Vicarious & Secondary Trauma

"I see all these stories on the news and on social media. I worry I'm not safe, that my loved ones are not safe, and I feel helpless in preventing it."

We each have internal safety systems designed to collect information along the way in order to identify, address, and prevent risk factors and foster safety. Our safety systems have a hard time discerning between personal experiences and the images/videos/stories we are exposed to on social media and the news. When we are exposed to both world events and local news, our safety system can collect this information and recognize them as active safety concerns; adopting these experiences as if they were our own. If you notice that you are experiencing intrusive thoughts, feeling hypervigilant (hyper aware of your surroundings), are struggling to focus, disrupted sleep, heightened agitation, racing thoughts, and experiencing a lacked sense of connection with others, you may be experiencing vicarious or secondary trauma. This is when PTSD symptoms are experienced from traumas that were not of our own lived experiences.

If you are experiencing this, therapy can offer a safe space to process these experiences, support you in your relationship to these stories, collaborating with your safety system to respond in ways that are truly protective and supportive for you, and feel grounded in your spectrum of control/choice/influence.