The 7 Types of Rest Essential for Recovering from Complex Trauma
If you are on the path of complex trauma recovery, you have likely embraced the concept of self-care. You’ve carved out time for relaxation, promised yourself early nights, and perhaps taken up a calming hobby. Yet, a profound, nagging exhaustion persists. You might find yourself asking, "Why am I still so tired? Why doesn't this 'rest' feel restorative?"
This is a common and frustrating crossroads for many navigating the aftermath of complex trauma. The answer, as Tim Fletcher explains, isn't that self-care is failing you, but that our understanding of "rest" is far too narrow. We often try to fill only one tank, when in reality, we have seven.
Why One Type of Rest Is Never Enough for Complex PTSD
To understand the solution, we must first understand the sheer scope of energy expenditure for those with Complex PTSD. Exhaustion isn't just physical.
Tim Fletcher illuminates this by describing our different "gas tanks" of energy:
The Physical Tank: Depleted by physical labour and activity.
The Emotional Tank: Drained by the hard work of grieving, processing painful emotions in therapy, managing anger, or even experiencing deep empathy.
The Intellectual Tank: Depleted by intense thinking, concentration, and decision-making. Our brains are energy-intensive organs.
The Survival Tank: Constantly siphoned by a nervous system stuck in survival mode—perpetually on guard, hypervigilant, and unable to truly relax.
The Social Tank: Even healthy, need-meeting activities like building friendships, maintaining authentic relationships, and pursuing our passions require significant energy.
When we engage in typical self-care, we might only be refilling the physical tank. But if our emotional, intellectual, and survival tanks are running on fumes, we will still feel the deep, soul-level weariness characteristic of complex trauma exhaustion. True recovery requires a holistic approach to replenishment.
The 7 Vital Types of Rest: Refilling Every Tank
Based on the work of Dr. Saundra Dalton-Smith, here are the seven types of rest that are non-negotiable for healing from complex trauma.
1. Physical Rest: More Than Just Sleep
This involves both passive and active forms of rest for the body.
Passive Rest: This includes deep, rejuvenating sleep and naps. It’s crucial to understand that for those with dysregulated nervous systems, achieving quality sleep is a key part of complex trauma recovery.
Active Rest: Activities that restore the body without complete passivity, such as therapeutic massage, yoga, stretching, or a leisurely walk in nature.
How do you know you need it? Constant fatigue, body aches, and a reliance on caffeine to get through the day are clear signals your physical tank is empty.
2. Mental Rest: Quieting the Relentless Mind
Do you struggle with brain fog, an inability to concentrate, or feeling mentally frayed? This is a sign of intellectual exhaustion. The brain, after working hard, needs a break from the constant influx of information and decision-making.
Tim Fletcher suggests several ways to achieve mental rest:
Take short mental breaks throughout the day.
Practice journaling to "dump" swirling thoughts, fears, and to-do lists onto paper.
Engage in daily mindfulness or meditation to regulate and quiet the brain.
Set firm boundaries with technology, such as turning off work notifications after hours.
3. Emotional Rest: The Freedom to Be Authentic
Complex trauma often forces us to suppress our emotions for safety. Emotional rest is the permission to feel what we feel without judgment.
Signs you are emotionally drained include feeling numb, crying easily, becoming emotionally dysregulated over small things, or feeling robotic and burnt out.
To refill this tank, you must:
Seek out safe, validating people and relationships.
Engage in therapy or counseling to process and resolve pent-up emotions.
Create private, safe spaces where you can have an honest, healing cry.
Establish firm boundaries with "energy vampires" who drain your emotional resources.
4. Social Rest: The Balance Between Connection and Solitude
Have you ever felt lonely in a crowd, or found yourself irritated by everyone around you? This is a classic sign of social exhaustion. For those with complex trauma, social interactions can be particularly draining, especially if they involve masking or people-pleasing.
Achieving social rest involves a delicate balance:
Prioritize alone time to reconnect with yourself.
Learn to say "no" to social obligations that drain you.
Set boundaries with toxic individuals.
Intentionally spend time with friends who energize and uplift you.
5. Sensory Rest: Recovering from Overload
In our modern world of constant screens, notifications, and background noise, our senses are under siege. This sensory overload can lead to irritability, trouble sleeping, eye strain, and headaches—exacerbating complex trauma symptoms.
To find sensory rest:
Intentionally turn off screens and notifications.
Sit in silence or with soft, dim lighting.
Spend time in nature to give your senses a gentle, natural focus.
Use noise-cancelling headphones or white noise to create a calm auditory environment.
6. Creative Rest: Rekindling the Spark
This is especially vital for those who use creativity in their work or healing. When the creative well runs dry, it leads to feeling stagnant, uninspired, and in a rut.
How do you refill the creative tank? The answer is often to stop trying to be creative.
Immerse yourself in the creativity of others—visit a gallery, listen to powerful music, read inspiring literature.
Engage in pure, purposeless play and imagination.
Change your surroundings; a short walk or a day trip can spark new perspectives. As Tim Fletcher notes, your creativity often returns to a new level after it has been allowed to rest.
7. Spiritual Rest: Reconnecting with Purpose and Belonging
This addresses the profound, existential fatigue that can accompany complex trauma—the feeling that life is empty, dull, or devoid of meaning. It’s a deep disconnection from our sense of purpose, passion, and core values.
Spiritual rest is about reconnection:
Through prayer, meditation, or quiet reflection.
By spending time in a community that shares your values.
Engaging in meaningful rituals or volunteering for causes you care about.
Connecting with the awe-inspiring beauty of nature.
The Four Pillars of True Rest: Why Safety and Connection Are Everything
Tim Fletcher concludes with a crucial insight: rest only truly rejuvenates when four conditions are met. This is the cornerstone of healing for those with complex trauma.
1. Safety: The nervous system cannot rest if it feels in danger. As long as you are stuck in a sympathetic (fight-or-flight) state, rest is impossible. Creating a sense of safety—both internally and externally—is the foundation upon which all other rest is built. This is a primary focus in addressing survival adaptations.
2. Connection to the Healthy: Rest is an active process of connecting to what refuels you—be it healthy people, nature, beauty, or authentic parts of yourself. This is the "gas pump" that fills your tanks.
3. Boundaries (Disconnection from the Unhealthy): You must simultaneously disconnect from what drains you. This means setting firm boundaries around toxic people, overwhelming activities, and energy-draining obligations.
4. Meaningful Connection: Ultimately, deep rest requires deep, authentic connection—to yourself and to save others. It is in the space of honesty and shared humanity that we find our most profound restoration.
True rest, therefore, is not merely the absence of work. For those healing from complex trauma, it is an active, intentional practice of connecting to what is life-giving and disconnecting from what is soul-depleting. It is the essential, multi-faceted work of refilling every part of your being, so you can move from surviving to truly thriving.
If you see yourself in these words, know that your exhaustion is not a failure. It is a signpost, pointing you toward the specific types of rest your unique being craves. Begin by asking yourself: "Which of my tanks is most empty today?" and take one compassionate step to refill it. Your journey in complex trauma recovery deserves nothing less.
You are worth taking time for care, nurturing, and recovery
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