Trauma Analogies, Part 2: Trauma and the ER Doctor

This post was written by Life Psych therapist Mike Rodgers, as part of a four-part series he authored on trauma.

Michael Rogers, LPC

September 2025

This is the second in a series of posts about how I view trauma. I give these analogies to clients when we begin talking about the healing of trauma in their lives. And I encourage them to begin to believe that trauma can be healed, not simply processed.

For this second analogy I want you to imagine you have been out cutting trees with a chain saw and you slipped and put a gash in your leg. As you rush into the Emergency Room you are quickly taken to a doctor who, without looking at the deep gash in your leg asks “What’s wrong?” 

“I can’t walk”, you respond.

Without looking at the wound, the doctor writes a prescription for a serious pain medication and sends you on your way. While this may help you walk, it is certainly not going to go well with you as far as living. 

It should be obvious to anyone reading this that one of two things will happen to someone treated in this fashion. First, they could bleed out and die. Second, the wound will become infected, and eventually spread its way through the entire body, impacting every thing the person attempts to do and say.

This is what happens when trauma is left untreated. It can present itself in depression and anxiety. Panic attacks can be a symptom of unresolved trauma. These “symptoms” can begin to take over a person’s life. Anger and rage can drive others away. Fear and startle responses can cause issues with relationships. Each of these is a small symptom of infections caused by unresolved trauma.

Hopefully this analogy makes the impact that it has made on my clients. Just as it is important to take care of the physical wound, it is important to heal the emotional wounds. Without doing these things we will let our wounds become infected and these infections spread to everything we interact with.