Article on the link between trauma and psychosis

Submitted by Pheepho on Mon, 11/15/2010 - 10:34am

http://www.healingattention.org/documents/doc_litreviewpsychosis.pdf

the article is pretty scholarly and so I am skimming a lot of it and I have not gotten through it all. I have found what I've read useful, though. i have found in general looking back at my psychoses to be painful because there is a lot of shame, but now I am making the link between the shame and the abuse, and I think it may be part of my healing to look at the content of the delusions I was being influenced by at those times, even if this is scary for me. I remember during my psychoses the pdocs had about zero interest in the content of my paranoid delusions other than to be able to say, "yup, psychotic,"and I understand this is about time constraints to some extent, but also about the perception that delusions, hallucinations, etc are simply biological events with no rhyme or reason to them.

YES! Thank you for posting

Submitted by Sarsha on Mon, 11/15/2010 - 12:31pm.

YES! Thank you for posting this here, I hadn't seen this on the Icarus site. I was just reading in Mad in America about Mosher's research into the relationship between trauma and psychosis. Mosher hypothesized that psychosis is a coping mechanism for intense emotional turmoil. That schizophrenia is not a "broken brain" but a response to trauma, and people can work through their delusions and hallucinations and come out the other side. Mosher set up a residential treatment center called Soteria, staffed not by mental health pros but by empathic people who are patient and kind even to folks who might be pretty intense. The center was gathering research to see if empathy was a better treatment than drugs. This was inhe 70's when drug companies had already taken quite a hold on the psychiatric association and the research was seen as an insult to the mental health community and definately not lucrative to drug companies and their agenda.

The idea that the psychosis and trauma are linked makes alot alot of sense to me- my psychosis felt very much like a response to anxiety, like repelling away from a reality that was too harsh. I also feel that the content of my delusions, paranoia, psychotic visions and voices are pretty relevant to my current non psychotic state, that these are important and clear messages from inner psyche, much like the interpretation of dreams can be, sometimes metaphorical and at other times quite literal.

I am curious to hear how others have felt about the content of their psychosis relating to their trauma or inner psyches? What did you realize that was not clear before then? what did it show you, or point out?

Sarsha My psychosis were

Submitted by kaliope on Mon, 11/22/2010 - 11:36pm.

Sarsha

My psychosis were definately linked to my trauma. Not remembering my childhood, I am unclear what my specific trauma is besides child abuse but I can share what led to my Legal 2000. (being committed against my will) I had not slept because everytime I closed my eyes the world would spin and people would be grabbing at me, coming to hurt me. I would see my arm being sliced open and the blood pouring down. A gang of teen boys grabbing me and pulling me all directions. All I was certain of was people wanted to hurt me. I had started meds with a PA and went to a psychiatrist to ask if the PA should prescribe something else and she locked me up saying I was a danger to myself. Another incident I had was I was reading an article for one of my classes. It was on violence, an interview with a rapist. For many years I had been having this bloody flashback when I would go to bed. I would close my eyes and see nothing but blood and feel terror. So I am reading this article and the rapist is talking about why he thinks it is ok to rape women. How they deserve it and suddenly this man is standing in front of me in my room yelling all this stuff I am reading at me and all the violence and terror I feel in this bloody flashback seizes me. It was all so real. I dissociated and dyed my hair purple. I watched myself do it in the mirror. I kept telling myself to stop but I couldnt come back. I also experience psychosis when my anxiety is high. Walls will move. I will see things that aarent there. Driving is horrible. There will be NASCAR wrecks, cars on fire tumbling thru the air in front of me on the highway. trucks tipping over on me. I live in Reno and the casinos explode along the side of the highway. Those I cannot tie into trauma.....back to your article. there is a book you may be interested in....The Link Between Childhood Trauma and Mental Illness: Effective Interventions for Mental Health Professtionals. by Barbara Everett and Ruth Gallop. I read it awhile back. Its not a scholarly book. Informative.

I think sometimes psychosis

Submitted by Awen on Mon, 11/22/2010 - 9:46pm.

I think sometimes psychosis can be trauma related - a flashback or dissociation or body memory looks like psychosis if they don't know you had trauma.

The intense irrational fear I get that Vikings are outside trying to kill me - I haven't worked through much from that other than it tells me that I am actually very scared my ABUSERS are after me - But I am so scared of them, I cannot imagine them, so I imagine Vikings. Little kids do this all the time, they cannot handle knowing their parents are doing it, so they create imaginary enemies who abuse them to explain the fear. I think my brain doesn't understand how my lovers and friends were abusers still.

The depersonalization - when I looked at my arm one day and could see through it, but was amazed that the tree next to me was solid, they thought that was psychosis. My thinking seemed fine to me, but I was very concerned that I was fading away and no one else saw that. I wasn't scared though, I felt eeriely calm, just watching myself get so vague, I was curious as to what would happen next, like if I'd reappear somewhere else.

