“As we clench and tense up when we are faced with these emotions, we lock and store them into our hips. So it is important for us to practice hip openers in order to release the trauma,” said Sharma. She also added that one won't be able to experience the release of trauma in one go, “it's gonna take a while”.
How to release trauma stored in the hips? Exercise – Whether or not there is an emotional connection to the tension in the hips, physical relief is often needed to alleviate the pain and discomfort. Light walking, yoga or swimming will get the muscles and joints moving and promote circulation and healing in the area.
"In a fight or flight situation, your muscles respond by tensing up. If you think of your pelvis as the center point for your body to work off of when trying to get away from trauma, and your body's response to trauma includes making your muscles tense, it makes sense that your hips tend to store a lot of tension."
Hip-opening stretches provide a deeply nurturing way to care for the body, improve mobility, and boost energy. Hip openers may also release suppressed emotion and clear energy blocks. You will need to try various exercises to find the ones that work best for you and build them into your routine.
They are also our biggest stabilizing muscles and can often clench or become tight in moments of emotional activation or trigger. The tissues in our hips hold onto the unprocessed emotions from these moments as a way for the subconscious mind to remember to avoid that same trigger in the future,” Sherer explained.
Trauma is not physically held in the muscles or bones — instead, the need to protect oneself from perceived threats is stored in the memory and emotional centers of the brain, such as the hippocampus and amygdala. This activates the body whenever a situation reminds the person of the traumatic event(s).
For some people, the tremors are big movements in the muscles. For others, they are tiny contractions that feel like electrical frequencies moving through the body. TRE® is not painful—in fact, most people enjoy the sensations.
Tight hips, psoas, and hip flexors can mean that we're hesitant about facing the future. More specifically, we fear living up to our own expectations and those laid out by others.
Releasing physical and emotional tension
Stretching the hip muscles causes a release; pent-up emotions may resurface, suppressed memories may arise, unconscious tension still held onto from a traumatic event may bubble up. All of which may unleash a seemingly inexplicable barrage of tears.
The sacral chakra is associated with the color orange and the element of water. When the sacral chakra is blocked, it can affect your hips, kidneys, pelvis, sexual organs, and lower back. Issues affected by the second charka are sexuality, creativity, pleasures, movement, intimacy, empathy, and change.
You may deal with somatic symptoms such as pain or digestive distress or feel a steady stream of anxiety. This is because trauma is stored in the body in your nervous system as an overactive stress response.
That means if someone has a memory of their trauma or the memory is triggered, that might spark physical pain or discomfort in places like (you guessed it) the hips or whatever body part might be associated with that trauma.
Neck Tension = Fear and Repressed Self-Expression
Fear and anxiety are also frequently stored in this area, particularly as a physical response to danger (as the neck is a vulnerable area) or strange environments. Neck muscle tension is also related to trust issues.
Intense Fear or Hypervigilance:
Sometimes people experience unexplained fears. This can include people or places. This often results in hypervigilance and a constant feeling of being on guard. Both fear and hypervigilance are clear indicators of unprocessed trauma.
The most common areas we tend to hold stress are in the neck, shoulders, hips, hands and feet. Planning one of your stretch sessions around these areas can help calm your mind and calm your body.
Treatment for trauma
By concentrating on what's happening in your body, you can release pent-up trauma-related energy through shaking, crying, and other forms of physical release. Cognitive-behavioral therapy helps you process and evaluate your thoughts and feelings about a trauma.
Hip disassociation is the ability to move your leg in your hip joint freely without moving your pelvis or spine much.
“There is absolutely truth to the idea that hip-opening yoga classes can make us emotional because we store unmet trauma and emotion in our pelvic space,” explains Meffan.
Most basic emotions were associated with sensations of elevated activity in the upper chest area, likely corresponding to changes in breathing and heart rate (1).
I shared that: "[N]ervousness, stress, fear, anxiety, caution, boredom, restlessness, happiness, joy, hurt, shyness, coyness, humility, awkwardness, confidence, subservience, depression, lethargy, playfulness, sensuality, and anger can all manifest through the feet and legs.” That is quite a lot.
Problems within the hip joint itself tend to result in pain on the inside of your hip or your groin. Hip pain on the outside of your hip, upper thigh or outer buttock is usually caused by problems with muscles, ligaments, tendons and other soft tissues that surround your hip joint.
According to TCM theory, arthritis of the hip is considered a Bi Syndrome, a condition in which stagnation of blood and Qi (life force energy) causes pain and stiffness in the muscles and joints. Cold, wind, and heat are pathogenic factors that cause the blockage of energy moving freely through parts of the body.