Trauma (psychological)

[JRM]

I like that 'kicked in the balls" example because it is more than physical trauma. It's usually emotional trauma too, with lots of shame and maybe guilt. I never even realized I was holding on to psychic pain at all, until I explored it with a teacher. It just came up, boom. It's usually not something people are even conscious of, at all.

I almost mentioned this earlier, but chose not to. But now I will.

When we are deliberately kicked in the balls by someone, that's got a whole extra component to it which isn't there if it was done accidentally, as by a "gymmie," as per RE's experience.   And so it will likely have a lasting residue as an experience -- because it involves that interpersonal component.

We're all so used to thinking of psychological trauma as any experience which has left some kind of "emotional scar".  In that sense, when a boyfriend or girlfriend suddenly says "Hey, I'm done here. I don't want to do this relationship thing with you any longer," well, that will have left a scar of some kind, most likely.  But it probably won't feel life-threatening to most folks, and so won't leave the same kind or degree of scar as life-threatening experiences.

More and more people these days are wanting to distinguish the old sense of "trauma" from a new sense in which "traumatization" has a more restricted technical sense.  It's this which I need to get a handle on, somehow.  I suppose it has something to do with crossing the zero (0) line presented in the video in the opening post here, where states 3 and 4 occur. 

I have so much to learn!  Sigh.

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[g]

I like that 'kicked in the balls" example because it is more than physical trauma. It's usually emotional trauma too, with lots of shame and maybe guilt. I never even realized I was holding on to psychic pain at all, until I explored it with a teacher. It just came up, boom. It's usually not something people are even conscious of, at all.

I almost mentioned this earlier, but chose not to. But now I will.

When we are deliberately kicked in the balls by someone, that's got a whole extra component to it which isn't there if it was done accidentally, as by a "gymmie," as per RE's experience.   And so it will likely have a lasting residue as an experience -- because it involves that interpersonal component.

We're all so used to thinking of psychological trauma as any experience which has left some kind of "emotional scar".  In that sense, when a boyfriend or girlfriend suddenly says "Hey, I'm done here. I don't want to do this relationship thing with you any longer," well, that will have left a scar of some kind, most likely.  But it probably won't feel life-threatening to most folks, and so won't leave the same kind or degree of scar as life-threatening experiences.

More and more people these days are wanting to distinguish the old sense of "trauma" from a new sense in which "traumatization" has a more restricted technical sense.  It's this which I need to get a handle on, somehow.  I suppose it has something to do with crossing the zero (0) line presented in the video in the opening post here, where states 3 and 4 occur. 

I have so much to learn!  Sigh.

I'm surprised the accent is on the physical so much. Always thought trauma was more of a mental long term pain, or is anguish a more proper word for that?

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[JRM]

I like that 'kicked in the balls" example because it is more than physical trauma. It's usually emotional trauma too, with lots of shame and maybe guilt. I never even realized I was holding on to psychic pain at all, until I explored it with a teacher. It just came up, boom. It's usually not something people are even conscious of, at all.

I almost mentioned this earlier, but chose not to. But now I will.

When we are deliberately kicked in the balls by someone, that's got a whole extra component to it which isn't there if it was done accidentally, as by a "gymmie," as per RE's experience.   And so it will likely have a lasting residue as an experience -- because it involves that interpersonal component.

We're all so used to thinking of psychological trauma as any experience which has left some kind of "emotional scar".  In that sense, when a boyfriend or girlfriend suddenly says "Hey, I'm done here. I don't want to do this relationship thing with you any longer," well, that will have left a scar of some kind, most likely.  But it probably won't feel life-threatening to most folks, and so won't leave the same kind or degree of scar as life-threatening experiences.

More and more people these days are wanting to distinguish the old sense of "trauma" from a new sense in which "traumatization" has a more restricted technical sense.  It's this which I need to get a handle on, somehow.  I suppose it has something to do with crossing the zero (0) line presented in the video in the opening post here, where states 3 and 4 occur. 

I have so much to learn!  Sigh.

I'm surprised the accent is on the physical so much. Always thought trauma was more of a mental long term pain, or is anguish a more proper word for that?

