How to Break Generational Trauma

Table of Contents

Your Guide to Breaking The Generational Trauma Cycle

Generational trauma refers to the mental health effects of trauma passed down through families and communities. It’s also called transgenerational trauma, multigenerational trauma, or intergenerational trauma.

Your instinct might be to think, “What happened to my parents or grandparents shouldn’t affect me.” But this is not the case.

In reality, what your family, or any community you’re a part of, has been through can impact you.

It’s possible to break generational trauma. The first step is to acknowledge it. We’re here to help. Icarus Behavioral Health Nevada provides trauma-informed care, with specialists from many different walks of life here to support you.

How Can You Break Generational Trauma?

Healing generational trauma is a multifaceted process. Creating a strong support system, introspection, and changing your own habits or reactions often play a role.

Work to Understand the Trauma

Explore the ways collective trauma has impacted your family or community over time. This can include looking at the effects of traumatic events. For example, mental health issues, patterns of behavior, or tangible effects of adverse experiences (e.g., a lack of financial resources).

Acknowledge and Accept Your Feelings

Let yourself feel the emotions associated with the trauma. For example, anger, sadness, fear, or shame. Use radical acceptance to notice, but not judge, these emotions. This is important because it will help you avoid minimizing how you feel.

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Be a Cycle Breaker

Many trauma survivors find that there are cycles they want to break. Often, these cycles have passed down from one generation to another. Depending on your circumstances, breaking the cycle might include:

Learning new parenting skills.
Finding healthy ways to manage stress.
Open and honest communication.
Developing new self-care routines.

For example, if your emotions were dismissed as a child, you might work on validating your children’s feelings.

Practice Self-Care

Speaking of self-care routines, it’s important to implement habits that help you take care of your mental and physical well-being. For example, exercise, nutrition, getting enough sleep, going to therapy, and using emotion regulation techniques.

Create Healthy Boundaries

Sometimes, creating healthy boundaries is necessary for those with generational trauma. These could include any type of boundary (e.g., physical boundaries, time boundaries). Such as:

Not accepting unsolicited parenting advice.
Limiting the amount of time you spend on an activity.
Keeping information about your financial situation private.
Refraining from certain conversation topics.

Enforcing boundaries involves having a plan for what you will do if it’s crossed and communicating that plan. For example, “If you comment on my body, I will end the conversation.” Or, “If my child says no to a hug, you need to respect that, or we will leave.”

Cultivate Empathy and Form New Narratives

Especially for those with family trauma, feelings about family members and dynamics can be complex. In some cases, part of the healing process can include cultivating empathy and changing internal narratives about what happened.

This doesn’t invalidate the effects of trauma you face. Instead, it often involves balancing statements like “My parents did the best they could with the tools they had” and “I understand how that affected me and don’t want to continue the cycle.”

Seek Professional Help for Trauma

A mental health professional, like a therapist or counselor, can help you through the process of healing generational trauma. They can provide guidance and give you a confidential space to examine the effects trauma has had on you, your family, or your community.

Sometimes, people and communities have had poor experiences with professionals in the past. This can be an initial barrier to getting help for intergenerational or historical trauma. There are therapists who understand this and have been through it themselves.

It makes sense not to trust people immediately. A trauma-informed therapist will not expect you to. They will work with you to build trust over time.

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How Does Trauma-Informed Care Make a Difference for Survivors?

Trauma can affect how you experience the world, your thoughts, and your instincts. It’s vital to work with a therapist who is trauma-informed because they will understand the wide variety of effects trauma can have on a person.

If you are a survivor of generational trauma, it might be helpful to look for a therapist who understands your specific background, identity, and experiences. For example, a culturally-informed therapist.

Finding a match can take time, but it’s worth it. If a therapist doesn’t work for you for any reason, it’s okay to switch or keep looking. Perhaps, they’re not informed about a certain topic, aren’t open enough about their own views, or the type of therapy they use isn’t right for you.

Icarus Behavioral Health Nevada is passionate about helping you find an appropriate therapist. We are happy to help the people in our programs locate providers and services that meet their needs.

How Does Generational Trauma Affect Future Generations?

You might be at the part of the healing process where you’re exploring the effects generational trauma has had, whether on you, your family members, or the entire community. Here are some examples of how trauma can affect later generations.

