 

I wish I’d have been cooler. 

Smarter. 

More skilled. 

I wish I’d had more integrity, been truer to myself. 

What many people don’t understand about trauma recovery is, it’s not just about what happened to us. 

It’s also about how we responded at the time— and how we respond now to memories and feelings associated with what happened. 

There were times when I was not a nice person. Not a reliable person. Not a person of integrity. 

Yes, I can have some compassion for and extend some grace to who I was then— he was, after all, working with the tools he had at the time. 

But I still don’t love it. 

I get asked a lot about the relationship between self compassion, self forgiveness, and those times when we weren’t our best selves. 

“What if I actually DID hurt someone, even if I was down the rabbit hole of a trauma response that I didn’t choose?” 

Well, what if? 

I actually agree that our trauma wounds don’t, actually, give us a “free pass” to hurt people. 

If we weren’t our best selves, if we behaved destructively, we should own up to that. 

The problem that many of us trauma survivors have with “owing up” to our past behavior, tough, is that we have a tendency, because of our trauma programming, to blow right past “accepting responsibility” and lock right in on “kicking the sh*t out of ourselves.” 

Kicking the sh*t out of ourselves is not useful, necessary, or deserved. 

“Personal responsibility” and “making amends” in the context of trauma recovery is not about self-punishment. 

It IS about accountability— and realistic accountability is about changed behavior. 

We don’t change behavior long term out of shame or punishment. 

As counterintuitive as it might be, self-forgiveness puts us in a much better  position to sustainably change how we think, feel, and behave going forward. 

“Grace over guilt” is not just a catchy slogan. 

It’s a summary of how we practically, realistically approach our role in the train wreck of our past.

Neither you nor I require “forgiveness” for things that happened TO us. 

And both you and I can realistically, self-compassionately take responsibly for how we’ve responded to the things that have happened to us without kicking the sh*t out of ourselves.

With practice, we can do that, anyway.

drglenndoyle

Just “reach out,” oh really?

You’re going to be told to “reach out,” that trauma “only” heals in “safe relationships.” 

I understand why this is said. 

And, I think that dramatically oversimplifies things for many trauma survivors. 

It’s true that safe, stable relationships can help us regulate our nervous system. 

It’s true that safe relationships now can support us in healing the damage done by unsafe relationships in the past. 

But it’s also true that “reaching out” is not simple or easy for many trauma survivors. 

The truth about trauma recovery that many people dislike talking about is, many survivors are STILL not in safe situations. 

Many survivors reading this don’t actually HAVE safe connections they can realistically reach out to today, even if they wanted to. 

The world often treats survivors’ reluctance to “reach out” as a manifestation of their trauma symptoms, and sometimes it is— but very often “reaching out” is just not that straightforward. 

When therapists and others state that “trauma only heals in safe relationships,” that can lead survivors to whom safe relationships are not currently accessible to believe there’s no point in even trying to develop trauma recovery tools. 

The trauma recovery community is not good at supporting survivors who are not in a position to “reach out” or who have legitimate reasons to limit their reliance on other people right now. 

Of course I’d prefer every survivor feel realistically able to reach out— and I’d prefer if safe relationships were realistically available to every survivor reading this. 

And, I know that’s a fantasy. 

We, the trauma recovery community, need to get better at supporting survivors whose healing for whatever reason right now isn’t going to involve many other people. 

If you’re in the position where you simply can’t safely or reliably involve other people in your healing, you need to know you’re not screwed. 

You can still develop recovery tools that help soothe, ground, and regulate your brain, nervous system, endocrine system, and your physical body. 

You can still do trauma processing work— though doing it on your own is obviously going to require you to be realistic about risks, safety, and pacing. 

I want everyone to have safe relationships available to them as a healing tool, including a safe therapy relationship with a competent, trauma informed therapist. That would be my ideal world. 

We do not live in that world. 

So don’t feel bad if “reach out” is advice that makes you despair— or infuriates you. 

Some of us understand it’s not that simple— and that it’s not your fault that it’s not that simple. 

Just do what you can with what you have, today. 

Easy does it. 


Breathe; blink; focus. 

drglenndoyle

“Control” is a bogus concept.

Trauma survivors very often feel “out of control.” 

We know we’re not in control of many of the events of our lives. The events of our lives have demonstrated that to us, again and again. 

But also we very often feel like we have next to zero control over our reactions and feelings. 

It’s true that having endured certain things in our life mean we are particularly vulnerable to overwhelming feelings and behavioral reflexes that are often confusing or even self destructive. 

