Stuck in fight or flight
Adrenaline is one of the hormones that are critical in helping me fight back or flee in the face of danger. When something is triggering, a typical person will have heightened hormones and feelings and once the threat has left the typical person resumes to normal. People like me may experience this differently. For me, my body may continue to feel the threat despite my knowledge of knowing the threat is no longer a threat, aka denial. My mind may ignore the emotional brain and its alarms, but my body certainly feels every ounce of panic and its hormones. My rational brain is unable to convince the emotional brain out of its own 'world' of reality. My body is living in the past, in trauma, in some other time than the here and now. Something to keep in mind as a side note: it is easier for me to talk about what has been done to me from a victim and revenge point of view than to notice, feel, and put into words the reality of my internal perspective and experience.
No mind without mindfulness
I experience overwhelming or unbearable sensations that hit me in the pit of my stomach, my chest gets tight and my brain gets spacey. I have tried to avoid feeling these sensations but I see that it increases my vulnerability to being overwhelmed by them. After all, that stuffing after Eric went to California without me caused a lot of mental, emotional, and physical stress. Through therapy and communication, I learned that address and feeling the emotions allows their significance to lessen. Practicing mindfulness calms down the sympathetic system and can prevent fight or flight sensations. How are particular thoughts registered in my body? "Eric loves me" thinking or telling myself that statement is processed and filed into my heart, in my chest. Being open to my thoughts and where I put them can offer a possibility of releasing sensations and impulses I once blocked in order to survive. "my mom abused me" is a thought, a sensation that I don't want to feel. I want to run from thinking about that, visiting experiences that validate that statement. I feel it registering in my gut.
Getting in touch
I absolutely love touch. It is one of my love languages. it is the most elementary tool that we have to calm down. Think of a baby or a child just wanting to be helped. That. Is. Me. Oftentimes, when I am really hurting inside, my inner self only wants Eric to cradle me and sway back and forth. Even thinking of this act can be powerful enough to give me traction on what is going on, other times it isn't enough but I am too embarrassed to ask for such a childish or awkward request as an adult. Between massage school and reading this section of the chapter, I do believe that different parts of our bodies are storage for different memories and experiences. As if there is a filing cabinet for every part of the body allowing any information to be stored in them. Touch lets me know I am safe, protected, and cared for. I often don't realize just how tense I am in a particular area until it is touched. Getting attention in a tense spot or not allows my body to be heard and cared for.
Taking Action
My body becomes a giant mess when I do not respond to the danger signals. When I am feeling the fight or flight, I tend to shut down and focus inward. I feel helpless and immobilized. "When that happens their hormones still are being pumped out, but the actions they're supposed to fuel are thwarted. Eventually, the activation patterns that were meant to promote coping are turned back against the organism and now keep fueling inappropriate fight/flight and freeze responses." To end this cycle I can acknowledge the fight/flight impulses my body is trying to make me do, I can reply to these impulses by twisting, turning, swaying back and forth.
Medication
Medication is a temporary fix and band-aid. It does not set you up for success or teach long-lasting lessons of self-regulation.
I see that Paxil and Ativan were not only the wrong choice for me, but it was highly not okay for an adolescent of my age to be prescribed such strong and addictive drugs. Ativan is a tranquilizing drug. In many ways, it works like alcohol. This explains the extreme desire for them and the intense withdrawals I felt.
Paxil is a serotonin reuptake inhibitor. It basically makes feelings less intense and life more manageable as a result. They are supposed to make you feel calmer and in control, less overwhelmed and enraged. Some patients feel they are losing their edge. Ativan also interferes with processing trauma. I wonder what my brain was trying to do with everything I had and was experiencing all while having a drug constantly blocking it, preventing it from doing its own process for healing and regulation. A study shows that Prozac is effective, but not as effective as patients that received EMDR for treatment. Cool.
