PTSD expert breaks down what happens to your brain when you have been triggered. #diaryofaceo #trauma #ptsd #caraccident #podcast #didyouknow #brain #childhoodtrauma #fightorflight #dr #doctor #emdr #emdrtherapy #mentalhealth

Trauma is not a memory, it's a reliving. So this particular person, this brain scan that I have here, this guy was in a car accident and the triggered brain that I'm looking at here is, he was basically put in a FMRI scanner and he was intentionally triggered to see what would happen in his brain? Exactly. So he was shown maybe a car accident or something? No, no, specifically his car accident. What did you see? What did you hear? What did you smell? What were you thinking? Very specific sensory details, your sensory details. And the right side of his brain was illuminated? Yeah, the right side of the brain became very active, but what got inactivated was the timekeeper of his brain. So he could not lie there and say, oh I'm remembering what happened to me yesterday, he's reliving what happened yesterday. Instantly? You feel like it's happening right now and that's the nature of trauma. Trauma is not a memory, it's a reliving. Are you consciously reliving it? You feel like it's happening right now. With all forms of trauma? It's happening right now, but my feeling is happening right now. You don't know that the feelings actually belong to the time that your dad used to beat you. It is now I feel the same way because I disagree with you. So I've been triggered in the past and I felt that sort of instant fight or flight response because something's happened or whatever and it's instantaneous. So although I don't feel like I'm back there, my body does feel like it's back there. And so people are confused about it, they say, oh you relive the past. No, actually you're not aware that you relive the past because the past is the present. So you don't think, oh this reminds me about a time that my dad used to beat me when I was four years old. No, it feels like you are beating me right now.