Understanding Trauma, Complex Trauma, and Interpersonal Trauma: What They Are and How Therapy Can Help
While trauma, complex trauma, and interpersonal trauma may sound similar, each carries distinct nuances. Healing from these experiences requires working with the mind, body and the nervous system, allowing individuals to move from a state of survival to one of safety and connection.
What Is Trauma?
Deb Dana (my greatest teacher!) defines trauma as any experience that overwhelms your capacity to cope and leaves your nervous system in a state of dysregulation. Trauma is not just about the event itself but how your body and nervous system respond to the overwhelming experience. It disrupts your sense of safety and connection, making it difficult to return to a regulated state.
Trauma can stem from singular incidents like accidents or natural disasters or from prolonged stressors, such as abuse or neglect. When the nervous system becomes stuck in survival mode, trauma can lead to conditions like PTSD (Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder). However, not everyone who experiences trauma will develop PTSD.
Common symptoms of PTSD:
Flashbacks or intrusive memories: Reliving the traumatic event, whether through vivid images or overwhelming emotional responses.
Emotional numbness: Feeling disconnected from your emotions or detached from others as a coping mechanism.
Hypervigilance: Being on constant alert, feeling unsafe even in non-threatening situations.
Difficulty concentrating: Trouble focusing, often caused by ongoing stress or a dysregulated nervous system.
Sleep disturbances or nightmares: Difficulty falling or staying asleep due to heightened anxiety or reliving trauma in dreams.
Physical symptoms: Chronic pain, headaches, digestive issues, or muscle tension, often without a clear medical cause.
What Is Complex Trauma?
Complex trauma arises from prolonged exposure to traumatic experiences, especially in childhood, where there’s no opportunity to escape. In cases of complex trauma, the nervous system remains in a state of chronic dysregulation due to repeated relational harm such as abandonment, verbal abuse and neglect. This ongoing exposure disrupts your ability to regulate emotions, feel safe, and maintain healthy relationships.
Complex trauma is often linked to CPTSD (Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder), which includes additional emotional and relational challenges beyond PTSD, such as:
Attachment issues: Difficulty forming secure relationships due to early betrayal or inconsistent caregiving.
Emotional dysregulation: Difficulty managing emotions, often resulting in extreme mood swings or emotional numbness.
Chronic anxiety or depression: Persistent fear, sadness, or hopelessness.
Low self-worth: A deep sense of unworthiness, often feeling undeserving of love or care.
Dissociation: Feeling disconnected from oneself or the world.
Hypervigilance: Constantly being on alert, even in safe situations.
Emotional flashbacks: Reliving intense emotions like fear, shame, or helplessness, without specific memories tied to the event.
Physical symptoms: Ongoing fatigue, gastrointestinal issues, or chronic pain, which may have no identifiable medical cause.
What Is Interpersonal Trauma?
Interpersonal trauma occurs when harm is inflicted within relationships, particularly by someone entrusted with care, such as a parent or partner. Interpersonal trauma deeply affects the nervous system’s ability to feel safe in connection with others, leading to lasting challenges in relationships.
Symptoms of interpersonal trauma often overlap with those of complex trauma, particularly in emotional and relational capacities, such as:
Trust issues: Difficulty trusting others after repeated betrayal by loved ones.
Boundary problems: Struggles with setting healthy boundaries, leading to overextension.
People-pleasing and codependency: Over-prioritizing others’ needs to avoid conflict or abandonment.
Hypervigilance: Remaining on guard in relationships, anticipating harm or betrayal even when none is present.
Emotional flashbacks: Reliving intense emotional distress, triggered by current relationships.
Physical symptoms: Heightened startle response, chronic stress, or muscle tension that may linger after the trauma.
How Can Therapy Help?
Trauma-informed therapy offers a space to explore how trauma has affected your life and relationships while working with your nervous system to restore regulation. Here’s how therapy can help:
Understanding the impact: Trauma-informed therapy helps you identify how trauma manifests in your thoughts, behaviors, and relationships, especially through the lens of your nervous system.
Developing coping strategies: Techniques such as mindfulness, grounding exercises, and emotional regulation can help manage symptoms like anxiety, depression, and hypervigilance by bringing your nervous system back into balance.
Rebuilding trust: Therapy can guide you in rebuilding trust in yourself and others by fostering self-regulation and co-regulation.
Establishing boundaries: Learn to set healthy emotional and physical boundaries, helping your nervous system feel safe in connection with others.
From insight to embodiment: Therapy goes beyond understanding trauma to help you embody the change you seek, turning insights into meaningful action and supporting long-term nervous system regulation.
Other Ways to Support Healing
In addition to therapy, there are several practices that can support your nervous system and aid in trauma recovery:
Mindfulness and meditation: Grounding techniques and present-moment awareness can help you reconnect with your body and regulate your nervous system.
Body-based practices: Yoga, somatic experiencing, and gentle movement can release stored tension and promote nervous system regulation.
Supportive relationships: Trusted relationships or support groups provide non-judgmental support and validation, helping you co-regulate and feel safe.
Creative expression: Art, writing, and other creative outlets offer ways to process emotions that may be hard to verbalize.
Taking the Next Step in Your Healing Journey
Trauma, whether singular, complex, or interpersonal, can deeply affect your life on multiple levels. Understanding how trauma impacts your nervous system is the first step toward healing. Therapy, alongside other healing practices, can help you reclaim a sense of safety, connection, and self-worth by working with your nervous system to restore balance.
Further Reading
For more information on trauma and the role of the nervous system in healing, consider exploring the following work by Deb Dana:
Anchored: How to Befriend Your Nervous System Using Polyvagal Theory by Deb Dana
About the Author
Samantha Grimaldi, MS, LPC, is a licensed therapist and the owner of CoCreate Healing Center in Tinton Falls, NJ. With a focus on trauma recovery, Samantha specializes in working with complex trauma and interpersonal trauma using Polyvagal Theory, Mindful Self-Compassion, and trauma-informed care. Through her practice, she helps clients reconnect with their bodies, regulate their nervous systems, and build emotional resilience. Samantha is passionate about supporting others on their healing journey and providing a safe, collaborative space for growth and transformation.