Well, that's the very interesting thing!  Mind (psyche) and body (soma) are entirely intertwined.  To touch one is to touch the other.  To inflict harm on one is to inflict harm on the other.  To nourish one is to nourish the other -- up to a point, in various senses.

On one level, what we call psychological trauma is a particular kind of change in the nervous system, as well as the other bodily systems which tie in with the nervous system -- such as the various glands which secrete stress hormones.

I'm new to this study, but my early sense of things is that when we have unresolved psychological trauma we are are much more likely to live in a perpetual state of heightened arousal of the kind which relates to the fight or flight mechanisms in the body -- or stress.  That's as much a biological process as one we may call "mental" -- no, even more so!, since changing our conscious mind will not get at the very non-conscious biological processes involved.

The whole field of trauma science has been revolutionized in recent decades, and we're all playing catch up now.  Brain imaging technologies have really upended a lot of commonly held assumptions in the field.

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[Eddie]

Getting kicked in the nads as a kid in the schoolyard will certainly leave a lasting effect.  But it isn't likely to have the same kind or degree of a lasting effect as to have gotten into a bad car accident in which there was a fire and one was badly burned along with one's child. This happened to one of my students, which predisposed her to dissociating in our meditation hall during a session.

Now I have to get a handle on these distinctions.  Hmmm....  I know, without a doubt, that traumas which seem to the traumatized person to be life-threatening cause a different kind and degree of symptoms than being punched or kicked by a bully (most of the time) ... UNLESS the one being threatened or harmed by a bully feels that his or her life is at stake.  And even then, much depends on how we handle that experience immediately afterward.

According to Peter Levine, founder of the Somatic Experiencing approach to trauma therapy, all mammals will shake immediately after a traumatic event -- except humans, who only sometimes shake in this powerful, involuntary way.  We're supposed to shake in this way, 'cause we're mammals, but we often don't.  We inhibit that process -- often because we've been discouraged from doing what comes naturally.

In the below video, we can observe this shaking at minute 2:05.

https://vimeo.com/89958115   -- I tried embedding this video, but it failed.

Levine says that if we don't allow ourselves to shake in this way after a traumatic event, we are at serious risk of PTSD.

That's very interesting. I'd say your burn victim is an extreme example of EXACTLY the kind of trauma that people hold inside. Think about it. First you have the accident, BANG. Then your'e burning, in excruciating pain. And your kid is in pain and you can't do a damn thing about that except maybe watch in horror.

Yep, that's some very serious trauma. You won't be able to cure that, I'm afraid. But working through it with a therapist who understands somatic pain would be useful for her.

Ever try the Quantum Light Breath? It's wonderful. I highly recommend it.

http://yourfriendinspirit.blogspot.com/2007/11/quantum-light-breath.html

Scroll down and click on the link to the original Jeru version. Well worth 90 minutes of your time.

A lot of tantric meditation is movement meditation, aimed at opening all your chakras and raising Kundalini energy. Frankly, I get more out of QLB.

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[JRM]

Yep, that's some very serious trauma. You won't be able to cure that, I'm afraid. But working through it with a therapist who understands somatic pain would be useful for her.

I'm not a psychotherapist.  And I'm not a trauma specialist.  I am very clear with my meditation students about this. If they are in need of such specialist help, I direct them to a specialist with the proper credentials.  The student I mentioned was already in trauma therapy with a specialist before she had come to my classes. Thank heaven!  When she shared that she had dissociated in our session, I already was aware of her trauma history.

What I'm endeavoring to do now is to become a much more well-informed meditation teacher, with regard to trauma.  Nothing more or less.  This study is already transforming how I see and understand my work.  But I have proper humility about where I'm at in my learning about trauma. I'm new to that. No bones about it.
More and more people who teach yoga, somatics practices and meditation are becoming "trauma sensitive" teachers.  I want to be a part of that unfolding.

Ever try the Quantum Light Breath? It's wonderful. I highly recommend it.

http://yourfriendinspirit.blogspot.com/2007/11/quantum-light-breath.html

Scroll down and click on the link to the original Jeru version. Well worth 90 minutes of your time.

