Whenever I find myself in the midst of an overwhelming trauma reaction…you know…the fight, flight, freeze, or fawn type of response… when I can tell that something deep within me has REALLY been triggered, it always comes back to my inner child. In those situations, there’s some aspect of the trigger that has brought my wounded childhood part to the forefront. I can usually tell this is what’s going on, by the type of behavior that results. Often, for me, I either shrink back and isolate out of insecurity and social anxiety, OR I go into full on fight mode and throw a tantrum…I have a big temper outburst where I feel compelled to yell and slam a door. 

Over the years, my art and writing process has, time and time again, been a place that I can return, to release all the confusing emotions that I’m experiencing and practice what it looks like to nurture and care for the parts that are hurting. 

Today I’m sharing a drawing I did a while back, where I pretty quickly was able to go through this process of identifying my emotions, expressing them, and getting to the root of what they had to tell me. 

.