Three Steps to Recover from Emotional Bruises

Emotional Abuse-Blog 4

Residual Feelings

We have reached the last post in our series on dealing with emotional abuse: handling residual feelings. We have been looking specifically at situations with acquaintances and strangers, not focusing on intimate relationships. These encounters, no matter how brief or random, can be traumatic. We have examined reacting, reflecting and recovering from these uncomfortable encounters, but what if the feelings of unease continue to linger?

What happens if you can’t stop thinking about it? Churning it over and over in your head? When you are reminded of it, does it trigger a sick feeling in your stomach? Has this event left you with an emotional bruise?

Here are some questions to ask yourself:

• Are you affected more than before?
• What else is going on in you?
• What other pressures are you under?
• Would you consider your resilience diminished?

If you still feel impacted by the traumatic situation, repeating these steps from our last blog can help:

1. Breathe. Take deep breaths while counting to three, then out, also to the count of three.

Pray

Read something calming

Affirm identity

2. Seek help from those around you (who puts wind in your lungs?)

Deliberately pursue these connections (ask to have coffee or breakfast together)

Avoid words of condemnation that make you withdraw and feel shame

3. Consult a well-being mentor, professional supervisor or a therapist,.

If you have repeated these steps and still can’t shake the feeling that something is wrong, call your well-being mentor, professional supervisor or therapist and set up a recurring appointment to work through this ordeal. Failing to address lingering traumas, can affect the ability to be present at home, affect the capacity to be focused at work and will almost always surface some later time.

Remember that your feelings are valid and there is no shame in feeling deeply impacted by harsh and unjust words. While we can’t always change the way someone speaks to us, we can choose how we respond and how we move forward.

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