• We are a multilingual website again. Read the notice about this.
  • Understand AI use at MyPTSD: all AI use is explained in our AI help page. AI use is by choice here. It exists if you want it, but does nothing unless you choose to use it.

I need flashback proof

Status
Not open for further replies.

Smile

Platinum Member
I just had a conversation with my brother about an abuser I just recently remembered through crazy intense scary flashbacks.

Brother claims that he’s done “a ton of research” and that flashbacks cannot be trusted.

My T full on believes me (together with all the body memories etc).

But is brother right? Do you know scientifically? Do you have any research to back up… either way?
 
i don't care enough to do the research, or even keep up with the research being done, but i trust my flashbacks just slightly more than i trust my nightmares. in fact, i think of my trauma flashbacks as nightmares i have while i'm awake. even after i have processed the repressed emotions far enough to begin trusting the memory, i believe they will be gaslighted to one degree or another. true, but not entirely accurate. in my own case, proof is not available, one way or the other, so i trust the memory as the most accurate information available.
 
i don't care enough to do the research, or even keep up with the research being done, but i trust my flashbacks just slightly more than i trust my nightmares. in fact, i think of my trauma flashbacks as nightmares i have while i'm awake. even after i have processed the repressed emotions far enough to begin trusting the memory, i believe they will be gaslighted to one degree or another. true, but not entirely accurate. in my own case, proof is not available, one way or the other, so i trust the memory as the most accurate information available.
I feel pretty much the same way. Except I do believe my flashbacks bc they’re so REAL.
Being gaslit… constantly. That’s why I wrote this post.

I thought maybe I can try to fight back with some evidence… 🤷🏻‍♀️
 
The thing about a lot of abuse is there were only 2 people present. You, and the abuser.

Which, frustratingly, means most often there is no proof beyond memory (including body memory). Memory is a slippery lil sucker, trauma memory even more so. You could study memory you're old and grey and still only have an opinion about whether traumatic memories are super reliable, or super unreliable.

But, there's up side of only 2 people being present. Anyone telling you "that never happened" wasn't there. They have no idea what happened.

Ultimately, there is very likely never going to be 'evidence'. We have to find a way to believe ourselves without it. And that can be done, for sure. For me? Getting the opinion of 3rd parties who weren't present very often resulted in confusion and distress. So I'm very careful these days with who I confide in. When I do, I'm not asking for their opinion. I believe myself, and that's all that matters now, for me.
 
Looking for proof.
Symptoms?
Impact?
Explanations for how you are and how you function.

I was very very very hung up on *needing* to remember how a particular rape started before believing the resurfaced memory of it. The build up, the immediate aftermath, the emotional impact on the rapist when it dawned on him what he had done, the pyshical pain, the injury etc. All that was not enough as I could not , and still can't, remember how A got into B (I don't want to say the words).
Sometimes we have to just accept that there may always be gaps in our memories and we have to work with what we have.

I also had massive massive self doubt and disbelief. But, underneath that, deep deep down, I had a "knowing". Are you able to tap into that "knowing"?

The only way you will find your answers is by self reflection and searching within yourself.

Totally agree with others that seraching for answers from people who were not there and who have decided resurfaced memories can be false, are not going to help you on your journey. We gaslight ourselves enough. We don't need to invite others to do that too.
 
There has been cases of questioning reconstructed memories, in Europe there is specifically one trial in France where a group of abused children where proved wrong. It turned out that they got the abusers wrong, not the facts themselves, and they won the trial at the end of a lot of appeals and reinvestigations. But in the public it has had that impact "child abuse can't be proved because memory is unreliable and therapists implant ideas in people". That case or more exactly the way it's been covered by the media has done immense damage for all abused children advocates, trauma survivors and trauma specialists.

What it seems to me is that memory can be fragmented, partial, and eventually reiterated/reaccessed with elements of the present but effects of trauma and the core feelings are accurate. I myself have partial memories and a period of black hole where I really suspect something happened but I have no proof, only bits of things here and there. I can't be certain of who it was, only conjectures. I only realised because I got proven my memory was wrong and that mentally I did patch the missing bit with extension of other periods of time so the black hole would look seamless. But I do trust the feeling. And as it explains and makes more sense than it brings confusion (amnesia does bring confusion), I tend to trust that even if in the detail I don't know and I'm even unsure I want to know. Perhaps that's a case that's a bit different but memory isn't something easy to deal with. There is a Chris Marker film where he says the reverse of remembering isn't forgetting, and that sentence does echo in me in some way. Forgetting we forgot and replacing something significant by a non-event or covering it up with something else would be more of a form of definite, true forgetfulness.

But I wouldn't share these things with people from my family or anyone who has an interest in being comforted by the idea something didn't happen. This also includes most friends. And even very trustworthy people can't bring any form of knowledge since they weren't there, neither. It's hard to live with vanishing black holes.

