Psychotherapist Sebern Fisher gave a great webscast Oct. 14 in the NICABM series, about neurofeedback (biofeedback to the brain), which gives us access to our brain function frequencies. The brain gets organized from the womb in oscillatory patterns, and we with histories of early neglect and abuse, i.e. developmental trauma, suffer from disorganized and dysregulated brains.
Our fear circuits dominate. Neurofeedback can calm these erupting circuits, while encouraging neural connectivity, which helps us create a more coherent sense of self, so we feel safer and more centered. [FN1]
Folks with difficult parents often grow up with a “fear-driven brain” as I did — and it can be a huge relief to find out we’re not freaks; nope, we’re a chunk of the mainstream. In fact, maybe 50% of Americans have some degree of this “attachment disorder” due to parents who were too scary to attach to. Of course it’s not their fault either, because odds are, our grandparents were too scary for our parents to attach to, and so on inter-generationally.
But I was particularly struck watching Fisher as she repeated again and again how many people are walking around with a “fear-driven brain.”
I’d also bet maybe 20% of us have “developmental trauma” as I do, which means that life was one continuous trauma “since the sperm hit the egg.” For what it looks like when Mom is too scary for the kid to attach, check http://attachmentdisorderheali...velopmental-trauma-2/ [More in first installment http://attachmentdisorderheali...evelopmental-trauma/ ]
Neurofeedback, Fisher said, is a computer program therapists use in their office, training their clients to use it, to get clients in touch with their own brain waves so they can learn what’s good for the brain and to think “calming thoughts.” Fisher’s mentor Dr. Bessel van der Kolk himself also recommends a small neurofeedback program anyone can buy called HeartMath ($129-$299) which can fit on your PC or smart phone — but I haven’t tried it, so you’ll have to take Dr. B’s word for it, not mine. If you’ve tried it, please post a comment here to tell us about your experience.
Perhaps more important, Fisher had a huge amount of evidence on the “fear-driven” brain — and how that is nothing to be ashamed of, because proper treatment can heal it almost completely.
If you’ve tried it, please post a comment here to tell us about your experience.
Ms. Fisher got into this in the first place because she herself had a lot of head injury and traumatic brain injury; whether from a physical accident or childhood trauma, I don’t know. I did read that Ms. Fisher was in a mental institution in the 1960s with a more famous therapist, Dr. Marsha Linehan; see http://www.nytimes.com/2011/06...ewanted=all&_r=0
Ms. Fisher still uses the neurofeedback program herself all the time because, she says, “I have had a lot of head injuries so I am at a greater risk of Alzheimer’s than other people are, but all of the signs of head injury and traumatic brain injury that I had are all gone.”
“Neurofeedback is biofeedback to the neuronal activity of the brain. It is a computer interface where you pick up the firing of the brain in the EEG (electro-encephalogram) in real-time, scrolling for a therapist and client to look at together. By challenging their brain through feedback, we can see that the EEG is changing,” she starts.
“And obviously the change that I am most concerned about is change in levels of fear. Mostly what I am concerned about is quieting fear, so let’s take that situation. We know that the fear circuits are in the temporal lobe and that survival’s fear circuit, the survival amygdala, is in the right hemisphere. We’re trying to say to the brain – not to the person– “Stop practicing that fear-driven over-arousal. Chill. Get quiet!”
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