I’m trained in Somatic Experiencing, and lean heavily into this method when past trauma is wreaking havoc in my client’s present day life. Anyone can suffer from trauma, but ND people are especially vulnerable to trauma and to what’s called Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD), which is sort of like the stress-fracture of trauma. Whereas PTSD can happen when a healthy nervous system experiences an event that is overwhelming to it, CPTSD comes from an accumulation of moments of overwhelm, and a system that’s been degraded over time by a barrage of overwhelming experiences.
It makes perfect sense that we’re more vulnerable to CPTSD if you think of just one aspect of Autistic life. . . sensory sensitivity. For us, light, sound, and other stimulations are harder to process, take more energy to process, and max out our systems at a lower threshold. Whereas some people can sit under flourescent lights all day and not be drained in the least, others of us might get headaches, exhaustion, or even have seizures triggered by them.
Now add to that our accumulation of mishaps. ND people REGULARLY encounter experiences throughout our lifetimes where social interactions or interactions with systems go awry. Think about an ADHD kiddo at school, getting in trouble just for being themselves: energetic, chatty, distractable and exciteable. Not too long ago my parents sent me a bunch of papers they’d found in the back of a drawer from my childhood. There were stacks of notes that said “DON’T FORGET YOUR GYM CLOTHES AND YOUR LUNCH!” I had written this to myself over and over and over, because I had forgotten those items and gotten in trouble at school for it so many times. I remember doing the wrong homework, and showing up to class with the wrong book, and staying up all night working on a paper only to drop it in a puddle while I walked to school. Seeing those notes brought back the anxiety I felt as a kid, always worried I was doing something wrong that I just didn’t know was wrong . . .yet. CPTSD can feel like you’re always waiting for the other shoe to drop.
Somatic Experiencing (SE) is a way to allow the body and nervous system to put some of those long held anxieties to rest, at least a little bit. It can open up a great deal of space and calm and freedom. It can relieve us of certain symptoms that are purely coming from old traumas that are “stuck” in the body.
And it’s important to be clear that SE will NEVER make us neurotypical. The ND nervous systems is inherently more sensitive and prone to activation, stress, and wear and tear in most environments. You can imagine that if I’d done SE in 7th grade, a lot would have gotten better. But I would still be me in high school, so I’d keep accumulating more and more identity-destroying experiences until I learned exactly who I was, what I needed, and made the necessary changes to protect myself. And while we can’t instantly change the world we live in, and we will likely have to engage with systems and individuals that are damaging to us, Neurodivergent Affirming Counseling can go a long way to help us figure out what we CAN do to build lives that support us.