Triggers are something that reminds you of your trauma and causes you to feel the emotions you felt at the time of your trauma. This is called an emotional flashback.
Triggers can be a person, place, thing, event, smell, taste, sound, feeling, the look on a person’s face, the way a person expresses themselves, etc.
Our triggers are particular to each of us and what happened to us when we were traumatized.
Before we realize what is happening to us, some of us will conclude that we need to stay away from all people, and that we need to stay home to feel safe, because it can feel like we are constantly triggered, and that everybody and everything triggers us.
This could be true for many survivors, as all people can seem scary when you are triggered, and it may actually feel like it is not safe to leave the house.
When we become more aware of what particular things are triggering us, we can begin to be around more people and we can leave the house more. At least this is what I found for myself.
I have realized that not all people trigger me, but only certain people. Like, older women who remind me of my mother. People who make certain facial expressions. People who carry themselves a certain way. People who use certain terms when speaking.
One dead giveaway for me that clues me into the fact that I am triggered and am having an emotional flashback is that I’m am overly emotional. I will notice that the emotional reaction I am having far outweighs the situation. I will also notice that I feel less than, or like I’m a bad person and nobody likes me.
One of the things that I found has helped me become more aware of my triggers is meditation. Meditation has helped me gain an overall awareness about myself, but I believe that if I hadn’t started meditating I wouldn’t have gained the ability to observe myself like I can now, or become more aware of when I am triggered and in an emotional flashback.
Another thing that helped me become more aware of my triggers is journaling about my emotional flashbacks. Journaling helped me to see the commonalities between my triggers, which helped me become aware faster that I am triggered before I get too far down the rabbit hole.
