Childhood trauma and adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) can have lasting effects. Symptoms of childhood trauma in adults can vary, and are somewhat dependent on the way the traumatic events were stored in the brain and body.
Some adults aren’t aware that the symptoms they are experiencing are a result of childhood trauma. They might chalk it up to personality flaws, environmental factors, or simply their own failings, when really it’s unprocessed trauma. Here are 6 surprising symptoms that you might not have thought to be related to childhood trauma.
What is Childhood Trauma?
Childhood trauma, sometimes discussed in conjunction with adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), are events that threaten a child’s safety and/or wellbeing and negatively impact functioning. Trauma can occur when the child is not able to get support following an adverse experience. Additionally, children who experience traumatic events that result in an altered state of consciousness (i.e. dissociation) may face lasting effects of trauma.
Examples of Childhood Trauma or ACEs
According to the Center for Disease Control, ACEs are fairly prevalent in the United States. Nearly 1 in 6 adults surveyed experienced 4 or more ACEs during childhood. What’s more, the latest National Survey of Children’s Health data shows in 2017-18, when you exclude economic hardship, approximately 30 percent of children experienced one ACE, and about 14 percent of children experienced two or more.
Here are some examples of adverse childhood experiences that could result in childhood trauma:
- Child Abuse (physical, sexual, emotional, neglect)
- Domestic Violence
- Severe Mental Health Issues in the Home
- Substance Use in the Home
- Parental Separation, Divorce, or Incarceration
- Death of a Loved One By Suicide
- Serious Life-Threatening Illness
How Symptoms of Childhood Trauma Can Affect Adults
Childhood trauma can have a devastating impact on a child, but it can also lead to problems later in life. Surviving a traumatic event or series of traumatic events as a child can sometimes result in significant mental health issues. Sometimes these issues develop into disorders and carry forward through to adulthood.
Childhood trauma survivors may have diagnoses like posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), complex posttraumatic stress disorder (CPTSD), generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), major depressive disorder (MDD), or other mental health disorders. They might experience problems with attachment and conflict in their relationships.
For some adults, the symptoms may not always make sense or seem connected to their childhood experiences. They may not even realize something is going on.
Childhood Trauma Symptoms Can be Confusing
Some childhood trauma survivors deal with intense emotional reactions to common everyday situations. While others who experience major stressors or losses respond with little to no emotion. Childhood trauma can have such varying effects that it can be confusing to experience and sometimes difficult to nail down.
Maybe you’ve experienced so much systematic abuse that you are not able to recognize it as trauma. Or perhaps your brain long buried the memory of a tragic experience and you’re only peripherally aware of it’s existence. It might be hard to connect present day symptoms to these situations.
Or maybe you’ve already processed your past trauma in therapy and then boom, something happens to trigger a trauma response. Sometimes even normal life transitions can stir up traumatic childhood memories, causing trauma symptoms to show up in the present.
Childhood Trauma Symptoms in Adults and Parenting
Having a child is a huge life transition that can have a big impact on your mental health. Even if you thought you resolved some of your past “stuff”, taking care of little humans can trigger all sorts of childhood experiences you thought were long resolved.
Sometimes, raising kids can magnify your struggles with emotion regulation. What’s more, all of the ways you learned to manage stress as a child, good or bad, can show up in your parenting. Whether it was something modeled for you directly from your caregivers, or a survival mechanism developed during traumatic events, those stress responses will present themselves as you deal with parenting challenges.
Physical Health for Adult Childhood Trauma Survivors
Unprocessed childhood trauma can have serious effects on physical health. Traumatic experiences can get lodged in the body and brain in ways that lead to chronic issues. According to an article from Counseling Today about trauma (2021), “carrying any kind of tension in the body, including headaches, stomach troubles or sensations such as feeling a tightness in the chest, can be signs of untreated trauma.”
Experiences multiple ACEs over the course of your childhood can also lead to more serious long-term physical health issues like diabetes, heart disease, and cancer.
6 Surprising Symptoms of Childhood Trauma in Adults
You might be familiar with the more commonly known symptoms of childhood trauma in adults. Things like nightmares, flashbacks, mood swings, and panic attacks are often associated with posttraumatic stress in adults. However, you might not realize that some of the things you’ve long considered to be part of your daily experience, might actually be symptoms of childhood trauma.
Read on to learn about 6 symptoms of childhood trauma that some people may experience in adulthood:
- You say sorry a lot.
Do you often worry that others are mad at you? Ever work really hard to smooth things over with friends and family? Do you say sorry at the first sign of trouble, even if you don’t know what you’re sorry for?
For some survivors of childhood trauma, apologizing served as a means to avoid conflict, blame, and feelings of shame. Saying sorry might work to placate an abusive mother, resolve a domestic dispute between caregivers, or ward off a parent’s scathing criticism.
In an article published in Counseling Today (July 2021), trauma therapist Susan Gable, LCPC, explains that “low self-esteem, conflict avoidance and people-pleasing behaviors can be common among clients who have experienced trauma”. She goes on to say that people who experiences these symptoms often apologize a lot, even to their therapists.
