signs of complex trauma in adults

Most of the people I work with in my Manhattan therapy practice do not walk into the first session and say “I think I have complex trauma.”

They walk in and say things like this. My relationships never seem to work out even when they start well. I am successful at my job but I hate myself in a way I cannot explain. I feel anxious constantly and I do not know what I am anxious about. I cannot fall asleep because my mind will not stop. I love the people in my life but I feel numb when I am with them. Something inside me is broken and I do not know how to name it.

That is complex trauma. That is what it sounds like from the inside. It rarely announces itself the way people expect trauma to announce itself. It rarely feels like a single, terrible event. It feels like a hum. A low, background pattern of dysregulation that has been with you for so long you thought it was you.

I am Jessica Esposito, LCSW, an EMDR-certified therapist in Manhattan who specializes in complex trauma. This article is for the person who has been reading, and researching, and wondering. If any of what follows sounds like your inside life, that is worth taking seriously.