Trauma-Informed Counseling in Overland Park: What to Expect
Trauma-informed therapy is an approach to therapy that helps individuals address how traumatic experiences are impacting the way they think, feel, show up in relationships, and relate to themselves. Therapists who offer trauma-informed care are interested in helping clients understand why they’re showing up the way they are and work toward healing from the painful, sometimes debilitating impact of their trauma.
What is Trauma?
Trauma is defined by the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM) as “exposure to actual or threatened death, serious injury, or sexual violence” (American Psychiatric Association, 2022, p. 302). As a trauma-informed therapist, I define these experiences as Big-T traumas because they are significant events that cause individuals to feel powerless and out of control. Examples of these Big-T traumas include being involved in a car accident, surviving a sexual assault, or experiencing a disastrous earthquake.
Outside of these Big-T traumas, however, I also work with Little-t traumas. These traumatic experiences may not be directly life-threatening, but they do exceed individuals’ abilities to cope in a healthy way. Individuals who endure Little-t traumas may not have had the internal or external resources to cope well with painful situations, which contributed to a felt-sense of helplessness. Examples of these Little-t traumas include not knowing how to cope with your parents’ divorce, struggling to deal with a cross-country move in healthy way, or dealing with persistent financial troubles. While these situations don’t inherently threaten an individual’s sense of physical safety, many people face emotional, relational, and mental consequences.
Three Main Trauma Symptoms
In my work with clients, I look for three main symptoms that tell me an individual may be dealing with the impact of a traumatic experience:
Hyperarousal
Intrusion
Dissociation
Hyperarousal typically points to a nervous system that is chronically on high-alert for danger. Individuals dealing with hyperarousal symptoms might find themselves experiencing startled reactions to generally non-threatening stimuli, having difficulty sleeping, feeling restless, and reacting irritably to seemingly small provocations. Their traumatic experiences have impacted their nervous systems to remain in a fight-or-flight state that is always ready to respond to threat.
Intrusion symptoms cause individuals to relive their traumatic experience, which then also contributes to a chronically alert nervous system. Individuals with intrusion symptoms might experience flashbacks about the traumatic event, have recurring dreams related to the event, or experience significant distress when exposed to triggers that remind them of the experience. These intrusion symptoms might lead to intense moments of emotional dysregulation where individuals have difficulty calming down or feel emotionally out of control. This level of dysregulation is caused by a flooded nervous system that feels overwhelmed and helpless.
Dissociation occurs when an individual’s nervous system aims to protect the individual by shutting down and entering a “freeze” state. In this state, individuals might disconnect from both their internal world (thoughts, feelings, memories) and their external world (physical surroundings). Some individuals feel like they are in a dream-like state where everything around them feels hazy, or they might even express feeling like they are watching themselves from outside of their body. Dissociative experiences are the nervous system’s way of protecting individuals from unbearable pain and potential threat.
The Bottom Line
As a trauma-informed therapist, I work with you to establish safety by moving at a pace that feels safe and bearable for you. I aim to empower you to make choices collaboratively with me by explaining what a technique involves and why it can be beneficial. We use moment-to-moment tracking to pay close attention to your nervous system, trusting that your body has a beautiful, intuitive way of communicating to us what you need. At the end of the day, you deserve to pursue healing in a space where you can be seen, safe, and heard. I would be honored to create that space with you. If any of this resonates with you, reach out for a free consultation where we can explore whether we’d be a good fit together and what our journey might look like. You can also book directly through my online portal below:
References:
American Psychiatric Association. (2022). Diagnostic and statistical manual of mental disorders (5th ed., text rev.). https://doi.org/10.1176/appi.books.9780890425787
Yadav G, McNamara S, Gunturu S. Trauma-Informed Therapy. [Updated 2024 Aug 16]. In: StatPearls [Internet]. Treasure Island (FL): StatPearls Publishing; 2026 Jan-. Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK604200/