- You’re often talking about your “terrible memory”.
Do you struggle to remember large spans of your childhood? Ever have trouble recalling a timeline of events in your past? Do you feel jealous when others can remember specific details of childhood memories?
People who have experienced any form of child abuse or complex trauma during childhood often experience memory fragmentation as a result. When the brain and body are under threat, the parts of the brain responsible for creating memories are impacted. What’s more, some children dissociate or experience a change in consciousness during traumatic events. This can impact how memories are stored and whether they are available for easy recall later.
Check out this awesome visual aid from the National Institute for the Clinical Application of Behavioral Medicine to learn more about the ways trauma can impact memory.
- You suffer from chronic pain.
Studies show that there is an overlap between chronic pain sufferers and childhood trauma survivors. One meta-analysis from The Journal of Pain (2016) found that “childhood physical, sexual, and psychological abuse are reported to be risk factors for the adult development of pain conditions such as FM, irritable bowel syndrome, chronic pelvic pain, and temporomandibular joint disorders”.
While researchers are still exploring the causality of this link, many surmise that when the body is under stress for extended periods of time it can have damaging effects to our neurons. According to an article from the Harvard Health Blog about trauma and chronic pain, “When we are threatened, our bodies have what is called a stress response, which prepares our bodies to fight or flee. However, when this response remains highly activated in a child for an extended period of time without the calming influence of a supportive parent or adult figure, toxic stress occurs and can damage crucial neural connections in the developing brain.” This damage may lead to chronic pain in adulthood.
- You feel like you have an “addictive personality”.
Unresolved trauma from your childhood can put a lot of stress on your body. The resulting energy from the heightened state of alertness and anxiety can be a lot to manage. Plus, if you grew up with caregivers who also struggled with the effects of generational trauma, it’s likely they had few self-regulation tools to model for you. So when you have anxious energy (and too much adrenaline) coursing through your body on a regular basis, and you can’t rely on internal coping mechanisms, you might look to external methods. And not all external coping methods are helpful.
Many adult survivors of childhood abuse seek to override the stress response by indulging in high levels of drugs, alcohol, spending, sex, and working. These behaviors do tend to keep the energy at bay, but they only dull the experience. They do little to actually resolve the underlying source of the problem.
- You blame yourself for everything.
Adults who endured abuse as children may struggle to suppress intense feelings of shame as they move through the world. If you grew up with messages that you were the one responsible for the abuse inflicted on you, then you may have developed a pervasive frame of self-blame.
According to an article from the Australian Journal of General Practice (2020) on adult survivors of childhood trauma, “if a child is abused at a young age, they tend to believe they deserve it. This may be reinforced if the abuser implies the trauma is the child’s fault or if the child is not believed by other family members.”
- You’re an “overprotective” parent.
Are you on high alert when it comes to parenting, reacting and hovering at the slightest things? Are you chronically worried that something will happen to you or your kids?
Some call it high alert, others call it protection mode, but trauma therapists call it hypervigilance. When you experience ongoing traumatic stress throughout your childhood, it keeps your body and brain in a constant state of threat response. You are constantly scanning for threats to your safety. While in this state of being, your body is all too ready to engage a fight/flight/freeze response. You struggle to relax and it can be hard to determine when you are actually in a safe environment. It’s super taxing on the nervous system and it’s just plain exhausting.
Add all of that to the natural parental instinct to protect your child and you’re off to the races. With all of that anxiety embedded in your parenting, your child is also likely to develop anxiety in response to yours.
Other Symptoms of Childhood Trauma in Adults
Here are some of the more common symptoms of childhood trauma in adults:
- Intense Mood Swings
- Fear of Abandonment
- Conflict in Couple Relationships
- Low Self-Esteem
- Flashbacks
- Fear of Specific Places, Smells, Sights, Sounds, etc.
- Depression & Suicidality
- Anxiety
- Substance Use
- Impulsivity
- Mistrust of Authority
- Attachment Issues
If you are dealing with any of the above and the symptoms are impacting your overall well-being, it’s a good idea to consider therapy alongside any of the management strategies below.
How to Manage Symptoms of Childhood Trauma
Although symptoms of childhood trauma can be overwhelming, the good news is that there are lots of ways to manage them. And when you couple the self-care strategies below with therapy, you will put yourself on a path toward trauma healing.
Strategies to Manage Symptoms of Childhood Trauma
The suggested activities below make excellent self-care activities for any number of concerns, but they are especially helpful for survivors of childhood trauma. You can do them on your own, or with the support of a trauma-informed professional.
