The One Through Triggered Eyes

Everyone loves to say: "See the world as it is."

But when you're living with trauma, psychosis, anxiety or heavy emotional stress, you’re not seeing the world through calm, steady eyes.

You're seeing it through survival.

Through memory.

Through fear.

Through triggered eyes.

In that state, the world doesn’t feel neutral.

It feels sharp.

It feels cold.

It feels full of hidden threats and meanings — even if no one else sees them.

It’s not because people are "wrong" or "broken."

It’s because survival rewires the brain

It teaches you to spot danger where you once got hurt — whether it’s there anymore or not.

But surviving like that comes at a cost.

Memory gets patchy.

Focus slips.

Sleep disappears.

Even holding a simple conversation can feel like climbing a mountain.

It’s like expecting someone who’s been awake for 48 hours to sit an exam — it’s not realistic and it’s not fair.

Still, that’s often exactly what mental health services expect:

Stay calm.

Fill out the forms.

Explain yourself clearly.

Come back if you don’t get the help you need the first time.

Meanwhile, you're just trying to keep your head above water.

This isn’t just about emotions — it’s about real physical impacts:

insomnia that scrambles your thinking, memory gaps you can’t patch up and a mind that’s constantly running on empty.

And yes — sometimes people in those states do need guidance.

They do need support to reality-check what’s happening.

But not before they’ve been heard.

Not before they feel safe.

Because if you try to correct someone mid-trigger, without really listening first, it doesn’t feel like help.

It feels like another attack — another reason not to trust anyone.

And there's something else that doesn't get talked about enough:

When someone is in psychosis — or deep survival mode — what you say matters even more.

Because words aren't neutral when someone's fighting for mental survival.

They get absorbed.

Twisted.

Pulled into the fear-stories the brain is trying to build to make sense of what's happening.

A casual comment, a rushed explanation, even a well-meaning warning —can end up fuelling new fears, new threats, new versions of reality that feel absolutely real inside their mind.

Not because they want to misinterpret you.

But because when you're triggered, the brain grabs onto anything to survive.

That's why mindfulness, patience and care aren't optional — they're essential.

When you're standing inside someone else's storm, you’re not just talking —you’re either building them a ladder out or accidentally tightening the trap.

Choose your words like they matter.

Because in those moments, they do.

For many, surviving those states also means finding any way they can to self-soothe — some healthy, some not.

And when those survival tools are taken away, the ground underneath can feel brutal.

That’s when support matters most.

Not after people clean themselves up.

Not when they can tick the right boxes.

But right there — mid-mess, mid-fight, mid-broken sentences.

Healing doesn’t start from a polished place.

It starts from the reality of right now:

Triggered.

Exhausted.

Blurry.

Still trying anyway.

We don’t need services that punish survival.

We need services that honour it.

Because healing isn’t about acting like everything’s fine.

It’s about being seen — properly seen — even when you’re nowhere near okay.

Final Thought

Support isn’t about fixing someone or snapping them back to your version of reality.

It’s about standing steady beside them until they feel safe enough to find their own way back.

Healing is slow.

Survival is strength.

And every person still fighting deserves more than judgment —they deserve real understanding.