Your Thoughts Are Not Broken: Understanding the Cognitive Impact of Trauma | NowShift August 13, 2025

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Your mind is not failing you — it’s protecting you.
 In Episode 4 of the Trauma Symptoms Mini-Series, Dr. Abhimanyou Raathore, founder of the Antifragilient OS, explores the cognitive ways trauma reshapes how we think, decide, and see ourselves.

We look at seven key patterns:

• Decision paralysis that keeps you stuck
• The relentless inner critic that won’t let up
• Brain fog and trouble concentrating
• Confusion and disorientation
• Memory gaps that shield you from pain
• Rumination loops that replay worst-case scenarios
• Negative self-beliefs that feel impossible to change

Rather than treating these as flaws, Dr. Raathore reframes them as sophisticated survival strategies your brain created in response to overwhelming experiences. With awareness and the right support, these patterns can be rewired — and your relationship with your own mind can transform.

This episode offers both validation and clarity, giving you language for experiences you might have struggled to explain. It’s a step toward reclaiming your mental space and preparing for our next instalment, where we’ll explore the physical symptoms of trauma.

A podcast by Dr. Abhimanyou Raathore
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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Today is August 13th 2025.
My name is Dr Abhimanyu Rathoreand I'm the founder of the
Anti-Fragilient Operating System.
Today's anti-fragilienttransmission for the day is
about cognitive symptoms oftrauma.
So I welcome you back to ourtrauma series and in this

(00:25):
episode we are talking aboutcognitive symptoms.
That's the way trauma can shapeour thinking, our decision
making and beliefs aboutourselves and the world.
So what are cognitive symptoms?
In simple terms, let'sunderstand that.
See, trauma can leave animprint on how we think, the way

(00:45):
we process information, makechoices and see ourselves.
And now let's talk about somecommon signs.
The first one is inability tomake decisions.
You know feeling stuck.
When choice comes up, choicescome up right.
Second, guessing yourself orfearing that you'll make the
wrong move that's a cognitivesymptom of trauma.

(01:12):
Second is constantself-criticism.
You know that harsh innernarrative or narrator you know
that is always pointing outflaws, mistakes or what you
should be better or ways youshould be better, yeah.
Third is difficultyconcentrating.
You know struggling to focus ontasks, conversations or even
enjoyable activities, and yourmind just keeps drifting.

(01:33):
This could also be a cognitivetrauma symptom.
Fourth is frequent confusion.
You know feeling mentally foggy, easily mixed up or unsure of
what's happening around you.
Fifth is memory problems Okay,forgetting things from small
details to entire events,sometimes because the brain is

(01:54):
trying to protect you frompainful recall.
Sixth is negative or anxiousrumination.
You know going over the sameworries or worst case scenarios
again and again, and again.
And you're going over the sameworries or worst case scenarios
again and again, and again, andyou're unable to break the loop.
Seventh is negative beliefsabout self.
You know holding on to ideaslike I'm not good enough or I'm

(02:15):
broken, even when others seeyour worth.
So if these patterns soundfamiliar, know that you're not
broken.
You know your brain has adaptedto protect you by developing
these parts that think, feel,you know this way.
That is, the managers, thefirefighters and the exiles, and

(02:38):
with awareness, you can beginto shift these patterns.
In our next episode we'llexplore the physical or somatic
symptoms.
That is, how trauma can speakthrough your body.
Do let me know how you'refinding these episodes, because
the aim of these episodes isthat if you listen to them line

(03:01):
by line, just one episode a day,also, it can begin the change
for you, not just thesemini-series, but the very first
episode onwards.
You could do that, or you couldbegin wherever you're starting
from, whatever feels okay to you, right, you could begin there.

(03:23):
Do let me know how it is going.
Share it with people.
Let's make more and more peoplein this world anti-fragilient.
Thank you so much and I'll seeyou tomorrow.
Bye-bye.