Grounding techniques for a hard moment

5-4-3-2-1

This one uses your senses to bring you into the room you are actually in. Move slowly. There is no score.

1. 1Name five things you can see. A crack in the paint counts.
2. 2Name four things you can feel. The floor, your sleeve, the cool of a wall.
3. 3Name three things you can hear. Distant voices, a fan, your own breath.
4. 4Name two things you can smell, or two smells you remember well.
5. 5Name one thing you can taste, or one word you want to say to yourself.

Feet, seat, hands

When you cannot look around, work with contact instead. Press both feet flat and notice the pressure. Feel where the seat or bunk holds your weight. Rest your hands somewhere and let them be heavy.

Stay with each contact point for three slow breaths before you move to the next.

Cold and texture

Physical sensation gives attention an anchor. Run cool water over your wrists. Hold something with a clear texture — a rough towel, a seam, a book edge — and describe it to yourself in detail, as if explaining it to someone who cannot see it.

Counting backwards

Count down from 100 by sevens, or list every street you can remember from one neighborhood. The point is not accuracy. The point is that this kind of task uses the same part of your mind that spinning thoughts use, so the spinning has less room.

If a grounding practice makes you feel worse, stop and switch to something else. Different things work on different days, and that is normal.

When to reach for a person, not a technique

Grounding helps with waves. It is not meant to carry everything. If you are having thoughts of hurting yourself or someone else, or a wave will not pass, tell a chaplain, counselor, medical staff, or someone you trust. Asking is a skill too.

Where this comes from

• National Center for PTSD — grounding and coping tools