7.24.23_Adaptive and Maladaptive Coping Mechanisms after cPTSD

3:57PM Jul 20, 2023

Speakers:

Amy Hoyt

Leina Hoyt, MFT, MA

Keywords:

maladaptive

trauma

behavior

adaptive

relationship

feeling

identify

acknowledge

aware

mending

talking

engage

mistakes

timeout

awareness

situation

helpful

adaptive coping

moment

conversation

Hi, Amy here. Are you feeling stuck or overwhelmed by things that pop up in your daily life. And perhaps these are because of past traumas or toxic stress? Have you tried traditional therapy and found that it wasn't enough? I know that was the case for me. That's why we developed the whole health lab. Mini trauma has put together a program that combines the latest research with proven methods to help you recover from trauma and move forward from these daily stressors and triggers. We use somatic therapy EMDR, cognitive behavioral therapy and internal family systems therapy. We use nervous system regulation, and many other tools so that we can combine the best methods that are identified in the research to help you recover without being completely overwhelmed. So you can work on trauma on your own pace, your own time. And still with the mentorship and support of a highly trained certified staff. That's us. No more waiting for appointments or sitting in traffic driving to see a therapist with our online program, the whole help lab. You can access it from anywhere, anytime, even on an app, visit mending trauma.com backslash whole health lab and learn more. Get your questions answered. We've got a Frequently Asked Questions section and sign up so that you can have this life changing program in your world today. Don't let your past hold you back any longer. Take control of your future and we can't wait to see you in the whole health lab. Welcome to the universe is your therapist. We are your hosts, Dr. Amy Hoyt and Lena Hoyt, we are sisters. Take a seat and let's dive into this week's episode.

Hi, welcome back to another podcast. We're excited to be here. Today we're talking about maladaptive versus adaptive coping strategies. And I think this is such an interesting topic because things come up things happen. And we can respond in different ways. And some of those are adaptive, and some are maladaptive. The reason I like this language so much is it takes some of the judgment out of it. So tell us more about that. Lena, sure

in trauma, when we have come out of a trauma and even years down the road, we can reflect on why we did or didn't respond the way we had wanted to or why we didn't stand up for ourselves. And it's important to know that in the moment, our brain and body did exactly what it needed to do to survive. And also in that moment, a set of coping mechanisms was born. When that happens in trauma, the coping mechanisms that were born were applicable for that moment in that trauma. And they are now maybe costliness. So we want to acknowledge that our brain and body do a beautiful job working together to help us survive. And we also want to acknowledge that we can have some coping mechanisms that come out of traumatic experiences, that becomes subconscious and automatic. So one

of the examples I was thinking of is you're younger, someone hurts you physically, emotionally, sexually, I think with the ones that involve our bodies, we tend to leave our body when we're injured in that way, at least that was my experience. And so we call that dissociation as an adult, when things get stressful, I can quote unquote, check out or space out. And so while it was very helpful when I was going through that trauma, because it preserved some of my sense of safety and control, it is very, very disruptive when I need to pay attention, and I'm stressed and then I start to space out. And so what I like about this, though, is it's very benevolent that it served a purpose. And yet now as I move into trying to be a higher self or a higher version of myself, it's time to look at some of those behaviors that had utility back then, and reassess whether they have utility. Now,

well said, the idea is that these are so subconscious that they happen without our awareness. And so once we become aware that we are engaging in some maladaptive coping behaviors, we can identify when we are using those we can become more aware and we can become more insightful as to what's happening in an exchange or in a situation now based on the trauma we experienced in our younger years. Adaptive coping is any behavior that allows us to benefit not just in the moment, but long term. So in the moment of our trauma, whatever response we had was adaptive in that moment, because it allowed us to survive it only becomes maladaptive when it interferes with our growth, our relationship with ourself and others. And when it creates problems for us beyond our immediate circumstances in the present,

it's very similar to what I was saying about does it serve a utility for us now? And I think most of us are on this journey of kind of trying to embody our highest self, and is it going to serve us in that form?

Yes. And one thing that you and I have been really emphatic about in our conversations is that maladaptive coping is not our fault. It happens in an instant, and it has deep wiring, so that anything that resembles the emotions or the situation, or the thoughts of the trauma will bring up that hardwired reactivity without our conscious knowledge. And so being aware that that is part of what happens for us is really important, as we've spoken in another podcast, being able to have self compassion so that we can pay attention to what we're doing without judgment. That's the best way to learn how to change and become more aware and insightful.

Okay, so what are some examples where we see we have something hard happened to us that causes a traumatic response that in that moment was adaptive, but now it's maladaptive? What's an example we can give to our listeners?

Sure. I think the idea about trust is really relevant in this situation, what happens when we have trauma or traumatic experiences is that it alters our view of ourselves and the world. And it creates a barrier frequently to trusting other people or trusting a higher power or the universe. And when that occurs, and we have difficulty trusting than we engage in behaviors that may put up barriers subconsciously, to protect ourselves from being vulnerable. And yet, when we are vulnerable, that's when we can genuinely connect with other people.