Chronic stress. Chronic stress is common in people affected by intergenerational trauma. The physical and psychological effects of chronic stress can be serious if left untreated. This is part of why seeking help matters.
A higher risk of mental health conditions. You, your loved ones, and people in your community might be at risk of post-traumatic stress disorder, anxiety, depression, substance use disorders, or other mental health concerns.
Feelings of hopelessness. A lack of opportunities and resources, or repeated traumatization, can lead to feelings of hopelessness for persons and groups affected by generational trauma.
Unhealthy coping mechanisms (e.g., substance abuse, emotional avoidance). If left unaddressed, these are often repeated in families over multiple generations.
Feeling isolated or lonely among peers. Finding other people who have been through the same thing (e.g., through support groups or group therapy) can help with this.
You might feel hyper-alert and aware of potential threats, whether they’re real or perceived. This is an example of how significant trauma affecting communities, cultures, and families can “live in the body.”

Other effects, like fear of failure, trouble forming healthy relationships, and negative beliefs about yourself, can also occur. With help, you can overcome and manage these challenges.

What is Considered Generational Trauma?

“What is considered generational trauma?” is a common question among survivors. Generational trauma can be defined by any transmission of the effects of trauma from previous generations to subsequent generations.

Largely, past research on generational trauma focused on children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of holocaust survivors and survivors of Japanese American internment camps. Now, it has expanded to other areas, such as families of war veterans.

What are the Possible Causes of Generational Trauma?

Looking at the possible causes of generational trauma can help you identify whether it’s something that impacts you. Examples of what can cause generational trauma include:

War.
Genocide.
Natural disasters.
Racism.
Intergenerational poverty.
Serious mental or physical illness.
Cultural dislocation or forced assimilation.
Family history of substance abuse.
Discrimination.

Notably, these traumatic experiences tend to have lasting implications. They’re not a “one-off”.” For example, a natural disaster or physical illness can take a toll on a family for many years to come.

What are the Benefits of Getting Treatment for Generational Trauma?

Treatment is about more than “just talking about it.” Getting treatment for generational trauma can help you:

Address symptoms of mental disorders. Getting help for generational trauma can reduce symptoms of mental health conditions associated with the trauma, like PTSD, depression, substance use disorders, eating disorders, or anxiety.
Meet life goals. Intergenerational trauma can hinder people’s ability to meet life goals for different reasons, such as low self-esteem or a historical lack of access to resources. Treatment can help you find solutions, build confidence, and move forward with a plan.
Navigate challenges in the healing process. Some parts of the healing process aren’t easy. Therapy can help you get past hurdles that might show up along the way.
Improve interpersonal effectiveness. Trauma survivors may benefit from help with interpersonal skills, such as conflict resolution and communication skills.
Avoid repeating harmful patterns. There might be patterns of behavior or negative beliefs you do not want to pass on to the next generation (e.g., your children). This is a common goal for survivors of generational or family trauma.

During the admissions process, a staff member at Icarus Behavioral Health Nevada will conduct an intake assessment to help us gain a better understanding of your needs. Throughout treatment, we’ll help you set and work toward goals that are unique to you.

How is Generational Trauma Treated?

A trauma therapist might use a variety of different approaches to address generational trauma. The trauma therapy modalities that are best for you can depend on your goals. Types of therapy used for generational trauma survivors may include but aren’t limited to:

Trauma-focused cognitive behavioral therapy.
Dialectical behavior therapy.
Narrative therapy.
Somatic therapy.
Psychodynamic therapy.
Family therapy.

Clients at our centers get individualized treatment plans. Group therapy, peer support, individual therapy, and family therapy might be included in your treatment process. We’re here to listen and build a treatment schedule that works for you.

Turn to Icarus Nevada for Help Healing Generational Trauma

Icarus Behavioral Health Nevada is an addiction and mental health treatment center in Las Vegas providing top-rated, trauma-informed care. We take a personalized approach and go the extra mile to connect people with the professionals and services they need.

Our centers have a range of treatment programs available, including flexible outpatient programs for unresolved trauma. We’ll help you find the right fit for you.

Please call our admissions line confidentially today to learn more about how our specialists can help you break free from intergenerational trauma.

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FAQs About How to Break Generational Trauma

What is a cycle breaker in generational trauma?

A cycle breaker usually refers to the first person (or persons) to “break the cycle” of family patterns affiliated with generational trauma. This typically involves recognizing harmful patterns or dynamics and actively working not to repeat them.

How to release generational trauma from the body?

Many people find that somatic practices are helpful. For example, breathwork, mindful movement (e.g., yoga, tension-release exercises), and grounding techniques.