The Emotional Washing Machine

(8 min read)

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Or what it feels like to live with trauma and experience emotional flashbacks

 

“Trauma is not remembered, it is relived… We tend to think of trauma as an illness of the past, but trauma is not an illness of the past. Trauma is an illness of not being fully alive in the present moment.”

Bessel Van der Kolk

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Imagine a washing machine. A very special washing machine. It looks just like the one you have at home for doing your laundry. The mechanics are the same and yet, something is different. Its programmes are not what you’d expect. Instead of considering the kind of fabrics that are to be washed, they are based on the individual emotional experiences from the past of the machine's owner. So your washing machine will look exactly like mine, but it works differently and so your experience with it will be unique.

The other day, a dear friend of mine said something to me that, within a split second, connected me with one of my childhood traumas. Without this connection to the past, I would probably have brushed those words aside or not taken them so much to heart as I did. It was not really about the fact that he said what he said, but rather about the fact that his words combined with the situation I was in, activated an emotional charge that I was carrying inside. And so, this small comment tossed me into my own Emotional Washing Machine of reliving traumas, shut the doors behind my back, chose the programme suitable for that day and hit the start button. I had no choice in the matter. My body and brain were being hijacked by protective mechanisms against exactly these situations that I acquired when I was a small child.

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So there I was, stunned at first, trying to figure out what just happened and somehow numb with surprise. Then the programme started and the real flashback journey began. Instead of only referring to this one situation of mine, I’d like to give you a more general idea of the structure of such a flashback programme:

 

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1st cycle: water coming in

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After a first moment of surprise and shock, the emotions start welling up inside. Incredulity mixes with all sorts of emotions like anger, sadness, hurt, fear and whatever is connected to a specific triggering situation. Right there in cycle 1, I am still trying rationally process or stop anything coming up by telling myself that the situation doesn’t deserve such a strong reaction, that I must be overreacting. Another coping mechanism is trying to ignore it or talk myself out of even making it a big deal. With the rising level of the water coming in, however, my inner vision becomes blurred and I question my own reality. Did this really happen? Am I imagining things? Usually I spend a lot of time shaking my head in that cycle, trying to make sense of all those feelings and thoughts.

 

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2nd cycle: whirling about and soaking

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In this cycle I usually find myself loosing the last grip I had on logic and rationality and the emotions take over. My head is spinning and my mind is going around in circles while I am tumbling about inside the wash drum. My body hurts as I create a lot of tension, bracing myself for the internal fight that’s about to happen next. Usually, at that stage, I am still not able to really define what I am feeling until the washing cycles are activated. Each washing cycle is dedicated to a specific emotion and focusses on feeling it all in order to release it. If I take the example of the situation I described above, the cycles were the following:

 

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3rd cycle: washing cycles

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• anger/rage

• frustration

• sadness/grief

• anxiety/panic

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Sometimes these sub-cycles run one after the other and are clearly distinguishable, at other times they overlap or are even repeated in what seems to me a random order until every emotion has been felt in its entirety and released completely. You can imagine it as an internal debate between my different protective mechanisms, each wanting to be heard and respected. There is another washing cycle that I have not added to the list above, because it is different from the others. In its very own way, it actually gives us a break from being washed from head to toe and feeling everything so intensely. The wash drum stops rotating for a while, until we have recovered enough strength to continue the journey. No movement, no sound, just absolute stillness and darkness and the heaviness of being soaked like a weighted blanket pressing us to the ground. This break in form of deep rest is called depression. (Disclaimer: Depression can have many causes, so I will focus only on how I see depression as something positive and helpful in this specific context of emotional flashbacks.)

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For how long these dynamics last depends very much on the tools I have at hand, how much external support I have in form of therapy or trauma-informed or at least trauma-curious friends and family members and also on how well I can observe and compassionately support myself, which has all changed noticeably over the last decade. Please feel free to add to this list anything that feels true to YOU and which is part of your own healing process and support system.
 

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4th cycle: the rinsing cycle

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Once the 3rd cycle has had enough time to reach a point in which the waters that are leaving the washing machine are clear enough to start giving me a good rinse, fresh water will come flowing in. This fresh water represents insights, comprehensions, “connecting dots”, memories that had been supressed and now help me understand my automatic responses and voices in my head. It also stands for external validation and, in case this is true, realizing that my body, mind and nervous system are actually “just” remembering what happened in the past and had overwhelmed me back then to the point of becoming traumatized and that the circumstances in the present moment are different. I am saying “in case this is true”, because it could also be that I am being triggered by a situation that is indeed equal to the traumatizing event in the past and needs to be treated as exactly that: another traumatizing event.