But thinking in terms of “controlling” those “problems” is only going to make the situation worse. 

“Control” is kind of a bogus concept. 

We don’t, actually, “control” our feelings, even under the best or circumstances. 

We don’t even “control” our behavioral reflexes, even under the best or circumstances. 

If someone important to us is cruel or dismissive toward us, we’re going to feel bad. There’s no “controlling” that.

If we touch a hot stove, we’re going to recoil— and thereafter, we’ll probably recoil from anything that our nervous system suspects MIGHT be a “hot stove.” There’s no “controlling” that. 

CPTSD survivors tend to get way up in our had about all the things we can’t “control”— which, it turns out, is a hell of a lot. Almost everything, in fact. 

Sustainable trauma recovery asks us to surrender our focus on “control”— and instead shift to developing realistic INFLUENCE over what we can. 

The “Serenity Prayer” in the Twelve Step recovery tradition frames it in terms of having the “serenity” to accept the things we can’t change, the “courage” to change the things we can— and the “wisdom” to know the difference. 

There is SO MUCH we can’t control out there, we will drive ourselves absolutely crazy if we persevere on it. 

Trying desperately to have “control” over things we cannot control is an absolute recipe for depression and burnout. And nobody reading this needs to set themselves up for MORE depression and burnout than they’ve already experienced. 

I recommend making the shift in your self talk from a focus on “control,” to a focus on realistic INFLUENCE. 

Don’t ask, “how can I CONTROL my mood;” ask “how can I INFLUENCE my mood 1% today?” 

Instead of asking “how can I CONTROL my trauma responses,” ask, “how can I INFLUENCE my VULNERABILITY to trauma responses by 1% today?” 

Thinking and talking to ourselves in terms of influence, rather than “control,” and adding realistic frames around our self talk (1% today), shift how our nervous system processes and responds to our self talk and expectations. 

It’s the difference between a coach who only says broad, abstract things like “DO WHATEVER IT TAKES TO WIN!” versus the coach who instructs you to “work on improving this specific skill by this specific amount, right now.” 

Our self talk around “control” is often one of our biggest vulnerabilities in trauma recovery, and we often don’t even realize it, simply because it’s so “natural” to think and talk in terms of “control.” 

Realistic trauma recovery is not about “control.” It never was. 

“Control” is really kind of a myth. 

I will bet on the survivor who gets serous about realistically INFLUENCING their patterns every time. 

drglenndoyle

Here’s the thing about exposure treatments for trauma…

If you’re working through your trauma wounds with the help of psychotherapy, there’s a chance you’re going to be told at some point that “exposure” is part of the process. 

For a long time, various exposure-based treatments were a centerpiece of working with PTSD. 

The reason for that is, PTSD was originally thought of as primarily a “disorder” of avoidance: we were hurt or terrified by a thing, so our nervous system got in the habit of avoiding that thing. 

The solution, it was thought, was to teach trauma survivors how to re-engage with the thing they were so hurt by, the thing they learned to avoid. That is to say: to expose them to it. 

To this day, “prolonged exposure” is a centerpiece of the Veterans Administration PTSD treatment protocol. 

Here’s the thing about “exposure” as a tool for working with trauma: it relies, in my opinion, on a very one dimensional view of how trauma impacts survivors. 

And exposure based treatments definitely were not designed with COMPLEX trauma or dissociation in mind— in fact, in my experience “exposure” can make CPTSD or dissociative disorders exponentially worse. 

Yes, it’s true that one of the common symptoms of PTSD is avoidance. 

But the trauma responses associated with CPTSD go much deeper than old-school formulations of PTSD acknowledge. 

Whereas PTSD tends to evoke reactions to what traumatized us, CPTSD tends to f*ck with our thoughts, feelings, and beliefs— about the world, about other people, but most notably, about ourselves. 

One of the most frustrating things ABOUT CPTSD is the fact that many of our trauma responses may not seem to have ANYTHING to do with what traumatized us— which, by the way, we may not even remember, due to how CPTSD tends to “Swiss cheese” our memory. 

You don’t change important beliefs through exposure. 

And if a survivor is dissociative— as almost all CPTSD survivors are, either a little or a lot— exposure based treatments are highly likely to just kick on those dissociative defenses. 

Oh, you may get a “part” out front that can pretend the exposure therapy was a great success. 

But what’s actually happened is, the complex trauma wound has been deepened. 

I’ve told you all that to tell you this: there IS no one-size-fits-all, “gold standard” treatment for trauma, especially CPTSD. 

