Ways Betrayal Trauma Alters the Mind and Body

If someone close to you ever broke your trust, you’ve likely felt betrayed. This experience leaves a painful, deep wound and makes it challenging to trust in relationships. Any betrayal can cause distress, but you may experience betrayal trauma when a person you depend on to respect your needs in a relationship and provide a safe, nurturing space violates your trust. Betrayal trauma alters the mind and body in ways that can have a long-term effect on your well-being.  

Types of Betrayal Trauma

People likely think of partner betrayal when they hear about betrayal trauma. Partner betrayal can happen when your partner engages in an affair, physically or emotionally, including when they’re addicted to sex or pornography. But betrayal trauma isn’t just the result of trust being broken in a romantic relationship. There are other types.

Betrayal trauma can originate from a relationship with a:

• Partner. Relying on this person for safety and security causes intimate partner betrayal trauma when the trust is broken through a physical or emotional affair or intentionally hiding something significant that impacts the partnership.
• Parent. Parents are expected to provide protection. When they don’t or violate trust through physical, sexual, or emotional abuse (manipulation, gaslighting, and verbal mistreatment), betrayal trauma can occur.
• Caregiver or Guardian. Similar to a parent, a caregiver provides support and safety, yet they can violate trust through physical, sexual, or emotional abuse.
• Interpersonal. Sometimes close relationships, such as a sibling or long-time friend, provide protection and safety, increasing the trust bond. If that bond breaks, it may cause betrayal trauma. 
• Organizational/Institutional. In some situations, you may depend on an organization or institution for support and safety through financial means and even their community. Breaking that trust can also result in betrayal trauma.

“Anyone you rely on and trust deeply can betray you in a way that can result in betrayal trauma,” said Laurie Hall CPC-S, PSAP, BTRL, Partner Support Program Facilitator at Begin Again Institute. “The stronger your trust was in the person, the more impact the betrayal tends to have on you.”

Betrayal trauma differs from other traumas as it includes the abuse experience and a breach of trust by someone you relied on for emotional stability, safety, and security. The trusted person may provide support through physical, mental, emotional, financial, or other security needs. 

Sometimes the person experiencing the betrayal trauma must remain secure and minimize the severity or develop dissonance, allowing them to maintain two conflicting thoughts simultaneously. Ultimately, these coping mechanisms enable the relationship to continue unchanged or without dealing with the betrayal or rebuilding trust from the foundation.

“People always wonder why a betrayed person doesn’t just remove themselves from the situation, but that isn’t always possible,” Laurie said. “Sometimes it’s not safe for the person to leave, so they must adapt until they can safely remove themselves. Other times a person can’t leave because of their age, finances, lack of outside support, health condition, or even because there are others like children involved. Unfortunately, a lot of people have no choice but to stay in harmful situations much longer than they’d like because of factors outside of their control.” 

Signs You’re Experiencing Betrayal Trauma

Trauma impacts everyone differently, and you may not experience all the signs of emotional trauma. It’s also possible that you may experience emotional trauma symptoms that aren’t listed here. Still, knowing the common signs of trauma is critical so you can decide when it’s time to remove yourself from a situation or seek help. 

Signs of betrayal trauma may include:

• Anxiety
• Depression, or feelings of hopelessness and helplessness
• Panic or anxiety attacks
• Intrusive worry or thoughts, nightmares, flashbacks, or reliving memories of when you learned of the betrayal
• Paranoia
• Hypervigilance or feeling that nothing is safe
• A sense of inadequacy or embarrassment
• Decreased self-esteem
• Inability to identify or describe your feelings and emotions
• Shame, self-blame, or decreased self-esteem
• Isolation
• Loss of personal identity
• Experiencing “fog” or feeling “out of it”
• Insomnia, trouble falling asleep, or difficulty staying asleep
• Distrust of others through 
• Being unable to make decisions or trust your decision-making
• Mood swings, including rage, confusion, and restlessness
• Withdrawing from the person or avoiding certain situations
• Denial that the trauma happened or that the person was involved
• Dissociation by separating the event from everyday life and continuing as if it didn’t happen
• Physical health problems due to stress and trauma like headaches, chronic fatigue, stomach issues, and even immune and endocrine system problems
• Alexithymia or the lack of language to convey emotions and experience

“The symptoms of betrayal trauma are broad and impactful,” Laurie said. “Trauma causes severe disruption to your life and can make you feel overwhelmed, unworthy, and like you can’t trust anyone or anything. No one should have to live with these feelings, so seeking help to process what happened to you is critical.”

How Does Trauma Alter the Mind?

Betrayal trauma, coined by Jenny Freyd in 1991, alters the mind. It impacts the brain and its natural ability to react to stress. A critical region changed by betrayal is the limbic and hippocampal regions, better known as your emotional response center and memory data bank. 

