7 Things People Often Get Wrong About Trauma

How to cut through misperceptions and begin to understand trauma.

Posted May 1, 2026 | Reviewed by Margaret Foley

There's a lot of information out there about trauma these days. Worldwide, search interest for the word trauma tripled between 2015 and 2026 (Google, 2025). Surveys of the general population have also shown that almost 80 percent of adults living in the United States have experienced at least one major trauma (Briere & Scott, 2024).

In the broadening discussions that surround trauma, there has also been a semantic dilution of the word itself in mainstream social channels. But, for the purposes of this post, I'll lean on the definition provided by researchers Briere and Scott (2024), who define a traumatic event as one that overwhelms an individual’s internal resource state and yields extensive psychological distress.

Here are seven aspects of trauma that are commonly misunderstood.

1. Trauma isn't just psychological, it's physical [" They just need to change their thinking ."]

Telling someone to just change their thinking is like telling someone with a broken leg to just decide to walk normally. Although the intention is there, the body won't comply. I understand through my encounters with clients how trauma isn't simply relegated to the mind, but can exist in the body. It disrupts the homeostasis of internal systems. For instance, the nervous system , the very mechanism that governs how our body processes and responds to the world around us, may be thrown into a state of tremendous dysregulation. Traumatic experience itself often gets "stuck" in the body. This is why trauma may manifest within the survivor with real physical symptoms (Josephson et al., 2025). Trauma can show up in the body as elevated cortisol levels, temperature spikes (psychogenic fever), body aches, and cardiovascular strain. Thus, reorienting the body to feel safe again is part of the healing journey.

2. Not everyone is ready to tell their story, and that is OK. [" Why aren't they saying anything? "]

Trauma is complicated in ways that go well beyond the experience itself. It can be so devastating that it strips away a person's ability to articulate what has happened to them. Someone impacted by trauma may not have the inner emotional capacity to tell their story, nor the means of control. Some survivors may seek to protect family or friends from potential reactivity by remaining quiet, or may fear the re-experiencing trauma in their retelling. This can be misinterpreted as evasion or guilt . Sharing this kind of experience requires readiness, stabilization, and a felt sense of safety. The act of "telling" someone itself can be frightening, deeply activating, risking egregious judgment, and more, while threatening an already fragile equilibrium (Briere & Scott, 2024).

3. People may push away the very support they need. [" Why won't they let me help them? "]

For many, trauma imparts the act of reclamation of self amidst the living process. The survivor may seek to protect themselves from further perceived persecutory introjects (antagonizers). In fact, many survivors may view resource systems as persecutory, judgmental, biased, unsympathetic, and stigmatizing, creating more harm than good (Patterson et al., 2009). Caregivers who want to help may feel pushed away and disconnected. Patience, trust, and presence become the more important currency. Directive or unsolicited advice can be experienced as another loss of control and autonomy.

4. Behaviors after trauma may look random, but they aren't. [" They don't act like they did before. "]

The person you knew before the trauma is still there, but their mind and body are now organizing around having survived. This adaptive behavior may show up as activated at times, in uncharacteristic bursts of anger that seem disproportionate to the situation, or avoidant, such as an emotional flatness, withdrawal, or even exaggerated calm. The activated end can show through heightened anxiety , rage moments, or quickened impulsivity, where the avoidant end may demonstrate through numbness, denial , dissociation, or thought suppression, sometimes visible in sudden lapses in conversation, or an indifference expressed to what happened. This can be particularly confusing for loved ones, but none of this is random, and it is the nervous system doing what it was built to do, attempting to process and protect (Briere & Scott, 2024).

5. Trauma isn't the final word by any means. [" I'm afraid nothing will change. "]

Evidence actually points to the potential for real and positive post-traumatic growth (PTG) following trauma, not just for survivors, but also for those closest who have experienced vicarious affect exposure (Faggi et al., 2026). Deliberate reflection on the experience and its meaning is another significant factor. Growth doesn't happen from attempting to help someone restore old beliefs about safety, fairness, and identity , but rather, from rebuilding a more complex and strategic worldview imbued with cognitive flexibility. The person's own narrative capacity, emotional regulation , openness to change, self-disclosure, and optimism or hope are also huge factors in a person's growth (Noushad et al., 2025). Post-traumatic growth doesn't mean the pain goes away. A person may also be growing and still suffering during growth. This is something many don't understand.

6. A survivor's trauma may begin to show up in those closest to them. [ "I know this happened to them, but I'm starting to feel it too. "]

We, too, can hurt for loved ones, where our empathy is challenged by the pain we see, and a loved one may begin to over-identify with the survivor symptomatically. Those closest to the survivor are often unprepared for the emotional load that comes with being supportive and can be caught off guard by their own vulnerabilities in the process. Rather than co-regulating, they can become so enmeshed that they mirror similar symptoms (Butt et al., 2026). This is what is known as secondary traumatic stress (STS), and it can often mirror PTSD , showing up as intrusive thoughts, avoidance behaviors, and hyper-vigilance. What tends to drive this phenomenon is the interpersonal transmission that occurs when someone deeply wants to help a friend or loved one, but instead absorbs the weightedness of the experience without monitoring their own reactivity.

7. Establishing safety is not about righting the wrong. [" I'm going to fix this! "]

Loved ones often try to find a "sense of justice." In doing so, they take away the survivor's self-agency and pile fears and concerns onto the very person who needs their support. In the process, loved ones risk causing indeterminable harm. Research tells us that re-establishing safety is what matters most. That means being present and sometimes simply sitting with them, going for a walk with them, holding a hand, or giving a hug, not the "fix it" attitude.

Trauma is rarely what people assume it to be, and that gap in understanding is exactly where compassion begins, both with ourselves and with the ones we love.

Briere, J. N., & Scott, C. (2024). Principles of Trauma Therapy (3rd ed.). SAGE Publications, Inc. (US).

Butt, M. K., Šalakaitė, R., Grigutytė, N., & Eimontas, J. (2026). “I am hurting because they are hurting”: a qualitative study of secondary traumatic stress among Lithuanian professionals working with war-affected refugees. European Journal of Trauma & Dissociation, 10(2), 100678. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejtd.2026.100678

Cadogan, C., Joffe, H., Fleischer, K., & O’Connor, C. (2026). What comes to mind when you hear the term “trauma”? A qualitative study of social representations of trauma in Ireland. SSM - Mental Health, 9, 100592. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ssmmh.2026.100592

Faggi, D., Aprea, G., & Fioretti, C. (2026). Vicarious post-traumatic growth in health professionals facing their patients’ end of life. European Journal of Trauma & Dissociation, 10 (1), 100646. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ejtd.2026.100646

Google Trends. (2025). Trauma Trends. Retrieved May 20, 2025, from https://trends.google.com/trends/explore?date=all&q=trauma&hl=en

Josephson, B. L., Gattario, K. H., Kling, J., & Piran, N. (2025). “My body is not mine”: A mixed methods study on trauma and the experience of embodiment. Body Image, 55, 101986. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bodyim.2025.101986

Patterson, D., Greeson, M., & Campbell, R. (2009). Understanding Rape Survivors’ Decisions Not to Seek Help from Formal Social Systems. Health & Social Work, 34 (2), 127–136. https://doi.org/10.1093/hsw/34.2.127

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Rodney Luster, Ph.D. , is a higher education administrator, entrepreneur, and healthcare practitioner who maintains a private practice as a licensed professional counselor with his own company called Inspirethought.

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This article is part of the Bringwise Psychology Journal — daily insights on human behavior, mental health, and personal growth.