Your trauma recovery blueprint has to be integrative and individualized. 

And before you proceed with ANY modality of treatment from ANY provider, look it up. Know the assumptions that modality makes, the theory of change that modality embraces— and the risks associated with that modality. 

I want the telltale sign that a trauma survivor has read my blog or page to be the fact that they are HELLA informed about their options and tools.


Even if that annoys some providers. (Sorry, not sorry.)

drglenndoyle

So maybe you’re stuck.

You might be reading this at a time in your life when you feel profoundly stuck. 

That might be more than a “feeling,” actually— you might, in fact, be stuck at this moment. 

Stuck in a job. 

Stuck in a relationship. 

Stuck in some sort of arrangement that is exploitative. Some sort of relationship, personal or professional, in which you are not seen or appreciated. 

Stuck in a position where healing your CPTSD feels improbable or impossible, because in this particular situation you are stressed and trapped and controlled— and you can’t imagine having the safety or support to make headway in your trauma recovery. 

Again, this may be more than a “feeling.” There are absolutely situations in which we can be objectively trapped. “Trapped” isn’t always a state of mind— and it doesn’t only happen to children. 

There are plenty of adults out there who feel trapped— and ashamed that they’re in the situation they’re in. 

If this is you, I need you to know you’re not screwed as far as recovery goes. 

Yes, it is definitely more difficult to recover from CPTSD if you’re in an exploitative relationship of any kind— let alone an abusive one. 

But there are things you can do. 

Much of the work of trauma recovery involves developing psychological strengths and skills, even before we make outward changes in our life— and you can start doing that, even if you’re stuck where you are for now. 

You can start learning about how trauma impacts the nervous and endocrine systems— and how to use the recovery tools of self-talk, mental focus, and physiology to start influencing your nervous and endocrine system responses. 

You can start developing recovery tools (things you can use), skills (things you can do), and philosophies (ways to think and process information) that will serve you when you finally ARE ready to make some external changes. 

There is no question: when we are stuck, trapped, or controlled in any situation, developing recovery tools and resources is more difficult. That’s real. You’re not imagining that. 

But I need you to remember that “difficult” is not “hopeless.” It is not “impossible.” 

If you’re reading this, you’ve likely done lots of difficult things in your life. 

Turning your focus toward developing internal recovery resources— at first, for now— is no different. 

You are not hopeless. You are not a lost cause. 

Start laying the groundwork. 

Every recovery— every escape— started inside someone’s head, as a plan. 

drglenndoyle

Trauma recovery is the ultimate DIY project.

One of the reasons being a trauma survivor in recovery can be exhausting is, we forever have people telling us what we “have” to do to recover. 

What we “should” do to recover. 

What therapy we need to try; what book we need to read; what guru we need to follow. 

Mind you, lots of us survivors are super interested in and motivated to learn about and understand what makes us tick and what we can do to change how we feel and function. Many of us are like sponges, we soak up everything recovery or therapy related we can find. 

But at a certain point almost every survivor has gotten sick to death of being told what their recovery “should” look like. 

The truth is, nobody can tell you what your recovery, specifically, “should” look like. Especially not somebody who doesn’t know you or hasn’t spent a lot of time getting to know what makes you tick. 

Books and therapies and therapists can all have interesting, useful ideas— but nobody who is not you has the “secret sauce” for your recovery. Not comprehensively, not all in one place. 

I’m super glad survivors have found therapies and therapists and other resources that have made a difference for them in their recovery— but my eyeballs begin to twitch when anybody starts talking about a tool with evangelical fervor. 

There IS no one modality or technique that is a perfect fit for EVERY survivor. 

(Anybody who says differently is selling something, to quote “The Princess Bride.”)

Why does this matter? Because many survivors have the experience of trying a lot of therapies, therapists, and other tools that came highly recommended— and those tools not working for them as advertised. 

Understand, that’s normal, for one type of therapy to NOT be the be-all, end-all of trauma recovery— but when you’ve been told over and over and OVER again that, say, DBT or EMDR is “THE” tool that will FINALLY get you out of your rut…well, the impact can be more than a little discouraging. 

You’ve heard me talk all about Trauma Brain, the internalized voices of our bullies and abusers that we play on repeat in our head for decades. One of Trauma Brain’s specialties is convincing us, when a therapy or recovery tool doesn’t do all it was advertised to do, that WE’RE actually “the problem”— and the scope of that “problem” will necessarily extend to ANY tool we try in our recovery journey. 

