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As someone who was abducted and kidnapped at gun point, PTSD and trauma are experienced differently by different people. PTSD/trauma may be the result of being

As someone who was abducted and kidnapped at gun point, PTSD and trauma are experienced differently by different people. PTSD/trauma may be the result of being victimized, but it is not “learned” any more than a bone might “learn” to break under stress. What happens under extreme trauma is an onslaught of electric signals and chemical reactions in the brain, essentially adrenaline (fight or flight) and cortisol (stress) responses. They help you survive when needed, but terrible for the brain and body in extreme amounts and/or prolonged exposure. The issue is not that it is “learned” but that in some people the trauma essentially fires otherwise dormant pathways in the brain and instead of these pathways going back to a dormant state the neurons and pathways are potentially strengthened by the single acute episode and remain turned on. It creates an awful feedback loop where these neurons and pathways fire from normal/non traumatic stimulus moving forward because the connections become so strong they become a default pathway. Then regular firing of these pathways just reinforces the connections. You could point to that as “learning” I suppose, but it is involuntary. The associated behaviors are commonly avoidance in order to prevent these misfirings but unable to avoid it the responses will usually be consistent with the original response to the adrenaline and cortisol during the trauma. Not everyone responds the same, because it really isn’t learned but something I would describe more as a physical “injury” to the brain from the natural biological response to the trauma. The 4 pillar model of the article might encapsulate a decent general framework for trauma victims, but it entirely ignores the very real biological responses and physical effects of trauma, so is on par with saying stress and fight or flight responses are learned. If it were learned we would teach soldiers not to have those responses, instead they are trained to manage their reactions to those responses, and even with training trauma can not be prevented in all individuals in all situations.

