For those who experience/d flashbacks, have you ever had a flashback that contradicts something you've been told (i.e. you were told X happened, but in the flashback Y happens instead)?
How do you know what to believe?
landa
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Hey Landa,
Repressed memories have been like that for me in a sense. I knew there was a blank, I just didn't expect my blank to be filled with what it was and since the memories come back in the form of flashbacks I don't know if that is what you mean?
In my situation, how do I know what to believe? The truth is - I don't. One part of me is so shocked and thinks my mind may just have made it up. The other part "knows" it happened that way. My body feels sick when I think of it and there are feelings that are accompanied by the memories. Is it possible my brain made it up? Well when it comes to the brain there is always going to be a possibility, on the other hand it is also possible that it did happen that way. I wish I could offer you that clear answer - I wish I could offer myself that clear answer. I suppose my uneducated advice related to this topic would be to just go with it and perhaps your memories will become clearer as time goes by? More than that I really don't know what to tell you.
Repressed memories have been like that for me in a sense. I knew there was a blank, I just didn't expect my blank to be filled with what it was and since the memories come back in the form of flashbacks I don't know if that is what you mean?
In my situation, how do I know what to believe? The truth is - I don't. One part of me is so shocked and thinks my mind may just have made it up. The other part "knows" it happened that way. My body feels sick when I think of it and there are feelings that are accompanied by the memories. Is it possible my brain made it up? Well when it comes to the brain there is always going to be a possibility, on the other hand it is also possible that it did happen that way. I wish I could offer you that clear answer - I wish I could offer myself that clear answer. I suppose my uneducated advice related to this topic would be to just go with it and perhaps your memories will become clearer as time goes by? More than that I really don't know what to tell you.
Hi Landa,
I don't have flashbacks re: anything that I've been told. It was always my reality vs. their reality. The two sat side by side. At the time, I didn't see things for what they really were and blamed myself for everything. Now, I look back at things differently. I always ask myself when I doubt if I was mistreated, "Would I treat any of my own children that way?" And almost always, the answer is no. I'd never treat my children the way I was treated nor would I want them to feel the way I felt in that family.
What's changed for me is my opinion of what occurred, not necessarily the details of the events. Their details and mine were similar. We just have completely different views of the appropriateness of what occurred.
It must be scary to have a flashback and remember something entirely different than what you were told.
I don't have flashbacks re: anything that I've been told. It was always my reality vs. their reality. The two sat side by side. At the time, I didn't see things for what they really were and blamed myself for everything. Now, I look back at things differently. I always ask myself when I doubt if I was mistreated, "Would I treat any of my own children that way?" And almost always, the answer is no. I'd never treat my children the way I was treated nor would I want them to feel the way I felt in that family.
What's changed for me is my opinion of what occurred, not necessarily the details of the events. Their details and mine were similar. We just have completely different views of the appropriateness of what occurred.
It must be scary to have a flashback and remember something entirely different than what you were told.
***Trigger warning CSA
Hi Landa,
I've never experienced having one particular flashback be different from what I was told, but I do have family members who do not believe anything happened to me. I recovered memories of sexual abuse by my father when I was in my 30s. At one point I went to my mother to tell her what happened (I thought we were close at the time, should probably post in the mothers thread about that
) and she was fine when I told her. But I later found out from my sister that my mom believed that I believed it but she didn't think it was true. It was a way to protect her from facing her lack of protection for me while still keeping the relationship. (I have both come to trust my memories and had some outside confirmation).
As far as what you trust, I would decide in the same way you make other judgement calls. Is the person who is telling you its wrong on your side? Have you experienced them truly caring for you? Or have they been hurtful? Do they have anything to gain from it being the way they're telling you instead of how you're remembering it?
I don't have really clear factual memories, more intense body memories and memories of feelings from which I've had to piece together a narrative. It could be that your flashback is correct, it could be its a reflection of what you experienced and is different from someone else's experience. But I think you can trust that it's a memory of something significant for you, something that was painful and/or overwhelming enough at the time for you to hide it away. It's emergence is something that it's ok for you to attend to, even if someone else is saying it's different.
