Minimisation

[Nebulustrix]

I think minimizing is necessary when we are having extreme reactions to things - the minimizing is helpful then, as it brings our reactions down to manageable levels so we can function properly. But then there can also be a tendency to minimize TOO much, and this can be detrimental.

We have to be capable of recognizing that what we went through, even if it's "smaller" than someone else's trauma, was wrong. It was "that bad". It was terrible. It was unacceptable. Because of this, I think it would be unhealthy if we were ever not bothered by the circumstances of our individual traumas. It should bother us, because it was bad. It was wrong. It was traumatic, and it should have been traumatic.

A shocked, hurt, terrified, traumatic reaction to a traumatic event is healthy. Yes, it is discomfiting. Yes, it is debilitating. Yes, it sets us back and gives us issues with which we have to cope. But it would be unhealthy if we were so desensitized to the trauma that we considered it normal and acceptable. This is where minimization becomes extreme and problematic.

Over-exposure to anything leads to desensitization and acceptance, but we should never be accepting of something that is so wrong that it has caused so much pain and long-term damage. In working through PTSD, we need to be able to maintain a healthy level of non-acceptance while overcoming the intense reactions to triggers and/or stressors that might remind us of our trauma.

I think there tends to be a natural desire to minimize traumas to an "acceptable" level, convincing ourselves that it wasn't "that bad" as a way to be rid of our intense reactions. But this doesn't really help, because it can ruin our self esteem when we continue to have those reactions we are telling ourselves are unnecessary, because what we went through wasn't bad enough to warrant such a reaction.

It was bad. The reaction is good and healthy. The circumstances of our traumas were not acceptable. Our reactions are not wrong. We just have to turn down the volume- It's like the difference between an on/off light switch and a dimmer switch. We tend to think in black and white, on and off, and because of this our reactions being switched "on" seems wrong. But our reactions should be getting switched on. The PTSD is just causing us to turn our dimmer switch all the way up for things that really only require the lowest dimness setting, and we need to condition ourselves so that we can turn it down a notch, without turning it "off" completely.

 

[Meadowsweet]

I think you're right nebulustrix. But knowing what should be done, and having the ability to do it are two different places and getting from what I do, to what I should be doing is not a simple process.

 

[zaniara]

I find that I suffer a lot more with intrusions of traumatic images in my mind, body memories and anxiety about anything. I don't care about my health and my inner critic effects what i do. So I'm starting to see that minimising doesn't help, it causes more problems. When I've talked about it with my therapist, I explain that I feel a need to stay in control, and a fear of being seen to lose control - because of the way I've been brought up, I relate showing any emotion to 'losing control'. Minimisation and detaching emotion from events, is my way of feeling in control. But my therapist challenges that and asks me if I think I am really in control, and of course the answer is no.

I can relate so much to what everyone in this thread has written. And this too.. I have had big problems with minimization and I've been so shut down that I basically didn't know that "my leg was on fire": or if I noticed I tried to be positive about it: "Hey, look how much brighter things look like now with this fire?". :D When a normal person would have started screaming and rolling around on the floor to extinguish the "fire"!

My "fire" could, just to take one example, be living with a narcissistic man who "only" abused me verbally and mentally, and on occasion told me he could have me killed if he wanted to(and right then he wanted to; he told me with a big smile). But hey he didn't beat me for real. He only cheated on me and controlled my life in so many ways. For years. And all I did was minimize it and try to look at it in a positive way: "hey, look, I'm learning a lot of patience here!" :D When I did this I not only hurt me and caused my self to re-open the old wounds over and over again(re-enactment, really!), I also hurt my kids. So it's really damaging for not only for me, but also for others.

But being brought up in a family who minimize everything to the point of real madness(someone beat someone, and then everything was just "normal"; acting like nothing at all happened, and then opening the Christmas presents and being forced to smile and be nice and "happy" so that the family picture didn't get ruined!) that was what I was taught to do.

It's interesting Meadowsweet that you mention that when you do minimize you end up with a lot more intrusions of traumatic images and body memories and anxiety about "nothing". Since that's my own experience as well. It's almost as if something inside refuse to deny the reality and starts screaming loud and clear in one way or the other(flashbacks, re-enactment big time, or body memories and anxiety destroying the possibility to pretend that everything is "fine").

Interesting those thoughts about "being in control": I need to ponder those. Not sure I quite follow you there. But it could be my foggy brain making it hard to understand right now! :D Thank you so much for starting this thread!

 

[Abstract]

have had big problems with minimization and been so shut down that I basically didn't know that "my leg was on fire": or if I notices I tried to be positive about it: "Hey, look how much brighter things look like now with this fire?". When a normal person would have started screaming and rolling around on the floor to extinguish the "fire"!.... "hey, look, I'm learning a lot of patience here!"

Yes! This is exactly the mindset that has got me in a lot of trouble. Part of it has also been being totally out of touch with my emotions through long habit and practice. I have thought of myself as pathologically positive.

If I don't see it as me being harmed (or having been harmed) then I am not being harmed and all is OK. :rolleyes: Not.

 

[zaniara]

I have thought of myself as pathologically positive.

:D (Sorry, not laughing at your pain and struggle, I just relate so much!) It was a very good expression! I actually ended up learning a lot about "positive thinking"; after getting some Cognitive therapy and reading a lot of self-help-books(of course before getting the diagnose PTSD) and it only made things worse.. I felt better, a short amount of time, but only because I learned to be even more sick in my "pathological positivism"! :) :D Of course being positive is one of my greatest strengths too, so I can't think of it as all bad. But it IS bad when you deny the reality and the reality is full of things you should address.

