Climate Trauma & Fire Brain: Understanding the Mental Health Impacts of the LA Wildfires & Developing Resilience - Jyoti Mishra | Rapid Response #4

Los Angeles: have you been doomscrolling and unable to concentrate? There's a reason, & it has to do with how our brains respond to trauma. I spoke with Dr. Jyoti Mishra, a leading neuroscientist to make sense of it.

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Dr. Jyoti Mishra is associate professor Psychiatry in the UC-San Diego School of Medicine and Co-Director of the UC Climate Change and Mental Health Initiative. Dr. Mishra is trained in the computational, cognitive and translational neurosciences. She is also the founder of the Neural Engineering & Translation Labs (NEATLabs) at UCSD. Her lab innovates digital technologies for scalable brain health mapping, monitoring and precision therapeutics. Her interdisciplinary research emphasizes community partnered projects at the intersection of neuroscience, digital health technology & personalized AI/ML to inform mental healthcare and climate resilience innovations. Dr. Mishra also teaches an ongoing course on climate resilience.

I’m going to be candid: it’s been hard to focus on much during the ongoing disaster—and disaster after the disaster—of the Los Angeles wildfires. I find myself easily distractible and prone to doomerism. I’ve spoken to a number of other folks who feel the same way. It turns out these are some of the symptoms of climate trauma, a form of psychological trauma that results from experiencing or learning about climate change. Specifically, many of us are experiencing what Dr. Mishra calls ‘fire brain.’

Climate trauma is a relatively new field of study, and Dr. Mishra differentiates it from the more generalized, ongoing climate anxiety that many feel as a result of understanding global heating. She outlines how symptoms such as a PTSD, anxiety, and depression can all occur as the result of witnessing or experiencing the impacts of these wildfires—as well as how these are collective issues that require collective responses. At the end of the episode she outlines the four steps we should all take to respond to fire brain, minimizing harmful impacts for our loved ones and ourselves.

This episode is jam-packed with information, and many of the links she mentions can be found in the “Resilience Resources” tab via climateresilience.online.

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