Traumatic experiences can have a deep and lasting impact on a person. When these overwhelming events occur in childhood, how one experiences themselves, others and the world can be profoundly altered. This is especially the case when a child does not have a safe and reliable adult to offer support and help the traumatized child make sense of what has occurred.
Early attachment wounds can get locked away, frozen in a sense of timelessness that follows the individual into adolescence and adulthood. Some childhood trauma may be long forgotten or seldom thought about, while certain traumatic events may haunt the survivor of abuse on a regular basis. But whether actively reflected upon or not, the unremembered past continues to shape us. Trauma can reside deeply buried within us long after the conscious thoughts about what has occurred have gone dormant.
Our understanding of what happens to a person when they’ve been traumatized centers around the notion of fragmentation. In order to adapt to overwhelming experiences that surpass our self-capacities (for emotional regulation, attaching securely to others, finding and generating meaning in life), the mind becomes fragmented or fractured, like a glass jar that’s dropped and breaks into pieces. With this self-fracturing, these overwhelming experiences don’t always get processed in a beneficial way.
To survive, the mind may split off certain feelings or memories into separate “compartments” (dissociation). This protects the person in the short run, but the lasting impact can make one feel like their self is divided into unconnected parts. One’s subjective experiences can feel disjointed and highly polarized.
Self-coherence is lost by the fracturing effects of trauma. To survive, the mind may split off certain feelings or memories into separate “compartments” (dissociation). This protects the person in the short run, but the lasting impact can make one feel like their self is divided into unconnected parts. One’s subjective experiences can feel disjointed and highly polarized. A clear sense of agency, self-confidence and knowing what one wants can get scrambled. The ability to control emotions and self-regulate is compromised. Some describe identity confusion, not knowing who they are, feeling empty or adrift.
Let’s explore some examples of the ways in which self-fragmentation might manifest.
When words are lost
Roman rarely talked about his childhood. When asked to describe his early experiences, his responses were often clipped, with little information and no clear picture of what his life looked and felt like growing up with an alcoholic father. His father struggled to stay employed and would become unpredictably angry when drinking. Roman’s mother could be nurturing at times, but she was preoccupied with getting her master’s degree (which she would use to get a good-paying job and leave her husband). As a result, Roman was often left alone and isolated in his room to avoid his father’s wrath. But when asked to give more detail about what that was like for him and what he felt, he’d simply say: “It was OK, I guess…other people had it worse.”
Roman struggled to not only discuss the painful events of his childhood, he also couldn’t find the words needed to articulate what he experienced. In the language of trauma therapy, he couldn’t form a coherent narrative about what he suffered through. This goes beyond an avoidance of discussing painful experiences. Research shows that the parts of the brain used for language shut down during overwhelmingly traumatic events. In short, language is lost and must be found during one’s healing journey (van der Kolk, 2014).
Here language and memory are fragmented, an uncoupling that interferes with the processing of long-buried traumatic experiences. An important part of healing and the therapy process is to gain access to the language that allows the survivor to share their hidden experiences with another.
When sensations and emotions are scattered
Amanda described herself as “moody and overly sensitive.” She gave numerous examples of strong emotional reactions, especially when she felt slighted by someone. Her reactions ranged from being quick to anger and losing perspective to periods of self-loathing and difficulty getting out of bed. She would then get caught in cycles of obsessive rumination about how she “ruined another relationship because I can’t get my shit together.” Medication offered some relief, but these patterns continued to persist.
One way of understanding Amanda’s struggles comes from the neuroscience of trauma (Dana, 2018; Porges, 2011). She fluctuated between sympathetic nervous system reactions (fight responses when she felt threatened) and dorsal-vagal shutdown responses (apathy, depression, and withdrawal when she felt hopeless about these uncontrollable patterns).
As she learned to slow down and explore these reactions, she became increasingly aware of feeling trapped or stuck alongside an undercurrent of agitation and restless energy, a state she described as being “frozen in panic.” She would then explode with anger as a way of unfreezing herself from this intolerable state of being.
These two extreme states of being (agitated/restless/angry and shut down/numb) are another example of what has been described as fragmented self-experience. The nuance between these states, the shades of gray, are lost as is the person’s experience of themselves as having a coherent sense of self.
