How to Imagine a Miracle at Work: A Neurological Model of Psychological Trauma by Cub Lea A simple demonstration model for understanding how the brain handles both traumatic events, and the PTSD treatments, primal therapy, transformational psychology, "rebirthing", regression techniques, "tracing", EFT, "Doyletics" and the other various flavors of corrective experiential healing designed to correct those traumas. Last updated 07/11 | Contact the author

• A brief explanation, and the standard disclaimer
• A $25 bounty for useful illustrations
• The neural model of trauma
• The neural model of recovery from long-term trauma
• Translating this to real-world experience
• Memory data and the "amnesia gap"
• The model in practice
• The spectre of shock: not the same picture as trauma
• In summary...
  

My credentials don't matter. My experience doesn't matter. What matters is what works. But what works doesn't always work the way we think - or have been told - it works. It's common practice in psychotherapy to explain the process of injury and recovery in terms of the process itself rather than in a context which can be more easily understood...or, even better, a context which gives us points of reference we can use for measuring our own progress. Most therapists seem to think that the process is either too complex, too nebulous, or too far beyond our current understanding to be explained in terms that a typical high school student could understand.

They're right...to a point. The process is hard to understand. But only because we don't yet have standardized biological models of what's actually happening in the brain. It turns out that what's actually happening at a biological level is far simpler than what we can observe in our psychology. In fact, it can be described reasonably accurately in terms of simple electrical circuits, something nearly all of us already understand.

I've studied the phenomena listed in the title for many years and discussed them with some of the best people working today in a wide range of therapeutic disciplines and fields of research. While the model I'm presenting here is highly oversimplified, it nonetheless represents a useful benchmark for gauging the factual consistency and the expected efficiency of any of these techniques. The closer a given treatment model conforms to this simple neurological model, the less likely it is to be quackery, and the more effective it's likely to be...for an average individual. Our experiences vary, and the through-the-looking-glass effects which shock and severe trauma can have on our perceptions and responses makes it extremely difficult to accurately pinpoint any particular process as responsible for a given result. And we must always respect "phenomenological cure"; even a placebo seems to "cure" some people, and the most outrageous quackery often turns out to be precisely what a small percentage of people actually need for cure. But for the most part, the model below offers a simple, sensible physical model of what's happening in your nervous system, and explains how effective treatments should function at the level of the human nervous system.

I originally developed this model for my own use in attempting to write about the phenomenology of a particular class of post-traumatic stress disorders. I've since discovered that using this model as a point of reference has allowed me to easily explain concepts which even psychologists have a hard time explaining, and even people who barely grasp how a lightswitch works can still get the nuts and bolts of this basic picture.

I've also discovered that few if any models of this type are easy to find at this time on the web. So until such time as a standard "reference model" works itself into the public lexicon, I offer this model as a stopgap and a starting point. Such models are needed...badly...particularly by those likely to consume services which relate to trauma and its treatment. Models and structures function like myths and stories, giving us all common points of reference and allowing us to grasp difficult or uncomfortable concepts from a comfortable distance. Far too many people still settle for the assurances of professionals when agreeing to receive a given type of treatment, which is a shame when you consider how simple this model really is.

And it borders on criminal when you consider how vital such a model could be to the sanity of someone seeking treatment. The fact is that we can't rely upon health professionals for the information that we need to protect and inform ourselves in regard to our own health. We've paid a terrible price for over-reliance over the last century or two. Nobody expects such a model to be perfect...just to be simple, easy to follow, consistent with what we know, and forthcoming about what the model does and does not cover. I think I've met those conditions here.

I apologize in advance for not having illustrations for this model...even simple animated-GIF sketches which could show you how it works are beyond my limited abilities. (If anyone would be willing to supply such illustrations, I'd be more than happy to use them here...in fact, I'll offer a bounty of $25 for workable black-and-white sketches of at least 400x400 resolution, preferably vector graphics, which illustrate a simple "circuit tree" as described below inside a human head.)

(Shock is not covered here; shock apparently involves slightly different biological responses than the ones I'll describe here; this describes phenomena exceeding "functional limits"; shock seems to exceed "structural limits" in this context. If someone does know the differences, and can cite authoritative references, I'll probably update this page to include a model of shock. I'm not equipped to do so at this time. And if you spot a mistake, or a statement which could easily be misinterpreted, I'd like to know about that, too.)