Both systems usually work in concert to instruct you on what is safe in a relationship and what you can trust as accurate. Following a betrayal, this system is upended and enters survival mode, where the limbic system acts as a fire alarm. As this system blares danger, your memory center, the hippocampus, scans memories. You may begin questioning what you thought you knew. For example, you may start to doubt whether a particular vacation was as lovely as you once thought. You may even struggle to know what was truly real in your relationship. Every memory feels dislocated and unsafe.  

As the limbic region experiences more stress over time, you may enter a prolonged state of hyper- or hypo-arousal, where your mind changes to see memories and the world as threatening. 

Everyone’s response to trauma is different. Some people may “freeze” and others may “fight or flight.” Hyperarousal in betrayal trauma resembles a heightened flight or fight response. This response may include intense anger, fear, or panic. The opposite of a hyper-aroused state, a hypo-arousal state, may resemble disconnection with your body, mind fog, memory lapses, dissociation, and emotional numbness. Prolonged experiences in either of these states can drastically alter the brain’s ability to process memory, feelings, time, location, and your ability to be present in the moment.   

A third state resulting from betrayal trauma is appeasement or people-pleasing. This state may look like you are ignoring, validating, or catering to the needs of others to preserve relationships. Ultimately, this appeasement may result in loss of identity, create resentment, and lead to experiencing more betrayal in the future.  

A person may question everything about their relationship as they respond to heightened emotional pain. As you attempt to come to grips with the betrayal, you may ruminate on details you feel like you need to know to maintain safety. Scanning calendars, phone records, and emails could become common activities. You may eventually feel like a detective in your relationship. You may question the last year, three years, 10 years, or even an entire relationship because of betrayal.

“Betrayal makes you feel like you missed something that you should have been aware of,” Laurie stated. “This feeling results in you second guessing or questioning everything. It’s extremely unsettling. Your mind does whatever it thinks is necessary to protect you from this happening again.”

Does Betrayal Trauma also Affect the Body? 

Betrayal trauma doesn’t just alter your mind. It can also affect the body. The body under duress and trauma internalizes psychological pain and may manifest it as physical complications. The stress of coping with betrayal may exacerbate any existing health complication. Taking care of yourself may become labor as you cope with the relationship’s loss of trust and security.  

“Your mind and body are connected. Everything that impacts one, effects the other,” Laurie said.

Physical symptoms you can experience include: 

• Negative body image
• Overeating or lack of appetite
• Insomnia or oversleeping 
• Heightened blood pressure 
• Aversion to intimate touch 
• Crying episodes
• Vomiting
• Hair loss
• Numbness or lack of presence in the moment 
• Nerve pain
• Gastrointestinal concerns
• Migraines
• Muscle pain or weakness
• Consistent infections
• Unexplained fevers

Are Betrayal Trauma and Stress Linked?

Betrayal trauma and stress are linked together in that everything feels stressful following a trauma. 

For those who experience betrayal, every minute seems longer. Stress occupies every second in between as you try to make sense of your world. At times, it may feel like your emotions are out of control. These emotions may disappear as easily as they came. Day-to-day tasks also may feel dangerous or disconnected. 

You may struggle with the belief that you now have to keep a secret from your loved ones, community, and support network to protect the security of your family or partner. Keeping the secret of betrayal intensifies feelings of stress. You lose opportunities for others to empathize and validate your experience. It often becomes difficult to articulate how you feel or make sense of reality following betrayal trauma.

“After experiencing trauma, you may not be able to quiet your mind,” Laurie stated. “You feel like you need to protect yourself and your loved ones while trying to make sense of what happened to you. You also may feel shame that makes you want to keep the betrayal a secret. But you shouldn’t have to go through betrayal alone. You didn’t do anything wrong, and you deserve to be supported during this difficult time of healing.” 

How Can You Get Help for Betrayal Trauma?

Healing from betrayal trauma begins when you recognize what happened and its impact. It’s essential to understand how betrayal alters your mind and body and how many of those responses are outside of your control. 

Betrayal trauma can cause mental and physical changes that need healing. Finding support is vital to start the healing process while rebuilding your trust. Seek support from loved ones you can trust and lean on them as you recover from the betrayal trauma. It may be difficult, but working on your health must come first to allow your mind and body to heal.

Your healing journey must focus on identifying triggers that cause the physical and mental signs of betrayal trauma to resurface. Working with a mental health professional allows you space to focus on your healing first. Then you can decide what is best for your health and well-being. If you choose to stay with a partner who betrayed you, consider working with a therapist and writing an impact statement as part of your path to healing.

How BAI Can Help

In addition to working with a mental health professional, working with a support group may also provide another way to bolster recovery. Begin Again Institute offers a partner support program for those involved in betrayal trauma. We also have a 5-Day Partner Intensive for those who want to do more work toward healing. Working as part of a group can provide additional support to a mental health professional and provide different perspectives as you work to rebuild trust in yourself and others.

Your pathway to build trust in yourself begins today. Contact us to learn more about betrayal trauma and treatment options.