no memories (triggers)

[CepheidVox]

I don't remember most of my childhood but I think something happened to me, There are lots of strange things I remember from all periods in my life that could be clues. I developed a fear of bathrooms bad enough to make me wet myself at school in 1st grade. I have a memory of being on the floor in the school bathroom but it has no context, just the image and general unease. When my parents were separated I stayed with my dad in places with lots of different men who were also drug addicts... I called my mom and begged her to take me home a few times and refused to explain why (according to her, I don't remember this). In early puberty I was afraid of penises and didn't know why, I thought I was a lesbian. Looking at them made me feel sick and nervous. That's not normal! It doesn't just come from nowhere! I can't remember any sexual abuse but something is wrong with my body. I can't orgasm from sex and so I fake it - I've been faking for almost a decade with my boyfriend. I feel disgusted by my body. Both of my parents are CSA survivors. Will I ever remember what happened to me?

[Liminality]

I'm so sorry this is happening  to you, CepheidVox. You are very right, being afraid of male genitalia isn't a normal occurrence for a non-traumatised person. I don't know what else to say, except that you are being heard.

[Kat]

Hey there!  This is a tricky thing.  First off, you say you think something happened to you.  I think you know something happened, you just don't know what.

When I started therapy, it was because my mother had just been diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder in family therapy.  That made everything I took to be "normal" questionable, so I started individual therapy.

I was aware from the start that I was more angry with my father who was an absolute saint in the eyes of my three older sisters.  He's a very mild-mannered, charming, intelligent man.  I used to fantasize about him being busted by the police for being a serial killer or serial rapist.  Little by little, over the years I came to question whether he'd sexually abused me or not.  I had absolutely NO memories of any such abuse, but always had a feeling he had.  Years before I finally concluded that he'd sexually abused me, my therapist had already begun to suspect he had.  Of course, she didn't tell me about her suspicions until long after we were on the same page about the abuse.  (I'm leaving out lots of details because it's such a long story--just know that there were many clues along the way, but no concrete memories.)

It's been eight or so years since I accepted that he most likely had molested me.  In those years, I've experienced numerous "something like memories," as my therapist calls them.  Because I was so little when the abuse began, I didn't make memories of the abuse.  And once I could create memories, I was too little to understand and likely attached different symbols and meanings to what was happening. 

I said that this is tricky.  What I mean is that without concrete memories you'll have to trust the clues and your gut.  You may have been too little to form clear memories of the abuse.  I still have trouble saying unequivocally that my dad abused me.  However, I know something happened.   I'd love to be able to see concrete proof of the abuse--a movie or pictures--but I know I'll never get that proof.  At this point in my healing, the details of the abuse don't matter.  I have to accept that I'll never know for absolute certain, but that doesn't mean I can't heal.  Like I said, the details don't matter.

I don't know if you will ever remember what happened to you.  I can't answer that.  But, you may become aware of more and more clues that will lead you to some of the answers you're searching for.  As my therapist says, "Trauma wants to be known."  It will try to make itself known the best it can.

[Dee]

I have been told that I don't have to remember to recover.  I believe that is true.  The feelings are still there.  You can know and not remember.  I fortunately have evidence, so at least I am relieved of having to decide if it happened or not.

[Blueberry]

  I agree with Dee. I don't actually have any evidence that would stand up in a court of law, but I do have memories. However some people who don't know much about CSA question whether what happened to me is "enough". But my feelings are there and all the problems IRL that are directly connected.

I'm sorry that whatever happened to you happened and that you have symptoms like fear and nausea to recover from. I can appreciate that it's harder if you have no memories, probably similar to not being believed. I believe you. These symptoms don't just occur all by themselves out of the blue.

I don't know if you'll ever remember. Besides all what Kat explained about memories, there's also the theory that our minds shut down what we can't bear to think about and remember, until we reach a point where we're strong enough to remember. If the memories are brought up way too early, that can cause a delay in recovery, even a big delay. IME not worth it.

[CepheidVox]

Thanks everyone... I think you're right, Kat, I do know something happened to me because of the evidence; I just don't know what, I hope you're right, Dee, and I can recover without needing to know what exactly it was. I really appreciate being heard on this, thanks everyone.

