Felt Something For The First Time...

[macbeth]

In 7 years. I have been detached from my feelings for a long time but yesterday during my fortnightly counselling session I felt something other than my usual fearful, sad, numb responses. My counsellor ask me to recall an episode during my abuse. She then ask me how that felt, what it looked like, what colour it was and what was its texture. This seemed really foreign to me until my T said it was about re associating with feelings and experiences rather than disassociating with them which is what I usually do. When I got into it I felt like I made a breakthrough. Has anyone had a similar experience with their T? Also, has anyone experienced chronic thinking in that you have disassociated but are hyper vigilant if that makes sense?

 

[shimmerz]

@macbeth yes, I have experienced this type of treatment, although never with a conventional healer. They use colour a ton in Matrix Reimprinting. The texture thing is a nice spin as well. I think the idea behind it is to incorporate it into your senses. For me, it works very well. You can use this for comfort feelings as well. A bit like a child with a soft blankie. I have all sorts of colours (usually ones that shimmer ;)) and textures that ground me back to a good place. I also use smells.

I would love a little more information on your question about chronic thinking/dissociation/hyper-vigilance. Can you describe with a bit more detail what you are asking here?

 

[macbeth]

I was triggered long ago @shimmerz and I completely disassociated from the situation and myself. I think everything through and I was told that is an extreme form of hyper vigilance (when you can do nothing but think every action through) from a psychiatrist. I hope I can make it clearer for you if need be.

 

[shimmerz]

So in fact what I am hearing @macbeth, is that you think yourself into dissociation due to your hyper-vigilance due to maybe a freeze response that the original wounding caused? Does that make any sense to you? Am I expressing that correctly? It doesn't seem like a flight, fight but rather a freeze or fawn. That is actually what I am trying to get to here. What type of trauma response you are falling into.

 

[macbeth]

yes @shimmerz I froze. You have observed correctly but I still find myself constantly in a thinking mode and I was wondering if any members here experience anything similar. I was told by shrink that hyper thinking is hyper vigilance.

 

[shimmerz]

Thanks @macbeth. Yes, I experience this as well. It is, for me, an effective way of keeping myself 'frozen'. So for others it is what came first, the chicken or the egg? To me the circular thinking keeps me frozen, which as a result, keeps me safe from making the 'wrong move' so to speak. So for me, it is more of a coping strategy. In fact, I stopped this by standing back afterwards and asking myself what I was protecting myself from and if it was a truly 'dangerous' situation.

May I ask you, do you feel like 'someone else' is thinking or that the thought patterns are different when you are in this mode? I find my thoughts are crystal clear and not clouded. I don't feel like it is a DID thing for me, but instead I have more energy as I lose my body sensations at this time and more energy is committed to my thinking functions. This makes sense given my past, but it took some time to get to this.

 

[Seasounds]

@macbeth,
-yes, my T gave me the same exercise. (I imagine they go to the same continuing ed classes.) Since I find it calming, I have incorporated it into my regular meditation.

- your thought is interesting: hyper-vigilance associated with disassociation. Yes, you aren't alone. I believe I do this some times; other times I may not-if I'm so frozen or depressed that I'm not responsive.

Thanks for your insight!

 

[WillyKat]

That's a big step forward @macbeth. Part of the healing process is to integrate memories of the trauma into normal memory. Or in other words, to help your "cool system" (more rational, analytic brain parts) process the data instead of it always being your "hot system" (fear-based brain parts).

Your cool system can sort of defuse things. So over time, when the memories come, it doesn't have to always be your hot system that handles it. (I hope that makes sense; I think I'm rambling a bit.)

 

[Go Hungry]

That's an interesting thought about thinking things through as being a form of avoidance and hyper-vigilance. I do this constantly, often thinking things through until I am completely paralyzed with inaction. I'll just ruminate on things, considering factors and escape strategies and everything under the sun until I find myself 2 hours behind on my plans and then just deciding 'why bother'. I never considered that it might be a freeze response. :confused:

 

[WillyKat]

I do a lot of ruminating too. Such things are common with PTSD. I think its related …maybe… to repetition compulsion. Sometimes we repeat the same patterns over and over again, hoping things work out this time, if I just tweak this one thing.

I'm not sure there's been much research done on repetition compulsion or rumination. What there is out there lacks any kind of recommendations for dealing with it. The only thing that has helped (which is a long way from "fixed") is to recognize what the pattern is and figure out why it repeats itself. A lot of my repetitive thoughts and behavior revolve around being saved by someone, usually a woman, and I'm sure it has a lot to do with my mother not connecting the dots on the day I was abused and later as the symptoms got worse and worse.

 

[macbeth]

I do this constantly, often thinking things through until I am completely paralyzed with inaction. I'll just ruminate on things, considering factors and escape strategies and everything under the sun

I think you read my mind @Go Hungry. That is exactly what I do.

 

[greenleaf]

I may have done this hyperthinking for quite a while when younger, though don't always do it any more. I seem to go into it still when my mind decides there is some sorts of threats.

I just sort of tried the exercise you describe, and it seems to get the certain experience I was thinking of out of a grey mental space, into a more spatial & involving my current experience space. Colors, hmmm. (Some people reading this must think we are all on illegal substances.)

The thing I don't understand: I have read that ptsd & hypervigilance sends us into the "hot system", and we don't have as good use of our analytical skills there. However, it always seemed the opposite to me; is that the dissociation, then? If we dissociate the fear, we can use the "cool system"? However, I wonder if it feels grey and distant because the limbic system is squelched during this type of dissociation?

Perhaps this is the way some of us dissociating folks learn to access the "cool system" without having been able to really process the fear etc. (I was aware as a kid that I needed to think during the abuse to stay as safe as possible, so my brain probably had a strong survival reason to do something to make the "cool system" work somehow.)

I still felt hypervigilant while doing this thinking. The fear was often sort of there, but somewhere apart from "me" rather than being something "I" was experiencing. (I liked Spock quite a lot, but I'm not alone in that here I know!)