Interesting links for PSTD, "happy childhood" module ideas

[belle99]

Trauma and Essence

One thing I've been working on in my platinum is reconnecting with my essence, inner being, true self, the deeper part that goes by many names.

I haven't discussed this here a whole lot, but I found something in Waking the Tiger that explains the connection between a "lost" essence and the experience of trauma. This was something I missed in my first reading:

"When we suffer from trauma, the association between the life energy and the negative emotions is so close that we cannot distinguish between them. Discharge is precisely what we need, but when it begins to happen, the effect can be terrifying and intolerable, in part because the energy released is perceived to be negative. Because of this fear, we typically suppress the energy or at best discharge it incompletely." (Levine p. 152)

To expand on this...if one perceives their essence and the frozen energy to be one and the same, it is understandable that they would fear the deepest part of themselves, and at the same time be reluctant to release the energy, for fear that there will be nothing left if the trauma is gone....

[belle99]

Dorsal-vagal response

Inika,

I've found some links on the dorsal-vagal response. Sounds like it is sort of the blahs, or energetic flatlining, where the energetic system shuts down from system overload. Now I know what you meant when you wrote that you needed to read more about this!!

Dorsal Vagal - Human Nervous System

Biology of Kundalini: Exploring the Symptoms

The Polyvagal Theory

[belle99]

more stuff

More about what a "memory" really is.
Memories of Fear: How the Brain Stores and Retrieves Physiologic States, Feelings, Behaviors and Thoughts from Traumatic Events :::: Welcome to Child Trauma Academy :::::::::::

Sensorimotor therapies focus on the body to heal trauma.
T-200-01: Sensorimotor Psychotherapy:... Ogden & Minton (2000)

[Inika]

more on Somatic Experiencing and PTSD Module

Belle,
I am really impressed by your clear and intelligent grasp of these subjects. And your ideas for a module are great.

I have been thinking more about the module and I wanted to add some more ideas. There has to be a gentle renegotiation of the autonomic nervous system without dampening the potential life saving qualities. For instance if you are driving your car and have a close call. If you had no prior traumatic car accidents you would be fully in the present doing what needed to be done in that moment. On the other hand if you had a prior accident you might freeze more readily than swerve or speed up to avoid the accident. The sympathetic NS used prior knowledge to make it's responses faster but if the information from the past was flight that wasn't completed which defaulted to freeze then the present response would be freeze because that worked before.
[*]Instruct the sympathetic nervous system to assess the present situation without going back to the original unresolved trauma.
[*]Instructions for speeded up discharge through shaking or vibrations after sympathetic arousal and bringing more conscious awareness to the felt sense.

About releasing the freeze: In my experience when the freeze starts releasing the results can be quite frightening. I knew a woman who had been beaten and abused as a child and when she started getting better bruises appeared all over her body. Some people go deep into the trauma vortex or body memories. So I would caution about releasing the freeze in the module. I also think instructions to not dissociate could be counter productive because dissociation is a coping strategy.

It is such a tricky thing because to heal from the trauma we need to come in contact with the memory in a titrated way so that the nervous system is not overwelmed. So if you give instructions for positive thoughts about the trauma you cover it up instead of healing it. I had this experience with EMDR. The trauma was still there but there was a layer inbetween. This was good in the short term but I think, for me, not conducive to healing.

Maybe something like this:[*]Instruct the mind to remember the trauma and as the sympathetic NS ramps to a certain state bring in the parasympathetic, the awareness of the felt sense and the present moment.

I hope this helps.

What does this mean for a PTSD module? Instructions should address the following areas, as well as many more that I’m sure the programmers can distill from all the research:

• Instruct the nervous system to discharge frozen energies in the body and nervous system, without dredging up the original traumatizing memory
• Instruct “renegotiation,” which is “conscious awareness accessed through the felt sense” leading to a “gentle energetic discharge just as effective as that which the animal accesses through action.” (Levine p. 187)
• Instruct the body and mind to maintain better “nervous hygiene,” by keeping new experiences from causing energies to freeze in the body, once old traumas are cleared out
• Instruct a person to stay tuned-in to their body and its sensations (not dissociated or constricted)
• Instruct new positive emotions and positive beliefs, and take the sting out of painful memories and images, in order to allow the person to have relief and behave differently, while the underlying cause is healing, and prepare the person to have a normal life once all the frozen energy is gone
• Instructions to free the body of the negative trauma vibration, so that the person is able to have new choices in life, free from “compulsive re-enactment”
• Instructions to re-organize the memories and see them in a new positive light, with the understanding that the value of memories is less about keeping a recorded history of one’s life, and more about setting the emotional tone for the present and future.

I hope this is helpful information!

[belle99]

I really like your suggestions!

Here's something interesting: The role of the centrum in healing. Cell Talk: Talking to Your Cell(f) - Google Book Search

[belle99]

If anybody wants similar instructions in the platinum, they could send PATHS an email linking them to the particular posts in this thread that resonate.

I have found a lot of relief (and deep change) from the instructions, especially since I came across the information about trauma stored in the body. Once I started reading about PTSD and trauma and how that changes brain chemistry and behavior and ability to engage "successful living" and LOA to one's benefit, then I understood better how to make my requests specific enough that the instructions approximately doubled in their efficacy.

Until I had these PTSD, etc. instructions, I could not get the maximum benefit out of Successful Living, Money, or any of the emotional modules (Mood, Just Relax, Self Esteem, Deserving, Hooponopono). I had a chronic case of cognitive dissonance from many standard modules that the underlying traumatized "bodymind" just couldn't work with.

Until a PTSD module is available, the best way to address these issues is the platinum, in my opinion. I don't know how close they are to coming out with the PTSD module, but I hope it is soon so more people can benefit from what has been developed here.

Thanks PATHS!

[belle99]

"False" moods and emotions

One of the reasons why I think spirulina works so well is because it feeds the body with so many amino acids that so many people are deficient in. There are a number of treatment programs for addictions and eating disorders that are very effective because they also have a nutritional component, i.e. The Mood Cure.

I'm posting the topic of nutrition and mood here because a lot of emotional and mood problems are actually nutritional problems in disguise. It can come as toxicity and reaction to common food additives (as suggested in an earlier post by Jessica) or allergies or intolerances to otherwise healthy foods, or a neurotransmitter deficiency caused by situation or heredity.

In The Truth About Beauty, cosmetics and nutrition expert Kat James describes how her eating disorder and shameful feelings that she thought were a "mother issue" went away when she addressed the problems through a predominantly biochemical angle:

She says, "I learned that focusing on only emotional issues as a starting point, while sound in theory, set me up for a decade of needless struggle that might have been partially or even entirely avoidable if I'd only looked at my biochemical issues first. I cannot credit my years of intense emotional work with freeing me from my disease....emotional breakthroughs I did have...were not at all fruitful until I finally addressed my biochemical addiction to food" through changing her diet and taking the right supplements. Then she was able to help others, she says, to "achieve incredible, healthy transformation that greatly lifted their emotional struggles as an end result, rather than a prerequisite" by instructing them on eliminating sugar and harmful food/cosmetic additives.

I could go on and on about how important I think this point is! The importance is not so much about sugar or additives specifically, but the point that if you feel like you have done years and years of "work" on something be it an emotional issue or a food issue, and find you've only made very moderate improvements to show for all your effort, there may likely be something your body still wants you to give it, or stop giving it, to resolve trauma and/or simply function day-to-day. I know how upsetting it can be for healers to say, "this is a physical issue" and for medical doctors to say, "this is not a physical issue." They really are one in the same, in my opinion....