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Trauma is often misunderstood as something that only affects the mind — a set of memories or thoughts we try to forget. But trauma doesn’t just live in our heads; it lives in our nervous systems, our muscles, and our breath. For many people, trauma is something that continues to echo through the body long after the danger has passed. From a somatic (body-based) perspective, understanding trauma means tuning in to the silent ways the body holds on to fear, pain, and disconnection.
Trauma as a Survival Response
Trauma isn't just what happens to us — it's how our bodies respond when we don’t feel safe or resourced enough to process a threat. Whether it's a single incident or ongoing exposure to stress or danger, trauma can override the body’s natural ability to regulate. In that moment, our autonomic nervous system kicks into gear to help us survive: we fight, flee, freeze, or fawn.
When the trauma is over, some people are able to return to a state of calm. But for others — especially those with a history of chronic stress, abuse, racialized trauma, or neglect — the body gets stuck in survival mode. This is how trauma becomes embedded in the body.
How the Body Stores Trauma
People who live with unresolved trauma often experience physical symptoms that seem disconnected from the traumatic event itself. They may struggle with:
Chronic tension or pain
Digestive issues
Fatigue and sleep disruption
Headaches or migraines
Shortness of breath or shallow breathing
Feeling numb or disconnected from the body
These symptoms are not “in your head.” They are the body’s language — the way it speaks to us when something is unresolved. According to somatic psychotherapists like Peter Levine and Bessel van der Kolk, trauma can become trapped in the nervous system when a fight-or-flight response was activated but never completed. The energy remains in the body, leading to dysregulation, distress, or collapse.
Trauma and Dissociation
Another way the body holds trauma is through dissociation. This is not just a mental disconnect — it’s a physical one, too. Dissociation can feel like leaving your body, not being able to feel parts of yourself, or watching yourself from the outside. It’s a survival strategy that helps us cope with experiences that are too overwhelming to fully feel at the time.
Many trauma survivors live in a body that feels either too much (overwhelmed by sensation) or not enough (numb, disconnected, “frozen”). Both states are expressions of a nervous system still trying to protect itself.
Cultural and Intergenerational Layers
Trauma is also shaped by culture, identity, and history. For those from marginalized communities — particularly Black, Indigenous, racialized, queer, and trans individuals — trauma is not only personal, but collective and historical. The body learns not just from individual events, but from patterns of oppression, erasure, and exclusion.
This kind of trauma shows up in the body, too — through hypervigilance, suppressed voice, muscle tension, or even intergenerational coping patterns passed down within families and communities. Healing the body must also include acknowledging and validating these wider systems.
Why Somatic Work Matters
Traditional talk therapy can be helpful, but it often leaves out the body — the very place where trauma is held. Somatic therapy focuses on reconnecting to physical sensations, breath, movement, and embodied awareness to complete the trauma cycle and restore a sense of safety.
Practices may include:
Grounding through sensation (e.g., feeling your feet, holding an object)
Tracking subtle shifts in body awareness
Movement to release stuck energy (e.g., shaking, stretching)
Breathwork to calm or energize the nervous system
Titration — exploring emotions in manageable doses to avoid overwhelm
The goal is not to relive the trauma, but to gently build capacity in the nervous system to tolerate safety, connection, and emotion.
The Body Remembers — and Can Also Heal
The body is wise. Even when it’s holding onto pain, it’s doing so because it had to — because at some point, it was the only way to survive. When we begin to listen to the body with compassion instead of fear, we make space for healing that doesn’t require words.
Trauma healing is not linear, and it's rarely quick. But with care, attunement, and the right supports, the body can begin to release what it no longer needs to carry. We can begin to move from surviving to thriving — not just mentally, but physically, emotionally, and somatically.
Karoline Achille is an EMDR therapist at Catharsis Psychology and Psychotherapy.
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