So what would some of those behaviors look like I'm thinking, and please correct me if I'm not on the right track, but I'm thinking of having trust issues, and then kind of holding away from people when they are maybe not behaving the way we expect, or we want. And so as we pull away, because we feel unsafe, they sense something's changed in the relationship, and then they start to pull away. And then it's like a self fulfilling prophecy. It's a cycle, is that kind of what you're talking about? Yes. And

that's an it's a negative feedback loop. Because what happens is, if I'm thinking that you aren't responding in a way that is assuring to me, and so I pull away, the more I pull away, the more you might think I'm not trustworthy, so you pull away. And as that goes on, it just continues to feed itself. And it's super maladaptive, because it doesn't allow us to hold the cycle and question what we're experiencing.

So the example of trust, I think, is interesting, because I'm aware that we've had that issue in our own relationship. And so one of the ways that we've kind of disrupted that cycle is to name it, one of the things I really appreciate is your willingness to allow for that conversation, one of us identify something's going on, we can reassure each other, we can just name what's going on. I'm sensing this, and I'm not sure what this means. And then we open that conversation. And a lot of the time, it's nothing like the story that's concocted in my head, at least. And so I think that's one of the ways we can start to be aware of the behavior that has become maladaptive and then start to shift it we have to name it kind of takes away the power of it.

Absolutely. Your explanation of what we're trying to do in our own relationship is really appropriate to this concept, because we are trying to come out of a pattern that has existed for years between us and when we are able to state what we're experiencing and be able to identify our thoughts as thoughts and our feelings as feelings. We have much more productive conversations. And we tend to clarify things with each other in a way that engenders cooperation and clarity. One thing that adaptive coping skills allow us to do is to manage ourselves in relationship with the world and with other people and to manage ourselves in a way that does not create or contribute to further problems down the road. One of the things that we talked about when we were talking about this episode was the idea that there are some behaviors that can be adaptive in certain situations and maladaptive and other situations and being able to clarify that it's not the behavior itself necessarily. That's the problem. It's the way In which we are utilizing it and how it affects our relationships, that can be the problem.

So it's context specific and relationships specific. So there's a lot of nuances with this, which I love, I really gravitate towards precision and nuance. And so what would be an example of a behavior that would be actually very adaptive in one situation, but extremely maladaptive in another. One

example is if we are screaming, so depending on your living situation, and your life circumstances, screaming may be very disruptive to your living environment. However, there are times when screaming can be extremely adaptive. One example I use all the time is if you see a little kid running out into the middle of the street, you don't calmly ask for the kid to come back, you scream, to get the kids attention to get them to come back on the lawn or the sidewalk so that you can protect them from being hit by a car.

I still remember my oldest when he was a toddler, I swore I would never spank. And he ran out into the road in front of a UPS truck. And I just swatted his little bottom because I wanted him to never, ever forget, I don't know if it worked. I felt so bad afterwards. But I can see what you're talking about. But sometimes a big reaction is called for whether or not it has consequences is another episode, we can have Jackson on an interview about that.

I don't think he ran in front of any more UPS trucks, he's

still alive, we're doing well. It's

a good sign.

Let's talk about mistakes when we I mean, this happens in my life frequently when I do not behave in the way I want to and I know is part of my highest self. It's a mistake. It's it's not my best behavior. How do we grapple with that

the most important thing I think in grappling with that is to acknowledge that mistakes are things that occur without intentional forethought, or the consequences of the mistake were not known to us prior to deciding to engage in a behavior. And if we can't find a way to acknowledge when we've mis stepped when we have engaged in interaction with somebody in a way that is not adaptive, or helpful or productive, we have an opportunity to learn from that if we can't acknowledge mistakes. And if we can't acknowledge when we engage in behaviors that are damaging to ourselves or to our relationships, then we don't ever have a chance to learn. And the idea behind this is that by acknowledging mistakes or missteps, we are increasing our wisdom knowledge base with the idea that we have awareness now or we want to gain awareness without judgment about what contributed to that, and then try to correct it and learn from it.

