Complex Trauma & C-PTSD Therapy in Fort Collins, Colorado
Healing childhood, attachment, and relational trauma that continues to show up in adulthood
You don’t have to keep carrying the past into the present. Therapy can help you understand what happened, heal what still hurts, and create a more connected, grounded, and fulfilling life.
“It wasn’t one big event — it was a childhood where my needs often weren’t seen.”
What is Complex Trauma (C-PTSD)?
Complex trauma, or Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (C-PTSD), can develop from repeated or ongoing experiences of relational harm, abuse, neglect, instability, or a lack of emotional safety – often beginning in childhood. Unlike single-incident trauma, complex trauma usually happens over time, typically in the context of important relationships, and can deeply impact how you see yourself, others, and the world.
When trauma doesn't look like "trauma"
Complex trauma isn’t always obvious. It’s not just about what happened, but what didn’t happen – the consistent absence of safety, attunement, protection, or emotional responsiveness.
You can experience deep, lasting effects even if your childhood looked “fine” on the outside.
Growing up with emotionally immature or unavailable parents
You can develop complex trauma when your caregivers were emotionally unavailable, inconsistent, or unable to meet your emotional needs. This might look like a parent who was self-absorbed, reactive, critical, or emotionally distant. You may have learned to be the easy one, the strong one, the responsible one. or the peacekeeper – often at the expense of your own needs, feelings, and sense of self.
How childhood trauma can show up in adulthood
Early relational experiences can shape so much – including how you feel in your body, how you relate to others, and how you see yourself. You might notice patterns like:
- People-pleasing
- Perfectionism
- Hyper-independence
- Fear of abandonment
- Difficulty trusting others
- Over-functioning
- Feeling responsible for other people’s emotions
- Difficulty setting boundaries
- Never feeling like you’re enough
How I treat complex trauma
I use an integrative, trauma-informed approach tailored to your unique story, needs, and goals.
EMDR Therapy
Helps you process and heal from traumatic experiences so they feel less overwhelming in the present.
IFS-Informed Parts Work
Helps you process and heal from traumatic experiences so they feel less overwhelming in the present.
Somatic & Nervous-System-Informed Work
Helps you reconnect with your body, increase nervous system regulation, and feel safer and more present.
Why I offer longer trauma therapy sessions
Trauma work often benefits from more time and space. I exclusively offer 90-minute extended therapy sessions and EMDR intensives, giving us the time to go deeper, work at a pace that feels right, and integrate insights without feeling rushed. For many clients, this longer format leads to more meaningful, lasting progress.
Frequently Asked Questions
What’s the difference between complex trauma and C-PTSD?
Complex trauma refers to repeated or ongoing traumatic experiences, often beginning in childhood or happening within important relationships. C-PTSD describes a particular group of symptoms that can develop after trauma.
The two often go hand in hand, but they aren’t exactly the same. You can be deeply impacted by childhood, attachment, or relational trauma without necessarily meeting criteria for C-PTSD. And you don’t need a diagnosis for your experiences to be worth healing.
Can emotionally immature or unavailable parents cause attachment trauma?
Yes. When a parent is emotionally unavailable, unpredictable, highly reactive, or unable to respond to a child’s emotional needs, it can affect how that child learns to experience safety and connection.
Maybe you became the easy kid, the caretaker, the peacekeeper, or the one who didn’t need anything. Those patterns may have helped you then, but they can follow you into adulthood as people-pleasing, perfectionism, hyper-independence, difficulty with boundaries, or feeling responsible for everyone else’s emotions.
You can love your parents and still acknowledge the ways you were hurt by them. Both can be true.
How does childhood trauma show up in adulthood?
Sometimes it doesn’t look like “trauma” at all.
It can look like having a hard time saying no. Overthinking whether someone is upset with you. Feeling guilty for having needs. Being fiercely independent because relying on people doesn’t feel safe. Perfectionism. People-pleasing. Difficulty trusting. Or being incredibly good at holding everything together while feeling exhausted underneath.
These aren’t character flaws. They’re often patterns that made sense in the environment where you learned them. Therapy can help you understand where they came from and decide which ones you’re ready to stop carrying.
Can EMDR help with complex or childhood trauma?
Yes. EMDR can be especially helpful when you already understand your patterns intellectually but still find yourself having the same emotional or nervous-system reactions.
Rather than only talking about what happened, EMDR helps the brain process experiences, beliefs, and emotions that may still feel unfinished. The goal isn’t to erase your memories or pretend the past didn’t matter. It’s to help the past feel more like the past, so it has less power over how you experience your life today.
Can EMDR and IFS be used together for complex trauma?
Absolutely. I often integrate EMDR with IFS-informed parts work because complex trauma usually isn’t about one memory or one experience.
Parts work helps us understand the protective parts of you that learned to people-please, shut down, overachieve, stay hyper-independent, or keep everyone else happy. EMDR can help us process some of the experiences and beliefs underneath those patterns.
We’re not trying to get rid of those parts of you. We’re helping them realize they don’t have to work quite so damn hard anymore.
Still have questions?
I’m happy to talk more about whother therapy could be a good fit for you.