I forgot to write one thing earlier:

Of course I have always freaked out about, and overreacted, over things that is NOT dangerous, and really harmless. I've done so even more when I've been in my deepest denial over the real problems, and thus been minimizing those. It's almost like a "swing".. When one side goes up the other go down. Come to think about it: when I do minimize the "real issues" I tend to see minor things as catastrophic even more.

About this comparing-one-self-to-other-thus-finding-your-own-suffering-not-worth-mentioning/dealing with: If my foot is bleeding, because someone put my foot into a shoe with spikes in it: should I not be screaming from pain and seeking help for that, because someone else had his/hers legs cut off? (besides one can die from a very small wound that gets infected, while another person can survive horrible injuries in the most miraculous way..)

Sorry for all the bad metaphors! :D Someone else might be able to find better ones..

 

[Venusian]

I wonder if when we minimize what should be a "big thing" that we have to deal with on a daily basis and that most people never have to experience, we then elevate the "small things" out of proportion because it is something that everyone experiences so that we can express some of what we have buried.

I keep remembering my children when they were small, and my grandson when he could not talk yet, he would get frustrated because he could understand what he wanted but could not express it and he would throw temper tantrums. I am not saying that we are throwing temper tantrums, I am saying that sometimes the mind finds a way to release the emotion/frustration/tension by a channel unrelated to what caused the initial reaction. It could be something that happens to us or something we read in the paper or watch on TV. We over compensate,(the expression I had been trying to remember all morning.)

 

[Meadowsweet]

I wonder if when we minimize what should be a "big thing" that we have to deal with on a daily basis and that most people never have to experience, we then elevate the "small things" out of proportion because it is something that everyone experiences so that we can express some of what we have buried.

That seems about right. Earlier I mentioned that I experience about nothing when I'm trying to avoid traumatic intrusions - I have panic attacks driving, or get anxious about getting my car MOT'd (recent ones). These things have little or no relation to trauma, and I can see clearly that there is nothing to be anxious about. But maybe that's easier than seeing the real stuff that the anxiety stems from.

 

[TwoDee2ThreeDee]

If I write down my traumas in a list without attempting to minimize them, it's a freaking horror show to the point that one day my therapist stopped me in the middle of a session and asked me how I managed to keep going in life based on all of the things I have experienced. All I could say is "What else am I going to do? Lie down and die?"

I get really angry when someone has that reaction - and if they give me the "poor baby" look, look out. I feel like people might not believe me and maybe their questioning it is their way of seeing if I'm lying or that I've suffered enough to warrant such empathy. Not the healthiest response from me, I know.

 

[Nebulustrix]

Knowing what should be done, and having the ability to do it are two different places and getting from what I do, to what I should be doing is not a simple process.

Agreed. However, I feel that gaining the knowledge and understanding of the process helps, even if it doesn't get us from A to B immediately. Our instincts and emotions will react to things, even when we know, logically, that no reaction may be necessary. But when I am having, for example, a panic attack - knowing that it is happening because I was exposed to a trigger and that my emotions are overreacting may not immediately calm me down, but it helps me process what happened so that in the future, I may not panic so badly over the same trigger.

The same goes for the minimizing - knowing that it is OK and GOOD to be having a reaction means that I don't have to beat myself up over my "light switch" getting flipped to the "on" position. I can recognize that I just need to work through the process to help lessen my reaction, so that when I do have an "on" reaction, it will be dim when it is supposed to be dim, instead of unnecessarily bright. I don't have to minimize it to the point that my light isn't being turned on at all.

I keep remembering my children when they were small, and my grandson when he could not talk yet, he would get frustrated because he could understand what he wanted but could not express it and he would throw temper tantrums. I am not saying that we are throwing temper tantrums, I am saying that sometimes the mind finds a way to release the emotion/frustration/tension by a channel unrelated to what caused the initial reaction. It could be something that happens to us or something we read in the paper or watch on TV. We over compensate,(the expression I had been trying to remember all morning.)

I think this is very much like what is happening with PTSD! And this is where that knowledge and understanding can be so helpful. Children have outbursts because they do not know or understand how to express themselves and their emotions. PTSD sufferers seem to have similar outbursts for the same reasons - our emotions have been set off-kilter by the trauma and our ability to properly express ourselves has been thrown out of whack, partially because we do not know or understand how to express why our emotions are responding the way they are to things that are seemingly harmless.

 

[maddog]

I have always had a tendency to minimise the big stuff and to "maximise" - for want of a better word - the little things. I have done this since childhood, particularly in relation to the physical injuries I suffered back then, the serious of which I ignored to a dissociated extent, and the minor of which I would often obsess about in strange ways.

Thesedays I often, when struggling with enormous stressors or recently triggered, develop anxiety and/or other intense emotional reactions about extremely minor things. I'm ashamed to admit that a familiar foe for me is to become extremely anxious about technological issues, when my phone or computer have some problem or qwerk that I can't figure out. I become terrified that they are going to stop working and I won't have the ability, for whatever reason, to fix them, and will become horribly isolated as a result. Weird, and very unpleasant and illogical, but recurring enough that I've recognized it as a habit and pattern of reaction.

For me, this minimising/maximising dichotomy is like a form of emotional displacement behaviour. If I stress hugely about what doesn't really matter, then the thing that really matters, doesn't matter quite so much.

Maddog

 

[Meadowsweet]

Yes, that's what I find myself doing maddog. As always, you explain it really well.

 

[Abstract]

Could someone explain what they mean by maximising the little stuff? I keep going backwards and forwards trying to decide if I do that....Thanks.