The mind is a mosaic
We all have parts within us that create and act like a family called our Self-system. There should always be love and respect, each part should be nurtured and taken care of, each part allowed to be heard, seen, and wanted. Each part has different views, maturity, energy, wisdom, pain, and excitability. During trauma, our Self-system breaks down and causes split-offs resulting in these different parts. These parts are formed within us in an attempt to protect our inner Self. For me, many of my parts became dissociated from one another. The anger is never appreciated and I try to repress it. Make it unknown, heard, and seen. It reminds me of my mother and I want nothing to do with it. This is where Internal Family Systems therapy comes to shine the light to encourage communication between the parts and healing as a result.
"We all have parts that are childlike and fun. When we are abused, these are the parts that are hurt the most, and they become frozen, carrying the pain, terror, and betrayal of abuse. this burden makes them toxic, parts of ourselves that we need to deny at all costs." I think of my old lifestyle that was around 'country' living. The western wear, the cowboy boots, the big hair, the idea that tough girls don't cry, owning guns and regularly target practicing with them, country music, meat and potato diet, four-wheeling, hunting, fishing, rodeos, and more. These are all things that remind me of a life that I'd rather not remember. A life that brings up anger and angst deep within myself that I don't know how to let go of. My protectors keep the toxic parts away, but I can take on energy from my 'abuser', making me feel worse. Some of my categories of my parts: Critical (judgment of others, judgment of myself), perfectionism (if I'm perfect nothing bad will happen to me, if I'm perfect I will feel good enough and capable to manage anything that comes my way, behavior-based value), and emergency responders (impulsive, getaway, block, shutting down what comes my way).
Mapping the electrical circuits of the brain
Most hyperactive and impulsive children have slower than normal electrical waves in their frontal lobes. This is also present in brains with ADHD. "Slow wavelengths explains why these kids have poor executive functioning, their rational brains lack proper control over their emotional brains, which also occurs when abuse and trauma have made the emotional centers hyper-alert to danger and organized for fight or flight." All of this makes me wonder if Eric has always had ADHD or if it was acquired by trauma and abuse, or if his ADHD was heightened due to trauma his little self encountered.
Neurofeedback
Neurofeedback can assist in helping the brain to focus.
People with slower frontal lobes also have a tendency for having learning disabilities. They spoke of a woman who had an auditory processing disorder (like me), among her other problems. This lady was able to turn her life completely around because of neurofeedback.
"Feedback provides the brain with a mirror of its own function: the oscillations and rhythms that underpin the currents and crosscurrents of the mind. It nudges the brain to make more of some frequencies and less of others, creating new patterns that enhance its natural complexity and its bias toward self-regulation. We may be freeing up innate but stuck oscillatory properties in the brain and allowing new ones to develop."
Ways to cope and overcome trauma include but are not limited by: acupuncture tapping, yoga, IFS therapy, neurofeedback, theatre/drama, medication, meditation/mindfulness, EMDR, alpha-theta training, telling the truth-no secrets, creating structures (alternate realities of what you needed and wanted) and more.
***
This book has opened my eyes to what trauma really is. How it really affects us, all of us, all of our parts, and in all aspects of our lives. My empathy has grown even more for the humans in the world, especially those who have been traumatized. I have the urge to care for them, protect them and show them, love. I have a glimpse of my brothers and sisters the way our Savior does. It has made me fully believe in one of the most important things Eric has taught me: You cannot judge someone because you simply do not know their story. Trauma is more than common in this world and it takes a toll on us in various ways. Maybe that person you are judging so harshly came from an unthinkable childhood that explains their current actions. They might not even know there is a better way of living life because they are so caught up in fighting their demons or have given up.
This book has shown me the torturous things people have survived. It gives me hope that I can overcome my traumas and live happily ever after as the trauma survivors in the book did. Any therapy and modality do not erase the past, the horrendous events, but I can outgrow the grasp they hold on me. I can remember such a past and not be hijacked by my emotions.
