I was searching on self-states today to kind of figure out what I can do when I get taken over like last night and this morning and came across this article. It's long, so I'll post the link, and then some quotes. I was kind of surprised how much of the ideas identified (which probably are more universal and less to do with the treatment approach) applied to me and how I relate to myself. I could probably find slightly less jargony versions of almost every concept in this article (and some of the case study client's exact self-identification) in my journal from as far back as October. I guess that's why T is willing to read so much from me and maintains disbelief that I never studied psychology before.
Also explains why T keeps insisting that my trauma and childhood "crap" is much worse and more meaningful than I suggest to him that it is. Anyway, I just found it interesting and relatable, so I'm sharing here...http://www.aedpinstitute.org/i.../lamagna_gleiser.pdf
"The persistent remnants of maltreatment and disorganized attachment -- profound distrust, affect dysregulation, dissolution of identity, extreme dependency, and shame -- cast a large shadow over the survivor's ability to access inner resources and derive comfort from connections with others." (p. 3)
"Thus, contradictory needs (attachment vs. protection), affects (relief vs. fear), behaviors
(object-seeking vs. fleeing), and relational stances (approach vs. avoidance) can be segregated from one another within an increasingly disintegrated system of self-states. Each self-state incorporates divergent self and other representations, and may even encapsulate distinct attachment patterns (Blizard, 2003). The rapid shifting between poorly integrated self-states, each embodying different internal working models, offers a cogent explanatory model for the phenomenology of disorganized attachment. A common clinical manifestation of this is evident in the contradictory “come close/stay away” messages delivered by traumatized clients in crisis. For abused and neglected individuals, chronic re-experiencing and avoidance of traumatic memories, combined with a deficient, fragmented self system, form a psyche that is unable to provide the soothing, self-regulation and integration of self-states required for adequate psychological functioning. Such vulnerability gives rise to primitive annihilation and disintegration terror; as Fairbairn described, “the terror of objectlessness” (in Grand & Alpert, 1993), floating in an abyss of isolation and hopelessness." (p. 8)
"In contrast, for clients with disorganized attachment, intra-psychic relating among subjective and reflective self-states recapitulates the disengagement, abuse and inconsistency found in their relationships with abusive and neglectful caregivers. For example, a client’s longings for closeness may be met by internal scorn or contempt in the form of persecutory voices (Firestone, 1997) or images emanating from a self-state in the reflective position. Rather than allowing for an adaptive response to the need for connection, this internal enactment moves the client into a dysphoric state of shame, aloneness and depressive helplessness." (p. 10)
"A common clinical manifestation of this transformative power of emotion can be seen in a survivor of physical abuse, who, as a child, learned painful, terrifying lessons that anger is dangerous and destructive. As an adult, she indiscriminately disavows any internal experience of anger and is thereby robbed of resources geared toward self-protection, empowerment and ability to negotiate and defend interpersonal boundaries. In the absence of anger’s adaptive information and action tendencies, she is exquisitely vulnerable to re-victimization (Gleiser, 2003). Complicating this picture, the dissociated anger that is diverted from the relational field does not disappear; rather it may be turned viciously against the self via criticism, self-hatred, and covert self-sabotage." (p. 12)
"However, many traumatized clients present for treatment in the throes of longstanding affect phobias (McCullough-Vaillant, 1997), having learned painful lessons that intense affect plus desperate aloneness equals what Fosha (2002, 2003) calls unbearable states of overwhelming distress. Such clients learn to avoid being immersed in core affect at any cost." (p. 12)
"However, most clients with histories of severe trauma and neglect exhibit poor affect tolerance, dissociate under stress, harbor significant distrust of others and therefore, avoid contact with feared to be unbearable affective states at all costs (Gold, 2000). If gently pressured toward a fuller experiencing of dissociated affect, such clients often oscillate between extremes of constriction, numbness, deadness and detachment from self and therapist, to floods of dysregulated pathogenic affects, including intense shame, fear and aloneness (Gold, 2000)." (p. 14-15)
"Many survivors have limited ability to compassionately bear witness to their internal experience. Either they are so consumed by overwhelming emotions that no reflective self is available to intervene and provide self regulatory functions, or the reflective self reacts with persecutory responses (Firestone, 1997)." (p. 23-24)
"Internal systems characterized by years of rejection, isolation, alienation, and uneven distribution of painful, traumatic material (e.g. self-states who are burdened with the majority of traumatic memories/affects and then ignored by the rest of the self), show the strain of accumulated resentment, resignation, and even rage (Schwartz, 1995)...In other survivors, these negative relational dynamics can manifest in extreme behaviors such as self-sabotage, ”inflicting” intrusive flashbacks as revenge for “being ignored”, acts of aggression against the self, re-enactments..." (p. 25-26)
"For example, when a regressive, needy, help-seeking self-state initiates contact with the therapist, this can immediately elicit a protective, resentful, rejection-sensitive self-state that feels compelled to ward off intimacy and potential hurt. This confusing push-pull dynamic often results in multi-dimensional communications that must be carefully disentangled so that each self-state’s experience can be identified and respectfully responded to accordingly (Bergmann, 2005; Forgash, 2005; Paulsen, 1995; Schwartz, 1995; Watkins & Watkins, 1995). Failure to do so can catapult therapist-client dyads into dreaded but inevitable re-enactments that alienate the client from a source of available support and frustrate the most well-meaning therapist (Gleiser, 2003)." (p. 27) *** - Explains what happened with the whole "connection/disconnection" fiasco last month.
"We have found that connection with oneself and with others often creates a “double-edged sword” for survivors. While some self-states may possess powerful strivings to be heard, acknowledged and cared about, “being seen” also often brings with it anxiety provoking memories of predation, intense fears of abandonment, a sense of unworthiness, desperate feelings of dependency, self loathing for having dependency needs, and/or intense pain/grief in now receiving what has been needed but rarely if ever received in childhood (Blizard, 2003)." (p. 30)
"Often, trauma survivors struggle as much against feeling positive affects as they do against negative ones. Shame or fear of loss/destruction and envy can bind and/or block such experiences from conscious awareness." (p. 30)