 

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5th cycle: the spinning cycle

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Having insights and connecting dots can be a big breakthrough and painful at the same time. Sometimes it puts my whole world or reality upside down. I start asking questions that have never come up before. I feel the need to figure out what to do with all this information that I received during the process and how to integrate it into my life. This can be creating confusion and clarity, be beneficial and painful, energizing and tiring all at once.

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In this cycle I always tell myself that what feels like a rollercoaster in the beginning, will eventually slow down and come to the standstill that I have longed for.

 

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6th cycle: waiting and resting

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It always takes a few minutes until a washing machine deactivates the door locking mechanism and allows us to take out the washing. There is nothing we can possibly do unless we are willing to use a great external force which will invariably cause a lot of damage. In this story, these idle minutes are a good time for checking in with myself, for going inside and observing, of practicing patience. Sometimes, however, and this is also a very valid option of self-care, I decide to find an activity that nurtures my soul and thus gives me a healthy distraction from everything I just went through. A moment to take a breath, before interacting again with the that part of the outside world which is full of possible triggers for me.

 

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After the programme has finished:

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Once the door opens and I am free to take out the washing (body and mind), it is important to hang it out to dry and possibly do so outside in fresh air and sunshine. And fresh air and sunshine could mean reconnecting to people I couldn’t connect with during my time in the machine, talking to those involved in the triggering situation in a calm and healthy way if it is my desire to do so and catching up on anything else that I neglected. Steering clear of any known triggers until the washing is completely dry is also a must for me. My whole being still remembers the journey through the Emotional Washing Machine and I am not yet “dry” enough to expose myself willingly to challenging situations. Actively deciding what I am willing to expose myself to and what not feels incredibly empowering to me.

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Maybe you know what clothes smell like when they have been folded and put away still slightly damp. In this comparison the bad smell could translate into an elevated level of reactiveness, resentment and maybe even passive aggressive behaviours.

 

If you can relate to all of this, I really want to emphasize that you do NOT consciously choose to have emotional flashbacks. Although you may feel guilty or ashamed about being tossed into the Emotional Washing Machine every so often and “making a big deal out of something”, you are not to blame. The programmes of your Emotional Washing Machine are based on your upbringing, the hardship you had to deal with in life and the resources you had to do so. Also, once one of these programmes is running, the only way to stop it is to activate unhealthy coping mechanism like dissociation, addiction or denial. Although they bring us momentary relief and are an effective way of surviving in some surroundings and situations, unfortunately they will not lead to healing and may even be distructive and bring a different kind of pain to our lives.

 

What you can choose, once you acquired all the knowledge around your own washing machine, is how you deal with it, how you interact with others while going through the cycles and how much kindness you can show yourself during this incredibly intense experience. Here are some questions that may be helpful to ask yourself:

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• Who do I feel safe to interact with while being washed?

• Would I like to take a step back, pause and observe, before reacting or talking about it?

• If I react now, will I regret it late? Can I keep myself from reacting, e.g. lashing out at others? Can I be compassionate with myself if I can’t yet do it?

• How do I feel in each cycle?

• What are the voices in my head telling me? Who do these voices belong to? From which time in my past do they speak from? Do I agree with them?

• What is going on inside my body? What do I need right now, right there? Can I create it for yourself or do I need to ask for help?

• Have I learned something last time that I can actively remember and use this time?

• What tools and external support are available to me right now?

• How long does each programme take (hours, days or even weeks?) and what does it depend on?

 

Some of the tools that help me a lot are the right therapy, active somatics or any type of conscious bodywork, journaling, movement, nature, EMDR, co-regulation with a supportive human being, practicing assertiveness, educating myself and sharing that knowledge with anyone who is sincerely interested, and many, many more. Everybody is different and everybody’s past is different, so there is a mix of tools and types of therapy just right for ME and others that are just right for YOU.

 

With a lot of practice, self-observation and self-compassion, we learn to shorten the time that the programmes need to run. Like in a computer programme, the one in our brain can be rewritten. Often, we need these Emotional Washing Machine moments to show us which part of our neural programming needs attention and rewriting. So even though it is really tough, we can see the experience as the fundament on which we can build another part of a healthier tomorrow. Step by baby step.

Be kind to yourself. Always.