The Neurobiology of Trauma – What’s Going On In the Brain When Someone Experiences Trauma?
 |
with Bessel van der Kolk, MD;
|
 |
with Bessel van der Kolk, MD; Pat Ogden, PhD; Ruth Lanius, MD; PhD Dan Siegel, MD; and Ruth Buczynski, PhD
Sign up for a Gold Membership
some thoughts: cortisol prohibits hippocampus activity and adrenalin promotes emotional memory so the nature of trauma is to be overwhelmed by large emotions, as in the original trauma, but minus the integrative effect and organizational capacity of the memory shuffle executed by the hippocampus. That would explain the ongoing rages typical from those of us who have been tortured/raped.
Does the hippocampus’ integrative effect on memories promote prefrontal cortex activity? Does prefrontal cortex activity impact hippocampal activity as common sense indicates?
In the areas of attachment: Disorganized attachment leads to greater susceptibility to PTSD because with disorganized attachment the child’s ability to predict or expect an outcome from behaviour in themselves or others or circumstances remains uncertain. It is the predictive element of both other kinds of attachment, whether positive and regulated attachment or negative attachment, that allows the sense of self to predict outcomes. In other words, since the disorganized attachment experience has no predictability, the sense of self in the world rises through and expects the unexpected. When a trauma occurs later in life, it falls on a sense of self without a sense of consistency in the world or from others. That sense of self as inconsistent, because others and circumstance have proven inconsistent, mean the trauma may be repeated at any time. That position of world view through a sense of self that is periodic, pulsing off and on chaotically just as the early disorganized attachments created in the sense of self promote through a single traumatic event the belief that life itself cannot be trusted.
When the attachment has been positive prior to a later life trauma, the sense of self feels an innate ability to predict consistency. In other words, the trauma was simply a one off event. With negative attachment, no positive expectation is held in the self and so the self is fulfilled: see, another bad thing happened to me.
With disorganized attachment, no strong sense of self can hold the later life trauma in the body. And yet, the very disorganized attachment that creates this problem in later trauma can be the source of healing: since the person has learned to not expect outcomes of any consistency, if they learn to meditate enough, (and the use of Tibetan Vajrayana techniques are perhaps even more suitable here than Mindfulness, which is a Vipassana technique and allows for spontaneous insight, as opposed to Samatha, or the use of colours, shapes and sounds, which develop calm. His Holiness the 17th Gyalwang Karmapa advises much much practice in Samatha before Vipassana is engaged) if the person with disorganized attachment in early childhood learns to stay present enough, the very lack of expectation of an outcome may become the strength leading to a sustained focus in the present.
I hope some of this makes sense. I welcome any responses.
The Course keeps on getting Better through Fine Tuning
What was the bad experience. With the method or the trainers. In the time i did a course it was the trainers. Luckily i had already attended a lecture by Jon Kabat-Zinn. Watching several of his vids treating terminal cancerpatients reminded me of the original intention of the method and how it was to be used. Personally i believe when the method went commercial in expensive courses it often was not taught right and mixed with all kinds of other methods. Mindfulness is just the courage to really feel in all your bodysenses what you feel and feeling it will transcend and hopefully integrate it.
I am not a clinician. I am a sufferer of severe PTSD from prolonged, countless traumas. No one has been able to help me after years of medications and therapies. My husband just left me because he can’t take it any more. I am watching this, thankfully free, webinar desperately seeking something that can help me to become something close to normal again. I am quite smart; I am a member of Mensa. I can understand the brain science, so I am hopeful that since I can’t find a therapist who can fix me, maybe I can glean something here that I can use to save myself. The information on disorganized attachment being linked to impaired integration is new to me and gives me a new direction to research for my self work, so that’s good.
There is No suchnthing as “Fixing” your self since there is nothind to Fix.
This is ‘Brain Mind Body’s’Adaptive response to Chronic Trauma by becoming ‘Overwhelmed’. Mostly one gets stuck in Dorsal Vagal Collapse state,also called Freeze Respnse.
