Tag Archives: healing

What are you giving up for lent ?

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Triggered by Family at Christmas and Now Easter with the Family-Why Family Hurts:

Have you ever walked into your family home for the holidays and felt yourself slipping back
into old patterns—people-pleasing, shutting down, overreacting—even when you thought
you’d grown past them? You’re not alone, and more importantly, you’re not imagining it.
That phone call from your mother that shouts at you, Fix me! It’s all your fault! If you really loved me! You’re selfish and ungrateful!

You’ve just got over Xmas! That feeling of dread of being small again, uncertainty, not being
motivated-stuck, being told off for not doing enough for your family members, even though
they only contact you when they need you to fix something, scapegoated again?

The Neurology of Family of Origin Triggers

It’s not just psychological—it’s neurological. When you return to childhood environments,
familiar voices, smells, and even the layout of rooms can activate dormant emotional
pathways in your limbic system. Your brain essentially pulls up old programming, triggering
survival patterns (schemas) that you developed years ago, even if they no longer serve you today.

Think of it like this: your brain has been storing memories and emotional responses since
childhood, creating neural pathways that were designed to help you navigate your family
environment. When you step back into that same environment—same dining room table,
same family dynamics, same roles everyone expects you to play—your brain automatically
retrieves those old patterns. It’s doing what it was designed to do: prepare you for what itexpects based on your past experiences and perceptions.

The challenge is that you’ve grown and changed. You’ve done the work. You’ve developed
new ways of thinking, responding, and being in the world. But your brain doesn’t always get
the memo when you walk through that familiar doorway to your childhood experiences.

How to Remain Grounded in Who You Are Now

The good news? You can stay anchored in your present identity. In this post, I share
practical, science-backed tools to interrupt those old scripts and keep control of these
automatic early schemas, even when your environment tries to pull you back into the past.
You’ll learn why childhood environments trigger survival patterns in adulthood, how familiar
sensory cues activate your limbic system, and most importantly, what you can do about it. I
walk you through a practical framework that you can implement—along with simple
strategies you can use before, during, and after family visits to avoid emotional regression.

These aren’t just coping mechanisms. They’re tools for rewiring your brain’s automatic
reactions so you can show up as your authentic self, not the version of you that your familyremembers from years ago.


The 5-Steps to manage family holidays

Situation: Feeling triggered or regressing to old patterns during family holiday visits, usethese grounding strategies.


Step 1: Identify Triggers

Notice when your body signals that an old pattern has been activated e.g. tension in your
shoulders, headaches, anger rising, or the urge to withdraw. Recognize familiar triggers: a
specific comment or tone of voice, the smell from the kitchen, people over-indulging in
alcohol, or standing in a certain room in the family home. Ask yourself: “What am I feeling right now? What triggered this reaction?”


Step 2: Reflect on your automatic negative beliefs

Explore why this moment activated you. What old survival pattern is trying to take
over—people-pleasing, shutting down, or snapping back? Remind yourself: “This response
belonged to my younger self during family conflict when I felt threatened or responsible. I
am my adult self now and the threat is not so big now.” Consider what unresolved memory
(maladaptive schema) from your past is being replayed and the associated sensations,thoughts, and emotions.


Step 3: Write them down

Journal or voice-note your observations. Write down: the specific trigger (e.g., “Mum’s tone
when she asked about my career or the kids”), your automatic reaction (e.g., “I felt small,
insignificant, judged and wanted to defend myself”), your child part is responding because
deep memories or schemas have been triggered. Now, try to consider an alternative
response aligned with your present-day adult self (e.g., “I can calmly acknowledge her
question without being defensive, over-explaining or being upset”).


Step 4: Dispute your Automatic Negative Belief

Review what you’ve written and identify the pattern. Ask: “Is this reaction serving who I am
now?” “Does my reaction align with my values.” Notice how your body feels as you consider
a new, chosen response. Visualize yourself using your anchor phrase (“I’m the adult version
of me or I am worthy and capable”) and responding from your present identity (I’m OK as Iam) instead of your past programming (I’m not good enough).


Step 5: Formulate an Accepting Belief & Take Action

Create your new action plan. Choose a physical anchor (touching your ear or a piece of
jewellery, adjusting posture, taking a deep breath) and pair it with a neutral self-talk
response phrase like “I felt triggered, but I can handle it”, “I’m not 10 anymore”, “It’s OK, I
am enough.” This will help to ground you in the present and strengthen your own voice and
confidence. Practice this combination often, so it’s ready when the trigger appears. Committo using your anchor in the moment to give your prefrontal cortex time to re-engage before
responding, rather than reacting with your sub-conscious memories or schemas which arehard wired into our autonomic nervous system.

This Easter holidays, you don’t have to slip back into your child self or who you used to be.
You don’t have to brace yourself for conflict or shut down to survive. With the right tools
and an understanding of what’s happening in your autonomic nervous system, you can
show up as the person you’ve become—grounded, intentional, and more mindful andcompassionate about your early (childhood) schemas.


This Easter Holiday Can Be Different

The holidays can be a time of genuine connection rather than survival mode. It starts with
understanding your brain, autonomic nervous system and giving yourself the tools tomanage it effectively.

Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model

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The Adaptive Information Processing (AIP) model explains how unprocessed traumatic memories disrupt normal brain function and contribute to psychological distress, while memory reconsolidation is a biological process that can update and integrate these problematic memories, leading to a reduction in symptoms. The AIP model, a core component of EMDR therapy, suggests that traumatic experiences lead to maladaptively stored memories that trigger distressing thoughts, feelings, and physical sensations when encountered. By
activating the brain’s inherent capacity to process information, techniques like EMDR can facilitate memory reconsolidation, allowing these old memories to be updated with new information and thus become less disruptive.  This model states that, under normal circumstances, memories consolidate into adaptive networks. However, trauma can create “pathogenic” or dysfunctional memories that hinder this process. 


Maladaptive Storage: 
These unprocessed, maladaptive memories, which include the original cognitive, emotional, and somatic components of the traumatic event, remain “stuck”. 
Re-experiencing: 
When a current experience links to an unresolved memory, it triggers the full sensory and emotional components of the past event, leading to dysfunctional reactions in the present. 
Memory Reconsolidation A Biological Process: 
Memory reconsolidation is the biological process by which retrieved memories become temporarily unstable and are updated with new information before being stored again. 
Reducing Prediction Error: 
The brain seeks to reduce uncertainty by updating memories, minimizing future “prediction errors” (mismatches between what was expected and what happened). 

Updating Traumatic Memories: 
When traumatic memories are retrieved during therapy, they enter a labile state, allowing them to be updated and integrated with more adaptive information, thus reducing their emotional charge and disruptive impact. 
Connection to EMDR Therapy
EMDR’s Mechanism: 
EMDR therapy utilizes the AIP model to understand that trauma creates obstacles to information processing in the prefrontal cortex. 
Bilateral Stimulation: 
The bilateral stimulation (e.g., eye movements) in EMDR helps to activate the brain’s processing system, allowing for the re-evaluation and re-consolidation of these pathogenic memories. 
Resolving Symptoms: 
By supporting memory reconsolidation, EMDR therapy helps to transform these dysfunctional memories, resolving the associated symptoms of trauma and leading to a more adaptive and whole perspective.