I feel joy and pride in completing this book. I read a book that was difficult in more ways than one and was extremely long for me, which was intimidating. As I flipped to the last few pages my heart was a bit sorrowful knowing that my learning of trauma would be done. I understand I can check other books out at the library to further my research, but this author had a way of speaking to my soul. As I started to read the epilogue, my heart grew more fond of this author and his view of human life. You could say this whole experience has brought out more Christ-like love and attributes along with more of my social equality-democratic side. I wish I could just copy and paste this passage, I feel he says it better than I ever could. I'll start by saying the biggest epiphany I have had in my life is that every symptom has a root cause. I believe it is vital to search out the root cause and address the issue rather than address the symptom. Symptoms are surface level, they come and go, their accumulations, intensities, and severities range; root causes are deeper, misunderstood, and will only dig their heels in deeper if not found and addressed. With that being said, this author has explained the root cause of people's suffering and struggles. Trauma. He has also led me to question our country's systematic ways:
1. Why does our system allow a child to suffer by losing food stamps because their parent is unemployed (most likely due to their own trauma and lack of ability to be a fully functioning adult) or in jail?
2. Why is our country so opposed to universal healthcare that would benefit everyone, especially those who are trauma survivors or future trauma victims who are in desperate need of medical and psychiatric care?
Imagine a child is near you. He doesn't make eye contact. His head is drooped, shoulders shrunk in. You know he is malnutrition because of the protruding bones through his skin. Let's say you address him, asking where his parents are and there isn't a vocal or physical response from him. You scan the area looking for adults that are supposed to be caring for this child and no one stands out. Do you leave or do you help him? Imagine a world where you could contact someone for help knowing without a doubt that this child you've only known minutes would be taken care of by having food in his belly, a roof over his head, and other resources he is in need of. Imagine a world where there isn't anything for you to do but maybe call the police for him to be taken back home. Did he run away because home isn't safe? Did his caretaker drop him off and abandon him? If he goes home will he have a meal? This boy could have his issues addressed with universal health care because it is his right as an American citizen. Why should he have to suffer the lack of help because his parents or caretakers cannot provide the opportunities this child is in need of?
3. Why are we not a trauma-conscious society? How many people would see a person suffering from mental illness and completely pass on helping them, but people see an accident and rush to help?
4. Why is our healthcare system focused on disease? Why is it that a patient's psychiatry is overlooked for ailments and wounds in the body that can actually be seen and fully understood with science? It is not fair that these patients go undiagnosed, misdiagnosed, and or their suffering cannot be explained; it is not fair that these patients are often fixed with a band-aid setting them up for future failures.
5. The percentages of traumatized people are insignificantly high, it's unlikely for a majority of these trauma survivors to receive the help they need to function at their optimal potential. It's not necessarily their fault, a lot has to do with the cards they were dealt, the opportunities given to them, etc. People with trauma are often dissociated, coping with unhealthy means and looking for ways to disappear, feel again, or speak through action. Why is there a systemic prohibition for owning assault weapons whose only purpose is to kill mass numbers of people when our country has a mental crisis on the rise? If we don't have a system set in place for people of trauma to receive care and that these people are so dissociated to the point they are not safe, why must we allow them to obtain such unnecessary firearms?
6. Why are we wasting and throwing addicts' lives away by incarcerating them and wasting government funding when they really need psychiatric help? Addiction can happen by chance, but the majority of people that suffer from addiction are their unhealthy coping means to distance themselves from the trauma they are prisoners to. An addict that is incarcerated will most likely have a relapse once released because they weren't taught the tools they need to overcome their addictions, to understand why they have them, and to address their root cause, trauma.
"I wish I could separate trauma from politics, but as long as we continue to live in denial and treat only trauma while ignoring its origins, we are bound to fail."
"Poverty, unemployment, inferior schools, social isolation, widespread availability to guns, and substandard housing all are breeding grounds for trauma. Trauma breeds further trauma; hurt people hurt other people."
I am not better than these people. I do not deserve more than them. They deserve and should have a right to access any help that is needed to help them overcome trauma and set them up to be a successful adult with bright futures. Why should conservatism withhold them from such relief of suffering and withhold the ability to self-love, a God-given right? We are all in the same storm riding on different boats, weathering life in different ways; we are all headed to the same destination, why isn't our purpose to help others along the way?
