Recovered Memory Vs. False Memory

[shimmerz]

I found the whole politics behind this False Memory Syndrome Foundation absolutely fascinating. I didn't know about the family dynamics behind this organization at all. I remember reading about false memory syndrome as a kid. It is one of those moments that are stuck in my mind for some reason. I remember where I was sitting and what I was doing even! I had NO idea about my trauma or my background but for some reason it stuck.

Anyway, Jennifer Freyd accused her parents of sexual assault based on 'memories'. Her parents went on the create the FMSF and Jennifer is a renowned psychologist, speaker, author, and originator of the betrayal trauma concept and not to mention her work in dissociative disorders. Now that makes for an interesting family dynamic, doesn't it? Meanwhile her parents are attempting to gather information that will absolutely put to rest that repressed memories are or ever could be seen as real. This would make one hell of a soap opera.

Daughter - Jennifer Freyd
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jennifer_Freyd

Parents - Pamela and Peter Freyd
http://www.fmsfonline.org/

I have very firm experiential beliefs on repressed memories. I believe in them wholeheartedly. I have documented evidence that I was able to access after my memories came up. It sealed the deal for repressed memory theory for me.

I am just wondering. I know so many posts here ask 'how can this be true' when memories come back to us? Do you believe that repressed memories can be real? How do you weigh in?

 

[Teasel]

Ain't they full of **** x

I completely and utterly believe repressed memories are real. No questions.

I also totally get why ppl who've been abused doubt their stories - abusers spend a lot of energy, thought, manipulation, intimidation etc etc to make sure we keep silent.

And society doesn't much want to know either.

 

[Chava]

I have lots of thoughts to add on the science of trauma, memory, and dissociation (and my own experience with this). The science behind the foundation and their view of trauma memory is shitty. It will likely become an obsolete foundation as people realize it only exists through the pockets of pervs.

But all I really want to say here is that the parents look like assholes. If they weren't guilty, they'd be understandably hurt and humiliated and confused....and try to help their daughter through, versus set up an entire FOUNDATION TO INVALIDATE HER. Weird F+ckos.

They have likely hurt countless others in their selfish mess of avoiding their own guilt. Jennifer, on the other hand, is doing very important work.

 

[Seasounds]

I believe in repressed memories.

Thanks for the links.

 

[Teasel]

Recently saw a Louis Theroux show, about mentally ill people who had committed crimes like murder being in an institution instead of being in prison.
He talked to one man who had murdered his father because he had over near a decade come to believe his father had sexually abused him as a child.
Since being in the institution he had 'realised' that this wasn't true.
But I still believed him..

I'm sure there are some people who play the courts to suggest they are mentally ill to get out of prison sentences, but nothing about this man felt like that. Seemed Louis Therous totally believed this man was awful for having killed his father

There's not a part of me that thinks murder is just fine and dandy...

But I believed him

 

[Eleanor]

I think there are repressed memories. I also think there are implanted memories. Memory is ... plastic and easily shaped and changed. "Memory is like a crime scene." So I think there are people who have not very careful therapist/psych's who have an agenda and... can easily influence a suggestible person who is in a vulnerable state.

But for sure people recover memories. And how reassuring to find evidence....

 

[PlainJane]

I struggle with this personally. I without a doubt believe in repressed memories...in others. I somehow can't accept my own. The parents don't deserve the title mother and father, they are screwed up individuals.

 

[Intrepid]

I have one no longer repressed memory that has been totally unverifiable. It was caused by theapists with an agenda. But that doesn't mean it isn't real. It affects me as if it is real. In therapy I have had to treat it as if it is real, even if it is not.

I have had other totally verifiable repressed memories come to the surface. I have had the person who caused the trauma minimize or totally deny the trauma. I am sure she preferred that these memories stay repressed.

 

[scout86]

I'm with @Eleanor on this one. I also think you can have situations where people who were there all have different memories of what happened and all are equally, honestly convinced that their version is the truth. You also have people who lie, of course.

So I think there are people who have not very careful therapist/psych's who have an agenda and... can easily influence a suggestible person

My T has said exactly that. He does hypnosis and that kind of things some and says you have to be very careful how you do it. That you ask questions like "What do you see?" Rather than "Do you see X or Y?", for example.

 

[Powder]

Warning, Rant! I hate these guys and so should you.