[woodsgnome]

TRIGGERS

The memory of the school bathroom was/is a major trigger of mine. It's where, on the first day of kindergarten, I was first molested by the teacher, later dragged into a hallway, left there, then hauled back into the classroom, and thrown over a pile of unused milk cartons in metal crates. I'm amazed I wasn't killed, and so many times in subsequent years I wish I had been.

I didn't tell the parents about this, as I suppose at that age I was stunned and well, just totally confused. One other part of this whole deal--the m regularly molested me in a home bathroom so I was scared of her, period (she did this when the f was at work; he didn't know of this 'til I was 9 and stopped it, or at least it seems like he might have).

A lot of time in the age 7-12 period is rife with hazy memories as to details--I do remember escalating fights between parents that seemed to revolve around me and the f threatening to leave, at first putting the blame on me (as in 'blame the victim'), for what I had no idea. It was a wildly out of control mind-spinning time that still has me unhinged.

I do recall that bathrooms at school were also the place where incidents took place in grades 3 and 4; the f, after the last, got me to a child psych (the school, a religious outfit, didn't have such 'exotic' things as counselors even). The abuse continued when I was returned, but shifted from sexual to 'only' physical and emotional.

The molestations were all female teachers, the physical assaults by men. I'm a guy, but all of this still has me spinning as well...any notion of sexuality is beyond my comprehension although I'm alright with relationships that wouldn't involve that part, so I guess the 'label' for that is asexual. Whatever, I'm out of the loop when it comes to sexuality and I can't handle sexual innuendo or the banter that pops up all over. I go into freeze mode just seeing the word (besides bathrooms)

The 3rd and 4th grade incidents and the later beatings were similar to what you say, CepheidVox, in that I don't recall the specifics like with the kindergarten one (even there, there's gaps as to what went down when during that horrible day).

I need to stop, and I'm sorry for cutting into your thread with this. But I just felt so much emotion when that trigger word 'school bathroom' hit my eyes.

One other thing I'd like to ask, though, CepheidVox, it it's okay. On the thread "Emotional Flashbacks/What Helps With Your EF's" you mentioned something you call a "distress tolerance box". What is that? Just curious, I guess; always wondering about new ways to lessen the effects of EF's.

[I like vanilla]

CepheidVox unfortunately it is fairly common for those of us to have this type of (non-)memory. I have started to call these my 'body memories' as opposed to my 'story memories' where the former are felt in my body as sensations, smells, fleeting images, sounds, etc. and the latter exist in my brain as a story of what happened.

Like you (and I suspect like many/most) of us, I started with 'I think something might have happened that was terrible but I'm not sure' and 'how could that be that I can't remember something that seems so important' Well, OK actually I started with 'I think something might have happened... but it is also possible that I am making this up in my imagination' because I was deeply in denial. With the gentle support of my therapist, I have come to realize that these sensations are, in fact, memories of terrible things that have happened to me - NO terrible things that were done to me.

Now that I have come to 'acceptance' my therapist has argued that these body memories are as real as my story memories - reading I have done since makes me think that the body memories might actually be more accurate because for all of us (traumatized and non-traumatized) the details of story memories change over time but the body keeps a full accounting of what really happened ((un)fortunately, it often gives no story or details of the event(s)). The current thinking with the body memories* is that at the time the person subjected to the traumatic event was unable to enact the flight/fight response and so that 'get away and/or fight back'** energy was stored in the body rather than released at the time of the trauma(s). This unreleased energy is a big part of the problem with body memories as it stays in the body and is re-activated when we are triggered causing dissociation and/or emotional flashbacks. Because the energy is not attached to stories it seems to hit us out of nowhere, and it is elusive when we try to track it down during treatment (also because it is generally tied to terrifying, painful events that many of us, certainly I, are not keen to 'find').

