Trauma and Dentists

I gave a short talk to a woman's group last night. It was about trauma and how our nervous systems hold onto it. After the discussion, a few women brought up old wounds; they knew they still held from childhood.

Some of the ladies are in their eighties, and because of childhood experiences, certain activities have always been anxiety-producing.

The clearest example was a woman shared when she was small; a dentist pulled out a rotten tooth with pliers.This experience created a neural pathway, and each time she is in a dentist chair, the trauma reshows itself in her nervous system. She gets anxious and holds onto the dentist’s chair as if she is going to experience the original tooth, pulling again.

Neural pathways add to themselves as other experiences in life share a similar tone. The initial impact was at the dentist, but the nervous system has several events now that share this path to anxiety.

One or two sessions is possibly all that would be necessary to make the dentist a safer place.

We all have accepted that there are specific responses to daily events that we are willing to keep the same.

However, what if we decided that always being anxious at the dentist was worth healing?

What shifts would happen in other areas where anxiety exhibits itself?

We will never know without asking our bodies to show us.

Improving our nervous system is delicate, challenging, and profound work. Think of one behavior that you have where the automatic response needs to be changed.

What difference could this make?

The busier our nervous system is with holding space for old wounds, the less we can give to joy, love, connection, and everything good.

Shoot me an email or give me a call to talk about a regular response you want to change.

Free Somatic therapy consultations always available.