Why Unreleased Trauma keeps Triggering you

Trauma doesn't just sit in oyur mind it’s also in your body.

If your past feels “dealt with” but certain reactions still take over, or your body constantly aches and crashes this could be a sign your trauma was never fully released.

✔️ You’ve processed the story — but your body still flinches at the tone of someone’s voice.

✔️ You’ve tried to move on but the fatigue, the migraines, the tight jaw, the heavy chest… they linger.

✔️ You’re doing your best but you still find yourself shutting down, snapping, or numb without warning.

When we aren’t able to fully experience and release a traumatic event, the survival energy gets stuck in the body and keeps firing off signals long after the danger has passed. That’s why it doesn’t matter how well you understand it. If the body doesn’t feel safe, the system stays on high alert.

I use simple but powerful practices that let the nervous system finally complete what it didn’t get to finish to help clients release what their body has been carrying. Specifically, conscious connected breathwork and TRE (Trauma Releasing Exercises)

Here is the science around how conscious connected breathwork releases trauma

Breath + Brain: What Happens

1. Shutting down the mind-chatter network (DMN)

   • The Default Mode Network (DMN) is the brain’s “autopilot” for self-reflection, rumination, and replaying old worries. Breathwork, especially conscious, connected styles, quietens DMN activity by shifting your brainwaves from beta (busy) into alpha–theta zones 

   • This temporary “brain silence” allows deeper parts of the mind to surface, memories, emotions, even buried trauma, into consciousness so you can process and release them

2. Releasing Built-Up Charge

   • Trauma, anxiety, and chronic stress often leave an energetic residue in the body, particularly around brainstem/somatic centres, which isn't cleared through talking alone

   • Conscious breathwork increases oxygen flow and gentle internal stress, helping to mobilise this stored energy so it can finally move out of the nervous system and be released 

3. Rebalancing the Autonomic Nervous System

• Slow, rhythmic breathing enhances parasympathetic (rest-and-digest) tone, directly lowering heart rate and arousal, and indirectly calming DMN activity

• This shift lets you move out of survival mode and into a calmer state, making it easier for your system to process what it’s been holding rather than stay “stuck” in high alert.

When your body gets to complete the story, you finally get to move on.

🤍 Triggers lose their grip🤍 Pain softens, sleep returns🤍 Energy rebuilds🤍 You feel more yourself than you have in years

If you are interested in exploring conscious connected breathwork as a way of releasing past trauma, please ensure you approach a registered and trained breathwork coach. Check if their course was approved by the Global Professional Breathwork Alliance.