What are the Signs of Repressed Trauma

Whether you're aware of it or not, childhood trauma can have lingering effects on your physical and mental health. Your brain can automatically repress traumatic memories to protect you from repeatedly getting harmed by them. 

This is a coping mechanism that allows you to move past the traumatic experience and carry on with your life. Repressed memories are also called dissociative amnesia, and it can cause people to have gaps in their memory that could be years long.

Although repressed trauma helps you move past the traumatic experience, it can have serious consequences to your physical and mental health. When trauma is repressed, the damaging memories are stored without being properly addressed. 

Let’s take a closer look at the signs of repressed trauma to discover the impact it has on the mind and body.

Suppression vs Repression

The two main ways that traumatic memories can be stored is through suppression and repression. Each psychological process is unique in how trauma is managed and the effect it has on an individual. 

Suppression

Suppression is the conscious effort to ignore or push away negative thoughts and emotions. When traumatic memories are suppressed, someone actively chooses not to dwell on them. It’s a form of avoidance coping. This psychological process can be used to minimize the impact of trauma and maintain emotional composure.

Although suppressing traumatic thoughts can provide quick relief, it’s only temporary. In some cases, suppression can be a beneficial tactic to temporarily avoid trauma until you are in an appropriate setting to process it. However, trauma that is continually suppressed will lead to emotional bottling and may cause emotional outbursts. 

Repression

Repression occurs when the unconscious mind blocks traumatic memories from entering into your awareness. This is an automatic defense mechanism that prevents further psychological and emotional harm from a traumatic experience. With repression, your mind prevents harmful memories from becoming active thoughts. 

It’s common for someone to be unaware of repressed memories and emotions. Unlike suppression, it doesn’t require any conscious effort to repress memories. While repressed trauma may not actively cause distressing thoughts, it can still have a negative impact on someone’s mental and physical health. In order to resurface and process repressed trauma, it often requires the help from a mental health professional. 

Read our related article to help determine if you could benefit from trauma therapy. 

Signs of Repressed Trauma in Adults

In most cases, it’s impossible for a child to prevent traumatic experiences from occurring. And, unfortunately, children often don’t have the ability to properly process trauma or cope with it in a beneficial way. This ultimately leads to dissociation tactics and trauma repression. It’s common for repressed trauma to resurface later in life as physical ailments, mental health conditions, and interpersonal issues. 

Physical Signs of Repressed Trauma

The long-term physical effects of trauma on the body is called somatic memory. Somatic memory can cause persistent feelings of uneasiness, discomfort, and even pain. Some of the most common manifestations of somatic memory include:

• Digestive issues 
• Nausea 
• Poor posture
• Chronic pain
• Persistent fatigue

In addition to the manifestations of somatic memories, repressed trauma can lead to other chronic illnesses. Victims of trauma are more likely to develop diabetes, heart conditions, and autoimmune disorders. 

Fortunately, somatic memories can be relieved through a specialized therapy called somatic experiencing therapy. This type of therapy uses physical stimuli while someone addresses their traumatic experience. Somatic experiencing helps someone mentally and physically reprocess their trauma in healthier ways. 

Mental Signs of Repressed Trauma

Memory issues are one of the most common signs of repressed trauma. This can lead to long gaps in someone’s memory where they can’t recall events that occurred around the same time as a traumatic event. 

False memories are also common with repressed trauma. This can be the brain’s way of filling in the gaps of missing memories. Memory issues are often caused by the dissociation that occurred during childhood trauma.

In addition to memory issues, repressed trauma can cause someone to develop unhealthy ways of thinking. These negative thought patterns can lead to mental health issues like:

• Low self-esteem
• Depression
• Chronic stress and anxiety
• Mood swings
• Lack of concentration
• Substance addictions

Repressed trauma can also cause someone to develop unhealthy reactions to situations that may remind them of their traumatic experience. Dissociative episodes and avoidant behaviors are common reactions to preventing the stress of someone’s trauma.

Interpersonal Signs of Repressed Trauma

Someone with repressed trauma may also have difficulty with forming healthy relationships. Black and white thinking is common in trauma victims, which causes them to make irrational judgements on whether someone is only good or only bad. This can lead to major trust issues, causing a traumatized person to push away close friends, family members, and partners. 

Inversely, repressed trauma can cause someone to form unhealthy attachments to abusive individuals. These abusive individuals may remind them of the person that caused their trauma. This is often an unconscious form of revictimization. Revictimization causes trauma victims to unknowingly seek out people and situations that are similar to their traumatic experience.

Read our related article on attachment trauma for an in-depth look at how trauma can lead to unhealthy attachments and relationships.

How to Heal From Repressed Trauma

To properly heal from your repressed trauma, you need to bring the trauma to the surface and reprocess it with healthy coping mechanisms. This is an extremely difficult process that can be made much easier with the help from an experienced mental health professional. Trauma therapy provides a safe place for you to work through your trauma while you learn healthy methods of reprocessing it.

At Sequoia Behavioral Health, our professional therapists are specialized in treating trauma and the issues that come with it. Our trauma-specific treatments are designed to reframe and reprogram trauma responses, empowering you to live the life you were meant to live.

Contact Sequoia Behavioral health today to get started on your healing journey.