Think of the nervous system as nothing more than an extremely complex electronic circuit that grows as we mature and contains tons of extra backup circuitry for handling emergency overloads and special jobs. Imagine this circuit reduced to perhaps a millionth of its actual complexity, to the point where it looks like a tree whose branches grow out from your brain stem, and cross and connect with other branches as they grow. Electrical signals travel along these branches to endpoints or junctions or switches where they cause things to happen that we perceive as physical phenomena...they cause us to see, to move, to recall memories, to invoke equations. These signals govern everything we experience, because they have to. In order to be recorded in our memories, a signal must first go from a switch or endpoint (our eyes, tongue, nerves of touch) to a point where that signal is measured and translated into recorded data.

This network is built to a particular specification unique to every device (person) that has one. It has structural and functional limits. Functional limits are our natural limits. Structural limits are those beyond which we - or a part of us - is unlikely to survive intact. The overwhelming majority of what we experience is within the functional limits of our nervous circuitry.

But we're exceedingly well-prepared for events that exceed these limits. When such an event occurs, signals travel along our nerve circuitry which exceed the handling capacity of some of that circuit. Nerve junctions somehow pick up on these overloads or brown-outs and switch the signals off onto branches which are either designed for the purpose of handling such emergencies, or which are simply there as all-purpose circuits capable of handling some or all of the overload, or supplying current to beef up the brown-out.

Trauma doesn't occur every time these failsafe systems get used. It only occurs when the failsafe circuits end up getting used more heavily, or for longer periods, than the normal circuitry, or when they get used so often that backup systems actually grow strong enough that switching systems start to route signals through the failsafe circuitry when it isn't strictly necessary. In both cases, this overuse of failsafe systems tends to "train" the failsafe systems to tone themselves like muscles and behave as if they were the normal circuitry for a given task. This is why lasting trauma can happen either from a single event of sufficient electrical strength, or from a series of events of relatively little current strength. This is also why insufficient care in the aftermath of an event can produce trauma as well. The right care causes the switching networks to shut off the failsafe systems and return to the normal circuitry. The wrong care, or not enough care, prevents the failsafe switches from returning the system to normal function after an "emergency" event.

Long-term trauma occurs when failsafe branches and systems are used instead of the normal branches and systems that the normal branches and systems actually begin to weaken and behave like they are the failsafe systems.

We can now see how normal function is restored. If we somehow cause the switching systems (nerve junctions and other related "hardware") to route signals back through the normal branches which were designed for a given task in the first place, normal function will be restored.

There is no single way to do this. One way to achieve this is to stop signals from using the failsafe system so that they have to use the normal nerve branches again. Sheer force of will can theoretically achieve this, but so can the "assistance" of outside force. Another way to do this is to neutralize the effectiveness of signals which use the failsafe systems. We do this by forcing electrical signals of the opposite phase down from the other end of the nerve pathway, so that when the two signals meet, they cancel each other out. Ideally, this should happen as close as possible to the nerve junctions where the switching problem is occurring. Many types of chemical intervention work in this fashion, as do certain of sensory and experiential therapies.

Since this is living hardware, we can't expect to solve the problem from just one correction of the switching mechanisms. Sometimes, this has to be kept up until the normal pathways strengthen and exceed the signal-handling capacity of the failsafe systems. Sometimes this has to be repeated to actually train the switch junctions to send signals down particular paths.

But how can we know that we're actually correcting the malfunction, and not just creating a different type of malfunction? Fortunately, we are aided by our perceptions in this effort. We seem to be built in such a way that using the normal signal paths is either more rewarding or less stressful than using the failsafe systems. We can't always tell when we first start "fixing" the circuits. Both normal and failsafe pathways can be strained when they first begin to get used after long periods of dormancy, a strain we can experience as heightened perception or "rawness". We can only know for certain whether we've actually gotten signals to go down the normal pathways once these pathways gain a certain amount of their normal strength and tone. If observe reduced stress or increased reward from using these pathways, then one of two things has happened. In most cases, this means that we've actually corrected the problem.

