By Patty McDuffey, LAc, MAcOM, Dipl.OM
According to the Trauma-Informed Care: Implementation Resource Center, “Trauma is a pervasive problem. It results from exposure to an incident or series of events that are emotionally disturbing or life-threatening with lasting adverse effects on the individual’s functioning and mental, physical, social, emotional, and/or spiritual well-being. Trauma-informed care shifts the focus from ‘What’s wrong with you?’ to ‘What happened to you?’” This is the first article, in a 3-part series, about trauma, how it effects the body, how acupuncture is an effective treatment tool, and how I practice, here at Hawthorn Healing Arts. My hope for this series is to help create a greater understanding of what we are all increasingly seeing/experiencing, possibly within ourselves, but certainly within our communities. I hope that we can shift the narrative from ‘What is wrong with me/you?’ to ‘What has happened to create this reactive condition?’ If we can find even just a small amount of clarity around the topic, our nervous systems may start to relax, making room for greater compassion. Let’s commit to learning how to heal our wounds.
The US Department of Veteran Affairs reports that 60% of men (more typically accidents, physical assault, combat, disaster, witness to death/injury) and 50% of women (sexual assault and child sexual abuse) will experience at least one trauma in their lifetime. Within the United States, six percent of the population will develop post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) at some point in their lives.
So, what happens in the brain when someone is exposed to a traumatic event? PTSD is a psycho-physical condition. It is not only an anxiety condition. When a person is exposed to a stressor, there is a series of events and chemical reactions that take place to give that person as much of an advantage as possible to quickly react and find safety. There is also a set of internal signaling and reactions that down-regulate the nervous system so that the individual can return to a calm state of existence.
If someone suffers from PTSD, however, the cascade of events works a little different. As explained by NATAL: Israel Trauma Center for Victims of Terror and War, research has shown that the hippocampus and pre-frontal cortex, key parts of the memory-creation system within the brain, are smaller among those suffering from PTSD. This tells us that someone who has a smaller hippocampus and has been exposed to a traumatic event is more likely to experience PTSD. They are less able to convert the traumatic experience to a memory, using words to describe what the experience was, and leaving them more likely to continue experiencing the trauma as if it were currently happening. So not only is someone in this situation more vulnerable to PTSD, but there has been found to be a genetic component to its development.
In other studies, using PET imaging, it has been found that the amygdala, the “alarm system” of the brain and another component of the memory-creation system, becomes overactive in the brains of those struggling with PTSD when exposed to trauma-related stimuli (such as a war movie to combat vets). The decreased ability to file the traumatic event as a memory helps us to understand how the individual gets trapped in the emotional reaction.
Regarding chemical reactivity, an increase in neuro-adrenaline and “damage to the negative feedback on its secretion in the brain stem” can lead to an easily triggered sympathetic nervous system. Additionally, heightened activity within the endogenous opioid system (pain relief) can create an experience of dulled emotions, while low cortisol levels can leave someone challenged to respond appropriately.
I hope it is starting to become clearer as to how both anatomical differences and chemical imbalances join together to create a very complex disorder. For these individuals, the traumatic event seems to get lodged in the here-and-now, reactive, emotional body, never quite making it to effectively be logged as a past memory.
I will go further into detail into treatment for PTSD and trauma-related disorders in the next article, but for now, I will encourage you to look consider acupuncture as an effective therapy. Acupuncture helps restore brain plasticity and organ function and can interrupt the energetic pattern put in place by trauma. Stay tuned for next month’s article: Acupuncture and the Treatment of Trauma.