Life flows as if it were a story, but many moments are interrupted by traumatic events, something is going on and we are simply not prepared, after all, how does trauma affect us?
In many cases, regrets or feelings of guilt cause more suffering to those affected by trauma than the actual memory of the event itself. Many people who revive him every day are belittled, terrified, angry, feel like they are losing control?who could have done more, who could have been more attentive, who were able to be late and chose another way to go home, are despised for not foreseeing the future, are judged cruelly when everything has happened, when the rest of possibilities have most likely evaporated and only one remains.
- Trauma is a thing of the past.
- But the footprints left are deep; in some cases.
- Permanent.
- Conditioning the person and their emotions.
- Thoughts and behavior.
- For example.
- Thanks to Rorschach’s technique.
- Traumatized people have been found to tend to overcome trauma over everything around them.
In other words, and in addition to what we have already pointed out, trauma also affects the imagination, so it is necessary to consider new possibilities. Paradoxically, and as an example, it has been proven that many war soldiers only feel fully alive when they remember their traumatic past again.
Helping trauma victims tell their stories is important, but helping them build a story or motivate them to do so does not mean that traumatic memories disappear. For there to be a change, the body must learn to live in the present reality, without fear. of the danger that has passed.
Research to understand how trauma affects us has shown that people who are abused in childhood tend to have feelings without a physical cause; for example, they hear disturbing voices or behave in a self-destructive or violent manner. the margins of history.
When traumatized people are exposed to stimuli related to their experience, the amygdala (center of fear) reacts by sounding the alarm, this activation triggers a cascade of nerve impulses that prepare the body to escape, fight or flee.
“We can only be in charge of our lives when we are able to recognize the reality of our body, in all its visceral dimensions. -Bessel van der Kolk, M. D. et et al.
Some people deny what happened to them, but their bodies recorded everything that happened, including threats, so we can learn to ignore emotional brain messages, but the body’s alarm system will not be interrupted.
Does denial cause the physical effects of trauma on the body to manifest as a disease that requires attention: fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, autoimmune diseases?Medications or medications can erase or nullify unbearable feelings and feelings. For all these reasons, it is important that trauma treatment is carried out mentally, cerebrally and physically.
Several investigations have been done to answer a question: what happens to the brains of trauma survivors?Dr. Lanius asked, “What does our brain do when we don’t think of anything concrete?”We are attentive to ourselves, an event known as the ‘crest of self-awareness’.
Thus, there is no record of activation in areas of the brain related to self-perception in PTSD patients who have suffered childhood trauma, only very low activity was recorded in the area responsible for basic spatial orientation.
Frewen and Ruth Lanius discovered that the more disconnected people are from their feelings, the less perceptual activation they have of themselves. The explanation for these results is that, in response to trauma, these people have learned to disconnect areas of the brain that convey feelings. and emotions that accompany and define terror.
To better understand how trauma affects us, it is worth mentioning that the basic system of ‘I’ is divided between the brainstem and the limbic system, which is activated when people are threatened by their lives. The feeling of fear is accompanied by intense physiological effects. Activation. When people relive trauma, they end up with that menacing feeling that paralyzes or infuriates. After trauma, the mind and body are constantly activated, as if faced again with this imminent danger.
Traumatized people feel that the past is alive in their bodies, as they are continually bombarded by visceral warning signs, many of them feel chronically unsafe and, in the face of any sensory change, react by disconnecting external control (drugs, meditation, compulsions?) through panic attacks, so the inability to connect with the body continuously explains the lack of self-protection, difficulties in feeling pleasure and high victimization rates.