Learning from First Hand Descriptions
1. Jimbo Hart- professional Musician
Take Away: I can’t speak with any authority about what this wonderful musician means by “old school traumas.”
But I believe there is a hint of a take away for us. Jimbo Hart stepped away for a week in the summer and then stepped away from his role in Jason Isbell’s band totally in the recent weeks. Whether it is the case here or not… you can observe this: When trauma is buried and tagged “old”– this is the type of pain that can catch up to you in mid life. For the victim it can make day- to- day responsibilities and routines impossible to manage.
2. Emily Hand- several Days after Release She only Speaks in a whisper
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Take Away: Trauma Lands in the Body. There are two crucial and sad aspects to Emily’s recovery. One is that time was warped in such a severe way that she believed she had been in captivity a year instead of over forty days. Second is the sad outcome of her fearing the use and the sound of her voice at full volume. This tells me that she isn’t fully assured that the captors are not omniscient and omnipresent, thus able to bring about her murder. Often the signal cry of help stays “stuck” in the active and ON position. Her whispers say she is still feeling threat in every room even when her family is holding her.
3. A Unit Suffering in Constant Anxiety
A MILITARY UNIT – A TRAINING SESSION ON MIRRORING AND USING THE BREATH TO OVERWHELM THE AUTONOMIC ALARM SYSTEM
Take Away: There is much to see in this short video. When anyone in the midst of trauma performs breathing exercises this can over-ride the brain circuitry that raises your heart rate. It can over-rule the message to your limbs to fill with oxygenated blood and thus get a surge of adrenaline. These automatic responses make you feel compelled to run away or fight harder. Research has found that when you are continually stressed, your pupils stay dilated. This all debilitates your logical processes of how to stay safe. Thus, they hired a psychologist to work in an active war zone.
It is hard to sell the ideas as you see in the clip .. but breathing slowly can tell the brain,”you can take a break from being activated and vigilant.”
Notice that when they offer the method of meditating on a peaceful place the soldiers are so full of grief and trauma that they let the leader know, “This makes it worse.” They are full-on trapped in both trauma and grief. Remembering a home and loved ones at a table or children in a neighborhood playground setting was too painful for them. They want to put a steel barrier around the emotional content of longing for home.