Betrayal trauma is when a person’s trust is broken by the very people or institutions they rely on for their survival or well-being. It’s the kind of trauma that can severely impact the individual’s physical, mental, and emotional state, much to their detriment.
Betrayal trauma can occur within families, neighborhoods and communities, or institutions where a hierarchy of power expressly exists. It can even be among peers. Because of how deep the pain and trauma can be from this kind of trauma, the individual can carry this for many years long after the betrayal was committed.
Until betrayal trauma is addressed, the person can suffer from it in different areas of their lives, without even realizing it. It is very possible for a person to keep finding themselves drawn to the very same circumstance that created the trauma because they only know that it’s familiar, not that it’s harmful and so must be avoided.
Here at Wings of the Future Trauma Coaching and Consulting, we deal with betrayal trauma by working on locating the trauma in the body. With individual therapy, we aim to reprogram the brain in order to heal the trauma deep from within.
Apart from individual therapy, we also offer group sessions, depending on the needs of the patient. We also delve into relationship therapy, especially if the dynamics may be mirroring the original source of trauma, or is somewhat linked to it.
Our goal in handling betrayal trauma is to focus on healing the trauma in the body. It’s important to remove this seed of trauma for the physical memory of the body so that the client can stop making trauma-based decisions.
That’s why it’s important for us to understand the spiritual aspect of trauma. Trauma is not one-dimensional and static. It grows and is dynamic, and can spread deeper into several more layers. The longer it is left untreated, the bigger the damage it can cause.