That is to say: Trauma Brain can get us feeling real hopeless, real fast. And that’s no small thing when we’re teetering on the verge of suicidal ideation or substance relapse, as many trauma survivors are on the daily. 

My point with all this is: there are lots of tools out there that may contribute to your realistic trauma recovery blueprint— and lots of tools that may not. 

I can affirm for you, as someone kind of recognized in the trauma recovery space, that NO tool, philosophy, therapy, therapist, book, or other resource— including the teachings of Dr. Glenn Patrick Doyle, however incoherent those are— is going to be your one stop shop for your trauma recovery specifically. 

Trauma recovery, as far as I’m concerned, is an integrative, dynamic project. 

EVERY tool that works, is one that necessarily needs to be adapted to your needs and injuries and strengths and skills (and budget, for that matter). 

Don’t get discouraged when one tool turns out to be not all that you hoped for. 

Take what’s useful from each thing you try, and add it to the skillset. Maybe it’ll be a big part of the skillset, maybe less so; but remember that your trauma recovery blueprint is the ultimate DIY project. 

And that’s actually the good news. 

Also remember this: anybody who tells you that the reason “their” tool did not work for you was because you “did it wrong,” didn’t sufficiently invest in it, didn’t understand it, or whatever, may be more invested in the tool (or the reputation of the tool, anyway) than you. 

Breathe; blink; focus. 

drglenndoyle

“Everyone is mad at me and everybody hates me.”

Trauma Brain may take time every day to “helpfully” inform you that everybody is mad at you and everybody hates you. 

One of the most common experiences of many trauma survivors is worrying every day— or just feeling certain, every day— that people are mad at us. That people hate us. That people are about to yell at us or turn on us. 

Mind you: someone may very well be mad at you. People do get mad, sometimes for irrational or not terribly understandable reasons, and some peoples’ anger can absolutely be over the top. 

That is to say: Trauma Brain is not necessarily wrong about someone maybe being mad at you. 

What Trauma Brain— what I call the internalized voices of our bullies and abusers, which we unwittingly play on repeat for decades— is distorting, however, is what that might mean. 

First off, we’re usually not in as much “trouble” as Trauma Brain wants us to think we are. 

Even if someone IS mad at us, that doesn’t necessarily equate to being “in trouble” or in danger the way Trauma Brain wants us to believe (which again, doesn’t mean we’re NEVER actually in trouble or in danger due to somebody’s anger— it just  means Trauma Brain is most often distorting things, as it does). 

What’s usually happening when we feel this way is, we’re getting yanked into emotional flashback. 

Emotional flashbacks aren’t quite the same as sensory flashbacks, the traditional yanked-back-in-time experience the world calls “flashbacks.” 

When we’re experiencing an emotional flashback, we’re often aware that we’re in the here-and-now, at least as far as our senses go— but mentally and emotionally, we suddenly feel like we did back there, back then. 

Usually small. Usually dependent. Usually afraid. 

That “in trouble” feeling is real good at evoking emotional flashbacks— making us feel like a kid again, and not in a good way. 

We need to remember, when we’re worried or convinced we’re “in trouble” and about to be yelled at or abandoned, that we may very well be responding from a place of emotional flashback— and we need to manage it with compassion, realism, and patience, not panic. 

Yes, this can absolutely be hard to do. 

But now that you’ve read this, you’re going to have at last a little easier time remembering the next time it happens to you. 

Acknowledge what’s happening, breathe, and turn toward that scared, stuck-in-the-past part of you with compassion and patience. 

Remind yourself that, no matter who may or may not be mad at you now, no matter the “trouble” you may or may not be in now, you will handle it. 

Remind yourself that the days where you had to handle scary situations on your own are over— that the young “parts” of you no longer need to scrap and improvise to survive. 

The “parts” of us that get stuck in emotional flashback need, more than anything, presence and reassurance— not least because they’re used to being shamed, belittled, or ignored. 

Again: I’m not saying that it’s impossible for someone to be mad at you, or for you to be “in trouble” with them. I’ve been in plenty situations where another adult was quite mad at me, and I was definitely “in trouble” with them. 

What I’m saying is that our trauma conditioning will try to spin that into an emergency in our nervous system that it doesn’t have to be. 

(And, not for nothing, in my experience Trauma Brain’s insistence that “everyone” is mad at us is very often exaggerated to the point of qualifying as “bullsh*t.”)

Once again, we’re back to the core of realistic trauma recovery: our relationship with ourselves. Which, for trauma recovery to stick, has to be compassionate, accepting, realistic, and supportive.

