For thousands of years, homo sapiens have worried about immediate, daily dangers to our lives. From escaping an attacking predator to fleeing a disastrous storm, our bodies have built-in psychological and physiological responses to protect us from potential harm. These self-preserving reactions are often categorized as fight, flight, freeze, or submit. Even though most of us have evolved from a daily fight for survival, individuals who have experienced trauma may have “trauma brains” that are rewired to interpret and react strongly to challenges as if they are in life-or-death situations.
A trauma brain is almost always in emergency response mode, scanning for and reacting to danger, rather than engaging in typical everyday mental processing. Constantly being in emergency response mode has a very real and disruptive impact on physical and mental health.
Any sensory reminder of a traumatic experience can trigger a fight, flight, freeze, or submit response in an otherwise safe environment. This is a normal brain response to an abnormal situation. These reactions can happen in workforce development; toxic stress and trauma can manifest in many different ways in the workplace.
For example, let’s take a short quiz: Which of these following situations is a way in which trauma can show up in the workplace?
- Your coworker frequently argues with you
- Your coworker is often late or absent from work
- Your coworker has a hard time making decisions and prioritizing
- Your coworker tends to not speak up for themselves
Although most people think that trauma can only show up like option A, the correct answer is that all of the options can be symptoms of trauma and retriggering. Learning to recognize the symptoms of trauma in the workplace allows for greater understanding of the people in your life, along with the greater ability to help them.
Today CSW is releasing Part 2 of our four-part Trauma and Resilience at Work series. Part 2 is about the many different ways trauma shows up in your workplace right under your nose. It also contains tips for changing those harmful responses to healing responses. Like individuals, organizations and employers have the choice to engage in healing or harmful practices and policies.
We hope that this resource can serve as a guide for you to use throughout your time in workforce development and beyond!
Comments are closed.