Understanding PTSD Triggers: Finding Hope in Darkness

The trouble with PTSD is how, just when you think you’re on a good path and doing fine, something along the way triggers old emotions, and you find yourself suddenly in a pit with no way out. Panic ensues, and you feel powerless to do anything, stuck with pain and fear swirling around you. The pit is familiar. So many times I have fallen, worked frantically to get out, only to fall again into what feels like the same black hole. Understanding PTSD triggers and finding hope in darkness can free us to pursue a life where we can thrive.

Understanding Triggers

Triggers are an interesting phenomenon. One therapist puts it this way:

It’s important to note that there’s a difference between being uncomfortable or offended and having a true mental health symptom. In general, when a person is “triggered,” they’re being provoked by a stimulus that awakens or worsens the symptoms of a traumatic event or mental health condition. When we experience trauma, our brains tend to store the surrounding sensory stimuli to memory. Then, when we encounter these sensory triggers years later, the brain may reactivate the feelings associated with the trauma. In some cases, we may not even be conscious of why we are afraid or upset. https://psychcentral.com/lib/what-is-a-trigger

The Pit

A few years ago, an unexpected trigger sent sirens off inside me. I somehow landed in the familiar pit, panicked at the emotion that was volcano-ing from my insides. Then the walls of the pit collapsed in on me. Its heaviness made it near impossible to do anything and strangled the happiness out of every piece of my day.

After weeks of fighting, I sat in my pit and cried the pain of so many years ago, mixed with the fear that my life would be swallowed by the ominous dark. The tears dissolved the walls of the pit. Letting the emotion out released me from the pit. I sat exhausted on my life’s path in a muted light that whispered hope.

Finding light in the darkness and disabling the psychological triggers often seems impossible. We try to act like the trauma we’ve endured is no big deal and maybe even not real. This shouldn’t bother us anymore, right? But the emotions threaten to suffocate us even years after the traumatic events. We try to look past the emotions and force our way forward. But the more we deny the emotion, the deeper the pit becomes.

Sometimes we get mad that there are still triggers—monsters of intense emotion waiting around the next corner to trap us. We’re angry that outside forces could tap into such intense, old emotions. It feels like these emotions mean that those who inflicted this severe pain still have power over us. They can still make us cry, scream, and panic. It feels like we don’t have control.

Panic zaps our energy, and even the mounting anger does not give us the energy to fight our way out. Ironically, when we stop fighting against the anguish, anger, and terror, the answers come.

Hope in the Darkness

So what if we quit fighting and banging against the walls of the pit and instead sit and ponder? What can we learn from where we are? What control do we have over what is happening?

The first step is to allow ourselves to feel the emotion that is keeping us trapped. The walls of the trigger-induced pit are made up of intense emotion that we are afraid to feel, made taller by the anger that tries to hide it. Being open and sharing our emotions in a safe place frees us to climb out of the pit and from under the control of our trauma. It uncovers a light in the darkness. Letting the emotion out clears the way for us to see ourselves with more compassion. It frees us to continue forward and build a life where we can thrive.

I don’t know why God does not allow us to be rid of all the boxed-up trauma all at once. But I do know that he knows better than us what we can handle. And the fact that the effects of our trauma don’t disappear as easily as we think they should, does not mean we are weak. It simply means that we are human.

Feeling the emotion increases our capabilities to have meaningful relationships and frees us to have healthy connections with others—a desire that is innate in our beings. When we are real in processing and expressing complex emotions, we are free to use our trials to help others. We can turn the bad into something good. In reliving our own pain, we are reminded that others hurt, too, and that we all need a compassionate listener sometimes. Reaching out to others helps us see beyond our own pain and find light on our journey.

Trapped or Free?

My friend Jodi Orgill Brown was diagnosed with a brain tumor in her early thirties. Everything that might have gone wrong with the surgery to remove it, did. It was a long road to her healing. She still bears the affliction of her trial in the form of partial facial paralysis among other ongoing health problems. But she didn’t wait for all of that to go away before she forged her way forward. She works with her trials and adjusts her life accordingly. Her path has adjusted, but she is still a force for good and inspiration to many. https://www.youtube.com/c/JodiOrgillBrown

There is light in the darkness and disabling PTSD triggers is possible. Accepting and feeling our emotions dissolves the walls so we can see our way forward. What is the light I found in the darkness? That the pain will not destroy us and is not the total of our existence. We are not our trauma.

What keeps us trapped in the pit is the intense fear that letting out all of the emotion will poison the life we are so desperately trying to build. We panic that maybe the happiness and light we experience isn’t real. But believing in the good is what dismantles the power of the pain. The reality is that when the door of a dark of a closet is opened, the light from the adjoining room dissipates the darkness. The dark has no power to overcome the light.

Forward

Life is a process of accepting our pain and even our limitations. It’s okay to not be okay. It’s okay to feel horrible. It will not kill us. Letting the emotion go makes us free. Sometimes the fear and pain simply close our eyes to the light that is woven through our daily experiences. Instead of banging our heads against a wall of denial, accepting the problem opens our eyes to ways forward.

The light in the darkness—the key to disabling emotional triggers —is the truth that the dark is not all there is. It is only a small part of our existence. Finding hope in darkness and understanding PTSD triggers frees us to pursue a life where we can thrive.