A lot of flashbacks, they are so intense and fuzzy and messy and chaotic, I really thought they were psychotic episodes. I mean, I could sometimes hear a girl crying, or see an image of me 14 and naked after being raped as if that girl was far away and trapped in time and unreachable, stuck in suffering. I'd have these intense nightmarish feelings of terror - Most of the time that freeze me and my face gets frozen with big eyes - I am not here, but I cannot tell if it is dissociation, hypervigilance, or flashbacks - Maybe all three can happen? Or change so fast it is hard to know what's happening - It is biology. The few rage attacks I had I really was scared I'd physically be unable to not kill someone I was so angry that 1 in 3 women is sexually assaulted. I went to the hosptial and told them legally they had to let me in because I might kill people. They didn't think I would but I did, and that was what mattered. Some flashbacks are this weird feeling of being frozen, and everything looks dark and I am sobbing and I really cannot understand what people are saying to me and when they touch me I don't feel it, I am just someplace else. I am sure that looks psychotic.

When I was younger I'd end up talking to myself in the mirror and sobbing, "I don't want to kill you, I just want to kill what's inside hurting you" and that worried me a lot, it usually snapped me out of it because I was shocked about not how obviously nonsensitical it became. I really did have periods where I was sure the pain could be killed and then I'd be free, but I always stopped right before doing anything, with an awareness of the unity of me. But the intense crazy feeling that I could murder the pain and save this Heather person felt VERY REAL, and doctors did not like that - Psychosis. The suicide risk for me has always been the impulsive psychotic not thought out thing, of just stopping the torment so I can catch my breath, it isn't about ending life. It's more like rescuing me. Liberating me.

These were all things that doctors used to say were my bipolar 2 atypical depression anxiety mixed mania ultroid rapid cycling psychosis. And then i find out it's the norm for severe PTSD. Huh.

But if the mind can create seperate selves to handle abuse or dissociate and "go away" when triggered, why wouldn't it also create other voices to hear that are new selves talking to the main self, and things to see when "gone away"? I don't see how it can be such a cut and dry thing. What if you have created a caretaker part that startes talking to you to reassure you and it sounds/acts like someone else is in your head? Or if the abuser lives in your head and it feels like another person - I have that ALL the time, I spend hours a day arguing my goodness with everyone I contact - in my head to feel safe, like I can talk them into not abusing me. (They are not abusing me though. It is in my head. A nonstop legal trial defending me to doctors, abusers, social service people, the tea party, etc.) My flashbacks I didn't know were flashbacks until very recently because as we've all said, the definition of a flashback is so vague and yet so detailed all at once, I didn't think I had them. My Mom figured it out about 17 years before I did, but I really thought the threats were happening at the time of the flashback. But I am sure a girl a crying and holding her hands over her face screaming "no no no" over and over again and "they have my wrists" - If no one knew of trauma, then what did that look like?

So this is tricky stuff and as this is all an evolving science, I am sure that in 10 years the definitions will change - and take 20 years more for most shrinks to know about it.

I am glad we're talking about our actual experiences and not just assuming that we all know or agree with what a flashback or psychosis or dissociation is. By hearing from you all, it helps me clarify my experiences, so thank you! I really needed to hear about this from REAL people who experience it because the books definiations of even hypervigilance (my big problem) just don't hit home. But what we all say DOES. Danke.

"It's the end," said the caterpillar. "It's the beginning," said the butterfly.

Heather I just wanted to

Submitted by kaliope on Tue, 11/23/2010 - 12:38am.

Heather

I just wanted to say, some of the things you share just hit so clost to home for me. "I don't want to kill you, I just want to kill what's inside hurting you", "The suicide risk for me has always been the impulsive psychotic not thought out thing, of just stopping the torment so I can catch my breath". talking about voices inside your head, hypervigilance, dissociating. I had a whole commitee in there, good voices protecting me, the bad ones trying to take me out, shaming me, telling me all the reasons I didnt deserve to live. The hypervigilance was terrible, jumping at a whisper. I dissociated at the drop of a hat too. depersonalization, derealization as well. Life was hell. The anxiety was horrible, led to psychosis. I took the intro DBT class at the state hospital three times. I think that really helped with some of the emotional regulation.

This is good to hear, thank

Submitted by Awen on Tue, 11/23/2010 - 7:59am.

This is good to hear, thank you!

Since one of the most important definiations of trauma is that it is an event that is inexplicable - that has no meaning - Our consciousness is trying to make sense of what happened by reliving it, arguing about our worth, arguing about the abusers worth, trying to comprehend the best way to deal with something there is no good way to deal with! THAT to me would drive anyone mad. If incomprehendible things happen to you, how do you live with that? I think a lot of the psychosis type stuff we experience after trauma is a way of trying to understand what happened and how to prevent it from happenign again and all that - I think that's why I am always in these trials in my head arguing with ANYONE I fear might harm me (a doctor I just saw, a friend I just made, a hair dresser I saw, Glenn Beck, anyone) and get them to be on my side, to win them over. I have had to do some DBT stuff (I liked DBT a lot) and say "this isn't effective nor is it REAL" and make myself do something else (mindfulness and distraction skills). It is hard though, I do a reality check, "Is this person in the room?" NO. "Do they have power to harm me right now?" NO. "Will they harm me?" (I don't go by ideas of their goodness, I look for reasoning.) "No, they will not harm me I think, because they are very busy and to drive here and kill me would be inconvientant for them." "Who is suffering right now, me or them, due to these thoughts?" ME. "has thinking this way ever protected me in the past from danger or has it made me more vulnerable and scared?" More vulnerable. Stuff like that, it's how I have been able to release the trauma's hold on my thinking.

"It's the end," said the caterpillar. "It's the beginning," said the butterfly.