But in some cases, we notice that we feel as if the problem has been corrected when all we've accomplished is a certain degree of reduction in stress on the system. And sometimes we seem to have done everything necessary to correct a malfunction, but we have no actual evidence that the malfunction has been corrected. When either of these occur, it is because we have addressed a malfunction at a point in the circuit "tree" which is above another, greater malfunction, something we might refer to as "correcting the symptom, but not the disease". Fortunately, we can use this realization to begin to find and address the problem which is occurring at one of the lower branches on the circuit "tree".

This model represents a simple, concise explanation of how trauma and its correction actually occur at a physical level. If our nervous systems were simple and standardized, this would be all we'd need to know. But they're not. This model provides a functional explanation of normal trauma and correction, but that's all. It can only ever explain most of the phenomena involved in trauma and healing. In reality, the processes described above usually happening along thousands (at least) of interdependent circuit branches simultaneously, not just one or a handful. The model above is generally consistent with what actually happens only because so many of these uncountable circuit branches are interdependent; what goes on at one nerve junction or set of nerve junctions affects what goes on at other related junctions.

We all react and experience these processes somewhat differently, and each of us needs a personal benchmark against which to measure successful and unsuccessful trauma recovery. Only actual experience of real trauma and effective recovery can provide us with the experiential memories which allow us to set those benchmarks.

There is also another common problem that should always be kept in mind, especially when dealing with particularly severe or early trauma, and this is the problem of how to deal with memories which originate from a time significantly earlier than the earliest memories of our lives that we know about.

We all have "amnesia gaps". Most of us can remember our lives back to age three (and perhaps then only dimly) and no farther. We can "trace" back along malfunctioning nerve pathways because the pathways and junctions seem to have memory data attached to them; I imagine them as little icons floating around the nerve paths and neurons which present sensory data when sufficient current passes under the icon. We use this data as if it was tagging on the nerves themselves telling us where we are on the circuit "tree", or what time frame these branches and junctions represent, and what these nerves are actually there to do for us.

"Tracing" using these memory-tags only works effectively and reliably when we have experience of memory-tags of a similar type. The older the nerve branches themselves, and the less they've been used or checked over the years (or the more complex the catalogue of tags that we've had to keep track of over the years), the fuzzier the writing seems to get on those tags. Remember the fractal nature of memories...past a certain point, the principles of fractal decay apply, and we can no longer remember more than meaningless fragmented images and "fuzzy" perceptions, unless we're willing to risk sending far more current along certain very old pathways (i.e. pathways which existed when we were very young) than those pathways have typically handled in a very long time. And sometimes we need to do exactly that to fix a deeply-rooted problem with our signal routing.

When this sudden exposure to unfamiliar levels of current happens, the nerve junctions and pathways handling this current can trigger extremely vivid memories which seem to have no connection to anything we can remember. The writing on the tags might seem achingly beautiful and brilliant as neon, but it is as if they're written in another language, or not intended to be understood by us. The sensory experience of these memories can, and very often does, actually feel as if these were present-day experiences imposed upon us from another reality, and not memories at all.

Experiences such as these are common in psychotherapy, and are often exploited as evidence of paranormal, spiritual or religious phenomena. Some people experience such memories spontaneously when exposed to certain types of stimuli while in certain mind/body states, and it's been theorized that most of us experience relatively mild versions of memories that come to us from across the "amnesia gap" every night while we descend into sleep. Few of us, for example, ever remember actually nursing from a breast, but the sudden and fleeting taste of sweet milk is something most of us have experienced at some point in our adult lives.

Fortunately, there are ways to determine whether or not such experiences are memories, or whether they might originate from other phenomena. PTSD therapists are taught how to recognize certain changes in posture and expression, and how to determine the approximate age of the individual which these "tics" relate to. While experiencing intense memories of our early lives, therapists can actually test us for reflexes which we had at that age, reflexes which we no longer respond to as adults. But while intensely experiencing early memories in a regressed state, our nervous systems can - and do - actually respond to reflexes even at age fifty that we all outgrew by age five.

Only a careful retracing of the levels of circuitry between the levels we know and understand and the levels associated with these strange and vivid memory tags (levels of memory dating from a time before our oldest conscious memories) can offer us any meaningful reassurance that these are our actual memories. The sudden experience of our nervous systems responding to the world as they did before we could even crawl can be a profound, even shattering experience.