artificialLimbs 5y ago
> but it is involuntary No and yes. PTSD/trauma is the result of resistance to being. A person resists having their awareness in their body and being there with their emotions during crisis, and instead they are 'in shock' for the duration. This allows confusion or the kind of mental blocks where there is no recollection to happen. Once confusion or mental blocks manifest, it can be quite the challenge to regain clarity. It has been proven time and again to be very helpful to consciously relive traumatic situations over and over in one's mind in order to relieve the tension and begin to integrate the experience into one's being in a healing manner, rather than letting that stress continue to arise again and again in one's life. This should likely be done under the guidance of someone with experience in such matters, or at least with trusted friends in a good environment. Avoidance is so common here because that is the route taken during the crisis. The person avoids being, in the most fundamental sense, in exchange for becoming hypnotized by their senses and environment. Were the person able to be present and aware of their body and emotions during the crisis, no such PTSD would be able to be formed. So, a person may not be able to be present and avoid this psychological resistance, but they can learn to do so. Are they willing to undergo such learning is another matter. Psychological literature is littered with examples of these techniques, but I'm not exactly sure where I have stumbled across them. As an extreme example of letting go of resistance, I offer the link below to the story of Thích Quảng Đức. I wish I had something that was not of Buddhist nature, but it is terribly easy to pick on them. =D I do not mean to trivialize your experience or say that you were wrong, btw. I myself have been under extreme duress and have had a number of such traumatic instances and I wish you well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th%C3%ADch_Qu%E1%BA%A3ng_%C4%90%E1%BB%A9c https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th%C3%ADch_Qu%E1%BA%A3ng_%C4%9...
- XorNot 5y ago
  This is condensed pseudo-science given a veneer of acceptability by offhand reference to actual PTSD trauma research and treatment practice in psychiatry.
  - artificialLimbs 5y ago
    Is there some reason I should be using 'acceptable' trauma research and treatment practice in psychiatry for my past trauma, when by all measures I have been living an 'ordinary' and 'upwardly moving' life for years without such treatment? Can your 'acceptable' practices explain how a man can sit in a street motionless while he burns to nothing? If no, then perhaps it is the case that there is more to this life than what has been deemed 'acceptable'. I don't find modern psychiatry to be acceptable for myself whatsoever. If others deem it a help, then great. If yes, I am very interested in knowing more. Oh, I remembered this psychological technique: regression. Thanks for the brain jog. https://www.goodtherapy.org/learn-about-therapy/types/regression-therapy https://www.goodtherapy.org/learn-about-therapy/types/regres...
graderjs 5y ago
There's an important distinction to be made between true victims of crime or abuse, and those people who imagine themselves into the fake victim delusion and attach their identity to that. The psychological motivations of the latter are you get to blame everybody else and you don't have to take responsibility for anything that goes wrong in your life. It's a pretty toxic and disempowering delusion but it's also very compelling and addictive. people will struggle mightily against that which threatens to divorce them from their chosen identity as a victim. I'm not saying there's no overlap between the two categories but it's an important distinction nonetheless. Another way of talking about it is most people have been victimized by some trauma or another but how they respond to that, whether they see themselves as a victim and adopt that mindset, whether they see themselves as survivor, a thriver, whether they remake the meaning of that trauma and the response to it into some meaning that's personal for them and that is useful for them, is ultimately within the power of that individual. Some people go through stages some people choose for that trauma to define a large part of how they see themselves. Life has suffering and trauma and I think it's important for a person to make some ways they can personally deal with that. At the same time I think life is so much more than suffering and trauma and it's important to keep that in mind as well. Ultimately what you make of life, what you make it mean, it is up to you. I don't want to say it's not easy, or it's not hard, because everyone's different. but one thing I personally found useful is in dealing with the, as you mentioned, condition neural responses of traumatic memories is: where I live you can obtain the compound inderol (propranolol) over the counter and if you do self hypnotic regression when you go back and you know experience that memory again but you do it under the influence of inderol what happens is that the emotional intensity of those memories as you reactivate them becomes lessened. This does at least two things one is that the next time you remember them they're not as painful. The second is that by lessening the emotional intensity you're able to face an experience the emotions, and the associated events themselves, perhaps more fully and perhaps more objectively. I think it helps give you more perspective which is helpful. While I found that effective I actually feel other strategies for emotional processing were more effective for me, strategies that, different to the first one, involved directly feeling facing and processing the thoughts and emotions of myself and other participants in those memories. So whatever you do is your responsibility and I'm not telling you what to do, I'm just sharing some personal experience. Still, it's possible and understandable though that you may take what I'm saying at some sort of advice even though I don't intend it like, so even I don't want to say this because I know it's your responsibility what you choose to do, I think the way our society works in order for me to protect myself I better say the following: if you're thinking of trying what I told you I tried then I think you should talk with your doctor first about what I told you. While this technique is similar to the currently experimented MDMA regression therapies, there's also plenty of other ways to do emotional processing, but that may be one method you might find assists with some of the neurological aspects of it.
hzay 5y ago
The article says TVI is learned, not PTSD.
- throwaway_kufu 5y ago
  > But the people who score very high on TIV are generally those who have experienced some kind of trauma, like PTSD.
  - hzay 5y ago
    Yeah. Restated: Often, people who score high on TVI are a subset of people who have undergone trauma like PTSD. TVI is learned according to the author, not general trauma or PTSD.

artificialLimbs 5y ago

> but it is involuntary No and yes. PTSD/trauma is the result of resistance to being. A person resists having their awareness in their body and being there with their emotions during crisis, and instead they are 'in shock' for the duration. This allows confusion or the kind of mental blocks where there is no recollection to happen. Once confusion or mental blocks manifest, it can be quite the challenge to regain clarity. It has been proven time and again to be very helpful to consciously relive traumatic situations over and over in one's mind in order to relieve the tension and begin to integrate the experience into one's being in a healing manner, rather than letting that stress continue to arise again and again in one's life. This should likely be done under the guidance of someone with experience in such matters, or at least with trusted friends in a good environment. Avoidance is so common here because that is the route taken during the crisis. The person avoids being, in the most fundamental sense, in exchange for becoming hypnotized by their senses and environment. Were the person able to be present and aware of their body and emotions during the crisis, no such PTSD would be able to be formed. So, a person may not be able to be present and avoid this psychological resistance, but they can learn to do so. Are they willing to undergo such learning is another matter. Psychological literature is littered with examples of these techniques, but I'm not exactly sure where I have stumbled across them. As an extreme example of letting go of resistance, I offer the link below to the story of Thích Quảng Đức. I wish I had something that was not of Buddhist nature, but it is terribly easy to pick on them. =D I do not mean to trivialize your experience or say that you were wrong, btw. I myself have been under extreme duress and have had a number of such traumatic instances and I wish you well. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th%C3%ADch_Qu%E1%BA%A3ng_%C4%90%E1%BB%A9c https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Th%C3%ADch_Qu%E1%BA%A3ng_%C4%9...