So Return to– 1.Appropriate Movement/Exercise including Aquasizes, 2.Yoga in group with a teacher that Emphasizes Yogic Deep Breathing/Balanced Movement with Body Awareness,Sensation/ Focused Mindful Attention,3. Proper Nutrition, and connecting with a likeminded Group eg.join a choir and get some Voice training and or a Knitting group /Quilting group/Rhythmic Dance Movements like Two steps or Line Dancing/ Drama/Tai Chi etc.
Sitting Still for long time might push one into a Panic state.
Working with a good Therapist like Talk therapy,Dr. Stephen Porges Polyvagal Therapy and SE therapy focusing on Body trauma are of great Benefit in Releasing Trauma.
This is not about Cognition or Intellectual brain;It is Limbic brain focused Treatment and happens amid Therapeutic Alliance that develops with Trust and Compassion during the Relation ship with the Therapist.
Long Term Group Therapy is very supportive in face of Chronic Conditions . We are Relational human Beings .
Best Wishes for your On-going Healing Work.
I experienced the Lebanese civil war as a five year old. My father was an Austrian trade commissioner and we were posted there at the time.
I have been working on my PTSD, on and off, since my 19 year old son was born. Holding a small life in my arms was not the pleasurable experience many people had described.
I used to get in trouble when I would lose it as a child. They didn’t know much about PTSD back in 1976. I also developed an incredible fear of fire (shell fire, rocket fire, gun fire and cease fire). It took my mom a couple of years to realize that I thought fireman brought fire.
I also had a series of dreams at age of 6 in which my dissociation became very entrenched. This was all followed by my parents having an open marriage which resulted in moving 10 times in 4 years. At 13 we settled in Boston and I desperately tried to manage my brother and mothers fights for the next 5 years.
I will be 50 this year. I have a great therapist now and use EMDR alongside talk therapy. I use a meditation to get back to sleep at night. I hike, make art and play squash too. I am very happy hut there is still work to be done.
MY favourite concepts today were attachment, dissociation, memory, epi-genetics, meditation, vertical and horizontal systems integration, clustered experiences, the extra burden of freeze and the mind.
I’m so grateful for all the insights from all of the research and all of your hard work.
Cheers!
The term Mindfulness is a trigger now for me after a very bad experience with it.
What was the bad experience. With the method or the trainers. In the time i did a course it was the trainers. Luckily i had already attended a lecture by Jon Kabat-Zinn. Watching several of his vids treating terminal cancerpatients reminded me of the original intention of the method and how it was to be used. Personally i believe when the method went commercial in expensive courses it often was not taught right and mixed with all kinds of other methods. Mindfulness is just the courage to really feel in all your bodysenses what you feel and feeling it will transcend and hopefully integrate it.
I often wondered if Panic Disorder source stems from dissociation ….?
Thank you so much for this training. I found particularly helpful Ruth Lanuis explanation of what a lack of integration looks like in a client. Flashbacks from the past, out of body experiences, detachment. Hands or feet feeling detached, or multiple selves as so fragmented, no sense of self and disorganized attachment safety. As an Equine Facilitator of Human Development, we work very much with the body and being in the observer position in the present. The horses mirror back to people in a non-judgemental way what is going on for them internally when they are incongruent, which gives them something tangible and keeps them in the present. It will be really helpful to be able to help clients see that the neurobiology of trauma is not something to feel ashamed of and that it is not their fault that they have experienced it, that the guilt and shame is something they dont have to feel they have contributed to, and that they can have limbic revision and change their thinking and mindset, which will help them to become more fully integrated. Really looking foward to next week.
My husband and I work with addictions. Using groups to facilitate integration with self in the present and social engagement was supported by Dan Siegel explanation of changing epigenetic code for our bodies. I am so encouraged to hear this because we have watched it happen. Practicing being in the present has new meaning for me today. Thank you for this and the access to the research that can teach us more about what is happening as people become sober and begin to feel and integrate trauma that caused the acting out. We work closely with psychologists and watching these training series gives me so much hope and encouragement to continue to do this part of the work.
