Do the exercise again to reinforce your ability to recognize dissociation when it happens. Remember, the point of these exercises is not to prevent dissociation from happening. The point is to be able to recognize it as it happens. It is possible to be dissociated and to simultaneously be aware of what is occurring around you. This dual consciousness M4 important for beginning the process of healing and re-association. If you feel resistant to learning about this dual consciousness, your organism may be sending you a signal that dissociation plays an important role in organizing your traumatic symptoms. If you do feel resistance, honor it and proceed slowly. Remind yourself from time to time that dual consciousness is possible, and occasionally attempt it.
Dissociation, as it is presented here, occurs in a variety of ways, each having a common fundamental disconnection between either the person and the body, a part of the body, or a part of the experience. It may occur as a split between:
1. the consciousness and the body.
2. one part of the body, such as the head or the limbs and the rest of the body. 3. the self and the emotions, thoughts, or sensations.
4. the self and the memory of part or all of the event.
The way dissociation occurs will influence the way that more complex symptoms develop. In addition, there seems to be evidence that the use of dissociation as a response to trauma is influenced by both genetics and personality structure.
Spaciness and forgetfulness are among the more obvious symptoms that evolve from dissociation. However, there are other symptoms that are less easily recognized as originating from it. Among these are the following:
• Denial is probably a lower-level energy form of dissociation. The disconnection is between the person and the memory of or feelings about a particular event (or series of events). We may deny that an event occurred, or we may act as though it were unimportant. For instance, when someone we love dies or when we are injured or violated, we may act as though nothing has happened because the emotions that come with truly acknowledging the situation are too painful. Then suddenly, we may be consumed with intense emotion. Denial gives way to fear, anger, sorrow, or shame as the feelings once again integrate and the energy that has been bound up in the denial is released. However, when the bound-up energy is too great and the feelings too painful, denial can become chronic=a "set in stone" insistence that an event never happened.
• Physical ailments are often the result of partial or compartmentalized dissociation where one part of the body is out of touch with other parts. A disconnection between5 the head and the rest of the body can produce headaches. PMS can be the result of a disconnection between organs in the pelvic region and the rest of the body. Similarly, gastrointestinal symptoms (e.g., irritable bowel syndrome), recurring back problems, and chronic pain can result from partial dissociation compounded by constriction.
Helplessness
Helplessness is closely related to the primitive, universal, biological response to overwhelming threat—the freezing response. If hyperarousal is the nervous system's accelerator, a sense of overwhelming helplessness is its brake. Those who have read Watership Down may remember the way the rabbits froze when they saw headlights coming at them in the dark. This is the freezing response; in the story, the rabbits called it "tharn."
Unlike the automobile in which the brake and accelerator are designed to operate at different times, with a traumatic reaction both brake and accelerator operate together. Since the nervous system only recognizes that the threat has passed when the mobilized energy has been discharged, it will keep mobilizing energy indefinitely until the discharge happens. At the same time, the nervous system recognizes that the amount of energy in the system is too much for the organism to handle and it applies a brake so powerful that the entire organism shuts down on the spot. With the organism completely immobilized, the tremendous energy in the nervous system is held in check.
The helplessness that is experienced at such times is not the ordinary sense of helplessness that can affect anyone from time to time. The sense of being completely immobilized and helpless is not a perception, belief, or a trick of the imagination. It is real. The body cannot move. This is abject helplessness—a sense of paralysis so profound that the person cannot scream, move, or feel.
Of the four key components that form the core of the traumatic reaction, helplessness is the one you are least likely to have experienced, unless you have suffered an overwhelming threat to your life. Yet, this profound sense of helplessness is nearly always present in the early stages of "overwhelm" resulting from a traumatic event. If you closely examine your reactions to the three scenarios in the exercise at the beginning of the chapter, you may be able to identify a very mild version of helplessness. When the event is real and unfolding in a truly disastrous way, the effect of helplessness M6 drastically amplified. Later, when the threat is over, the intense helplessness and immobilization effects will wear off, but not completely. When we are traumatized, an echo of this feeling of being frozen remains with us.
Like hyperarousal and constriction, helplessness is an overt reflection of the physiological processes happening in the body. When our nervous systems shift into an aroused state in response to danger, and we cannot defend ourselves or flee, the next strategy the nervous system employs is immobilization. Nearly every creature that lives has this primitive response wired into its repertoire of defensive strategies. We will return again and again to this intriguing response in the chapters that follow. It plays a leading role in both the development and transformation of trauma.