If this type of experience is not put in its proper context by a trusted companion or proven to the individual to be a memory, it can be a life-changing event...and not usually a beneficial one. The sudden appearance of long-forgotten abilities and long-repressed strengths can easily be mistaken for experiences of the "spiritual" or divine, or on the negative side, of psychosis or possession. The only way to truly put to rest any doubt that these are memories is to evoke a recognizable chain of memories back from our earliest conscious memories to our memories of the time related to this particular experience. It can be a painstaking and difficult task to develop this level of reassurance, but it is often necessary to one's very identity. The consequences of misinterpreting the meaning or origins of spontaneous early memories can be catastrophic, especially when those memories seem to be suggesting to you that you change what you believe or how you live.

This model can be used to comprehend the actual physical processes at work when trauma and recovery occur. It allows us to understand how and why certain techniques and methods work, and also provide important clues to why they may only work on certain people or certain problems, or don't work for everyone.

It also demystifies the process itself, giving you tools to help you to determine what parts of a given treatment regimen are actually achieving a corrective result and which are there to facilitate the process, which do absolutely nothing, which parts might be counterproductive, and which parts might actually be causing new malfunctions while correcting the old ones. It can help explain why certain parts of the corrective experience might be eerily familiar to experiences you know in a different context, and even help you to identify treatments which might be ideal for others but poison for you, or which aren't likely to be very effective for anyone.

But we can never forget the spectre of shock, which looms over trauma like an angry ghost, threatening to undermine everything we think we understand and derail even the hope of relief from our problems. Shock is still a relatively new paradigm in transformational psychology, and still not well-understood even by most practicing professionals. In this context, think of understanding shock as like wearing your seatbelt. It could very well be knowledge you never need, or need only once in a lifetime. But if you do happen to be unfortunate enough to need it, that understanding could very well save your life...or the closest things to it in this context: your sanity and your free will.

As I mentioned earlier, this model only explains what is occurring in a nervous system which is malfunctioning but still intact. A shocked system or subsystem doesn't behave in quite the same way as a traumatized one, the same way as a computer with faulty circuitry (literally broken or crossed circuits) doesn't behave like one with a bug-riddled operating system (literally using incorrect or inefficient signal pathways and incorrectly-functioning switches). The two may look the same, and might even appear to respond the same way to certain fixes or work-arounds. But actual correction has very different requirements...if in fact correction can be achieved at all.

In a shocked system, nerve pathways and junctions can literally be "blown out". It may not be possible to restore normal function without a "parts replacement". Nerve pathways and junctions might be stretched or stressed beyond the ability to restore normal function. Malnutrition, prolonged strain or illness could cause normal pathways to become so weak or atrophied that they can't ever handle normal signal loads again, or failsafe pathways to be permanently strengthened to where they can no longer be restored to a weaker "stand-by" state.

Until I have a more accurate picture of the behavior of a shocked nervous system to present here, this partial explanation of shock's impact on normal function will have to do. If nothing else, it might offer explanations for observations that don't seem to fit within the model I've presented here.

I hope this helps you to make a bit more sense of the actual process of trauma recovery and transformational healing. I'm a particularly tricky individual to treat in a therapeutic context, and I've found this model to be of enormous value in helping me to sort out what works for me from what doesn't work and what only seems to work, and it has also helped me come to terms with what often seem like cruel or excessive requirements for effective corrective treatment.

I hope it also helps some people to realize that when such a relatively simple model can be used to explain what can appear to be an unfathomably complex problem, it isn't necessary to accept partial solutions and grim diagnoses. A surprising number of people still believe, for example, that complete cure for any serious post-traumatic stress disorder is nothing but a pipe dream. While this model does suggest that you can never return a seriously traumatized nervous system to the state it would be in if no such trauma had occurred, it might be far easier to cure such problems than we have ever properly acknowledged. it may take nothing more than a treatment regimen properly matched to the problem to achieve a degree of restoration of normality which is as complete and effective a "cure" as one could ever reasonably want.

In that light, perhaps the real challenge in "curing" PTSD isn't pinpointing the perfect treatment for the condition, but rather adapting the treatment itself to the specific needs of the person receiving it. (Hey, I never said cure was going to be easy, just that there's no reason why it has to be as hard as it seems to be for so many people.)