My story will be different to your story and, likewise, your story will be different to others.

I am not a trained counsellor or psychologist, but I am someone who has had to navigate the tricky waters of trauma.

Two years ago I resigned my employment due to numerous challenging factors. It was one of the hardest decisions of my life to date, and it was a traumatic experience.

There are certain experiences that we have that are traumatic for us. Trauma shatters our sense of psychological safety and it can happen to us regardless of our age, gender, background, or experience.

To try and create a full list of traumatic experiences would be near impossible but some examples could include losing your own or a loved one’s physical and mental health, experiencing bullying at school or work, an abusive authority figure, threats or actions of physical or emotional violence, sudden job loss, or even experiencing a global pandemic.

Facing trauma and its impact on us is usually the very last thing we want to do. We would never choose to go through difficult circumstances, or have difficult relationships, yet if we do not engage with it then it can mean healing takes longer and may not happen as fully.

What steps can we take to be navigate the road to recovery from trauma?

Acknowledge it

First of all we need to learn to recognise trauma and acknowledge it as such.

When we have been affected by a traumatic event or experience a natural reaction can be to either minimise or ignore the devastating effect it has had on us. Unfortunately this doesn’t lead to healing and wholeness in our souls.

If we’ve gone through trauma and we’re experiencing shame we will often start to believe that it’s our own fault, we make excuses for the perpetrator, we dismiss what’s happened as ‘it’s not that bad, probably my fault anyway’.

One of the first steps to help heal from suffering caused by trauma and the shame attached is to name the pain, and where there has been sin then we must recognise it and call it sin.

Shame is sticky and attaches itself onto our sense of worth and identity to think that there is something fundamentally wrong with us – ‘I am the worst’, ‘I am rubbish’, ‘I always mess up’, ‘I should’ve known better’ are all examples of shame thoughts.

When Adam and Eve first sinned in the Garden of Eden they hid from God because they felt shame. Shame causes us to hide, to wear a mask, to not fully embrace life, and this hinders our healing journey.

Get help

We all need a bit of help.

We’re vulnerable when we’re hurting and so it is unlikely helpful or healthy to your healing journey to go around telling everyone or posting on social media about unresolved pain. There are better ways to dialogue.

Several years ago I attended six counselling sessions and it was difficult process but so worth it. I want to be able to have safe spaces to do so. I’d recommend counselling to everyone – I also attended counselling when I had to resign my job in difficult circumstances two years ago.

Whether it’s counselling, or talking to your pastor, or chatting honestly, vulnerably, and openly with a close friend, whatever it is please do speak to someone. Life can be hard enough, let alone trying to do it alone.

Trust God

I would encourage you to embrace the slow, and painful, journey of healing and restoration. You have a God who wants to walk with you, to comfort, to guide, and lead you.

It takes courage and trust in Him to keep saying yes and taking a step at a time but you will take steps forward with Him and He who describes Himself as the Good Shepherd will get you where you need to get to.

There is no easy or quick fix, but I do believe that healing is possible and hope is available because of who I’ve come to know Jesus to be. There are many examples we could look at in the Bible for encouragement to the face the future with hope, whether that’s some of the stories or promises made.

One that has particularly strengthened me has been the promise that God works out all things for the good of those who love Him (Romans 8:28). The promise is not only good things will happen to us. Jesus and many that followed Him faced harassment, betrayal, and execution! But the promise is that even from the worst of the worst circumstances God can and does bring good from it.

God can handle whatever we bring to Him, whether it’s our trauma, our shame, our sin, or whatever else it is, we can come to Him and pray real prayers and cry real tears. We can bring everything to Him: our anger, our disappointment, our hurt, all of it.

If you’ve gone through trauma or wrestling with the idea of something good coming from something horrific, I hear you, I have similar questions but I also do have a trust in Jesus who has promised that there will be a day with no trauma, no suffering, no crying, no pain, and even no more death anymore (See Revelation 21).

There is no quick fix or mantra to recite that makes us immune or pain immediately dissipate, and to try and cover everything that could help is beyond my expertise and the scope of this blog post. I believe you are loved, God is good, and because of these two things I really believe that we can have hope that the best is ahead.

Reflect

What do you think are the next steps you need to take? Ask God for His help to do so.

Thanks for reading, I know from experience that this is a painful but necessary topic. I’d love to hear from you, please share in the comments your reflections or any questions that you might have, Dan

Further reading

God on mute by Pete Greig

Good boundaries and goodbyes by Lysa Terkeurst

Necessary endings by Henry Cloud

Spurgeon’s sorrows by Zack Eswine

The Emotionally healthy spirituality by Peter Scazzero

Try softer by Aundi Kolber

When people are big and God is small by Edward Welch

Wounded by God’s people: Discovering how God heals our hearts by Anne Graham Lotz