Healing Trauma Triggers
Who forgives all your sins,
Who heals all your diseases;
Who redeems your life from the pit,
Who crowns you [lavishly] with lovingkindness and tender mercy;
Who satisfies your years with good things,
So that your youth is renewed like the [soaring] eagle.
(Psalm 103:3-5)
An Unexpected Trigger
Let’s talk about trauma triggers. I experienced something several years ago that, at the time, I didn’t have the self-awareness to identify as a trauma. I knew it was a heart injury, and it devastated my life, but it would be years before I could define it as a trauma. My body even processed it like a trauma. In two months, I lost over forty-five pounds because I could not eat from the stress. It caused me to have nightmares about the situation, not just in that time frame but also in subsequent years.
God did a tremendous healing in my life, and the situation no longer bothers me. It’s been an area that I have been able to minister to others about. However, today something rather disturbing happened. Someone sent me a message that had a very loose connection to the trauma, but it was connected. My body physically responded just like it did so many years ago. I was immediately sick to my stomach, and a flood of unexpected emotions came up. The response surprised me.
Triggers can show up unannounced on any day, and in some of the most minor forms. A smell or a song can transport you back to an event without warning. When they do raise that internal flag inside of us, it will require us to do something.
Process Yourself in His Presence
We are not always able to predict tragedy before it happens to us, but we are responsible for what we do with our healing. That incident today triggered something unresolved in my heart that I didn’t realize was still there. It prompted me to get quiet before God and ask Him to search me and speak to me. What do I do with this? This passage of scripture in Psalms 103 came up in my heart that God heals all of our diseases. Those are not just physical sicknesses but also the things that affect our hearts and minds. That, to me, says if life can send it, God can heal it. No matter what it is, even things like stress and anger.
Trauma can be the result of many things:
- Illness
- Death of a loved one
- Financial loss
- Rape or abuse
- Divorce or a break-up
- Breach in trust
- Job loss or unexpected life transition
- Childhood tragedy
Trauma triggers are a spiritual alarm to let us know that we still have areas that need God’s help and intervention. In my writing, I often share that anger and tears are the thermometers of the soul. So, if you are still crying or angry about it, that’s a place that still needs healing.
I am intentionally being redundant in using the word trauma, because often we can be dismissive of other’s life experiences. What may devastate one person may not impact another. I don’t think we should help people stay victims, but showing grace and compassion to someone else’s journey is the nature of love. Part of healing is being seen and understood.
Times and Seasons
Ecclesiastes 3:1-8 tells us there is a time and a season for everything and this passage specifies a list of things that are traumatic. It’s human nature to stay in the bad seasons too long. Perhaps it’s time to heal, to build up, to laugh, to dance, to embrace, to gain, to sew, to love, and to live in peace.
Christ always leads us to victory! 2 Cor 2:14 (excerpt)
I don’t want to be triggered by my past. I want to be whole and fully experience all that Christ came to give us.
Let’s let trading trauma for healing be the anthem leaving this year and walking into the next. I want my years to be filled with the good things God promised in His Word. So I challenge all of us to let go of anything that would occupy the space in our lives meant for those good things. May we exit this year lighter!
Just sharing my heart tonight.
♥Liz