Trauma leaves a mark long after an experience has passed. We explored in the previous interview with Dr Mahima Sahi that the effects of a traumatic incident reach beyond the memory of what happened, affecting a person’s sense of self. It raises equally important questions: what does it take to heal from it?
Recovery does not mean putting the past behind us. Psychiatrist Judith Herman, in her influential work Trauma and Recovery, proposed three stages of recovery: establishing safety, remembering what happened, and reconnecting with life and relationships. So healing involves rebuilding a sense of control, stability, and connection to the present. Although similar, the path is never so straightforward for all trauma care patients.
What does the road to recovery look like in a therapy room? How does a psychologist help, and how can caregivers around ensure the same? Answers to this and more from Dr Sahi, whose work involves clinical quality, supervision, and training other therapists in the field of trauma care.
You specialize in trauma work, and for many of us, healing from trauma is lifeline. But what does progress in therapy look like for trauma patients? How does it impact the way someone treats themselves or navigates relationships?
Progress in trauma therapy does not focus on making someone completely unaffected by what happened to them. It works quietly, and progress starts when a person slowly learns to stop organizing their entire life around that incident.
The improvement reflects in smaller everyday actions like saying no without feeling guilty or asking for help without feeling weak.
People are okay with making mistakes and getting comfortable with uncertainty without desperately trying to predict what happens next.
In relationships, progress can look like recognizing that familiarity isn't necessarily safety. It is when a person notices something doesn’t feel right and begins to trust their own judgment again. They learn to stay in a relationship that feels safe while also tolerating the vulnerability that shows up when someone starts caring for them.
And how does it shape up in one’s relationship with oneself, since we also spoke about how it gets impacted?
In recovery, one’s relationship and perception of themselves change slowly too. There is less punishment and shame. The person learns not to measure their worth by their achievements or their usefulness by how much others need them.
Ultimately, trauma therapy is never about erasing the past but rather helping someone reclaim enough safety and agency in the present so that the past no longer gets to make all of their decisions for them.
Understood. So far, we have spoken about what it is to manage trauma. But there’s another side to this - and that is how trauma affects those around you. You may love them with all your heart, but how do we establish strong relationships despite trauma?
The first thing to understand is that you cannot love someone out of their trauma, and this is difficult to accept when you care deeply about someone.
