Emotional Flashbacks: CPTSD Element
Season 02, Episode 21
The nervous system is our body’s control center, telling us when to move, think, and breathe. Disorders like CPTSD (complex post-traumatic stress disorder), put our bodies in a state of dysregulation that can have profound effects on how we feel and react.
Human emotions are a full system experience, affecting the entire body by way of hormones, sympathetic and parasympathetic stress responses. Big emotions can be overwhelming for those with CPTSD, initiating a maladaptive survival response.
In today’s episode, Elisabeth Kristof is on the show to discuss one element of this new diagnosis: emotional flashbacks. There are some misconceptions around this term, but understanding it is an important step to living a better life without the burden of trauma.
Emotional flashbacks are not regression, but rather a real-time response often created in childhood. Our brains perceive the world through the filter of our experience, so those with trauma will respond to triggers with the neurological patterns they developed as children.
Elisabeth spent years stuck in an emotional flashback state, and only saw true change through working with her emotional body to regulate her nervous system. The cognitive mind cannot overpower emotional flashbacks, so you must create your own toolkit through self-awareness.
Relieving the trauma is not necessary, but it is imperative to express your feelings in order to move on to the next step in your healing journey.
Tune in to learn how to get started!
Topics discussed in this episode:
- Definitions of emotional flashbacks and the neuro-somatic perspective
- Emotions and symptoms related to emotional flashbacks
- What can trigger an emotional flashback
- How the brain matches your internal state to the external world
- The inability to regulate emotions as a child affects how you respond to triggers
- Understanding your baseline level to recognize trauma responses
- Sympathetic and parasympathetic stress responses to a real or perceived threat
- How neurosomatic tools, or “neuro drills,” can help regulate the nervous system
- Elisabeth describes her years stuck in a dysregulated state and cycling through trauma responses
- Jennifer shared her journey from childhood trauma, being stuck in an emotional flashback state, and finally gaining self-awareness
- The importance of understanding your triggers and responses
- Pattern recognition triggers
- Neuro tags and how they activate an existing trauma response pattern
- Creating safety in the nervous system to build new patterns and behaviors
- Getting past a disorganized sense of self to become aware and express emotions
- Practice daily to make intentional changes to your nervous system
- Working with your emotional body to release big, repressed emotions
- Find practitioners that will give you a safe place to be vulnerable
- Having the life you want means working on your symptoms of CPTSD
- Elisabeth shares the story of a client who gave up dating because of their overwhelming emotional response to breakups
- Emotions affect the whole body, from hormones to brain function
- Work through feelings of guilt and shame to improve your responses to triggers
- Don’t rely on the cognitive mind to make change
- The 5 components of CPTSD
- Experiencing self-sabotaging behaviors from trying to change your nervous system
Head to https://calendly.com/traumarewired/consultation for a consultation to identify trauma responses in your own life and learn how to train your nervous system to move out of behaviors that aren’t serving you!
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Interested in getting more insight about the mind-body experience? Check out Elisabeth’s book pick, Molecules of Emotion by Candace Pert.
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