A tall order, I know, when we’ve been conditioned by trauma to hate and distrust ourselves. 

That’s why we breathe; blink; focus;  and take all of this one day, one hour, one minute at a time. 

drglenndoyle

Welcome to the sh*t show.

If you haven’t noticed, many moments in trauma recovery are what we sophisticated clinicians call a “sh*t show.” 

We get hit with triggers we didn’t anticipate— or didn’t even know were triggers. 

We have reactions we don’t understand, and we can’t shake out of for hours or days (or longer). 

And then we very often blame ourselves for getting triggered and having reactions— because we’ve been conditioned to believe that everything is our fault, and everything is our responsibility. 

It’s no fun. Anyone who thinks that survivors are out here trying to “opt in” to trauma survivorship because trauma is “trendy” or they want “attention” really doesn’t get how much it sucks to be in this club. 

I wish I could tell you that trauma recovery was a smooth, clockwork like process once you get the hang of it— but it often isn’t. 

Sh*t shows gonna sh*t show— again, as we sophisticated clinicians say. 

The name of the game when we’re down the rabbit hole of the trauma sh*t show is doing what we can, with the tools we have, to be as safe and stable as we can manage in this moment. 

It rarely goes perfectly. It’s rarely cinematic. 

And we trauma survivors can very easily get all up in our head about “failing” in this process, when we don’t apply our recovery tools or coping skills immediately or perfectly. 

Listen to me: f*ck “perfect.” 

This recovery thing is not about “perfection.” Ever. 

It is about getting through, and getting .01% better day by day. 

I know: our trauma conditioning tries to get us doubting and second guessing and hating ourselves with every move. And Trauma Brain’s voice in our head can sound INCREDIBLY convincing. 

But you are not “failing.” 

You are developing. You are learning. 

You and I are works in progress in this whole “recovery” thing. 

Years into my own recovery, I am a work in progress. Me, whose personal and professional identity is wrapped up in recovery— I am still, still, STILL a work in progress, muddling though one day at a time. 

It’s okay. 

Recovery is a sh*t show for everyone, not just you. 

You just work it one day at a time. 

You just pay attention to you self talk, your mental focus, and your physiology. 

You just focus on asking Recovery Supporting Questions and developing Recovery Supporting Rituals. 

You just breathe, blink, and focus. 

The sh*t show’s gonna sh*t show. 

But you just do the next right thing. 

drglenndoyle

Trauma and that knee jerk “are you criticizing me?” thing.

A super common, frequently misunderstood complex trauma symptom is, we survivors find it super easy to feel criticized. 

It’s this nifty trick Trauma Brain plays, where it takes objectively neutral statements, and tries to tell us that we personally are being attacked or criticized.

Then it tells us we need to haul out our “fight” response, because the best defense is a good offense, right? 

Mind you, we come by this habit honestly. 

Many of us, like me, were raised by emotionally abusive narcissists, who never tired of finding was, subtle and not so subtle, to criticize us. 

It makes a lot of sense that we’d develop the habit of inferring shade, even when no shade (or any intentionality at all) is present. 

Want to know how “crazy” this can all feel? Trauma Brain gets me defensive when YouTube videos have provocative titles. “What, you think you know me, online platform that has zero stake in my behavior other than me clicking on the next video? Well, f*ck you!” 

What’s happening when we sniff out “criticism” is, we’re being nudged (or plunged) into emotional flashback. 

It’s that “in trouble” trigger that’s the fulcrum. 

Many of us were raised with such shaky or nonexistent self-esteem, that we instinctively understand criticism— real or imagined— as the “obvious” precursor to abandonment or punishment. 

Again: we don’t make this up for the hell of it. This reflects what we were raised with and in. 

That is to say: we may feel “crazy”— emotional flashbacks are incredible at making us feel that way— but we’re not. 

We’re actually responding the way injured, scared kids might respond. 

Which is what we are on the inside, when emotional flashbacks  occur. 

Soothing ourselves when the “in trouble” trigger gets tripped draws upon the basic trauma recovery tools we spend every day developing: self-talk, mental focus, and breathing/physiology. Creating safety on the inside of our head and heart with how we talk to ourselves, how we direct our attention, and how we breathe and otherwise use our body. 

You are not the first, last, or only trauma survivor to feel blindsided by “criticism” that, upon examination, may not actually be criticism (or even have all that much to do with you at all). 

You are not “crazy.” 

You are injured. 

And shame does not heal injuries. Compassionate care and time do.