Excerpted from Feel to Heal: Releasing Trauma Through Body Awareness and Breathwork Practice
By Giten Tonkov
©2019
It’s easy to agree that a “bad day” is different from “trauma,” and that “trauma” is a term that’s reserved for people who have experienced something very unusual. However, research across the world shows that the experiencing of traumatic events is more common—and “routine”—than we would like to think. Trauma statistics are available from many sources worldwide, and they paint a startling picture. According to the National Center for Injury Prevention and Control (NCIPC), a division of the U.S.’s Centers for Disease Control, trauma is the number-one cause of death for people aged 1 to 46, and is the most likely reason to shorten a person’s life before the age of 75. “Trauma” in this reference can mean physical and burn injuries; intentional trauma, such as suicide or assault; and unintentional accidents, collisions, falls, drownings, and poisonings.