So what are some skills that we can teach our listeners today that will help them identify adaptive versus maladaptive behaviors in context, as well as kind of moving towards shifting that for themselves. One thing

that I think is really helpful in terms of relationship is to pay attention to whether or not the behavior, the communication, the perception is

accurate. For me, when I have a behavior, if it is leading me to a physical sense of peace in my body, I feel intuitively like it's adaptive, it may not bring me joy, but it doesn't bring me that tightness in my stomach and that tightness in my chest. And so I use physical sensations a lot of times to understand if my behavior is adaptive or maladaptive. I'm not always conscious of those terms. But when I start to get that tight feeling, or sometimes that sick feeling, there are moments where I think there's a pivotal moment where you can ignore it, and it'll eventually you'll get used to it. But you also have an opportunity in that moment to say something's not feeling right. And those are just our little clues that our body gives us that we can then use to investigate where that feeling that sense of discomfort is coming from. That's an

excellent way of trying to identify if our behavior or our reaction is adaptive versus maladaptive. The other thing is the sense of energy that we have in the conversation or exchange with people and if the energy is really big or loud or defended, that would be something that we'd want to take a look at with benevolent curiosity so that we can try to ascertain what's happening, what stories we're telling ourselves in our head and our contribution to anything that may have gone sideways in the relationship or in the exchange that we just had.

I'm aware that there's times at home where I don't realize I'm irritated ate it. And all of a sudden, I raised my voice or a snap, or I'm very defensive. And one of my children or my husband will say, are you okay? What's going on? And I instantly Of course, that brings it to my awareness. But My instant reaction is I'm okay, I'm fine. And then about a millisecond later, I realized I'm not fine. And so sometimes I feel like it sneaks up on us. And I think that that's okay, too, when it sneaks up on us, because we have people around us who are going to inquire, you know, what's going on relationships are a mirror in a lot of ways. And so that can be a way of kind of starting to reflect when someone's like, Hey, what's going on? You seem defended,

yes. So they're bringing it to your attention. And that gives us an opportunity to pause for a moment and reflect, and you've gotten way better at that, I think, in a really quick amount of time. And I'm still really struggling with my own awareness in regards to that.

I think living with six people makes you hyper aware of all

your flaws, as opposed to living with no people.

I mean, I'm not saying yeah, I'm not saying I may be jealous, but I love my people, but I am, it's a lot of mirrors in my face.

Love it, it's a lot of mirrors, I love it, one thing that we can do is after an exchange, we can get to a place where we have the opportunity to regulate our autonomic nervous system. So we're coming back into our window of tolerance, where we can think and feel the same time and from that place, we want to notice what our contribution was, or we want to pay attention to the chain of events that occurred, we also want to use the concept of self compassion and give ourselves a type of grace that acknowledges that we are human. And for the most part, we're doing the best we can in the situation that we are in, I've also found it really helpful to ask my higher power for help with this to increase my ability to be aware and insightful, so that I can change.

Absolutely, I would also encourage people to use meditation, because I love meditation, and it's my favorite practice. One thing that's been really helpful for me is having a meditative practice helps me to reset my limbic brain. And so what that's doing is it's giving me space between some of my typical triggers, and my reactions, there's a lot of data, especially coming out of Joe Dispenza. His work and the research that his Institute has been doing for the last five years plus about actually getting into what he would say, the hard wiring of the brain, the limbic system when you're in a deep meditative state. And I have found that for myself to be completely true that it just creates enough of a gap between trigger and reaction, what a great way

of identifying that because that's, in fact, what we are aiming for. When we talk about our window of tolerance, our ability to think and feel at the same time, what we're identifying is that we want to be able to have enough space from any event that gets us going takes us into fight or flight and our response. And when we're able to do that, then we can have a more productive or if satisfying exchange with other people and with the world. And even with ourselves. I also know that one of the skills we learned early on in our family, when we started to become more aware of some of the trauma that had happened when we were in our late teens, our family started to get some guidance in this area. And one of the things that still resonates with me is taking a pause or what we would call a timeout in the conversation. And so what I still do with my kids is I'll say can we let's put a pin in this because I'm feeling very activated right now. And I don't want to overreact. No granted, sometimes I just overreact. But when I am have that space, that mental space, and I say let's take a pause and talk about this tomorrow when I've had a good night's sleep or when I'm not hungry. It always works out better when we are able to give ourselves a timeout. So the timeout in this situation that Amy's referencing is a pause that I initiate because I'm not in my window of tolerance. I'm not yelling at the person I'm engaged with that they needed to take a timeout because they're being unreasonable. And so this idea is that we continue to learn and grow and become more aware as we pay attention to our entire bodily experience, what's happening in our thoughts, what's happening in our emotions, and any body sensations that we're having. And specifically, one thing that may be helpful or a place to start is to identify one coping mechanism that you may have previously thought was healthy or adaptive but an actual Whether you may be reactive and problematic to yourself or your relationships in the long run, and when you are able to get into a place of awareness, we want to commit ourselves to just noticing without judgment, we're not there to beat ourselves up or anyone else. What we're trying to do is we're trying to increase our ability to notice our own behavior and to have the freedom to change that behavior once we see how it's impacting us and our relationships. Okay, thank

you so much for joining us. We'll see you next week. Thank you for listening to the universe's your therapist this week. If you have any questions or looking for more information, you can find us at mending trauma on Instagram, as well as mending trauma.com Our website and if you're enjoying our content, we'd love it if you could rate review and subscribe to the show. We'll see you all next week.