The Evolution of Trauma Research
The Journey from Trauma Research to Complex Trauma
Understanding trauma research can be compared to finding something large and mysterious in the dark and studying each part of it in depth before exploring another. There have been several pieces of research studied independently before putting everything together with the name, complex trauma.
After observing and following episodes of hysteria in his patients, Paris-based Neurologist, Dr. Jean Martin Charcot (1825-1893), proposed that behaviour connected to complex trauma was not neurological, but rather psychological reactions to past trauma. His patients’ bodies and minds were not only remembering their trauma, but reliving them with physical pain and authentic emotions.
Sigmund Freud (1856-1939) furthered this work and is quoted as referring to memories of trauma acting like a foreign body or virus that enters the body and continues to affect it long after, and can be reactivated years later.
Trauma is not limited to one event
Judith Herman’s research showed that trauma isn’t limited to a single catastrophic event, but rather is the result of a physiological experience or repeated experiences of overwhelm which happens when something happens that is too much, too fast, or too soon, and threatens one’s ability to cope and return to a felt sense of safety. The body can be overwhelmed by even the perception of danger. This will look different for each person.
An example of this is a child in a home where there's domestic violence on an ongoing basis, repeated sexual exploitation, abusive uses of control, and other actions in this vein. This child is not allowed to process their trauma or does know how, and so develops coping behaviours in order to survive. These coping strategies include:
Trust no one
Learn to manipulate others
Always be in control
Never be vulnerable
Stuff all emotions
But these behaviours are maladaptive because once this child becomes an adult, these will cause problems in relationships; the dysregulated feelings, shame, anxiety, fear and childhood wounds are still present. Their sympathetic nervous system and parasympathetic nervous systems will be out of balance because the body still holds fear and anxiety from the past which signals the brain to continue releasing cortisol and adrenaline into the blood. This leads to burn out and all kinds of mental and physical ailments.
As adults, coping may evolve into being constantly distracted /workaholism without realizing that their trauma is still present in their subconscious and is still affecting them even if they don’t consciously think about it.
Many who experience ongoing trauma and overwhelm share mental and physical reactions to someone who is being held captive. This is where the term CPTSD (Complex-Post-Traumatic-Stress-Disorder) originated. CPTSD survivors have complex physical and emotional symptoms that affect more of their life in more ways than just single event trauma. Complex trauma affects people in such a way that they become vulnerable to walking right back into again and again.
Trauma is a subjective, perceptive and physiological response to a person place or a thing
Trauma is embodied, meaning it is stored inside the body (not just the mind). So we cannot simply “think” trauma away with information; rather we need to give attention to our nervous system.
Dr. Besso Van Der Kolk - Shell Shock and PTSD
Shell-shock came to describe the experiences of soldiers during the American Civil War who, after being exposed to exploding shells, would go numb with helplessness and panic; they became irrational and sometimes they couldn’t walk or even speak. This behaviour came to be known as P.T.S.D (post-traumatic-stress-disorder) by Dr. Besso Van Der Kolk, M.D. who began his trauma research while working with veterans from the Vietnam War. His work involves In vivo / Gradual Exposure Therapy where the client is gradually exposed to frightening memories or triggers in order to desensitize them so that they no longer went into shock.
The American Psychological Association now defines P.T.S.D. as any catastrophic stressor outside the range of normal human experiences and abnormal stressors that were thought to be significant enough to cause long-term symptoms that impeded one's ability to live a normal life, such as:
A natural disaster
Rape
Civil War
Vehicular accidents
Torture
Janet Woititz - Adult Children of Alcoholics
Janey Woititz wrote a book called, Adult children of Alcoholics, where she identifies unique characteristics of behaviour in children who grew up in alcoholic homes. Since then, research has shown that these characteristics also appear in those who grew up in homes with violence, sexual abuse, and overall dysfunction (even if alcohol was not present). These children were in constant pain, but didn’t have anyone to help them resolve their pain.
