BLOG

There is something very intimate about being touched when you are vulnerable. A hand on the shoulder can communicate reassurance without a single word. An embrace can make someone feel held when language has become difficult. Even the briefest contact can sometimes bring a person back into their body after years of feeling disconnected from it. But the same gesture can have an entirely different effect. For someone who has experienced trauma, touch can bring up sensations tha

A little while ago, I finished what I thought had been a fairly quiet day. I had worked from home, answered a handful of emails, read a few articles and spoken to a couple of clients online. Nothing particularly stressful had happened. There were no difficult conversations, no looming deadlines and no unexpected crises. By early evening, I should have felt reasonably settled. Instead, I felt oddly restless and tired at the same time. I remember walking into the garden because

The other day I was standing in the supermarket trying to choose between two jars of peanut butter. It should have taken about ten seconds. Instead, I found myself staring blankly at the shelf while my mind jumped between half-finished emails, an upcoming appointment, a conversation from the previous day and whether I had remembered to pay a bill. By the time I reached the checkout, I felt strangely exhausted, despite having done nothing particularly demanding. As I loaded th

I used to think grounding meant calming down. If someone had suggested a grounding exercise to me ten years ago, I would probably have smiled politely and then carried on doing whatever felt more productive. There was always something more important than stopping to notice my breathing or the feeling of my feet on the floor. Besides, I was functioning. Working. Travelling. Looking after other people. From the outside, everything appeared perfectly manageable. My body was tell

A friend of mine once apologised to a waiter three times because the restaurant had brought her the wrong meal. Not complained. Apologised. She laughed while telling me the story, but I could feel the recognition in my own body immediately. That strange reflex of trying to smooth things over before anyone has even become upset. The quick smile. The overly agreeable tone. The subtle tightening in the chest while saying words you do not actually mean. Most people think trauma r

A few years ago, I was standing in the kitchen trying to decide whether to answer an email. That was it. One email. Nothing urgent, nothing particularly difficult. But my body was behaving as though I had been asked to defuse a bomb. My jaw was tight. There was heat moving up my neck. I kept opening the laptop, then walking away from it again. At one point I found myself reaching for a sweet snack, which is apparently one of my nervous system’s preferred avoidance strategies.

As a child I used to wish I didn’t have a body. It was inconvenient as that is where I felt things, and feelings were hard. Growing up I stopped noticing it. I could notice everyone else. Their moods, their needs, whether they were comfortable, uncomfortable, irritated, tired. I could read what mood my mother was in before she uttered a word. As I grew up that turned into being able to read a room within seconds. Useful skill in community work, terrible skill if it comes at t

So many clients can tell the story beautifully. They can explain what had happened, why it had affected them, how it connected to earlier experiences. They understand the patterns. They have insight coming out of their ears, frankly. If healing were based entirely on being articulate, many people would have been finished years earlier. Meanwhile, their bodies are still clenching every time I ask about certain topics. There is a particular exhaustion that comes from understand

Is this you or something like you? The phone is in your hand before your eyes have properly opened. There is a tightness across your chest that you barely register because it has been there so long it feels like weather — just the climate you live in. You move fast from the moment you get up. Coffee, kids, inbox, commute, meetings, lunch at the desk, more meetings, dinner, couch, screen, bed. By the time you stop, you are so wired and so depleted at the same time that sleep d

My friend sent me a link last week with a message that said, 'You need to read this.' I read it. It was convincing, well-written, completely plausible. Then I googled it and found an equally convincing, equally well-written article that said the exact opposite. I sat there for a moment with a strange feeling in my chest — not quite anxious, not quite angry — more like something in me had quietly decided to stop trying. I just felt flat. Done. That flatness is worth paying att