Education is key to doing better so the best thing an abuse victim can do who has PTSD is to educate themselves so they know what is going on. For years now I have been blamed for how I have acted when triggered. Before this I found it very distressing that no one understood what was happening to me and why I reacted in that way and how I felt so ashamed and degraded and often blamed for my reaction to simple things.

I have found a great book that explains exactly what happens to the brain when a victim has flashbacks and gets triggered. It is written by the world top expert on PTSD he has studied the brain of those with PTSD for thirty years and his research is amazing. The book is called The body Keeps the score by Bessel Van der Kolk it is easy to read and has pictures that show you what is happening to the brain when you are triggered. I found it very healing to read it because it explains in clear detail what was happened for me and how I felt and it is backed up by science by a Dr. I would recommend anyone who has PTSD or works with anyone that has it to read the book because it is so educational and you will know what is happening and you will know what to do and what works. Here are some of the sections of the book that talk about what is happening.

Page 2

Long after a traumatic experience is over, it may be reactivated at the slightest hint of danger and mobilize disturbed brain circuits and secrete massive amounts of stress hormones.

Page 3 Facing trauma

They also help us understand why traumatized people so often keep repeating the same problems and have such trouble learning from experience. We now know that their behaviours are not the result of moral failing or signs or lack of willpower or bad character they are caused by actual changes in the brain.

Page 12

It is any wonder then, that the traumatized individuals themselves cannot tolerate remembering it and that they often resort to using drugs, alcohol, or self mutilation to block out their unbearable knowledge.

Page 13

After you have experienced something so unspeakable, how do you learn to trust yourself or anyone else again.

Page 40

I had just finished a study on how trauma is remembered( to be discussed in chapter 12) in which participants repeatedly told me how upsetting it was to be suddenly hijacked by images. feelings and sounds from the past.

Page 42

a picture of the brain relieving trauma

Page 45 Speechless horror

Our most surprising finding was a white spot in the left frontal lobe of the cortex, in a region called Broca’s area. In this case the change in colour  meant that there was a significant decrease in that part of the brain. Broca’s area is one of the speech centers of the brain, which is often affected in stoke patients when blood supply to that region is cut off. Without a functioning Broca’s area you cannot put your thoughts and feeling into words. Our scan showed that Broca’s area went offline whenever a flashback was triggered. In other words we had visual proof that the effects of trauma are not necessarily different from and can overlap  the effects of physical lesions like stokes. Under extreme conditions people may scream obscenities, call for their mothers, howl in terror or simply shut down. Victims of assaults and accidents sit mute and frozen in emergency rooms, Traumatized children ” lose their tongues and refuse to speak. Even years later traumatized people often have endless difficulty telling other people what has happened to them their bodies re experienced terror, rage and helplessness as well as the impulse to fight or flee. But these feelings are almost impossible to articulate.

Page 45

When something reminds traumatized people of the past, their right brain reacts as if the traumatic event were happening in the present. but because their left brain is not working very well, they may not be aware that they are re expencing and reenacting the past. They are furious, terrified, enraged, ashamed or frozen. Trauma interferes with this kind of awareness, and over time, our research demonstrated why.

Here is another book that is helpful for victims of PTSD it is called the Complex PTSD workbook by Arielle Schwartz phd and there are exercises and questions that you do in the book that will help you to recover from the condition along with counselling.

Moral Educate yourself so that you know what is happening and can find a way to help you!