I have a blog to help myself and others de stress called “Diary of a Mindful Nature Lover.” This information is valuable for that. It was presented in an accessible way. Thank you. Nina Naomi
Thank you so much for this. it is such a powerful tool for awareness and healing.
Thank you for this excellent program. I have been able to think of how I can help my clients today with what I have learned. Karen Johnson
Thank you so much for inviting me to this update on Trauma Series. I loved it.
First how I could use the information at work is put together an approach
like Pat Ogden’s to use mindfulness to *see* what the body is doing in a
slowed-down form….while putting feeling words to postures and gestures…and I am
thinking, to have my client describe the difference for example–being hunched over
as compared with erect-in-space.
This moves me on to what Dan Segal said about mindfulness and increased telomerase.
That’s what Pat is doing…increasing her client’s mindfulness, hence increasing telomerase!
So I got an acknowledgement,(forget who was speaking here), perhaps both Ruth
Lanius and Dan Segal, that pathological dissociation is highly related to a disorganized
attachment. That is a kind of exciting puzzle piece, that makes total sense in my own
early life experience.
I’m so of excited to realize what happened to me this morning…concerning Default/Salience/Executive
brain functions…where the EMOTIONAL brain ….is where I can still get stuck and unable to verbalize. This is complex
and I have to simplify it somewhat to discuss it. But here is my epiphany: When my
emotional connection, (trust) of someone, recognizes they are lying to me on some level, it sort-of
does not compute. I cannot integrate. Then I cannot verbalize a response and also cannot hear what the individual
is saying to me in the interim of the disconnect. And this is in present day dating back to pre and perinatal traumas and
disorganized attachment. I can now congratulate myself for growing my telomeres even this morning!
Wow what you guys are doing is amazing. I think the part about self blame for the trauma and helping people to understand it’s just your brain doing it’s normal human thing in response to trauma is a real game changer. How many people spend so much time on guilt and shame around the trauma that could be better spent on healing just because they don’t have the facts of neurobiology. Frees up so much healing energy and focus to get them to understand this. Thank you:)
Such a wonderful explanation of the effects of trauma on the brain and the whole person. Integration and “presence” will bring about regulation for the client. This is such positive learning for me to incorporate into my practice. Thank you. 1.15am.
Thank you for the video.
I try to increase awareness of trauma and mental health by writing.
I also create visual materials to help explain the experience of Complex-PTSD.
MStewart
I signed up for the trauma series with the understanding that the series was available at anytime on video . Clearly I made a mistake as I was in Paris at the time, and working in London. I didnt return to the USA until end of November and now just ready to take the course. Now I see it has expired so essentially I wasted quite a bit of money plus the CEUs. Any suggestions.
This was a wonderful training! Follow up question for anyone on use of mindfulness with clients who have a trauma history. I have had several clients who are resistant to the use of mindfulness, many have resistance, because of previous therapists misuse. I usually explore their resistance with them and outline (if they did use it) what they would want to benefit from it. I am curious about the following:
How do you approach mindfulness with resistant clients?
When a client is resistant, do you approach mindfulness during a later phase of treatment?
What techniques are helpful to teaching mindfulness?
Any helpful resources you would recommend?
Thank you so much!
i feel you really went for the core of trauma tonight, thank you so much for these webinar sessions
enlarged amydala (mothers’ high cortisol levels while pregnant) – intriguing, i will research more online
Thank you Ruth! This was a wonderful way to start the series. It validates the tools I am teaching in my Breathwork and Gentle stretching techniques class for clients with sexual trauma here in Portland, Or. Many of our schools are replacing PTSD with PTSI- Post Traumatic Stress Injury. It does feel like a compassionate way that encourages healing.
Thank you! This updated information on neurobiology is exciting and so well explained! Ruth, your process of pausing to explain the points each expert has made is masterful.
Resourced with this material, we can explain to clients what happens to the brain during trauma and help them shed their personal shame about how trauma has affected them. Knowing that the integration of their traumatic experience is possible with mindfulness of the body and emotions is a powerful inspiration for healing.
