Mi'sen

this type of dysregulation requires RELATIONAL and SOMATIC interventions. talk therapy and cognitive behavioral therapy and even mindfulness alone can help change and manage some of the aspects but essentially the trauma needs to be metabolized in a full body and social way

doing the sound and music healing training i did last year started to open me up to this line of inquiry and practice, and now studying neurodevelopmental trauma a little more deeply i'm unpacking WHY playing music with other people can be so so so healing

long story short, trauma of various kinds can get our bodies essentially addicted to being in "survival physiology" ie increased stress hormones flooding the body, which is incredibly taxing on the physical body and can create emotional dysregulation

so i'm researching and learning a lot about whole-body forms of care and healing that rely on rhythm and regulation, in a social setting

one form of this dysregulation is having FLIGHT and FREEZE modes activated simultaneously. which, as i unpack my time in what i now understand to be a coercive and toxic meditation center, i realize is why i could meditate so much and for such long periods

i feel like we are on the cusp of a paradigm shift in how we understand how traumatizing events (which can include routine surgeries & other things we think of as normal but have an imapact on our sense of survival) impact almost every aspect of a person's existence

i also believe i was using meditation to bring myself into what is known as the faux window of tolerance, essentially managing symptoms in a way that MIMICS regulation but is still in a highly activated survival physiology state, sort of locking in unhelpful paterns and defenses