Trauma can result in physical, emotional, behavioral, and psychological symptoms. It can significantly impact your quality of life while dealing with these symptoms.
When you’re going through a trauma and the aftermath, you may notice time doesn’t feel like it moves the same way. This is because trauma can be a roadblock to being present and in the moment. It can also keep you stuck in your past.
Here’s a look at how trauma can impact your sense of time.
Your past continues to shape your present.
A traumatic memory can be very intense and emotionally charged. When you’re in a circumstance that is extreme or results in a negative impact, you may be more likely to become stuck in that moment. Those memories become engrained in your brain, and your mind can have difficulty letting go.
Ruminating on a past memory can alter present moments and cause you to have a difficult time distinguishing time frames.
After a traumatic event, you may also experience flashbacks, which can trigger unexpectedly and at any time. A flashback will jolt you from the present moment right back into the past. This can distort time and cause difficulty distinguishing the present from the past.
You experience dissociation.
Some people use dissociation as a coping mechanism after going through a trauma. Dissociation is a normal response to an abnormal situation. Dissociation is not the most helpful of strategies and can affect your perception of time. You may experience gaps in your memory or difficulty recalling details during dissociative episodes.
You may feel detached and in a state of timelessness. Re-orienting yourself to the present can become difficult during this time. Fragmented memories can make it more challenging to assemble your narrative and establish a proper sense of time.
Time Becomes Distorted
After a traumatic experience, it’s possible that time may seem to move too slowly or speed up. When faced with a threatening situation, the brain goes into survival mode and remains that way for the duration of the event. While you’re hyper-focused, time may appear to slow down as you move through the event, make decisions, and take action.
Alternatively, avoidance is another coping mechanism often used with trauma. Certain tactics to keep busy or keep moving can contribute to a speed-up of time. Distorted memories may cause the series of events to be incorrect, which may also make time appear to be faster than reality.
You lose a part of yourself.
Memories are naturally imprecise, with each person cutting out certain details and filling in blanks with non-factual information subconsciously. Trauma can skew your memories, leaving some details all too clear while making others a bit fuzzy.
You might remember the stressful ones in more detail, fixating on a thing you’d like to forget. Newer memories may then be harder to retain in full detail. When you don’t fully reconcile the past and heal your trauma, it can be harder to move on and continue living as your full self. Part of your mind holds on to that trauma and can be triggered by a past loop, making time feel altered.
Hypervigilance Skews Time
Depending on your circumstances, you may experience some hypervigilance afterward. You can describe hypervigilance as a heightened state of alertness that causes you to constantly look over your shoulder.
When you’re always looking for possible threats or things to go wrong, your body never relaxes from its on-edge state, nor can you relax. Activities take longer, and your mind focuses on details you wouldn’t normally consider. Because of this, time may feel like it’s moving in slow motion.
If you’ve experienced trauma and are having difficulty returning to normalcy, reach out to us for a free consultation to learn more about coping and healing processes.
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