I'll look into it.  Odds are I will have already done something very like it, but perhaps by another name.  There are lots of common principles underlying all which is effective.

Some here may find this video of interest:

Peter Levine's Secret to Releasing Trauma from the Body
<a href="http://www.youtube.com/v/s1RnTipiU_Q" target="_blank" class="new_win">http://www.youtube.com/v/s1RnTipiU_Q</a>

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[JRM]

Right near the top of the opening post in this thread I posted a quote from the original thread from which this one sprung. I quoted myself, saying "We have so many filters and blinders on, collectively, around this that it boggles the mind.  (!)"

So it was interesting when Eddie mentioned his belief that MOST, not a few, but MOST of us guys got kicked in the nuts by a bully at some point in their young lives. I would add that we were likely bullied in lots of other ways, besides.  And I've often wondered ... Why? What is it that causes a vast majority of us to be bullied by other boys when we are boys?  What is at the root of bullying?

I've long suspected (though I can't say I know) that much of the bullying perpetrated by boys against other boys is the acting out of an unspoken, and thus largely unconcious, cultural script about maleness and masculinity.  If the salient portion of that script, which I have in mind, were to be made explicit in words it might say
"Boys must become men, and they must become men by becoming "tough," meaning insensitive".  It is the sensitive boy which tends to get the most bullying, after all.  Sensitivity is regarded as "feminine" -- and so this is all gender role training at bottom.  At least that's been my speculative hypothesis for many years.

Related to all of this is the very ancient habit of preparing men to become warriors, to do battle against other men -- to the death.  A sensitive person will find such
struggles to the death nearly (or entirely) impossible.  So the "script" goes deeper, and if made explicit in words might also say, "Us guys owe it to one another to beat the femininity (sensitivity) out of boys, thus making them men -- which means that we are making them warriors.

Even when men are not at literal war with one another, they tend to be in figurative war with one another -- in the battlefield of business, politics, mate-selection, and so forth.

But the deeper point I'm making here is that this is socialization, not "human nature," per se.   

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[JRM]

I just realized I forgot to finish my thought.  To do so I'd have to tie in the quote:  "We have so many filters and blinders on, collectively, around this that it boggles the mind.  (!)"

I suspect that when we BELIEVE the messages in the unspoken script I mention, the result is that we can't see it as a mere script, subject to change.  We then mistake it for "just how boys are".  We take it to be perfectly natural and normal, even though the evidence is to the contrary.  For not all cultures have or have had this script, and those cultures did not involve such a nearly ubiquitous cruelty of boys against other boys.

In some cultures, boys are allowed to retain their sensitivity, which is not seen as weakness or frailty.

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[Palloy2]

I'm probably going to find this thread too esoteric, but I can see one important thing which hasn't been mentioned yet - when the trauma occurs at an early age, say before 3 years old, when the brain hasn't developed any coping strategies yet, it is going to leave its mark one way or another. 

We are all familiar with "brain maps", those diagrams which show which areas of the brain surface deal with which mental functions.  Isn't it surprising how everybody's brain turns out to have the same map? - to which the response is that they don't, quite.  There must be a developmental plan, presumably programmed into the DNA, and if the plan is not disrupted, you turn out "normal".  But if the plan is disrupted, and your coping strategy isn't working, you end up with the layout of the brain map "wrong".  How wrong is very difficult to say, it's certainly not uni-dimensional.

Anyway Prof Asperger noticed some young kids who showed common symptoms of not engaging in communication normally, like the majority of their cohort.  They were clearly somewhat like Autistic kids, who really stick out behaviorally, and so that got labeled Asperger's Syndrome.

The more carefully you watch for kids diverging from "the plan", the more you can see this happening, although getting the very early steps right results in a more "normal" personality.  This gives rise to the label Asperger's Spectrum, although that makes it sound like the problem is uni-dimensional, when in fact there are many interdependent aspects to the plan that occur in parallel.

So although people affected by Asperger's Spectrum Disorder can turn out different in a wide variety of ways, and can seemingly all cope well enough that they don't have to be "looked after" in life, they are nevertheless not "normal". 

