⚠️⚠️ Content Advisory: Contains Sensitive Content – Viewer Discretion Advised. ⚠️⚠️
⚖💙 Trauma-Informed Care ❤🩹 ⚖
🚫⛓ Cycle Breaking ⛓🚫
Hello Everyone!
When we think of trauma, many times we think of pain, fear, and even hopelessness. While traumatic experiences are unfortunate events, we can, with training our brains, break cycles. Let us use the example of corporal punishment, which is the use of physical means to discipline another person, usually children of one’s own, or in the case of some brazen individuals, another person’s child.
Many parents who physically discipline their or other people’s children will tell you something along the lines of “It worked for me, so why change what works?” What they will often fail to tell you is that they are stuck in a cycle, and they will also likely fail to even realize that they were abused. This is what you may hear referred to as abuse “normalization.”
Particularly with older generations, corporal punishment was extreme – it often involved a “switch” that the child had to pick out at the prompt of a parent/authority figure, and the children were left bleeding. In Oprah Winfrey and Dr. Bruce D. Perry’s (2021) book , “What Happened to You?: Conversations on Trauma, Resilience, and Healing,” Oprah explained how she was left to bleed after a beating and go to church directly after she was given a beating by her grandmother. While Oprah, with help from Dr. Perry, understands that the beatings are a form of abuse that affect her to this day, many do not realize that abuse is abuse.
At the same time, with more trauma-informed resources and stronger trauma-informed health providers out there (kudos to you all!) nowadays, there are some parents that realize the effects of being “smacked,” “whooped,” and “getting a bonk in the head” had on them when they were children and say something like, “You know what? While I will still discipline my kiddo(s), I will not use physical force to do so.” This is an ironclad cycle-breakage!
By choosing not to physically discipline their children, those parents are looking to break the likely inevitable cycle it leads to: Parent hits child ➡ Child throws things when angry ➡ Child has issues developing healthy friendships and relationships as they develop ➡ Child ends up in jail or as a manager who cultivates a culture of fear. While this listed cycle is just one way things can go, the idea is that causing trauma to young ones in particular causes them to enter a cycle that often leads to negative outcomes. This in turn can lead to feelings of hopelessness or shame as our kiddos grow up and even well into adulthood.
I believe Dr. Tracey Shors (2021, p.5) put it best when she tells us in her book, “Everyday Trauma: Remapping the Brain’s Response to Stress, Anxiety, and Painful Memories for a Better Life,” that “we always have the chance to reshape our stories for the better.” To me, that is exactly what cycle breaking is all about – deciding that we can do better, and taking the necessary steps to get there. With this said, it can be, and is, difficult for many of us to break cycles.
Please Note: I am providing the Amazon links primarily to give you a description of the books. I do not receive any commissions or payment from Amazon for this.
Below is a video where I discuss another example of cycle-breaking.
Cycle Breaking: Worksheet
Check out the free worksheet below to help you with breaking cycles! If you like the worksheet, there will be plenty more released over the next few weeks that will be $1.99 and will be sold via Gumroad.
Agency
In counseling, the term agency refers to the ability of a person to make decisions for themselves and realize that they always do have a choice about how to act. This does not mean that bad things do not happen to them. It means that even when something bad happens to them, they know that they are in the proverbial driver’s seat. I will use myself as an example. Resultant from retaliation for filing a report of sexual assault, Eastern Connecticut State University officials had me trespassed off campus right after I was hospitalized for psychiatric care, rendering me homeless instantly. I was a graduate intern hall director at the time.
I knew that I could then be “mad at the world” and self-sabotage, or I could take the proper, legal steps to hold the responsible actors accountable. I chose the latter and opened federal and state-level investigations into my case and Eastern. I used my agency to help me move forward in a safe way. Similarly, anyone and everyone has the ability to decide how to move forward with their lives, even in the face of adversity.
With this said, going through many experiences that leave us feeling hopeless or unworthy of being treated with positive regard does take a toll on us. Even today, people face discrimination for something as frivolous as the color of their skin or their sexuality, among many examples. In these cases, we can use our agency to find a way to enact systemic change – we will cover systemic change in another lesson! 😇
In the below video, I go a little bit more in-depth into agency.
Empowerment
To bring this lesson home on a positive note, we will discuss empowerment. Remember how we discussed hopelessness? Empowerment is, in a sense, the opposite of it. Rather than ask ourselves, “What is the use?”, we tell ourselves “I am going to give it my all!” This is an example of self-empowerment.
Empowerment can also be external, coming from others encouraging us. Some people have friends or family members that cheer on the ones they care about. When you have people telling you that you can do something, it may help you to really believe you can. Empowerment can also come from agencies! For example, known for their advocacy for Black people’s rights, the NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Colored People) empowers others by seeking to “ensure the political, educational, social, and economic equality of all.”
Dr. Rachael Pelletti (personal communication, June 16, 2025) once told my classmates and me, “Hope and awareness are vehicles for change.” I think her quote is a good way to describe the intersection of agency and empowerment. With both, we cultivate self-efficacy, or the ability and willingness to make decisions for ourselves, versus having someone else make decisions for us the majority or all of the time.
A Gentle Reminder
We covered quite a bit in this lesson! With all of this learning, I want to leave you with this: Treat yourself with kindness, love, and respect. Remember to follow the golden rule – treat others how you would want to be treated. Lastly for now, you got this! Give yourself credit for how far you have made it and grace if things are tough! ❤🩹