Trauma

Using WREMS to Handle After-Effects of Trauma
Trauma comes in many forms. Except where you might be attacked by a lion, all trauma has a human cause. Even natural disasters. A tornado is over in moments. A hurricane in hours. Recovery --- suddenly you are up against elements of human responsibility and this can go on and on and on.
But there is a difference between being raped, face to face, a human doing violence to a human and the aftermath of a hurricane where the human violence is indirect and contributes to overwhelming loss of everything, helplessness going on for seemingly forever and stark inequality.

      Let's deal first with human to human direct violence. For example, rape.
      Understand the directions for doing WREMS. Have a clock visible. There is a tendency when working on trauma effects to want to continue no matter what. Keep your session to 90 minutes.
      Have tissues handy.
      Do you want to cuddle a teddy bear? Or have your dog in the room?
      Make sure there is a blanket nearby. Fear makes you cold.
      Begin your eye movements.

Remember, there are three forms of remembering:
      Imaging - slide shots, pictures, smells
      Recall - vivid movies of what happened
      Replaying or re-enactment - actually going through the event

You could experience all three.
Almost always the trauma survivor has one of two responses to the eye movements - instantly going into the most horrific part of the trauma or going NUMB for the entire 90 minutes. Hope for the first.
If you are lucky enough to go directly to the trauma, call up the color to get a correct assessment of the emotion you are experiencing. How dark is the color? Make a note of it. This is important because the more WREMS you do, the lighter the color=emotion becomes.
Some WREMSers insist on going through their trauma memories a little at a time. Not recommended! Would you want to go to the dentist and have him pull a terribly painful molar just a little, then wait a week to pull it a little more? UGH.
Go all the way through the painful memory. Pull that tooth. Keep in mind that you will reach CALM. You will.
Maybe not on the first session. Not uncommonly, trauma has varied effects and, especially if the trauma happened years ago, you've accomodated to the constant pain. You must do WREMS around all these accomodations and that includes covering the influences of people around you. Mom, Dad, husband, wife, children... boss, teacher...
So don't be susprised if you find yourself re-visiting your past traumas again and again even though you've reached CALM on one or another aspect of the event. If you have a bunch of events to deal with, just keep going. Your subconscious mind will organize them as to which to handle first, second, third.

You've reached CALM.
Write your sessions down in your journal and be sure to date them. Why? Because you have done the equivalent of 'de-fragging' your brain and in about a week, there will be what is called a SHIFT. You may not notice the change until someone else points it out.
At 3 months, there will be another SHIFT. This one more pronounced. You may be quite shocked when you realize how differently you are reacting and behaving. How CALM you are. Also --- a warning. Be aware that you may not be afraid of your abuser or you may react with positive anger. If you are in a dangerous situation, get out. Hide your reactions until you are safe.
Almost to the date in a year, you will have a big SHIFT. If there have been hidden traumas that you've avoided working on, expect to be ready for them now.

Emotions change.
Trauma engenders very predictable emotional responses.
Fear comes first. Often the fear is so intense you are in shock. If the shock continues over a long time, as in years of abuse, you may become NUMB. Working through fear is easy. Working through NUMB can take session after session. NUMB is what you used to protect yourself. You won't want to give it up. Keep going. Once you break free of NUMB, you will safely feel again. You want this. NUMB can be deadly to your immune system as it shuts down endorphins and other bio-chemical responses.
Once you've moved your fear response to an excitement response, then you will almost always deal with anger, dark anger which is rage. The equivalent of NUMB in anger is DEPRESSION which is rage suppressed. Anger is a primary emotion and usually very easy and quick to take care of. Then, if you are a woman, you must come to terms with feeling positive anger --- that is, finding out it's okay to be angry. Positive anger is DETERMINATION. You might have to do a whole WREMS session on being positively angry.
Somewhere in the cycle of emotions - and you will experience a cycle of usually three, sometimes four, emotions - will be grief. Remember that grieving is the highest and most enlightening of human, and animal, emotion. Grief is purple - purple is made up of red and blue. Yes, shame and guilt. You'll have to go through the shame and guilt or it can be the lighter side of shame, empathy. Grief can definitely take a bunch of WREMS sessions. Count on it. Once you reach the light purple shade of peace though, all will be well.
The most difficult emotion in your trauma cycle will be guilt. Shame- guilt - conscience - empathy. That is the progression. Nothing is as difficult as working through this primary emotion. Talk about pulling teeth! Even moreso if you are dealing with the darkest of the shame - blue color: survivor guilt. Having survived a trauma where others died and you lived can, on many levels, be more painful than anything else. Why this is so, no one understands. To have watched others die while you live --- well, the only way past this is to do your WREMS. Maybe a bunch of sessions. You will reach peace.

Ongoing trauma.
Recovering from a hurricane means dealing with government officials and complete idiots who seem bound and determined to frustrate your every basic need. What you could easily do for yourself is hindered by the sheer enormity of lack and loss. And FEMA or the Red Cross or whomever simply cannot fill this void completely.... if at all.
Or you are in an abusive marriage and you are on pins and needles until you can reach safety.
Or you've lost your job and no work is on the horizon as far as you or anyone can see.
Handling long term trauma is far more difficult than getting through a one-time or in the past event. Every day is another challenge. Do your WREMS. Reach CALM.
The major emotion will be anger, mostly the frustration part of anger. You will also have to deal with shame and guilt. Society makes us feel very bad about being a victim... as if it's our fault for being in the path of a hurricane! Or your fault for getting beaten or losing your job ... your fellow humans can be uglier than the trauma event.
Do your WREMS. Come to terms. Accept that you'll reach a level of understanding and trust. You will understand that humans behave badly and you trust that each of the humans you must negotiate with has his or her method of dealing with the world. Like: you learn to trust them to the extent of their capability. You become CALM.
And you will learn to deeply appreciate those humans who treat you with respect and love. You accept how precious they are. You can feel gratitude and not do anger towards them.

Walking down the other road.
Once you've done sufficient WREMS work on your trauma, you will find that in the case of direct violence, you become determined to avoid the circumstances which put you into that sphere. The best description of your SHIFT is the poem in the right column on this page.

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DON'T FORGET TO JOURNAL!!!!
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