As I start up a new practice having recently acquired an LCSW, I hope to integrate training as a massage therapist with clinical therapy. I am especially interested in sensorimotor psychotherapy as a way to integrate the learnings from this training session to inform my practice and process my own life experiences.
I learned about the vertical and left-right brain integration and the use of Mindfulness and body sensations as a way to help clients integrating the brain. Yet, I do not feel comfortable to say that I will start using the learnings. I feel that I need to get more confident in applying the brain integration interventions. I already use mindfulness and meditation with the majority of my clients.
Wonnderful opening for the series. Excellent summary of the brain functioning in the face of trauma. Looking forward to the more in depth discussion of mindfulness in trauma treatment. Thank you.
There is a confusion in the literature that I hope someone will take up and resolve for everyone who is looking for a definitive position on the Freeze response. Some refer to Freeze as the orienting moment that takes place at the beginning of the potential trauma. Others, like Ruth Lanius in the presentation, use Freeze to describe what the first group considers Tonic Catatonia and Tonic Collapse. While both ends of the trauma experience are similar in autonomic function and balance, they are also very different. Well-respected researchers are publishing on both sides. I would like someone to end the confusion by making a decision and sticking with it. Or, maybe that’s too much to hope for. Thoughts?
In the 20% that get PTSD and might some of them have temperaments consistent with the Highly Sensitive Persons (per Elaine Aron)?
Thanks for this wonderful consciousness-raising series. As Ron suggests, the contribution of neuroscience is a paradigm shift out of the 20C neurosis of self-blame and analysis – those stubborn discourses of guilt and talk therapy that go around in circles and waste time, years, whole lifetimes, keeping people trapped in mistaken and impotent meanings. I appreciate the hope that comes from understanding how mindfulness of body states, emotions and thoughts promotes integration – healing the fragmentation of dissociation. ‘Trauma’ is a wide word these days – a bit like ‘sustainability’: buzz words that point to themes that demand integration at the social level if humanity is to face current challenges. I quit my job as a boring counsellor applying organisationally-produced bandaids – in order to develop deeper healing work that is informed by this work and expressive arts therapy. Getting started and so the series is a very timely and accessible summary of this knowledge – and deeply supportive of therapeutic practice – and I will purchase the Gold Pass. The format works well, bringing faces and personalities to these Names – easy to remember. I appreciate your commitment to spreading this knowledge – fundamental to us all, how we understand ourselves, others and our societies. Thank you.
I heard a lot of information that is important in my work, and in my own life. Mindfulness Training is truely an important thing to learn. I have been to training and it affects me every day. It was particularly interesting to hear that it gives charge to your epigenetics and can in fact change your outcomes in life. I will be on next webinar for sure.
I’ve just watched again! Thank you for providing this opportunity! Yesterday after watching and commenting on the powerful experience, I realized how for years it was obvious to me that the people I was meeting in and out of therapy, in and out of recovery from adult children of alcoholics/addicts/dysfunctional families, as well as substance and process addiction recovery seemed to be more likely to have and possibly die from what I sensed were stress- and/or trauma-related illness such as cancer, diabetes, depression, heart disease, etc. Very powerful for me to see that my intuition/observations were on target; that the full extent of the impact of what I and so many of us were and are experiencing is truly expressed in our bodies, life experiences, diseases and health, as well as potential impacts on genes and future generations. It has felt like a long, short journey with so much further to go in the advances (many of us traveling the road to healing have seriously questioned if we have been helped by all the years of work we have invested, along with our lives and financial situation, in our healing), yet the current findings feel very promising to me! Thank you!
Thank you for bringing such great experts together to speak coherently about trauma and its possible effects on the brain! All of what was said reinforces my belief that EMDR Therapy, coupled with parts work and some somatic therapies, is uniquely positioned to change people’s lives!
