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flashbacks

Trauma Thursday: What Flashbacks Feel Like

Submitted by FaithA on Thu, 07/02/2009 - 07:30
  • child abuse
  • flashbacks
  • Foster adoption
  • Foster care
  • Older child adoption
  • PTSD
  • Trauma Thursday
  • Traumatized children
  • what flashbacks feel like

Traumatized Adopted Child (c) JulieC

I (unfortunately) had a flashback last night, so I thought I would write out what it felt like so foster and adoptive parents of traumatized children can have a better understanding of what their children are going through when they have one. I have been dealing with flashbacks for years, so I cycled through the process pretty quickly. What I am describing over a period of an hour used to take me days to cycle through.

I have been very sick with a sinus infection and bronchitis. I cannot sleep if I cannot breathe through my nose. It is very triggering for me to breathe through my mouth.

Out of sheer desperation, I set up my pillows so I was lying on my back and sitting almost straight up and down. I hoped this would clear my sinuses. Instead, it triggered a flashback.

***** trigger warning – This information is graphic ******

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Trauma Thursday: Losing Control of Bodily Functions

Submitted by FaithA on Thu, 04/30/2009 - 07:15
  • child abuse
  • DID
  • dissociative identity disorder
  • flashbacks
  • Foster adoption
  • Foster care
  • losing control of bodily functions
  • Older child adoption
  • Trauma Thursday
  • Traumatized children

Traumatized Adopted Child (c) JulieC

An embarrassing part of healing from trauma can involve the involuntary loss of control of bodily functions. This generally happens during a flashback or, in the case of a child with dissociative identity disorder (DID), when a particular alter part is triggered.

For example, let’s say the abused child was tortured to the point that he eventually vomited. When he experiences a flashback of that particular event, his body might react the same way that it did when he first experienced the abuse. So, as he recovers the memory through a flashback, he might get a very strong urge to vomit.

The same thing can happen with bladder or bowel control. If the abused child was terrorized to the point of wetting her pants, then a flashback of that event can cause her to wet her pants again. This is true even into adulthood. If a seventy-year-old child abuse survivor was only 8 when abused, then she is going to revert back to feeling like she is 8 when experiencing the flashback.

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Trauma Tuesday: Raw Emotions After Flashbacks

Submitted by FaithA on Tue, 02/10/2009 - 09:19
  • child abuse
  • flashbacks
  • Foster adoption
  • Foster care
  • Older child adoption
  • post-traumatic stress disorder
  • PTSD
  • recovered memories
  • Trauma Tuesday
  • Traumatized children

Traumatized Adopted Child (c) Julie C

One issue that might surprise you as a parent of an abused adopted child is that recovered memories (or flashbacks) come with very raw pain. People often assume that, even though the memory has been “hidden” from the child, the emotions should not still be there, too. That assumption could not be more wrong.

When an abused child recovers a memory/has a flashback, the emotions associated with the event return as well. The full punch of the emotions might lag behind by a day or two, but they will definitely come. When the child feels those emotions, they are as raw is if the traumatizing event has just happened.

Whenever your adopted child has a flashback, prepare yourself for dealing with very raw emotions within the next couple of days. Your child needs you to reasssure him that what he is feeling is normal. Experiencing very deep and raw emotions years after the event took place can make the child feel “crazy.” It is very important that you reassure the child that feeling these emotions is a normal part of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

  • FaithA's blog
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Trauma Thursday: Flashbacks, Amnesia, and “Samantha Who?”

Submitted by FaithA on Thu, 11/13/2008 - 09:15
  • child abuse
  • Christina Applegate
  • flashbacks
  • Foster adoption
  • Foster care
  • Older child adoption
  • Samantha Who?
  • Trauma Thursday
  • Traumatized children

Traumatized Adopted Child (c) JulieC

I am a big fan of the television show Samantha Who?, which stars Christina Applegate as a “bad girl” who got hit by a car, lost her memory, and is now a “good girl” trying to figure out who she is. In each episode, the amnesiac Samantha experiences a flashback in which she remembers being an incredibly self-centered and mean person. The Samantha today is starry-eyed and sweet. Trying to merge together who Samantha was with who Samantha is today is at the core of the show.

What does this have to do with adoption? If you are parenting an abused child, it has everything to do with it. While Samantha Who? is a comedy and not looking to “go deep,” it provides a wonderful representation of what it is like to deal with flashbacks.