Dr. Vincent Felitti - ACE (Adverse Childhood Experiences) Test
Dr Vincent Felitti worked in an obesity clinic in San Diego. After one of his patients brought up experiencing sexual abuse as a child he began to wonder if childhood abuse was consistent in all his patients. He developed the ACE (adverse childhood experiences) test which was made up of a number of questions that helped identify childhood trauma. His research found that the more questions a client identified with the greater the probability was that they would experience depression, suicidal, thoughts, health issues, addiction issues, and mental health issues as an adult.
Richard Schwartz - Internal Family Systems (IFS)
As Dr Richard Schwarz worked with patients who’d experienced childhood trauma he realized that parts of them were stunted in their growth, while other areas grew up at a natural rate. He found that these clients hated or rejected parts of themselves that were in great pain, while other parts developed to protect the wounded parts. He began the development of Internal Family Systems, which is now a great tool in healing trauma. These are the parts represented in this tool:
Exiles / Inner child: These parts hold emotions, memories, and vulnerabilities from early experiences that were ignored or unresolved
Mangers / Inner Critic: These parts organize and maintain daily life, and work to keep the person safe from harm. They do this by controlling thoughts, feelings, and behaviors.
Protectors / Firefighters: These parts are activated when exiles produce overwhelming emotions. They act impulsively to inhibit those emotions, sometimes through addictive behaviors, self-destructing, or dissociating.
Marsha Linehan - Dialectical Behaviour Therapy (DBT)
In research around the brain Marsha Linehan discovered that when the limbic area of the brain is triggered other parts become totally dysregulated causing emotions to get out of control. She developed tools to help people return to a state of calm mindfulness.
Stephen Porges - Vagus Nerve
The Vagus nerve touches every organ in the body and sends two-way communication between these organs and the brain. It helps regulate heart rate, blood pressure, and respiration. It also plays a role in the "rest and digest" response, which helps the body return to a calm state after a stressful event.
He realized that when someone does not feel safe their Sympathetic Nervous System / top of the Vagus nerve, becomes activated which sends survival alarm signals to the brain demanding a flight or flight response. This can increase heart-rate, release adrenaline into the bloodstream, constrict blood vessels, slow digestion, and other things that push the body into survival mode.
If this doesn’t work, the Dorsal Vagal System below the diaphragm activates a freeze or fawn response that tells the body to conserve energy and lead to feelings of numbness, depression, and hopelessness.
When the body feels safe, the Parasympathetic Nervous System is activated which allows someone to relax, rest, and digest. It is from here that healthy social behaviour and interaction can happen.
Dr. Daniel Kahneman and Dr. Bruce Lipton - The Subconscious Mind
Through neurobiology and various testing they have found that over 90% of decision making throughout the day is controlled by the subconscious mind - it is a powerful force. They found that subconscious programming and templates of people who experienced childhood trauma actually take that person’s thinking in negative or harmful directions - it provides instant safety and survival, but can do damage in the long-run. This is significant information for treating trauma.
Bowlby and Ainsworth - Attachment Theory
We are driven to attach, and we need safe people to attach to from the moment we are born in order to experience healthy development. If we don’t, we will struggle with relationships and coping skills for the rest of our lives. Emotional needs are just as important as physical needs.
DTD (Developmental Trauma Disorder)
A child who experiences chronic or adverse trauma during the developing years of their life will continue to feel the effects the trauma has on them far into their future. This can show up as low self-esteem, difficulty regulating their emotions, impaired social skills, chronic fatigue, habitual self-harm, extreme distrust, verbal or physical aggression, as well as a number of psychiatric disorders.
Fight, flight, freeze, and fawning
Our initial response to trauma happens at a primal subconscious level by engaging the sympathetic nervous system. In a microsecond, the brain releases adrenaline and cortisol to get you to safety: your body will fight or flee (flight) to resolve the problem. These responses are based on a variety of things like environment and genetics but also internal factors like safe or unsafe attachments. This means that two siblings growing up in the same home with the same external environment could react in different ways.
When fight or flight doesn’t work, the parasympathetic nervous system engages by releasing opioids as natural medication into the body which tells your body to shut down. This causes the body to freeze or dissociate and find a safe inner space inside your mind that you can escape to.
