Are Your Flashbacks Ever Distorted?

[Klo]

What I mean by distorted, is certain details changed or missing, or maybe there is just a theme to them, a relevant theme, but not the exact traumatic event?

Or are your flashbacks always pretty spot-on as far as the details of what you experienced?

I'm not sure if I really experience "flashbacks" or just something else. I get intrusive thoughts, and sometimes the thoughts are spot-on, but sometimes they are just thematic. And then my environment starts to feel very dangerous, I "feel" or "sense" for example that someone dangerous is there, even I am alone and I know it. In some rare cases, I will see or hear things that make me jump out of my skin, but then it turns out I am just tripping balls due to anxiety.

I don't want to call these sorts of things "flashbacks" if they are not really.

 

[Anarchy]

I can't remember whether it was van der Kolk, in " the body remembers," or Fisher, in " neurofeedback in the treatment of developmental trauma " who referred to interviews with ivy league alumni, about their lives including second world war experiences.

These were spaced decades apart. Twenty or thirty years.

Memories of non trauma, but still major events in the people's lives, like meeting the person who they went on to marry, who attended their wedding, what they ate or wore...
Those memories changed between the interviews

Unresolved Trauma memories and the details in them remained exactly the same.

It seems that trauma memories are indelibly etched and remain incredibly accurate.

On a slightly seperate note, and I think it was @shimmerz who posted a thread about this
One of the top researchers into dissociative amnesia and recovered memories, has as parents, the couple who lead the group which pushes the idea of "false memories"

It's not difficult to guess the parents motivation.

 

[Klo]

I can't remember whether it was van der Kolk, in " the body remembers," or Fisher, in " neurofeedback in...

Yes I know my body remembers things I do not, because I have severe vaginsmus. And on my first gyne exam, I thought I was a virgin, but my doctor said I had internal scar tissue. That all really messed with my head for a long time because I have no memory of being sexually assaulted in any way. But then maybe I wasn't old enoughto form memories at the time, so I don't know, but my body remembers, or so it seems, due to the vaginismus (which is extremely crazy when my own body basically doesn't believe my here-and-now interpretation of a situation).

But the closest thing I seem to experience to "flashbacks" based on my reading, is just that I get all of the thoughts, feelings and ideas, and so on, of something, that isn't actually happening, but I'm not sure of what exactly my brain and body seem to think is happening. That is where there is not much specific detail, and my only clues are the themes of the intrusive thoughts I get, or specific memories of things that share the theme. But no actual memory of what happened to me in that regard.

 

[Anarchy]

Shit, im sorry Klo,
Realising that our lives aren't what we thought they were, and that our memories are incomplete, is a bit like waking up in a weird science fiction story.

From what I've worked out so far, the stuff that led me here started before I was 6 months old. I've later stuff too, that I do remember, bullying, shaming etc. I m male, so I can see my scar tissue down there. Finding out that the parts we make many of our strongest connections through, were damaged for us in early life is hugely distressing and infuriating.

OK,
I just lost a post about emotional flashbacks.

Do you get emotions like terror, shame etc? Perhaps accompanied by adrenaline rush?

Or are you experiencing just (just, is a terrible word, I don't mean it in a diminishing or invalidating sense) your muscles going apeshit?

 

[Klo]

Shit, im sorry Klo,
Realising that our lives aren't what we thought they were, and that our memories a...

When it comes to that, I didn't experience anything emotionally. It was just like my body was possessed. My limbs would start to fight my partner even though that's not what I wanted to happen, and them my muscles in terms of sex were just like NOPE and sex was impossible. So it really feels like my body and I are two separate beings, it's very freakish.

 

[Anarchy]

Hoping that your partner respects the fact that you dont control this.

Are you feeling sort of normal and there in your head when it happens?

Or do things go a bit spacey and a bit fuzzy? Perhaps like hearing going a bit blurred, or like you go further back from your eyes, or your body feels fuzzy as though you are not in it?

A more extreme would be watching yourself from above, or losing time,

or feeling and perhaps even talking like a little girl

 

[Klo]

Hoping that your partner respects the fact that you dont control this.

Are you feeling sort of normal a...

I no longer have a partner. I stopped dating years ago because I knew I wouldn't be able to have sex, and then the relationship would just die a slow, painful death. No point.

I'm not sure what specifically you are asking about. If you are asking about the vaginismus, it was only what I described above. If you mean the experiences I get while having what seem like flashback type things (but I don't know really), disassociation is usually a precursor for those experiences. I will generally weave in and out between being very numb and detached from everything (including myself), and feelings of intense rage and/or terror. During the feelings of intense terror or a feeling like extreme danger and doom (not sure how to describe it really) is when it's like I start to lose touch with reality. One of the signs for me that it's starting is when I smell things that are not really there. I smell chemicals, people's houses and so on, and then I know that it has begun.

 

[Anarchy]

I was askingabout what happens in your head when your body is rebelling.

Those smells are themselves flashbacks.

Trauma memories are often "written in different files" for the different senses.

Dating isn't for everyone all of the time. I will say that there are patient and caring people (of either gender) who will stick with you, even when your inner critic is telling you the opposite.

 

[BlueOrange]

I will say that there are patient and caring people (of either gender) who will stick with you, even when your inner critic is telling you the opposite.

There's also a subcultural thing to be aware of - there are people who say that their sexual preference is 'asexual', but who do engage in romantic and committed relationships. You tend to find them in the geek/fringe community.

 

[Klo]

I was askingabout what happens in your head when your body is rebelling.

Ah. Well honestly nothing. It's been years since I was in a relationship, though, so the memories of those times are getting older and faded like photos. But I don't remember anything going on in my head, except for maybe anxiety and frustration that it wasn't working. I mean I tried everything. Breathing exercises. Xanax. Psychotherapy. Nothing worked at all. So all of my thoughts/feelings were in response to not being able to have sex and what that meant for the failing relationship. It's been so long since then I've accepted being single and don't feel bad about it that much anymore. But it is still an eerie feeling to know that your body acts on its own accord, that distinct separation of self and body is jarring.

 

[Anarchy]

Really sorry that you went through that. It must have been really frustrating and upsetting at the time.

:hug: if you'll accept them.

 

[Mafia_Science]

I have similar experiences with alterations in my flashbacks. When I was 13, I was hit over the head with a huge flashlight and passed out. When I woke up, I couldn't remember anything about what happened, except who knocked me out, and why (my "boss" when I worked at the local barn, and because I broke open a sandbag when putting it on a shelf).

As time went on, even a year after, I had flashbacks that contained more and more details. I remembered that he actually set a burlap bag on fire and started threatening me with it. That he was pushing me into a bunch of stuff, hitting me with a shovel, throwing stuff at me, yelling really loud. I never spoke about it, until a few weeks ago when my friend, who also worked there, brought up the crazy guy and confirmed everything that happened.

We didn't know any better and let him take advantage of us. We were paid $5 an hour of back-breaking work and we were 13 years old. We spent all the money on spikes for tack, movie tickets, and sodas. Looking back, the whole situation was very sad and I can't believe he was so cruel to a few kids.