- Psychoeducational Books About Trauma
- Journaling
- Activities that Integrate Body and Mind (Yoga, Massage Therapy)
- Synchronous Activities (Choir Singing, Dance Classes, Team Sports)
- Relaxation and Mindfulness Activities (Deep Breathing, Meditation, Artmaking)
Therapy to Manage Symptoms of Childhood Trauma
For adult symptoms of childhood trauma that impact you more than you can manage on your own, it’s a great idea to seek the support of a therapist. Trained trauma professionals can teach effective techniques that will help you process your trauma in safe and productive ways that will im
There are several modes of trauma therapy that have been shown to be effective, including the following:
- Prolonged Exposure (PE)
- Eye Movement Desensitization & Reprocessing (EMDR)
- Somatic Experiencing
- Brainspotting
- Cognitive Processing Therapy (CPT)
Many of these therapy modalities utilize similar treatment techniques, including building a strong therapeutic alliance, providing psychoeducation, shifting cognitive frames, relaxation strategies, and memory processing.
Additional forms of therapy that have shown to be helpful for trauma work, when implemented by trained mental health professionals, including the following:
- Person-centered therapy
- Art therapy
- Writing/Journal Therapies
- Grief Counseling
- Group Therapy
- Family Therapy
Proven Help for Trauma Survivors
Finding a therapist who is not only trauma-informed but has experience and training in one or more of the models above can be especially important when seeking psychotherapy to address childhood trauma. The key benefit of trauma therapy is that it helps you tend to the trauma in ways you haven’t been to do on your own.
Trauma manifests in the body – stored and stuck – sometimes for decades. And a good therapist will not only help you understand its impact, but also help you find ways to release it.
Trauma manifests in the body – stored and stuck – sometimes for decades. And a good therapist will not only help you understand its impact, but also help you find ways to release it.
Interested in Therapy for Childhood Trauma?
If you are a resident of Pennsylvania and you are considering therapy for symptoms of childhood trauma in adulthood, the Center for Creative Counseling can help.
You may wonder what’s wrong with you. You may feel as though you are broken and your past trauma will define you forever. But it doesn’t have to be that way.
As one of my favorite trauma experts Dr. Eric Gentry said during a training:
“you are not broken, you are over-adapted. All of those adaptations got you through, and now you are simply over-adapted.”
Dr. Eric Gentry
Therapy can help you learn to rewire those over-adaptations that served you during your childhood. Therapy can help you learn to recognize when you are safe, stay in your body when triggered, and learn to manage your body’s response when you don’t feel safe.
Therapy for Childhood Trauma in Pennsylvania
If you live in Pennsylvania, whether you are in Pittsburgh, Erie, Philadelphia, or someone in between, you can start online therapy for childhood trauma at the Center for Creative Counseling.
I offer a free 15-minute consultation to make sure I am a good fit for what you are looking for. Please feel free to browse my website, explore the therapy services I offer, and check out the rates for therapy.
When you are ready, click below to see available appointment times and book your free consultation to get started.
References
- Bray, B. (2021, July 30). There’s nothing small about trauma. Counseling Today, 64(1). Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://ct.counseling.org/2021/06/theres-nothing-small-about-trauma/
- Edwards, R. R., Dworkin, R. H., Sullivan, M. D., Turk, D. C., & Wasan, A. D. (2016). The Role of Psychosocial Processes in the Development and Maintenance of Chronic Pain. The Journal of Pain, 17(9), T70–T92. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jpain.2016.01.001
- Family Psychiatry & Therapy. (2018, November 26). Is Your Childhood PTSD Affecting Your Adult Life? Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://familypsychnj.com/2018/11/is-your-childhood-ptsd-affecting-your-adult-life/
- Garrison Institute. (2016, May 20). Becoming Part of a Larger Whole. Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://www.garrisoninstitute.org/blog/becoming-part-of-a-larger-whole/
- Jones, B., MSN-ED RN-BC, & Gans, S., MD. (2021, December 21). Signs of Repressed Childhood Trauma in Adulthood. Verywell Health. Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://www.verywellhealth.com/signs-of-repressed-childhood-trauma-in-adults-5211845
- Kiesel, L. (2018, April 2). Chronic pain and childhood trauma. Harvard Health. Retrieved April 25, 2022, from https://www.health.harvard.edu/blog/chronic-pain-and-childhood-trauma-2018033012768
- Loggins, B., & Lockhart, PsyD, ABPP, A. T. (2021, November 23). Childhood Trauma in Adults: How to Recognize and Heal From It. Verywell Mind. Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://www.verywellmind.com/signs-of-childhood-trauma-in-adults-5207979
- National Conference of State Legislatures. (2021, December 8). Adverse Childhood Experiences. Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://www.ncsl.org/research/health/adverse-childhood-experiences-aces.aspx
- Su, W. M., & Stone, L. (2020). Adult survivors of childhood trauma: Complex trauma, complex needs. Australian Journal of General Practice, 49(7), 423–430. https://doi.org/10.31128/ajgp-08-19-5039
- Thatcher, T. (2022, January 24). Healing Childhood Trauma in Adults. Highland Springs. Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://highlandspringsclinic.org/blog/healing-childhood-trauma-adults/
- Wilds, H., MA, AT, LPC. (2021, December 4). 7 Best Childhood Trauma Books. Creative Therapy Ideas. Retrieved April 24, 2022, from https://creativetherapyideas.com/best-childhood-trauma-books/
