Neurobiology

So the other day I got an email from my therapist that said something like this: "I want us to talk tomorrow about the neurobiology of the trauma response." She has said more than once that, while someone who has experienced a very clear event such as abuse or rape or homelessness in their past is usually seen as someone has definitely experienced trauma, it is also true that subtle, insidious events can also add up to lead to one big issue. When she first mentioned this to me, I was very resistant to the idea. After all, I had a good childhood, never wanting for anything material and from an intact family. I was raised with my one sister, and we took family vacations together to popular family spots. We went to college, on my father's dime, and we were given the opportunity to take dance lessons and go to summer camp and take part in extracurricular activities. It was your basic Generation X childhood.

So why did I spend so many years unable to cry? Why, when someone reached out to hug me, did I feel like I was doing it "wrong?" Why have I always let myself get swallowed up in relationships? Why can't I identify my emotions when I am experiencing them? Why do I feel like I have a vortex within me that I am trying to fill with food and stuff and internet games? Why do I feel about myself the way I do?

My therapist: "I think your amygdala is jacked up." So for those who don't know, the amygdala is a little walnut-sized part of the brain that is responsible for, among other things, emotional learning and reactions. As I usually do when something like this is introduced in therapy, I headed into the research to see what the "experts" have to say about this idea. Some studies have suggested that the size of the amygdala may be increased in cases of childhood trauma, as well as its reactivity. In addition, the corpus callosum, which is the primary pathway between the left and right hemispheres of the brain have been shown to be affected by such experiences. This can diminish the integration between the left and right hemispheres of the brain, which means that someone who is predominantly right-brained (which I believe I am) does not have her right brain as well-integrated with the left brain, which affects emotional regulation and expression.

Okay, so the research seems to say that she has a point. Jacked up amygdala. Diminished corpus callosum. Lots of thinking. Not so much with the feeling. Insidious, subtle happenings from childhood adding up to what has become a big problem. I come from a family of internalizers. We don't "do" emoting. We don't do communicating, either. We don't do hugging or comforting or feelings. We do grudges and judgment and passive aggressive behaviors. We do white lies. We do shame.

So the other thing my therapist said this week is that maybe we have been doing things a little bit in the wrong order. Maybe the neurobiology has to be addressed before things can get "better." Because right now, things don't feel better. Right now, things feels really, really hard. The money stuff is hard. The food stuff is hard. The emotions are hard because they are coming to the surface, and I am spending some of my time trying not to numb them, and feeling them sometimes feels excruciating. I am trying to stay busy roughly 99% of the time, but when I am in her office or in our group therapy sessions, when I am somewhere safe with people I trust, the emotions demand to be felt. And I am fortunate to have a little village who makes that possible for me.