This month's practice is for our friends who are in EMDR therapy and need help practicing their Safe/Calm place more regularly. Safe/calm place is relatively easy to develop for most of us but can be hard to use to its full potential especially if we don’t practice. This month’s video will guide you through a calm place practice and is meant for you to use repeatedly to build those neural pathways for feeling calm.

We are in the thick of winter and a lot of us are experiencing those seasonal affective symptoms like sadness, fatigue, and a lack of motivation. If that describes you, then try out this video. It includes some mindfulness, affirmations, and breathing to help regulate your nervous system. Our brains learn through repetition so repeat this as often as needed during the winter months.

Do you have to spend time with your toxic family or friends this holiday season?  Do you find yourself nervous or upset beforehand?

Then this new regulation video is just for you.  You can use this before, during, or after the event and it will both help you to regulate your nervous system as well as provide some affirmations to help with common issues we see with toxic or abusive family members.

The vagus nerve, also known as the wandering nerve, is the longest and most complex of the twelve cranial nerves. The Vagus is actually the tenth cranial nerve, or cranial nerve x, consists of two nerves, and travels from the brain stem into the stomach and touches all of our other bodily systems.

For those of us who have experienced abuse, our early warning system for danger can go awry causing us to feel guilt, shame, or fear about things that are actually healthy and good for us. This can happen with any abuse but is especially prevalent in folks who experienced child abuse as these misplaced reactions can become ingrained in the patterns and beliefs that make up our personality.

Emotional flashbacks are a terrifying reality for many trauma survivors but with practice can be managed more effectively. Learning to identify when a flashback is occurring, using a flashback script, using mindfulness and cognitive strategies to manage the flashback while its occurring, giving yourself the room to feel your feelings, gaining support, building insight, and being easy on yourself are all key skills to practice.

The more you can focus on what you CAN do, instead of spinning your wheels thinking of what you can’t, the better you’ll be. There’s no way to come out of this pandemic unaffected but we can mitigate any negative symptoms from PTSD and rest in the knowledge that we did the best we knew how.

Generational trauma, like trauma in general, is a hugely under-addressed public health issue that affects almost all of us. The world is a brutal place and was more brutal 100 years ago than it is today. For our ancestors, trauma was just the way of life and this impacted them, their kids, and their grandkids all the way down to us.