The FMSF disbanded because one of its founding members gave an interview in Holland for a publication promoting that sex with children is not abuse and that it's normal. The male member didn't think the USA may not have realized the conversation with the reporter was going to be published.

Since it was in Dutch, it took about a year for the connection to be made back home. When it hit the press, the FMSF disbanded. I know because I had been researching this for six months. One day their site was reduced and they announced in the their final newsletter that there would be no more (without comment or explanation). Other news sites declared 'why:" the male member's interview with the Dutch magazine on sex with young boys and how "normal" it is.

Jennifer Freyd's parents did more than just start a foundation! Her mother called U of O to use her $ and influence to BLOCK Jennifer from receiving a position as Assistant Professor and even told Jennifer about it. "See how much power we have, honey. Don't bother trying to fight us!"

Jennifer's father joked her whole life about being a child prostitute. Her parents are the type that thinks that forcing kids to have sex with adults is a human right and that since they had to put up with it, so should everyone else.

There is more. Elizabeth Loftus of UW research WAS a highly reputed memory "expert" and was paid an average of 3.5 million per court case to testify in defence of sexually exploitative parents. She and her other "expert friend" perjured themselves in court, twice, and were caught because there was a paper trail of evidence submitted to the courts.

When Elizabeth Loftus found out that she was being sued by both of those child abuse victims who she won cases against for their pedophilic and wealthy clients/parents, she pulled out of the APA (American Psychological Assn) which is against the APA's rules. They allowed it. Nobody is allowed to pull out of the membership of the APA while under investigation for violation of its ethics. She was under APA investigation for 48 hours when she pulled out, which she did as soon as she found out about being found out/investigated.

Loftus gave an interview with a Seattle paper and disclosed that Yes, she had been molested as a child by a babysitter, and NO, she see's it as "no big deal" (original quote). This implies she also does not see CSA as a "big deal" and has no scruples about helping sadistic pedophiles win in civil cases against their daughters.

My point is if you are a pedophile incest creep in America, you only need money to hire people from the FMSF to help you win cases. There is no defamation because these guys were already robber baron wealthy, and they "won" so it's the daughter/victim who got no job, no justice, and no fairness in our "civilized" society that doesn't want to look at our pedophile problem or hopes it's confined to trailer parks. Grrr.

I'm angry, having been down this rabbit hole, and what a lonely and isolating one it is. My parents both were in on making child porn out of me.

My mom threatened me when I tried to get her to listen to me about what my dad was doing. I distinctly remember her exchanging money and leaving me with men. My dad and his friend video taped and took photos of me naked and having stuff done to me and sold it. My dad even took me to the place that dealt the drugs and illegal porn, probably to "advertise" me.

My mother's reaction to my memories is only to bring up the FMSF and Loftus.

Loftus is a memory expert, but she has 0 training in traumatic memory or trauma. It is already proven that traumatic memory is different than regular memories, by definition of trauma, and by MRI scans. This area is still controversial. There is both evidence that traumatic memory is actually more accurate and intrusive, impossible to escape. However, pediatric populations are not studied much yet. The effect of infantile amnesia, dissociative amnesia, and traumatic amnesia are all well proven, but how these interact in an individual's life is not well understood or measured clinically.

For most, it is common to dissociate after the trauma, to remember shortly after and have nightmares about it, and then to forget or dissociate it again. Then, the memories are split off for a long time, only to be triggered into intruding again later in life, after the birth of a 2nd child or after a life change or trauma.

I'm very AGAINST the simplistic and mechanistic term "repressed memory" as it does not accurately reflect reality for survivors and is easily touted to spread widespread misunderstanding.

After researching for a year, FMSM and Loftus = society's smear campaign against the rape victim; huge retraumatization to me.

 

[Intrepid]

So I think there are people who have not very careful therapist/psych's who have an agenda

I had a group of therapists who induced a totally unverifiable memory to come up. It doesn't matter. I had to treat it as if it were real. I now understand the therapy as a traumatic incident. It was awful. It made he later on refuse to do EMDR or trust therapists in general.

I have totally verifiable memories that were once repressed. The person who caused the original trauma at times minimized her actions, and at other times denied them all together. I'm sure she would have preferred they never come to the surface.

 

[Friday]

Can they be real? Absolutely.
Are they always real? No.

Human memory is a really fluid & changeable thing.