The Memory Remains

August 3rd, 2009 at 02:36pm Mitchell F. Davenport

(Warning:  Beginning with this blog, the next few will be about childhood trauma.  If you are reading these articles and have a history of being traumatized, these articles could trigger a trauma reaction in you.  If this should happen, contact a mental health care provider immediately). 

Near the end of the movie Rambo, there is a scene in which Sylvester Stallone (“Rambo”) is in the police station surrounded by policemen who want him to surrender himself.  On the contrary, Rambo is geared up for a fight.  Also inside with him is his mentor and trainer.  The police have sent him in to try to get Rambo to surrender.  In a very heated scene in which his mentor is talking to him about giving up, Rambo breaks down and starts crying.   In the midst of his tears he shouts at his mentor something like, “I can’t just turn it off!”  People recovering from trauma often feel that way, “I just can’t turn it off.”

The Classic Rock group, Metallica, has a line that is repeated in one of their songs over and over again, “and the memory remains.”  Trauma messes with our memory which in turn messes with our fight or flight tendency, and (especially in children) the result becomes a noticeable inability to regulate emotions.

Before going any further, it might be helpful to define trauma.  One might say, “Trauma is in the eye of the beholder.”  Two people can be in a car accident and one of them develops severe trauma symptoms while the other is unfazed. (It is estimated that between 18 and 45% of people in car accidents will develop Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.) So, while keeping in mind that trauma is a subjective experience unique to each individual, we can say in general that trauma is “an experience that produces psychological injury or pain” (dictionary.com).  The Early Trauma Treatment Network defines trauma as it relates to children as “an exceptional experience in which powerful and dangerous stimuli overwhelm the child’s capacity to regulate emotions.”  The Adverse Childhood Experiences study chose to refer to trauma-like experiences as “adverse childhood experiences.”  In doing the study they chose the following as “adverse childhood” experiences: childhood abuse and neglect;  growing up with domestic violence, substance abuse or mental illness in the home; parental discord, and a family member involved in crime.  While technically one would not necessarily call these traumas, they increase the odds of a person later in life having physical and emotional difficulties. 

The body and the brain remember, often wreaking havoc in the traumatized person’s life. 

(In our next blog we will examine the results of the ACE study mentioned above and following that we will look at the specific impact of trauma on children and the diagnosis of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.)

Entry Filed under: Children's Mental Health