FLASHBACKS

****POSSIBLE MAJOR TRIGGERS****
“Memories that were split off at the time of the abuse sometimes break through later in intrusive, overwhelming images, fragments, or feelings. Even though we may not be able to understand or tell the story of our abuse, we may be bombarded by feelings, body sensations, and visual images of terrifying scenes.

These intrusive memories, or flashbacks, can be so vivid that you feel as though the original experience is happening again now, rather than just being remembered. Flashbacks may be accompanied by the feelings you experienced at the time, or they may be stark and detached, like watching a movie about somebody else’s life.

Frequently flashbacks are visual: “I saw this penis coming toward me,” or “I couldn’t see my mother’s face, just the yellow nightgown she always wore.” These memories can be very dramatic:

My husband was just beginning to initiate some lovemaking. I had a flash in my mind. The closest way I can describe it is that it was much like viewing slides in a slide show, when the slide goes by too fast, but slow enough to give you some part of the image. It was someone jamming his fingers up my vagina. It was very vivid, and enough of the feelings came sneaking in that I knew it wasn’t a fantasy. There was an element of it that made me stop and take notice. I lay there and let it replay a couple of times.

I felt confused. I was aware that it was something that had happened to me. I even had a recollection of the pain. I scrambled around my mind for an explanation. ‘Was that a rough lover I had?’ Immediately I knew that wasn’t the case. So I went back into the flash again. Each time I went back, I tried to open it up to see a little more. I didn’t see his face, but I could sense an essence of my father.

But not everyone has visual recall. One woman was upset that she couldn’t get any images. Her father had held her at knife point in the car, face down in the dark, and raped her. She had never seen anything. But she had heard him. And when she began to write the scene in Spanish, her native language, it all came back to her-his threats, his brutality, his violation.

Flashback can involve any of the senses. What you heard, saw, smelled, tasted, felt, or thought can return with such immediacy that you feel as if you are actually reliving the original experience." (The Courage to Heal)

When I know something is wrong or amiss is when I would have the sense of panic, being trapped, feeling powerless with no memory backing it up some of the time.

When I am able to share what I can in t. about my abuse, it is like I am experiencing the past right in the present. This is when the feelings/sensations rise up in me as a child and my adult self goes else where and I feel I am not protected and that is when the fear comes in and takes over. I usually am not able to speak as much during this time. A lot of head nods, grunts and hiding behind my clenched hand to my mouth.