Peter Walker says there is a fourth response called fawning, which is essentially people-pleasing and wearing masks in hopes of appeasing dangerous people. The body does this when people who should be protecting you and meeting your needs are the ones who are putting you in danger. The key here is that, like a child being abused by their parents, there is no way to escape trauma.
Cortisol and Adrenaline Release
When someone is in trauma the body releases adrenaline and cortisol so your body has energy to get you to a safe place. But if the body doesn’t use up all the energy by the time you’re safe, it essentially needs to find a different way out. This can show up as trembling / shaking, screaming, moaning, etc.
If someone is in an ongoing dangerous state where their body is continuously releasing cortisol and adrenaline their bodies never complete the trauma cycle and they constantly have energy pumping through their veins. This has adverse effects in all kinds of ways including negatively affecting the immune system and nervous system, causing autoimmune disorders, chronic pain, gastrointestinal disorders, relationship issues, sexual dysfunction, ADHD, anxiety, depression, hypervigilance, and mental disorders.
Dr. Bruce Perry - Bottom up processing
The brain processes information from the bottom up through the brain stem first, then the limbic system, and then finally the cortex. So when the body senses something happen through the five senses, say the sound of car backfiring, the brain stem receives it first and searches for a memory to pair the sound with; if the sound is determined to be safe, the information passes to the limbic brain and finally to the cortex. But if while in the brain stem or limbic brain a memory is linked to the sound of a gunshot or an explosion, the body will react as if there was gunshot or explosion. The information will not make it to the cortex (the adult part of the brain).
Also significant here is that the brainstem and limbic brain do not keep track of time. So when they process anything related to a past memory, the body will interpret the experience as happening in real time.
Dr. Van Der Kolk - Past and present experiences
The nervous system does not keep track of time, so when something is triggered from the past, the body experiences physical sensations and emotions as if they are re-experiencing the painful event. This causes people to become frightened and uncertain when they become triggered.
This is especially hard for those who faced trauma as children because their prefrontal cortex wasn’t developed yet, meaning, their experiences would have been pure emotion.
Bringing It All Together: Understanding the Legacy of Trauma and Pathways to Healing
As we've seen through the groundbreaking work of pioneers like Freud, Van Der Kolk, Felitti, and Porges, trauma is far more than a singular event — it is an embodied experience, one that reshapes both the mind and the body, often in ways that aren't immediately apparent. Whether it manifests as PTSD, CPTSD, or developmental trauma, the impact is not just psychological but deeply physical, influencing our nervous systems, our relationships, and the way we navigate the world.
The history of trauma research reveals not only the complexity of its effects but also the evolution of our understanding. We’ve moved from seeing trauma as a linear, episodic response to an event, to recognizing it as an ongoing, complex interaction of physiological, psychological, and emotional factors. But perhaps one of the most profound insights of all is that trauma, while deeply impactful, is not a permanent sentence. Healing, though nuanced and deeply personal, is possible.
Through frameworks like Internal Family Systems (IFS), Dialectical Behavior Therapy (DBT), and Polyvagal Theory, we now have tools to help individuals reconnect with their bodies, understand their emotional responses, and gradually heal. The most important takeaway here is that trauma does not define a person forever. With the right support, self-awareness, and therapeutic interventions, it is possible to reclaim agency, break free from the patterns of survival learned in childhood, and rewrite one's narrative.
The journey may be long and filled with challenges, but it is also one of immense potential for transformation. By acknowledging the profound, lasting effects of trauma, we make space for compassion — for ourselves and others. Understanding trauma’s history, its deep-seated effects, and the resilience of the human spirit can spark those "aha" moments of awareness, giving us hope and a sense of direction as we navigate the path toward recovery and wholeness.
Additional Resources to Support Your Journey
You don’t have to navigate this path alone. Explore these resources designed to support and empower you:
- ALIGN Courses: Practical, self-paced, trauma-informed tools to help you navigate recovery with clarity and confidence.
- Article: Read “The 12 Essential Needs for Healing from Complex Trauma” for actionable insights into overcoming trauma’s long-lasting effects.
Healing is a journey of self-discovery and empowerment. You don’t have to walk it alone. Let’s take the first step together.