Hi Penelope,
I'm not sure how to interpret 'felt sensations', as in tactile, as in the body's experiencing, or whether it is the best thing to go into deeper interpretation of it? I think this might make a really fascinating separate thread on the discussion board, to make sure more people see and can respond to it.
I can only speak to it through the limitations of my own experiencing, and I'm vague in other areas. So it's good to get feedback from others, because they may have even greater understanding and knowledge of how to work with the felt sense.
Sometimes the 'felt sense' for me are clues about the body's physiological response to things like anxiety, panic attacks, emotional states of mind, so they can indicate a trigger coming on and sometimes before it takes full hold as in flashback, dissociation. Sometimes they can indicate stored energy to do with fight/flight and freeze responses. And sometimes they do tell us about our emotions and as we get to know them, it can help us identify our emotions earlier before our brains recognize them-- this is powerful stuff to get to know.
For me at this stage in my recovering, I've been steering away from interpreting the felt senses, as I'm just begining to get to know them. I have been getting some insights about them and ways I can use this to my advantage over troublng symptoms.
What I've spend some time doing is to simply observe them, you might want to start to record them in a journal. I started to do that for a bit, with an outline picture of a human form, a "gingerbread woman" figure even :) and I would use crayons to colour in where I feel sensations, and a one word description of it, e.g. tingling, aching, sore, etc.). That might be a really good place to start, if you haven't already re: getting tuned to the felt sense and observing your own tendencies. I photocopied these pictures and I would place the date at the top of the page, so I had started a bit of a journal for body sensations. I think over time of observation, a person can lean how it's own body can communicate with the self, inform on feelings, on danger on pre-flashback panic/hyperarousal.
At my stage of recovery which is still a lot to do with stage one, back at stage one, it's important for me to learn first to relax about what I observe happening in my body, because I need to feel safe, I need to not panic about my body, cause it's my major ally in my recovery :).
The mindfulness meditation and the yoga I've been introduced to, for now is a training about simply observing the body's sensations when they arise, but then to refocus on the breath. I think this is important to get a good foundation of safety with one's body because it can become a very helpful ally to help re-ground from flashback and to keep present to the present moment of experiencing, without going to far off into mind (where we can also start dissociating more, etc.).
I've discovered that he felt sense, to me can be an early warning indicator of early onset of a trigger, before it becomes flashback. "Something's wrong, am I safe right now. . . I need to get someplace where I'm safe", so I can be with myself and observe this and take care of myself. Or if sitting a waiting room, can possibly pull that off safely and discretely
I've been discovering that certain sensations do alert me to a panic attack before even my heart rate goes funky, and if I catch on to it, I can practice mindful abdominal breathing technique and actually prevent a full blown panic attack. I can feel things like tension around my heart, like queezy stomach, constriction in my throat-- they're not flashbacks. But the panic, the physiologial arousal in response to a trigger, can bring on flashbacks-- it's that hyperarousal thing, cluster of ptsd symptoms. The cool thing about the breathing technique is that it can be done discreetly even, in public. I practice it when I'm on a bus or at the bus stop, etc.
That's what I can give you so far about how I'm working with it.
There are some specific therapies that are out there that work more closely with the body, the felt sense, but I think that's better when you have a therapist that's specialized in these methods? I'd also ask the group directly for their imput on this, if you are thinking about exploring that type of therapy? Somatic therapies; "emotional freedom technique", things like that. . .?
The doctor's office experience, sounds like it was possibly an emotional flashback-- I find those confusing to me. I sometimes can't tell what's happening within and separate what's happening around me-- sometimes I've over-doubted myself, so there is something to intuition and trusting that to keep yourself safe.
A couple of things you might want to check out: 1) there's a Pete Walker article in the "Articles" section on this board to do with C-PTSD and Emotional Flashbacks, that might help you out a bit more.
Another thing that's kind of trippy are "psychic flashbacks", I read about that I think in a Babette Rothschild book, something about 8 Keys. . . re: helpful for ptsd recovery-- sorry, I don't have the exact title handy at the moment. But those are also kind of trippy.
I remember one quite clearly now, but I didn't have a concept for it at the time, but it wasn't too long ago, but it was picking up on the slightest of gestures I percieved in a flash moment in a person's expression. I 'read it', it created panic in me, I went on to experience flashbacks afterwards. I kept myself safe and grounded and alert while dealing with this person, keep present to what's going on, deal with my feelings later.
The freaky thing was, is that I percieved it correctly, a flash, instant insight and I know this because I had a chance to talk to that person afterwards and I just told her what I was picking up on, it wasn't a new issue, but I had thought it was resolved. It's been an issue that's been hurtful (jealousies, it hurts me, I expect further attacks and there are situations those jealousies have prompted violence towards my self or another person-- so it does flip me out). A "psychic flashback' and I thought I was going totally insane, it really freaked me out. But it was a completely accurate perception of that person, in that moment.
Jealousy is pretty intense energy, just like rage is. She was trying to keep it down and I also felt that effort as well. And a slight very miniscule curl of the lip. It's freaky. It was difficult because we were working on a group project and then I'd be at the project site, and than energy travels, she'd get mad at her boyfriend, he'll over-compensate and treat me bad, then because he's the head-hauncho, it spreads to the other workers, some are male, and I had also a bad experience before at this event related to that. . . and I'll just stop there for now, but men who think it's okay to dominate and take, pick up on mysogynist energies take to objectification of me. . . it's gross. Sorry. I don't dislike men, there are many really good men, more so than the occaisional psychotic/sociopath for example. And I had no interest in her geezer boyfriend whatsoever (he wouldn't even bother wearing his teeth :) ), no attraction there-- it's all to do with her own insecurity, abandonment issues, etc. and it's really intense for her. She's a good person though, it's just hard for her, her old wounds coming forth and current insecurities. It's just a trigger reaction for her that's just really difficult for her to deal with. I always dressed down, kept my clothes baggy, even churchy, and even held back on participating, I'd introduce new ideas to her, not in front of her boyfriend. . . kind of stressful.
