more B. A. van der Kolk
"Ordinarily memories of particular events are remembered as stores that change over time and that do not evoke intense emotions and sensations. In contrast, in PTSD the past is relived with an immediate sensory and emotional intensity that makes victims feel as if the event were occurring all over again. The "Grant Study," a longitudinal study of the psychological and physical health of 200 Harvard undergraduates who participated in WWII, is a good illustration of how people process traumatic events. When these men were reinterviewed about their experiences 45 years later, those who did not have PTSD had considerably altered their original accounts; the most intense horror of the events had been diluted. In contrast, time had not modified the memories of the minority of subjects who had developed PTSD. Thus, paradoxically, the ability to transform memory is the norm, whereas in PTSD the full brunt of an experience does not fade with time."
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"Over time, the initial intrusive thoughts of the trauma may come to contaminate the individual's responses to a range of other cues and reinforce the selective dominance of the traumatic memory networks. Triggers for intrusive traumatic memories may become increasingly more subtle and generalized; what should be irrelevant stimuli may become reminders of the trauma...
"... people who suffer from PTSD develop biased perception, so that they respond preferentially to trauma-related triggers at the expense of being able to attend to other perceptions. As a consequence, they have smaller repertoires of neutral or pleasurable internal and environmental sensations that could be restitutive and gratifying..."
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"...much has been written about trauma's effects on people's sense of themselves and their relationship to their environment. ... [it has been] pointed out that "confrontations with violence challenge one's most basic assumptions about the self as invulnerable and intrinsically worthy, and about the world as orderly and just. After abuse, the victim's view of self and world can never be the same: it must be reconstructed to incorporate the abuse experience." ..."
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"...the first task of treatment is for patients to regain a sense of safety in their bodies. For most individuals, this requires active engagement in challenges that can help them deal with issues of passivity and helplessness: play and exploration, artistic and creative pursuits, and some form of involvement with others. ..."
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"Over time, the initial intrusive thoughts of the trauma may come to contaminate the individual's responses to a range of other cues and reinforce the selective dominance of the traumatic memory networks. Triggers for intrusive traumatic memories may become increasingly more subtle and generalized; what should be irrelevant stimuli may become reminders of the trauma...
"... people who suffer from PTSD develop biased perception, so that they respond preferentially to trauma-related triggers at the expense of being able to attend to other perceptions. As a consequence, they have smaller repertoires of neutral or pleasurable internal and environmental sensations that could be restitutive and gratifying..."
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"...much has been written about trauma's effects on people's sense of themselves and their relationship to their environment. ... [it has been] pointed out that "confrontations with violence challenge one's most basic assumptions about the self as invulnerable and intrinsically worthy, and about the world as orderly and just. After abuse, the victim's view of self and world can never be the same: it must be reconstructed to incorporate the abuse experience." ..."
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"...the first task of treatment is for patients to regain a sense of safety in their bodies. For most individuals, this requires active engagement in challenges that can help them deal with issues of passivity and helplessness: play and exploration, artistic and creative pursuits, and some form of involvement with others. ..."