Trauma and Your Brain: It Isn’t Just All in Your Head

Your brain is one of the greatest supercomputers put here on earth. It consists of a network of approximately 100 billion neurons that process and organize information. It is so fast at doing so, it produces between 18 and 640 trillion electrical impulses every second. This network precisely encodes and stores your experiences and memories, which ultimately make you unique.

But what happens when shock or trauma disrupts your life? How can shock or trauma linger in the mind and body thereby impacting your health for years?

The answer is that trauma leaves a real, physical imprint on your mind and body. It changes how memory storage is processed, and it changes your brain.

Untreated trauma can negatively impact your health for years. The emotional and physical impact can increase your risk of serious health conditions including heart attack, stroke, obesity, diabetes, and cancer, according to Harvard Medical School research.

In addition, the risk of developing serious health conditions increases if you experience more traumatic events over your life. “For example, your risk for problems is much higher if you’ve had three or more negative experiences, called adverse childhood experiences (ACEs),” says Harvard research scientist Andrea Roberts.