Trauma Therapy Goals: What To Expect After Treatment

Trauma can be defined as an emotional response to a devastating event, like a crime, accident, natural disaster, neglect, or abuse. For some people, the effects of a traumatic event can be long-lasting. People may experience flashbacks, unpredictable emotions, or physical symptoms like nausea and headaches. 

Trauma therapy is a type of talk therapy that is primarily designed to help people manage the impact of trauma on their lives. A trauma therapist is typically trained to help people process dangerous, abusive, scary, or life-threatening experiences. There are different types of trauma therapy to help people overcome these challenges, including cognitive behavioral therapy, narrative therapy, and eye movement desensitization and reprocessing.

Types of trauma therapy and their objectives

In the first 48 hours after a traumatic event, interventions usually focus on meeting basic needs, like food, shelter, and water, to provide support and instill a sense of safety. Mental health interventions in this phase typically aim to provide a calm, supportive, and caring environment and lay the foundation for psychological recovery. Beyond the initial trauma response, other interventions are likely to be needed.

PTSD treatment goals usually depend on the person’s treatment plan and the type of treatment they’re seeking. Here are some common approaches to trauma therapy and their primary goals.

Cognitive behavioral therapy

Cognitive behavioral therapy, or CBT, is generally based on the idea that thoughts, emotions, and behaviors are all connected, and that changing one's thoughts can affect their behavior. There are several varieties of CBT, including the following: 

• Cognitive processing therapy (CPT): CPT is a 12-session treatment approach for groups or individuals. It usually combines elements of exposure therapy and CBT. According to the National Center for PTSD, the main goal of CPT is to “identify the patient's stuck points and, through cognitive restructuring, help the patient to arrive at more accurate, balanced interpretations of the event.”
• Exposure therapy: Exposure therapy normally requires people to explore trauma-related emotions, memories, objects, and places. They may experience intense emotions initially, but these should decrease with time as the person becomes less sensitive to the traumatic materials through repeated encounters. This type of therapy usually aims to help people face their fears. It is often considered a front-line treatment for people experiencing flashbacks, intrusive thoughts, avoidance, pain, or fear related to the trauma they’ve experienced. 

Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing

Eye movement desensitization and reprocessing (EMDR) is a widely used treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and trauma. The goal is generally to help the person process the experience that is causing them distress. EMDR can do this by stimulating bilateral brain activity that can affect how the memory of the traumatic experience is stored in the brain. 

Narrative therapy

Narrative therapy is generally based on the idea that the stories we tell ourselves make up our self-perceptions and identities. Some of these stories may be helpful, and others may be less constructive. Narrative therapy typically focuses on helping people rewrite the stories they tell themselves in a more balanced way by reframing and questioning the events of their past.

Post-traumatic growth

The approaches to trauma therapy discussed above may each involve processing trauma in a different way, but they all share a similar overarching goal: to help people process their emotions about the event and mitigate any long-lasting effects of trauma.

The positive changes that can occur in a person during the aftermath of trauma are sometimes referred to as post-traumatic growth (PTG). When people experience PTG, they may develop a new understanding of themselves, their world, and how they relate to others. PTG usually differs from resilience in that it’s not about someone’s ability to bounce back but instead how someone who has difficulty bouncing back manages an event, challenges their core beliefs, manages the psychological struggle, and finds personal growth.

Signs of post-traumatic growth can include an appreciation of life, positive changes in relationships with others, spiritual shifts, and increased personal strength.

Trauma therapy does not always focus directly on post-traumatic growth, as this could be misconstrued as minimizing the trauma and encouraging someone who has experienced trauma to “just move on” from it. Instead, therapists may encourage people to understand that growth after trauma is possible while helping them overcome their emotions related to traumatic events.

How to know if you’re healing

Healing from trauma can take time. Everyone is different, but there are some signs to look for to determine whether you are healing during and after treatment. 

Some of these may include the following:

• You may notice your muscles relax, your breathing slow, and your gut health improve. Trauma can stimulate your body’s fight-or-flight response, which, among other things, can cause muscle tension, GI disturbances, and rapid, shallow breathing. As you begin to heal, your body may realize that it is safe, leading to less muscle tension, relaxed breathing, and improved gut health.
• You may start to sense that you are safe in your body. As you learn to process the trauma, symptoms like hypervigilance and easy startle responses may begin to subside, which can help you feel more at ease in your own skin.
• You may stop experiencing flashbacks, or experiences that lead you to sense that you’re reliving a traumatic event. When you no longer experience flashbacks, it can be a sign that you’re healing from trauma.
• You may no longer go out of your way to avoid triggers. When you learn to place traumatic experiences in the past rather than reliving them in the present, it can lessen the need to avoid triggers. 
• Your sleep may improve. Unresolved trauma can lead to hypervigilance and make it difficult to fully relax, leading to poor sleep quality. As you heal and improve your emotional regulation skills, your brain may begin to realize you are not in danger, allowing you to get more restful sleep.

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Getting help

Getting treatment for posttraumatic stress disorder can help you learn to process traumatic memories and gain coping skills to move forward in your life. If you aren’t sure where to start, talk to your doctor. In some cases, your physician may prescribe anti-anxiety medications, and they will likely recommend talk therapy.

If you’re interested in talking to a mental health professional, consider online treatment. With an online platform like BetterHelp, you can work with a qualified mental health professional from the comfort of your home at a time that works for you. There are more than 30,000 providers on the platform, and you can change therapists at any time until you find the right fit. 

In addition to being flexible and convenient, research has shown that online treatment can effectively treat a range of mental health conditions, including PTSD.