Stressful home environment rewires kid's brains

[Guest guest]

Since discovering that our mother is mentally ill, my Sister decided

to go into therapy herself to help her deal with her own issues, since

we are now experiencing the stress of giving our nada boundaries and

rules for the first time.

The psychologist told Sister about a new treatment that is supposed to

help improve the ability to concentrate and focus. Although Sister is

intelligent, hard-working and successful, she was frustrated with her

life-long inability to learn certain subjects (she wants to go for an

advanced degree) and this new brain treatment sounded intriguing! The

treatment involved an initial test that showing how and where the

various parts of the brain react to certain stimuli, and afterward the

psychologist said he had never seen anyone's reading come out so high

in the anxiety/nervous area.

This astonished Sister, who did not consciously feel anxious or

nervous at all! And they tried the test twice, on two different

occasions, and it came out the same.

In light of how we were raised, Sister said she and her psychologist

theorize that Sister must have totally and completely dissociated from

her true feelings of abject fear around nada as a survival mechanism,

because if Sister reacted (if she was shrieking in terror, pleading,

trying to run) it would get her even worse and more prolonged abuse.

(I too remember the " SHUT UP OR I'LL GIVE YOU SOMETHING TO REALLY CRY

ABOUT " threats.)

So, in effect, as a little child Sister froze like a statue both

inside and outside when nada would begin raging, and part of Sister

never thawed out.

For example, Sister says she has absolutely no startle reaction, ever,

which is odd but not causing her any particular problem. What *is*

causing Sister frustration is the difficulty concentrating on

learning certain things like foreign languages. So, something about

certain academic subjects triggers the original dissociation reaction,

apparently!

Now my Sister is trying to decide whether to go ahead with this

therapy or not, because the psychologist advised her that this

particular kind of therapy could very well unlock her " frozen "

fear/anxiety reactions and she would become conscious of them again.

He said that Sister could wind up with all kinds of things like

nervous tics, a strong startle reaction, etc. Not a very pleasant

side-effect.

I know, because that's the direction I went in as a child: I, for

whatever reason (I'm simply a different individual, different

birth-order, whatever) did not dissociate and could feel my fear when

nada went after me. And I did wind up developing into an extremely

nervous, anxious, hyper-alert person. To this day I have a strong

startle reflex to unexpected loud noises or sudden movements towards

me. Its actually painful and it takes a while for my heart to

slow back down afterward. I still bite my nails, have occasional

facial tics, and other unpleasant, chronic side effects that get worse

under stress.

So, I believe our own natural physiological nervous systems, part of

our *brains*, got rewired badly from daily exposure over years and

years to our highly stressful home environment (which I have likened

to living in a POW camp) at the mercy of an unstable, unpredictable,

violent, angry, mentally ill person.

That's why I keep harping on my pet issue: I wish that all children

could be rescued from their mentally ill parents and raised in safe,

calm, nurturing, stable, healthy homes. I think " Cluster B "

personality disordered people are WAY too dangerous to be *around*

children unsupervised, let alone raise their own children or

grandchildren. Although I haven't done any research to corroborate

this theory yet, it would not surprise me if the majority of males who

commit incest and rape are " Cluster B " narcissists, borderlines or

sociopaths. Woudn't surprise me at all.

-Annie