  • FaithA's blog
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Trauma Thursday: What Does a Flashback Feel Like?

Submitted by FaithA on Thu, 08/28/2008 - 07:45
  • child abuse
  • flashbacks
  • Foster adoption
  • Foster care
  • Older child adoption
  • post-traumatic stress disorder
  • PTSD
  • Trauma Thursday
  • Traumatized children

Traumatized Adopted Child (c) JulieC

If you are parenting a traumatized adopted child who has been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), you might wonder what a flashback feels like. Before I had one, I had a very different idea about what a flashback was. I heard about veterans seeing the movie Saving Private Ryan and finding themselves “reliving” their trauma through flashbacks. I envisioned people who felt as if they had time traveled back to their past and lost touch with the reality of the present. This was very different from my experience with flashbacks.

Flashbacks generally come in one of two ways. One way is like what happened to those veterans: Something “triggers” the flashback because the sight, sound, smell, etc. reminds the person of the trauma. However, flashbacks do not necessarily need a trigger to come. Flashbacks also happen when the traumatized adopted child feels safe enough to begin healing from the trauma.

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Trauma Tuesday: Revealing the Traumatized Child’s History

Submitted by FaithA on Tue, 07/29/2008 - 08:00
  • abused adopted child
  • child abuse
  • flashbacks
  • Foster adoption
  • Foster care
  • Older child adoption
  • recovering memories
  • repressed memories
  • Trauma Tuesday
  • Traumatized children

Traumatized child (c) JulieCIn my last post, Being Truthful With Your Adopted Child About His History, I talked about the importance of being truthful with your adopted child about his history. Those of you who are parenting traumatized children might wonder how much information you should disclose to the traumatized adopted child about the past abuses he suffered, particularly if the child was young when the trauma happened. My answer is that you need to be completely honest with the child in an age-appropriate manner.

Many people mistakenly believe that traumatized children do not remember traumas that they endured when they were very young. I speak from experience – those memories are still held in the traumatized child’s brain. I have recovered memories from as young as 18 months old. They were vivid memories because that is how flashbacks come. I could tell you the details about where I was (my bedroom) and who was harming me (my mother). I could even describe my mother’s hairstyle when the abuse happened as well as the color of the drapes on the windows, even though this first incident happened when I was only a toddler.

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Trauma Thursday: Traumatized Adopted Child and Body Memories

Submitted by FaithA on Thu, 07/03/2008 - 08:37
  • abused adopted child
  • flashbacks
  • Foster adoption
  • Foster care
  • Older child adoption
  • post-traumatic stress disorder
  • PTSD
  • Trauma Thursday
  • Traumatized children

Traumatized childMost people are familiar with visual flashbacks being a part of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). I have also written about emotional flashbacks. Another variety of flashbacks that is less well-known is called a body memory.

A body memory is a flashback that a traumatized adopted child feels in his body. A body memory can result from any form of trauma to the body. A good example is the amputee who continues to “feel” his amputated limb. Some people believe that even the cells of the body experience trauma and that body memories are the body’s way of releasing the energy associated with the trauma, just as a flashback is the release of the emotional memory.

If the traumatized adopted child does not know what is happening, experiencing a body memory can be scary.

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Traumatized Adopted Child, PTSD, and Triggers

Submitted by FaithA on Mon, 05/05/2008 - 15:33
  • abused adopted child
  • emotional triggers
  • flashbacks
  • post-traumatic stress
  • PTSD
  • Traumatized children

Old house (c) Lynda BernhardtMany adopted children who have been traumatized, whether through abuse, neglect, or other form of trauma, are diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). When a person has PTSD, he is vulnerable to triggers in his life that cause him to remember a prior trauma. This is true even after doing lots of healing work.

I just went through this yesterday, when I saw that my husband had taken our seven-year-old child out onto the roof to help him paint a window. I don’t think I am going out on a limb to assume that the vast majority of adoptive parents would agree that taking a seven-year-old boy with impulse control issues out onto a slanted roof is a bad call. However, most adoptive parents probably would not have reacted quite as strongly as I did.

I was diagnosed with PTSD several years ago. I have worked very hard to heal from the PTSD, but I am still vulnerable to triggers. Seeing my precious child up on a roof was a huge trigger for me.

When I was around six or seven, my then-four-year-old sister and I witnessed a young child fall from a deer stand.

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