When parts of us take over and we lose control
There seems to be a truism in psychology that the more traumatic experiences one has endured in childhood, the more extreme measures are often needed to manage and defend against the internal fallout from these overwhelming events. This might take the form of chronic avoidance of emotional closeness with others, avoidance of emotions altogether, or even an avoidance of sitting quietly to “chill” at times. Survivors of childhood trauma often describe dissociative experiences, “blanking out,” feeling unreal, dream-like, and disconnected from one’s surroundings or others.
Internal Family Systems (IFS) (Schwartz & Sweezy, 2020) theory describes our psychological defenses as protector parts, the reactions and ways of being that were developed (often unconsciously) to help keep psychic pain at bay. Some of these protector parts might have become extreme in their efforts to keep you feeling safe and not overwhelmed by the thoughts, emotions and sensations tied to painful childhood experiences. However, the more extreme efforts by these parts can be harmful and short-sighted, thereby bringing about emotional and relational side effects that can be problematic.
Let’s look at an example: A condescending boss who treats you as if you’re less-than. On the surface, it’s solely a work interaction, but beneath it, decades-old emotional wounds can be stirred (i.e., the pain of being dismissed or mistreated by a parent or sibling). To keep those overwhelming feelings from breaking through, a protector part may step in, perhaps reaching for food, alcohol, or drugs to numb the pain. Or an angry protector might jump out and verbally attack the boss in a misguided effort to shut down the threat.
When protector parts become extreme in their helping roles, our behaviors can become erratic and, at times, damaging in the efforts to manage our emotional turmoil.
When protector parts become extreme in their helping roles, our behaviors can become erratic and, at times, damaging in the efforts to manage our emotional turmoil. The fragmented experiences might vacillate between being overly-controlled emotionally to explosive, then shame-filled for the damage caused by the anger or acting-out behavior.
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In the above examples, the impact of trauma can be seen in the emotional and behavioral extremes that can become pervasive for the adult survivor of childhood abuse. Due to the fragmenting impact of childhood trauma, how one experiences themselves (the unique sense of “I” or “this is who I am”) may feel confusing, too often shifting or not “solid.” You might feel indecisive and emotionally “all over the place”. . .not embodied and grounded within yourself. These self-oscillations can be understood through the activity of a traumatized, overwhelmed nervous system or through the lens of over-active, hard-working protector parts being deployed to keep you emotionally safe.
Fragmentation runs on a continuum. Under certain conditions, you might feel out of control of your thoughts, emotions and impulses, while in other contexts you might feel a greater sense of agency. Self-control, however, doesn’t always equate to feeling more emotionally centered.
Protector parts can use a variety of methods to sequester painful memories by having you over-function in particular ways — for instance, by over-working, existing in the role of heightened caretaker of others, or engaging in obsessive routines/rituals that prevent an emotional free-fall. Dissociative compartmentalization can also give greater emotional control, although it often leads to other forms of out-of-control behaviors (such as infidelity and destructive secrecy).
When the traumas of our past are examined and worked through, our psychological defenses (protector parts, over-active nervous system, dissociative experiences) no longer have to work so hard to internally organize our inner world. When psychological efforts designed to manage the shame, pain and terror of the past are not required to be active on a full-time basis, what follows is greater self-integration: deeper clarity about who you are and what’s important to you in your life as a whole.
When fragmentation gives way to integration, you begin to experience yourself differently. Words like coherence and wholeness are often used to describe these inner shifts. This doesn’t mean that the pain disappears; rather, the internal energies once devoted to prioritizing safety and banishing the shame and pain of the traumatic past are now freed up. That vitality can be reallocated to pursuits that bring meaning and fulfillment.
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Rich Nicastro, PhD, is a clinical psychologist with over 25 years of experience supporting individuals and couples as they navigate betrayal trauma and other emotional challenges. He offers teletherapy to clients throughout the United States. To work with Dr. Nicastro and join his waiting list, please email him at Rich@RichardNicastro.com.
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Article References
Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. New York: Norton.
Dana, D. (2018). The polyvagal theory in therapy: Engaging the rhythm of regulation. New York: Norton.
Schwartz, R. C., & Sweezy, M. (2020). Internal Family Systems Therapy (2nd ed.). New York: Guilford Press.