My therapist has also let me know that (un)fortunately, it is unlikely that I will ever retrieve the stories related to most of my body memories. Because I was too young and/or unable to understand and/or verbalize what was being done to me, my brain at those times was unable to create the story of what was being done to me - I literally did not have the words to create the stories. So, I might never be able to retrieve stories tied to many/most of my body memories because stories were never created at the time of the events. No stories exist in my brain to be retrieved. However, my T has also reassured me that this lack of stories in no way hinders my ability to heal from the traumas I experienced. Again, he focuses on somatic-based rather than talk-based work, so much of what we do (using a careful process to avoid re-traumatizing me) is go with what I have, sensations, smells, etc. and see what comes up related to my emotional responses and also in relation to what my body 'needs to' do in response to what I am experiencing. The idea is to allow my body to undertake the actions that it might have taken had I been able to enact a flight/fight response - in one example, my body needed to fight back, in this case using self-defence techniques that I had learned since, so that is what I did in his office, allowed my body to move in a fighting back way that seemed to respond to the position(s) that I 'must have' been in at the time. I am still uncertain of the details of what was done to me at that time but I really do feel as if I fought off my attacker and am no longer respond so emotionally to that type of trigger. We also spend time just allowing me to feel my emotions related to current and/or past events and seeing where they go and what my body needs to do in response. The feeling of emotions is often painful and scary but again, it does seem to help release and de-activate that stored energy and to help keep new "bad" energy from being stored.***

I almost put in a rant about much of the so-called research about memory (and body memories, so-called, and I would argue inaccurately called, 'repressed' memories) but am realizing that this posting is already quite long, and that I must get ready for work. My overall idea is that if these so-called researchers spent less time and energy (and funding) into trying to put an academic mantle on their quest to gaslight us about our experiences, and more into listening to us and developing strategies to recover from our experiences, then we would be light years ahead of our understanding of trauma and healing than we are now.


*I have done a lot of reading but because it was for my own interests/needs I did not keep track of sources. Bessel van der Kolk's book The Body Keeps the Score addresses these types of memories (though I found parts of that book very triggering). He has also written many journal articles and given talks (found on Youtube) on the topic.

**Yes, freeze and fawn have been added to the responses but my sense is that we develop freeze and/or fawn responses because we learned that flight/fight are ineffective through being unable to flee from or fight back against the abuses that were done to us (though I could be wrong in that interpretation).

***I have found this type of somatic-based treatment very effective for me, and there is literature (largely by van der Kolk and his colleagues) that suggest this is an effective form of treatment for those with body memories. HOWEVER each person must decide from themselves if a particular type of treatment works for them - what works for one person, or even many people, might or might not work for someone else. And that is OK. Trauma and healing are complex and a one-size-fits-all strategy does not (and likely can never) exist. It is also important to recognize that the dynamic between therapist and client is as important as the type of therapy (of any type) that is used. So the key factors are finding both a good fit of strategy and of therapist and client in order for the process to be most effective for that client.

[CepheidVox]

One other thing I'd like to ask, though, CepheidVox, it it's okay. On the thread "Emotional Flashbacks/What Helps With Your EF's" you mentioned something you call a "distress tolerance box". What is that? Just curious, I guess; always wondering about new ways to lessen the effects of EF's.

I took a DBT course and it taught me lots of distress tolerance skills and at the end we made a box with all the things that worked for us. Often I dissociate or switch into a younger self so I forget the things I've learned to help myself. Now when I have a bad EF I can open the box and be reminded of what helps me. My box has a pinecone (reminder to go for a walk in nature), a squishy dolphin toy (it's broken so I can't squeeze it too hard and it's really cute so it's kind of a reminder to be gentle with myself), a piece of foam that feels really soft and nice (a tactile sensation that helps me in dissociative moments), some strong lemon candies (another sensation), semi-precious stones I really like and some small ammonites, a pen and small notebook to write down my thoughts and feelings. It also has some emergency numbers and a list of rights to remind myself that I'm allowed to feel and be myself.

Thanks Vanilla, it's really reassuring that I can still heal without knowing the story of what happened to me. My body definitely remembers something and I'm going to try and trust it instead of thinking I might have made it up. I'll talk to my therapist about this somatic technique, maybe it'll help me too.

[deptofhearts]

great thread, so applicable for me too. thanks everyone X

[caroline]

Thank you everyone for sharing, means a lot x