In another occasion I did have the opportunity to check a very old memory of something I was supposedly way too young to remember, but there were several people who saw it. It was something no one ever told me and by the baffled surprise they had when I said I remembered the kind of details you cannot know if you weren't there, I could tell not only it was true but also perfectly accurate. The precision sometimes is horrific. But there are categories of memories that aren't that clear. Perhaps if I didn't have the external validation for this one I wouldn't find it clear neither. In any way I guess the thing is to learn how to live with the shades and not just being able to tell everything or investigating. We can know for ourselves, to an extent. An event of category X happened to me and it isn't so clear. And the not clear part is okay too.
 
I think memories change in the telling sometimes. There is a part of our mind that wants to bend memory away from truth - away from trauma. In the telling it moves farther away so it's easier to deal with.

In my case the memory was locked away. My T was there for the first telling. All we knew at that point was trauma wasn't I expected it to be. When it showed up it was crippling - pretty much literally. Had that same whacked upside the head with a blunt object feeling as after the accident. What shocked me at first was how the single most terrifying thing in my nightmare was right there. One and the same, trauma and nightmare.
Those nightmares ended right there too. That says to me the memory was genuine. It had just been so painful for so long it had gotten firmly locked away where conscious memory couldn't access it.

There is one other sign and @Movingforward10 knows it. After that point of trauma memory "shatters" into bits and pieces, and you don't know the chronological order. I found that in both traumas. Which makes me trust the memories of the first one more.
 
Yeah @Freddyt is right. The 'shattered' memory. I have one assault where the memory is totally and utterly shattered. It's like a million bits of things floating around outside my body. The only tangible thing I have is the 'knowing'. Like freddyt says, that one makes me believe the others more easily too. Just makes sense and even though the memory is shattered: all the other pieces of the puzzle seem to fall into place.

Why on earth would we invent these memories?
 
So I'm very careful these days with who I confide in. When I do, I'm not asking for their opinion. I believe myself, and that's all that matters now, for me.
Yeh. I’ve stopped confiding in pple (really just family. Anyone else believes me. But it still hurts. So bad

also had massive massive self doubt and disbelief. But, underneath that, deep deep down, I had a "knowing". Are you able to tap into that "knowing"?
Yes, I can tap into that knowing. I know exactly what you mean. But… it means going to a horrible place in order to feel the fear, the pain, the FEAR again. And I don’t want to :( I know that makes me sound childish but…

Chris Marker film where he says the reverse of remembering isn't forgetting
What’s the name of the film?

There has been cases of questioning reconstructed memories, in Europe there is specifically one trial in France where a group of abused children where proved wrong. It turned out that they got the abusers wrong, not the facts themselves, and they won the trial at the end of a lot of appeals and reinvestigations. But in the public it has had that impact "child abuse can't be proved because memory is unreliable and therapists implant ideas in people". That case or more exactly the way it's been covered by the media has done immense damage for all abused children advocates, trauma survivors and trauma specialists.

What it seems to me is that memory can be fragmented, partial, and eventually reiterated/reaccessed with elements of the present but effects of trauma and the core feelings are accurate. I myself have partial memories and a period of black hole where I really suspect something happened but I have no proof, only bits of things here and there. I can't be certain of who it was, only conjectures. I only realised because I got proven my memory was wrong and that mentally I did patch the missing bit with extension of other periods of time so the black hole would look seamless. But I do trust the feeling. And as it explains and makes more sense than it brings confusion (amnesia does bring confusion), I tend to trust that even if in the detail I don't know and I'm even unsure I want to know. Perhaps that's a case that's a bit different but memory isn't something easy to deal with. There is a Chris Marker film where he says the reverse of remembering isn't forgetting, and that sentence does echo in me in some way. Forgetting we forgot and replacing something significant by a non-event or covering it up with something else would be more of a form of definite, true forgetfulness.

But I wouldn't share these things with people from my family or anyone who has an interest in being comforted by the idea something didn't happen. This also includes most friends. And even very trustworthy people can't bring any form of knowledge since they weren't there, neither. It's hard to live with vanishing black holes.

In another occasion I did have the opportunity to check a very old memory of something I was supposedly way too young to remember, but there were several people who saw it. It was something no one ever told me and by the baffled surprise they had when I said I remembered the kind of details you cannot know if you weren't there, I could tell not only it was true but also perfectly accurate. The precision sometimes is horrific. But there are categories of memories that aren't that clear. Perhaps if I didn't have the external validation for this one I wouldn't find it clear neither. In any way I guess the thing is to learn how to live with the shades and not just being able to tell everything or investigating. We can know for ourselves, to an extent. An event of category

X happened to me and it isn't so clear. And the not clear part is okay too.a
Thanks for that. Yeh… I think I have to become more self reliant and not expect ANYTHING from anyone. I’m not there yet
 
Those nightmares ended right there too
Same with me! I had had recurring nightmares since a little child. Once I told it to my T, never had it again. And then a few years later (now) the flashbacks started… and what a punch to the gut it was. My world was thrown upside down.

But I can’t seem to explain this to my siblings in a way that they believe me. Oh well

Why on earth would we invent these memories?
That’s what I keep clinging to.
 
Status
Not open for further replies.

Donation drives

2026 Donation Goal

Goal
$1,800.00
Earned
$910.00
This donation drive ends in
0 hours, 0 minutes, 0 seconds
  50.6%

Trending content

Featured content

Back
Top Bottom