Good Morning :) Hope you are all having a fantastic weekend! I wanted to talk about Childhood Trauma, Repressed Memories and Ways Humans Cope in times of Extreme Stress. I will also talk about the Four F's: Flight, Fight, Freeze and Fawn and how it affects our daily activities, wellness and ways of coping. First, I wanted to start with a statistic. I don't really care for statistics, because I find them impersonal, but this one is pretty staggering. More than Two-thirds of children in the United States experience a traumatic event before they turn 16. This spans from things humans can't control(like a natural disaster or loss of a loved one) to things humans can control(like domestic violence and sexual assault). Obviously the victim can't control someone being violent towards them or sexually assaulting them, but it's something caused by humans rather than something outside of us, like Nature or God. When something Traumatic happens to us in our childhood, it remains stored in our brain and body, even if we can't recall the Traumatic event that happened. This is known as a repressed memory, or dissociative Amnesia. I was thinking about this the other day and trying to remember details of my childhood, but found it hard to remember specifics. I remember some traumatic things that have happened, like being locked in the attic at my grandparents house and falling through the floorboards onto the cement floor; laying in the hospital bed after eye surgery, spending time with my cousins who tried to strangle me, shove things down my throat and even stab me, etc... but when I recall these events, I see them as if they were a dream. Just bits and pieces here and there, no concrete things that were said or done, but just blurs. When I tried to remember the details I couldn't, and then I realized that a lot of people actually can't remember a lot of specifics of their childhood. The reason we have repressed memories and amnesia from our childhood is because the younger brain is considered more vulnerable and easily overwhelmed by trauma, so we stuff the memory deep in our subconscious as a way to protect ourselves. Our younger brain/prefrontal cortex, which is in charge of executive function and decision-making ability does not full mature until the age of 25, so our childhood and adolescent years are extremely vulnerable when it comes to trauma, because we experience the emotion of a situation, but don't know how to fully make sense or handle it. To add to this, just because we can't recall our childhood, doesn't mean we necessarily went through a traumatic event; there is also what experts call "childhood amnesia," which is basically the brains inability to remember things as well in childhood as in adulthood, because the brain is still developing. We typically have a stronger memory development between the ages of 8-10 years old. Another thing that can make memory and trauma confusing, is our brains ability to create believable memories that didn't actually happen. These "created" or “false” memories are often influenced by things we've experienced through our five senses, these are known as “concrete” or “sensory” memories because we can recall them through our senses. They can become inaccurate records of what actually happened when we fill in the gaps of memory with our own beliefs about how the world works and what others have told us. These “false” memories are either partially true or made up entirely. They can be vivid and convincing when you encounter compelling suggestions/narratives or details that your brain then uses to create a new memory without you consciously knowing it. All-in-all there's no entirely accurate way to separate the “sensory” memories from what we've created in our minds. Perhaps this is why two people can experience the same event and have entirely different renditions, or experiences, of what happened.
Do you have a specific area in your life that you struggle with and have been struggling with for as long as you can remember?
Adults who’ve experienced childhood trauma, and especially repressed memories, often struggle in areas without a rhyme or reason, and will often experience pain in their body that doesn't have a tangible cause. Adults with childhood trauma can also experience higher rates of anxiety, depression, suicide attempts, self-harm, PTSD, relationship struggles, drug and alcohol misuse, problems sleeping and regulating emotions.
Do you feel like you have repressed memories form childhood or have idiopathic pain in your body or anxiety that comes about without any clear cause?
You might benefit from seeing a BodyMindBridge Therapist, who can unlock these repressed memories and give you a clearer cause for your struggles and pain.
When you go through a traumatic event, how do you cope?
Do you Fight back, Run away, freeze up and remain still/paralyzed or exhibit a Fawning response(which is a way of people-pleasing to avoid conflict and appease abusers.
I would love to hear your thoughts on this subject and feel free to share any personal stories or general stories in the comments below!
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