One common characteristic is that they tend to be loners - they don't get as much pleasure out of just being with people.  How many times times have you heard someone say "I enjoy my job as a shop assistant because I enjoy meeting new people." ?  I don't ever spend a second on thinking about shop assistants, they are just faceless entities one has to deal with in the mundane process of shopping - worth a "Thank you" at the end, but that's all.

Another is a lack of proper respect for your boss, and other authority figures.  You are not supposed to speak out on something which reflects badly on your boss, especially if it is in front of HIS boss, even if it is true.  This is labeled "Oppositional Defiance Disorder", and you are a "difficult" person.

Another is feeling more at home with computer programming, the cold hard logic of Logic - I was amazed when I heard on the radio that there is an acknowledgement of this in Silicon Valley.  They have realized that some people with "difficult personalities" make fantastic programmers if you don't put them in an open plan roomful of programmers, but let them have their own office, where they can keep the door shut.

Obviously the above all applies to me, but can anyone else here recognise some of those aspects in themselves?   

It might also be extrapolated from that that preferring to have conversations on the Diner, as opposed to face to face at a bar, selects for a certain type of personality.  Conversations are presented in themed threads, even though they may wander dramatically.  And what is written stays on the record and can be quoted back at people.  All very satisfying to a tidy mind. 

Here I was going to pull up a quote, but I can't find it because I split the thread and somebody else moved it somewhere else.  But paraphrasing, 'Palloy is clearly an intelligent asshole (Thank you) but is still an asshole (I really haven't the least idea what you mean)'.

We certainly have I higher than normal proportion of loners and difficult personalities (assholes) here at the Diner, as you might expect from the above.  I suppose we have to just live with the assholes.  (RE would stick a "LOL" on the end of that, but I never find his flippancy worth laughing out loud over, and he thinks I never make jokes at all, which means he doesn't recognise my sense of humour.  Oh well.)

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[azozeo]

Thoughts are electric.
Emotions are magnetic.

Journaling is the remedy. It releases the emotional manifestations to the paper ...

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[JRM]

This is labeled "Oppositional Defiance Disorder" [ODD], and you are a "difficult" person.

While the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders may have some virtues, I think it has at least as many shortcomings.  It is compiled and revised by people with a lot of biases, after all.  One such bias is the context-striped item on the list of bases for diagnosis of ODD: "5. Often actively defies or refuses to comply with requests from authority figures or with rules."

That item can also -- to my  mind -- be understood as a "symptom" of extraordinary mental health.  Such people are much less likely to go along with an authoritarian regime, or social atmosphere in which some ugly form of group-think has set in.  After all, authorities should not be blindly followed, with their every command dutifully obeyed.

Highly obedient people allowed a nut like Adolf Hitler stir up the mass murder of millions of people, after all.  And that's just one item in a very long list of craziness resulting from blind obedience to authority / authorities.

I find the presence of ODD in that book as an embarrassing moment in the annals of the mental health profession.

Some "rules" should be followed -- such as not running red lights at traffic intersections.  Others should be disobeyed on the basis of good sense, reason, and ethics.

I suppose if someone is breaking all rules on the basis of a general contempt for all rules, they are probably a little off their rockers, however. 

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[luciddreams]

Some "rules" should be followed -- such as not running red lights at traffic intersections.  Others should be disobeyed on the basis of good sense, reason, and ethics.

That is why I got myself kicked out of the Navy.  I felt I was doing the right thing by no longer participating.  I did not care what the consequences were. 

Also, I've read this entire thread, and I did watch the original 30 something minute video.  I found the information to be interesting.  I've studied the nervous system, so much of it I knew already intuitively I think.  The simple brief explanation of it is that we evolved big brains on top of survival programming.  Our big brains confuse the signals and can perpetuate a special kind of physical hell that necessitates a mental hell.  The four precise stages of the autonomic response was new to me. 

