There are times it feels like triggers are everywhere,for instance my partner will say or do something seemingly innocuous but because of past trauma it sets off a reaction in my body; my heart races, I start to shake, sometimes I cry. The feeling that there’s a major emergency takes over and I freeze or run or fight (mostly just freeze).
As an example, I wanted to try one of the meal kits you order online so I placed an order for a three day’s worth of meals for two weeks. When my partner came home from work and I let him know what we were getting for dinners the following couple of weeks. His reaction was just to say that he wished I had talked to him about it first. Pretty reasonable request, n’est-ce pas? Well, my reaction was to cancel the whole order. It was too late to cancel for the first week but I did cancel the second right away. When I told my partner what I did he said that he had wanted to have an actual converstation about it, not to automatically have me cancel the order.
You see, I cancelled the meal kit order so there would not be an argument. I wanted to avoid any kind of conflict at all because conflict was what lead to boyfriends beating me up, or husbands becoming more mentally abusive and gaslighting me. No way did I want even one iota of conflict. It was a trauma response, hypercompliance, I believe it is called.
Hypervigilance is another trauma response and all it takes to trigger me is for a black GMC truck driving by and I have to check it out to make sure it isn’t my ex hubby number two. He doesn’t even live in the same province and has virutally no reason for coming here but my trauma response is to check it out and hide my face. Sometimes it doesn’t even have to be a GMC truck, sometimes it’s just a black truck. You see, he had chased me down the highway for an hour before I could lose him. It was terrifying and pickup trucks became a trigger.
When I am triggered I have to get a grip on reality before my fight or flight response takes over and creates an out of control reaction. Listening to music helps, and I have to check in with the facts. My ex has no reason to come to NS, my partner isn’t trying to start a fight, he just wants to discuss things, those are the facts and I must use them to convince the rest of me there is no emergency and I am safe. My triggers are likely to be with me for life and I have no control over when they will rear their ugly little heads but I sure as fuck can control my reaction to them, slow down and think about what’s really happening.
My Phoenix Rising 