XorNot 5y ago
This is condensed pseudo-science given a veneer of acceptability by offhand reference to actual PTSD trauma research and treatment practice in psychiatry.
- artificialLimbs 5y ago
  Is there some reason I should be using 'acceptable' trauma research and treatment practice in psychiatry for my past trauma, when by all measures I have been living an 'ordinary' and 'upwardly moving' life for years without such treatment? Can your 'acceptable' practices explain how a man can sit in a street motionless while he burns to nothing? If no, then perhaps it is the case that there is more to this life than what has been deemed 'acceptable'. I don't find modern psychiatry to be acceptable for myself whatsoever. If others deem it a help, then great. If yes, I am very interested in knowing more. Oh, I remembered this psychological technique: regression. Thanks for the brain jog. https://www.goodtherapy.org/learn-about-therapy/types/regression-therapy https://www.goodtherapy.org/learn-about-therapy/types/regres...

graderjs 5y ago

There's an important distinction to be made between true victims of crime or abuse, and those people who imagine themselves into the fake victim delusion and attach their identity to that. The psychological motivations of the latter are you get to blame everybody else and you don't have to take responsibility for anything that goes wrong in your life. It's a pretty toxic and disempowering delusion but it's also very compelling and addictive. people will struggle mightily against that which threatens to divorce them from their chosen identity as a victim. I'm not saying there's no overlap between the two categories but it's an important distinction nonetheless. Another way of talking about it is most people have been victimized by some trauma or another but how they respond to that, whether they see themselves as a victim and adopt that mindset, whether they see themselves as survivor, a thriver, whether they remake the meaning of that trauma and the response to it into some meaning that's personal for them and that is useful for them, is ultimately within the power of that individual. Some people go through stages some people choose for that trauma to define a large part of how they see themselves. Life has suffering and trauma and I think it's important for a person to make some ways they can personally deal with that. At the same time I think life is so much more than suffering and trauma and it's important to keep that in mind as well. Ultimately what you make of life, what you make it mean, it is up to you. I don't want to say it's not easy, or it's not hard, because everyone's different. but one thing I personally found useful is in dealing with the, as you mentioned, condition neural responses of traumatic memories is: where I live you can obtain the compound inderol (propranolol) over the counter and if you do self hypnotic regression when you go back and you know experience that memory again but you do it under the influence of inderol what happens is that the emotional intensity of those memories as you reactivate them becomes lessened. This does at least two things one is that the next time you remember them they're not as painful. The second is that by lessening the emotional intensity you're able to face an experience the emotions, and the associated events themselves, perhaps more fully and perhaps more objectively. I think it helps give you more perspective which is helpful. While I found that effective I actually feel other strategies for emotional processing were more effective for me, strategies that, different to the first one, involved directly feeling facing and processing the thoughts and emotions of myself and other participants in those memories. So whatever you do is your responsibility and I'm not telling you what to do, I'm just sharing some personal experience. Still, it's possible and understandable though that you may take what I'm saying at some sort of advice even though I don't intend it like, so even I don't want to say this because I know it's your responsibility what you choose to do, I think the way our society works in order for me to protect myself I better say the following: if you're thinking of trying what I told you I tried then I think you should talk with your doctor first about what I told you. While this technique is similar to the currently experimented MDMA regression therapies, there's also plenty of other ways to do emotional processing, but that may be one method you might find assists with some of the neurological aspects of it.

hzay 5y ago

The article says TVI is learned, not PTSD.

throwaway_kufu 5y ago
> But the people who score very high on TIV are generally those who have experienced some kind of trauma, like PTSD.
- hzay 5y ago
  Yeah. Restated: Often, people who score high on TVI are a subset of people who have undergone trauma like PTSD. TVI is learned according to the author, not general trauma or PTSD.