I'd say when I was on restriction, getting kicked out of the Navy after 9/11, and I ended up on solitary confinement/bread and water, while I was in that cell I was probably at the fourth stage.  Then there was the trauma of hearing my neighboring ship mate in the cell next to me lose his fucking shit and start banging his head against our common cinder block wall.  I heard the repetitive thud, thud of his head, and he was singing a Pink Floyd song, but I can't remember what one (might as well have been The Wall).  I watched through the little slit window in my cell door as they dragged his bloody ass off kicking and screaming.  I never saw or heard from him again.  It was an autonomic, sympathetic, claustrophobic clusterfuck in that cell.  Luckily I had studied Buddhism at sea to keep myself somewhat sane while we were bombing Afghanistan.  So while I was in solitary I just went to a zen place and rode it out. 

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[azozeo]

Some "rules" should be followed -- such as not running red lights at traffic intersections.  Others should be disobeyed on the basis of good sense, reason, and ethics.

That is why I got myself kicked out of the Navy.  I felt I was doing the right thing by no longer participating.  I did not care what the consequences were. 

Also, I've read this entire thread, and I did watch the original 30 something minute video.  I found the information to be interesting.  I've studied the nervous system, so much of it I knew already intuitively I think.  The simple brief explanation of it is that we evolved big brains on top of survival programming.  Our big brains confuse the signals and can perpetuate a special kind of physical hell that necessitates a mental hell.  The four precise stages of the autonomic response was new to me. 

I'd say when I was on restriction, getting kicked out of the Navy after 9/11, and I ended up on solitary confinement/bread and water, while I was in that cell I was probably at the fourth stage.  Then there was the trauma of hearing my neighboring ship mate in the cell next to me lose his fucking shit and start banging his head against our common cinder block wall.  I heard the repetitive thud, thud of his head, and he was singing a Pink Floyd song, but I can't remember what one (might as well have been The Wall).  I watched through the little slit window in my cell door as they dragged his bloody ass off kicking and screaming.  I never saw or heard from him again.  It was an autonomic, sympathetic, claustrophobic clusterfuck in that cell.  Luckily I had studied Buddhism at sea to keep myself somewhat sane while we were bombing Afghanistan.  So while I was in solitary I just went to a zen place and rode it out.

good job LD... 

The answer always lies inward.  Intention is powerful, use it wisely !

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[luciddreams]

I'm probably going to find this thread too esoteric, but I can see one important thing which hasn't been mentioned yet - when the trauma occurs at an early age, say before 3 years old, when the brain hasn't developed any coping strategies yet, it is going to leave its mark one way or another. 

We are all familiar with "brain maps", those diagrams which show which areas of the brain surface deal with which mental functions.  Isn't it surprising how everybody's brain turns out to have the same map? - to which the response is that they don't, quite.  There must be a developmental plan, presumably programmed into the DNA, and if the plan is not disrupted, you turn out "normal".  But if the plan is disrupted, and your coping strategy isn't working, you end up with the layout of the brain map "wrong".  How wrong is very difficult to say, it's certainly not uni-dimensional.

Anyway Prof Asperger noticed some young kids who showed common symptoms of not engaging in communication normally, like the majority of their cohort.  They were clearly somewhat like Autistic kids, who really stick out behaviorally, and so that got labeled Asperger's Syndrome.

The more carefully you watch for kids diverging from "the plan", the more you can see this happening, although getting the very early steps right results in a more "normal" personality.  This gives rise to the label Asperger's Spectrum, although that makes it sound like the problem is uni-dimensional, when in fact there are many interdependent aspects to the plan that occur in parallel.

I've long been interested to see if there is some type of correlation with Aspies and their early childhood development.  I've wondered if there is some common trauma that occurs to them.  I've also read that one of the leading theories is that it's passed on by the father.  My father had two sons, me and my half brother (who is a classic case).  My father is either an Aspie or a Narcissist, I've been unable to tell because it can be difficult to tease out the difference at times since Aspie behavior can appear to be narcissistic. 

So although people affected by Asperger's Spectrum Disorder can turn out different in a wide variety of ways, and can seemingly all cope well enough that they don't have to be "looked after" in life, they are nevertheless not "normal". 

I think we learn how to parrot normal behavior and get by in the world.  But I also think that Aspergers can easily get in the way of a successful life.  It has in my case, at least by societies standards. 

