Post-Traumatic Stress and Brain Change StopStressingNow.com
By Guest Blogger Michele Rosenthal
For a long time after my trauma I felt…. different. I didn’t feel comfortable or safe in my body. I didn’t even feel comfortable or safe in my mind. Suddenly, there were thoughts, emotions and memories that seemed out of my control. In order to deal with it all, I did my best to suppress the problems and carry on with a ‘normal’ life.
I bet you can already guess that I wasn’t exactly successful. The more we avoid post-traumatic issues the more they fester and eventually erupt. On the days that I just couldn’t hold myself together – when I melted down, lashed out or shutdown in order to lessen the stress – I thought the problem, certainly, was me. I was too weak to manage. The truth, I found out later, is the problem was not me at all. The problem is that trauma impacts and changes the brain in significant ways that impair our ability to function.
For example, did you know that the experience of trauma can actually cause neurological changes in the structure of your brain? Recently, I interviewed Dr. Rachel Yehuda, PhD, Professor of Psychiatry and Neuroscience, Director of the Traumatic Stress Studies Division at Mount Sinai School of Medicine and the Mental Health Patient Care Center Director at the James J. Peters Veterans Affairs Medical Center. I asked her to explain what happens in the brain during trauma. She outlined it by saying that during a trauma the individual responds to a threat through the following processes:
the brain gives signals of trauma
the brain’s main function is to get through the event
the brain helps us survive by activating biologic reactions involved in helping us mount the fight/flight response
the sympathetic nervous system releases adrenalin (your heart racing and the acceleration of your breathing signifies the release of adrenalin, which readies you to move)
the brain lowers the chemicals released to help us with regular functions (parasympathetic nervous systems energy is diverted to help you cope with surviving)
hormones are released to reign in stress response to stop long term damage to your body.
After trauma, Yehuda notes, not all brains reset themselves but they always tries to recalibrate. “When things happen to us we don’t go back to the way we were,” she explains. “After trauma, the brain’s job is to remember what happened and develop survival skills for the future. The brain integrates the lesson of trauma; it recalibrates to do better next time.”
For weeks or even years you may have been thinking you’re crazy, but now, you’re beginning to see there are often scientific reasons for much of your behavior, including increased, diminished and killed brain regions, functions and neurons. Consider the following:
Can’t find the words to express your thoughts? That’s because the prefontal lobe (responsible for language) can be adversely affected by trauma, which gets in the way of linguistic function.
Can’t regulate your emotions? How could you when the amygdala (responsible for emotional regulation) is in such overdrive that in some PTSD survivors it actually enlarges.
Having problem with short-term memory loss? Of course you are: studies show that in some PTSD survivors the hippocampus (responsible for memory and experience assimilation) actually shrinks in volume.
Always feeling frightened no matter what you do? Understandable when your medial prefrontal cortex (responsible for regulating emotion and fear responses) doesn’t regulate itself or function properly after trauma.
The good news is the brain is designed to be plastic. That is, it is hardwired to rewire. Recent advances in scientific research all support the idea of ‘neuroplasticity’: “The brain’s ability to reorganize by forming new neural connections throughout life. Neuroplasticity allows the neurons (nerve cells) in the brain to compensate for injury and disease and to adjust their activities in response to new situations or to changes in their environment.” (Medicine.net)
So, what hope do we have of recovery? Yehuda answered: “The good news is, if your brain can change in response to one environment that is trauma it can change in response to treatment, too. Our brains are capable of change.”
According to Dr. Dave Ziegler, PhD, founder of Jasper Mountain, a treatment center for severely traumatize children and their families, “The goal of treatment (something parents and friends can facilitate, in addition to the survivor) is positive brain change. Trauma changes how the brain operates. There is no returning to normal. What we often say is there is now a new normal. It’s not necessarily negative if the right help is given. There is major change.”
Things adults, teens and kids can do to help themselves, include:
Relaxation techniques, which help resolves effects of trauma on the brain
Understanding what’s going on
Exercise, particularly aerobic, does very important things in the brain including encouraging stem cell development and regeneration of neurons
Promoting higher reasoning centers in the brain (for example, saying to a survivor, ‘I want you to tell me what you were just thinking when you did that particular behavior’ encourages receptive and expressive regions of the brain to formulate answers and thoughts, which raise processes to higher level rather than reactive level
Social support and connections
Meditation
Professional help offers effective approaches, including:
changing perceptions of the individual of the self, other people, the world
change the process system from reactive stress producing limbic reactivity to thoughtful consideration in using the executive functions of frontal region of the brain
repairing the damage that’s been done through attachment through developing resiliency and learning to self-heal
Above all, Dr. Ziegler said the most important thing is to get the kind of trauma treatment you’re going to need at the right time in your life.
It’s very easy to become overwhelmed, despondent and hopeless when dealing with symptoms of post-traumatic stress. Learning about the possibility to recover, however, will help you have hope, belief and above all, the motivation to seek the right help to get you on the path to becoming your next self.
Michele Rosenthal is a trauma survivor, PTSD coach and the founder of www.healmyptsd.com. Her radio show, ‘Your Life After Trauma’ may be heard weekly on-air and streaming online.