I was very touched by Ruth’s reference to relatives of those suffering from trauma when she introduced this series. I know that experience first hand, being the partner of someone with Childhood PTSD, who had no real support from original caregivers.His father before him experienced the same… then obviously passed it on to him via beatings as a young child. Consequently we can’t have a fulfilled relationship. I’m a Life Coach seeking further understanding for myself and others, and have followed NICABM series before now. My partner, now over 70 has sought many groups and mindfullness techniques but not therapy. I personally feel it may be his only hope, and for our relationship also. Any advice for close relatives of those suffering from PTSD? I support him all I can, but am often met with denial, defence, and what feels like ‘stonewalling’. Almost impossible to live with, so I remove myself from our relatiuonship for much of the year.
When Dan Seigel said that Presence will repair our telomeres, by optimizing telomaraze, he was surely also talking about Mindfullness that nurtures one’s Presence. Mindfullness and Presence are not exclusive, or separate ‘solutions’, in my view.
Research has been conducted on meditators that meditated on Loving Kindness and repaired their telomeres. This is a practice of Mindfullness. The results excite an inspire me with hope!
My perspective is also that we could try to ‘take in’ telomaraze as a medicine I think I’ver seen it in online marketplaces). Hiowever our body’s cells will not accept it if our cells’ receptors are addicted to other chemicals, for example being addicted to our body’s own cortisol over long periods of recalling stress events. I’d love to know others’ views on this. I look forward to the rest of these sessions. Many thanks for this informative series!
Helpful in explaining to clients how the body responds to trauma and how mindfulness, strategies, and tools can help with coping now, but also regarding coping in the future and genetics in the future. Loved the analogy re the tips of the shoelaces to protect the tellemeres (spelling?) and the brain and body’s vertical and horizontal integration system. Thank you!!!
Thanks for a fascinating introduction to What happens in the brain during trauma. I have a long held interest in neuroscience and have actually used mindfulness to alter menopausal symptoms by imagining myself in a bath of freezing cold water just as a hot flush occurred. I was able to completely stop these hot flushes within five weeks and have not had any more for eight years. Of course being a long time meditator and user of mindfulness for 20 years helped me to concentrate and change my physiology. I have taught these techniques to clients and the most useful aspect is having them understand the science behind the techniques.
Thank you so much for providing this for free! I have started a private practice in a new city and it’s been slower than expected to fill my schedule. Viewing these has kept me inspired and motivated to keep going!
Thank you for this webinar. So helpful in organising interventions and reflecting on specific ways of working as Dance Movement Psychotherapist in particular.
Exciting, information that helps integrate theory and practice. Thank you!
Hi, thanks for the great information! I’m a PhD student in anthropology (with a focus on neuroanthropology) investigating the sensory lifeworlds of people living with fibromyalgia, and how they navigate the world with sensory sensitivity. Most of my research participants have had some kind of trauma or significant stress, either early in life, or around the onset of their fibromyalgia symptoms, or both. I have the condition myself, and clinically I would fall into the complex PTSD category, so this information is personally relevant as well. This session is relevant in that it integrates with the kinds of sensory and visceral experiences reported by participants. I’ve been looking a lot at autonomic dysregulation, and also at the broader issue of how autonomic stress is often kind of culturally invisible, so people with the kinds of symptoms that emerge from this dysregulation have trouble making sense of it themselves, but also have difficulty getting it recognised medically. The idea about the mind not just being the brain but the whole body and relational world is central to the neuroanthropology approach I am taking, looking at the relationship between culture and the brain. I’ve been looking at epigenetics as well, so fantastic to know we can change our telomeres!
Thank you for the wonderful opportunity to hear from the worlds top experts. I am not in practice at the moment due to ill health but it is truly wonderful to be able to keep in touch . I find your commentary very helpful and it allows me to keep focused on all the insights . Thank you too for the opportunity to have a second chance to hear the sessions as just now finances don’t allow me to purchase the package.
Thank you Thank you
Finola Finn
When I have my degree I’ll use this to help victims of domestic violence. I’m a survivor of DV and someone whose experienced trauma from being unable to get away from the violence before I ended up experiencing disassociation and being diagnosed with CPTSD. I’ve experienced fight, flight and freeze. Its wonderful to be on the other side of all this. I probably wouldnt be except I had a secure, nuturing and and loving family when I was growing up! Learning some of the details regarding DNA is very exciting to me!