The Long Shadow of Childhood Trauma in Men

Early experiences of neglect, emotional unavailability, abuse, or inconsistent caregiving can have a profound impact on brain development and the body’s stress-response system. For men in Sydney and beyond, these formative relational wounds may contribute to insecure attachment styles (Bowlby, 1988; Mikulincer & Shaver, 2007), such as:

1. Avoidant Attachment: Appearing self-sufficient, but avoiding closeness due to fear of vulnerability.
2. Anxious Attachment: Craving intimacy but fearing abandonment or rejection.
3. Disorganised Attachment: A mix of both fear and longing, often rooted in unpredictable or traumatic parenting.

These attachment patterns don’t just affect romantic relationships—they shape friendships, emotional expression, and one’s sense of self.

How Childhood Trauma Manifests in Adulthood

Men who have unresolved trauma may experience:

1. Difficulty trusting others
2. Emotional suppression or alexithymia (difficulty identifying feelings)
3. Anger outbursts or numbness
4. Relationship avoidance or toxic dependency
5. Addiction, perfectionism, or compulsive overworking
6. Chronic anxiety, depression, or rumination

Many men in Sydney carry these patterns unknowingly, believing “this is just how I am.” In therapy, we explore where these behaviours come from—and how they once helped you survive.

Therapeutic Approaches at Our Sydney Counselling Services for Men

Christian Acuña draws from a range of evidence-based modalities to support healing and personal growth for men:

• Cognitive Behavioural Therapy (CBT) to identify and restructure limiting beliefs and thought loops.
• Existential Psychotherapy to explore meaning, purpose, isolation, and freedom.
• Attachment-Based Therapy to revisit formative relationship patterns with compassion and understanding.

When traditional talk therapy isn’t enough to resolve deeply rooted trauma, somatic-based approaches offer powerful alternatives. These therapies recognise that trauma is stored not only in the mind but also in the body and nervous system. At Counselling and Psychotherapy Services for Men in Sydney, Christian Acuña integrates these methods to support men in healing emotional pain at a physiological and cellular level.

Somatic Therapies: Healing Beyond Words

Trauma isn’t just stored in memory—it’s encoded in the body. Christian incorporates the following somatic and experiential methods when clients need to go deeper than talk therapy alone:

1. Brainspotting

Developed by David Grand, this approach uses the visual field to locate “brainspots”—eye positions connected to traumatic experiences. Brainspotting allows deep access to subcortical brain activity and helps process trauma stored in the body. It’s especially beneficial for clients who tend to intellectualise their pain or struggle with structured protocols.  It is especially useful for men who intellectualise or resist structured protocols, allowing quiet, profound processing without the need to “explain” everything verbally.

“We’re going to follow where your eyes naturally land when we think about this feeling—and just stay with it gently.”

2. Internal Family Systems (IFS) & Somatic IFS

IFS views the psyche as a constellation of parts—such as protectors, exiles, and managers. Trauma often creates rigid roles within this internal system. Christian uses IFS to help clients unblend from self-critical or hypervigilant parts, creating space for healing. Somatic IFS includes body awareness to ground the process and address how parts show up physically (e.g., tightness in the chest or jaw). IFS helps clients unblend from protective or wounded parts (e.g., the inner critic, the ruminator, the abandoned child) and reestablish internal harmony. Somatic IFS adds body tracking and breathwork, helping these parts feel safe in the body.

“Let’s check in with the part that’s always scanning… what does it want to say?”

3. Sensorimotor Psychotherapy

Founded by Pat Ogden, this method combines somatic awareness with attachment theory to gently process trauma through body movements, posture, and sensation. It’s ideal for men who feel “stuck” even when they intellectually understand their patterns, offering a route to healing through embodiment rather than analysis.Trauma often lives in micro-movements, posture, and breath. Sensorimotor techniques explore how the body holds survival responses—fight, flight, freeze—when clients struggle to access emotions cognitively.

“Notice what your body does when we talk about your breakup. What’s happening in your shoulders?”

4. Havening Techniques

This psychosensory modality involves self-soothing touch while recalling distressing events. It works by generating delta brain waves, calming the nervous system and reducing the emotional charge of traumatic memories. Havening can be used independently between sessions, giving clients a sense of agency in regulating their emotions. It helps regulate the nervous system and calm obsessive thinking, offering a simple self-regulation tool.

“Would you like to try something you can do anytime to soothe your nervous system—even outside therapy?”

5. Coherence Therapy

Coherence Therapy identifies and then “disconfirms” emotional truths (e.g., “I don’t matter” or “I have to be perfect”) that keep trauma alive. When brought into conscious awareness and paired with new emotional experiences, it can enable memory reconsolidation—the neural erasure of a symptom’s root cause (Ecker et al., 2012).

“What emotional truth does your brain keep going back to, even when your logic says it’s not true?”

6. EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitisation and Reprocessing)

Originally developed by Francine Shapiro, EMDR helps reprocess traumatic memories by using bilateral stimulation (eye movements, tapping, or sounds). This technique enables the brain to ‘unstick’ from past trauma and respond differently to triggers. EMDR is particularly effective for PTSD, complex trauma, and intrusive rumination. Clients often report that, after EMDR, distressing memories feel more distant or less emotionally charged.

Each of these methods helps bypass the cognitive defences that can stall healing and instead work through the nervous system, fostering long-term change from the inside out.

Why These Approaches Work

All of these methods support memory reconsolidation, nervous system regulation, and deep embodied awareness—three crucial elements for trauma resolution (van der Kolk, 2014; Porges, 2011; Ecker et al., 2012). Clients release survival strategies and learn to feel safe, loved, and connected—often for the first time.

About Christian Acuña & His Practice in Surry Hills, Sydney

Christian Acuña is a qualified psychotherapist and counsellor with over a decade of experience helping men overcome trauma, anxiety, and relational difficulties. His Surry Hills practice in Sydney provides a supportive space for men to explore vulnerability, strengthen resilience, and cultivate healthier, more meaningful relationships.

If you’re a man in Sydney seeking help for childhood trauma or men’s mental health issues, book your first session at
www.counsellingformen.com.au
or call 0415 237 494.

References

• Bowlby, J. (1988). A Secure Base: Parent-Child Attachment and Healthy Human Development.
• Mikulincer, M. & Shaver, P. R. (2007). Attachment in Adulthood: Structure, Dynamics, and Change.
• Ecker, B., Ticic, R., & Hulley, L. (2012). Unlocking the Emotional Brain: Eliminating Symptoms at Their Roots Using Memory Reconsolidation.
• Grand, D. (2013). Brainspotting: The Revolutionary New Therapy for Rapid and Effective Change.
• Ogden, P., Minton, K., & Pain, C. (2006). Trauma and the Body: A Sensorimotor Approach to Psychotherapy.
• Porges, S. W. (2011). The Polyvagal Theory: Neurophysiological Foundations of Emotions, Attachment, Communication, and Self-regulation.
• Shapiro, F. (2018). Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) Therapy: Basic Principles, Protocols, and Procedures.
• van der Kolk, B. (2014). The Body Keeps the Score: Brain, Mind, and Body in the Healing of Trauma.
• Cramer, P., & Jones, C. J. (2023). Adverse Childhood Experiences and Personality Development. Journal of Research in Personality.