Another is a lack of proper respect for your boss, and other authority figures.  You are not supposed to speak out on something which reflects badly on your boss, especially if it is in front of HIS boss, even if it is true.  This is labeled "Oppositional Defiance Disorder", and you are a "difficult" person.

There is a common type of Aspie personality (this is my type), the "moral police officer."  Nothing will stand in the way of me pointing out you are an idiot if you are acting like an idiot.  Mostly I don't care who you are.  I try to be tactful. 

Another is feeling more at home with computer programming, the cold hard logic of Logic - I was amazed when I heard on the radio that there is an acknowledgement of this in Silicon Valley.  They have realized that some people with "difficult personalities" make fantastic programmers if you don't put them in an open plan roomful of programmers, but let them have their own office, where they can keep the door shut.

I don't do computer programming, but I get the logic and why it's comfortable.  I made an awesome EMT because I lacked emotional empathy for my patients.  Which is an important difference between somebody with aspergers and socio/psychopaths.  By that I mean a sociopath has no empathy at all.  I have empathy, but I don't experience it emotionally.  I experience that empathy intellectually.  Hence, the cost on my soul for killing all of those innocent Afghanis. 

It might also be extrapolated from that that preferring to have conversations on the Diner, as opposed to face to face at a bar, selects for a certain type of personality.  Conversations are presented in themed threads, even though they may wander dramatically.  And what is written stays on the record and can be quoted back at people.  All very satisfying to a tidy mind. 

Socializing on a forum provides all of the mental stimulation with next to none of the in person emotional and unspoken communication.  Aspies do not pick up well on the unspoken, we miss the cues, and it makes shit complicated.  Here, on this forum, it's all just words which are strictly logic.  And, most importantly, we can socialize while actually being alone, behind a closed door.  Which is why they say when you put somebody with Aspergers behind a closed door they no longer have aspergers. 

Here I was going to pull up a quote, but I can't find it because I split the thread and somebody else moved it somewhere else.  But paraphrasing, 'Palloy is clearly an intelligent asshole (Thank you) but is still an asshole (I really haven't the least idea what you mean)'.

I called you an asshole because of the shit you were giving me about misspelling words.  I was at the tale end of catching shit for it all day and I'd had enough.  You were being an asshole, I'm an asshole everyday, our head honcho is a complete asshole...and?

We certainly have I higher than normal proportion of loners and difficult personalities (assholes) here at the Diner, as you might expect from the above.  I suppose we have to just live with the assholes.  (RE would stick a "LOL" on the end of that, but I never find his flippancy worth laughing out loud over, and he thinks I never make jokes at all, which means he doesn't recognise my sense of humour.  Oh well.)

I like the emotocons because it's a way I can be emotional without being emotional.  It also allows for better nuance via this medium of communication.  It can, for instance, help clarify that your sarcastic ass may be joking.  If not it can be easy to not understand somebody. 

This is where I'm not a typical Aspie.  I understand faces very well.  I can read them.  And so I have learned to compute some unspoken emotional communication just by understanding that when the face does x it means y...or whatever the fuck it means.  My point being I've learned to read faces and body language to help me camouflage my social deficits. 

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[azozeo]

Your intending your 6th sense into the mix. Clair-audience, Clairvoyance and the like will
be more readily available in these new energies we're experiencing.

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[JRM]

I'd say when I was on restriction, getting kicked out of the Navy after 9/11, and I ended up on solitary confinement/bread and water, while I was in that cell I was probably at the fourth stage.  Then there was the trauma of hearing my neighboring ship mate in the cell next to me lose his fucking shit and start banging his head against our common cinder block wall.  I heard the repetitive thud, thud of his head, and he was singing a Pink Floyd song, but I can't remember what one (might as well have been The Wall).  I watched through the little slit window in my cell door as they dragged his bloody ass off kicking and screaming.  I never saw or heard from him again.  It was an autonomic, sympathetic, claustrophobic clusterfuck in that cell.  Luckily I had studied Buddhism at sea to keep myself somewhat sane while we were bombing Afghanistan.  So while I was in solitary I just went to a zen place and rode it out.

Oh, man!  All of that was traumatic, indeed!  I'm so sorry you had to go through all of that my brother.

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