We can struggle to trust ourselves when truth was scare in childhood. We didn't have good feedback and reflections to measure our perceptions against so we could learn. So we also really tend to question flashbacks. And because they are often of painful things or bad acts and we don't want to accuse an innocent person of a bad act, we're even slower to believe. If it's possible, can you accept that you don't know the truth, but you want to examine what you're feeling and experiencing in that flashback to see what it says about you and how it fits into your story?
AG
Hi Landa,
I've never experienced having one particular flashback be different from what I was told, but I do have family members who do not believe anything happened to me. I recovered memories of sexual abuse by my father when I was in my 30s. At one point I went to my mother to tell her what happened (I thought we were close at the time, should probably post in the mothers thread about that
) and she was fine when I told her. But I later found out from my sister that my mom believed that I believed it but she didn't think it was true. It was a way to protect her from facing her lack of protection for me while still keeping the relationship. (I have both come to trust my memories and had some outside confirmation). As far as what you trust, I would decide in the same way you make other judgement calls. Is the person who is telling you its wrong on your side? Have you experienced them truly caring for you? Or have they been hurtful? Do they have anything to gain from it being the way they're telling you instead of how you're remembering it?
I don't have really clear factual memories, more intense body memories and memories of feelings from which I've had to piece together a narrative. It could be that your flashback is correct, it could be its a reflection of what you experienced and is different from someone else's experience. But I think you can trust that it's a memory of something significant for you, something that was painful and/or overwhelming enough at the time for you to hide it away. It's emergence is something that it's ok for you to attend to, even if someone else is saying it's different.
We can struggle to trust ourselves when truth was scare in childhood. We didn't have good feedback and reflections to measure our perceptions against so we could learn. So we also really tend to question flashbacks. And because they are often of painful things or bad acts and we don't want to accuse an innocent person of a bad act, we're even slower to believe. If it's possible, can you accept that you don't know the truth, but you want to examine what you're feeling and experiencing in that flashback to see what it says about you and how it fits into your story?
AG
*Trigger warning for flashback detail*
born2write, Liese and AG,
Thank you so much for your replies, all of which have shaken me up a bit. To be honest, I think I was hoping people would say the flashback can't possibly be true if it doesn't match what I was told so then I could call myself a liar, file it away and pretend it's not happening. As hard as I work in therapy, there's part(s) of me constantly trying to rewrite the past so at least one of my parents was safe. Every time a new flashback comes up, it makes a lie of my rewrite and I fall apart again.
Last week, I had a tough T session largely revolving around trust and safety and their importance in childhood - big trigger topics for me, and since then I've been dealing with a lot of body memories and feelings of sadness, confusion and fear. And this one new flashback.
Many years ago, my father told me how I'd gotten three scars near my hand. He said it happened when I was around three years old. My mother and I had been going outside to get some washing in and I was carrying the washing basket. She told him I fell down the concrete back steps and a piece of the basket snapped and cut into my wrist. He laughed about it when he told me and said I was a clumsy kid, always covered in scratches and bruises. Prior to the flashback that started Thursday night, I had no memory of the incident at all (the first ten years of my life are an almost complete blank), and it hasn't appeared in flashbacks before.
Where the flashback and my father's story differ, is that in the flashback my mother pushes me down the steps. I feel her hand on my back, feel her shove me, feel myself falling forwards, see concrete path coming towards me, feel fear, and hear my mother laughing.
I don't often have vivid flashbacks, mostly it's body memories and emotional flashbacks, and over the past few months I've been getting occasional visual/aural/physical flashes of things I don't really understand. But there are some incidents that I re-experience in flashback form when triggered.
So do I believe what I'm experiencing in this one? Or is it my mind playing tricks on me? My default state is to disbelieve myself and believe what I was told throughout my life (they were good, I was bad, anything they did to me was my fault). But as I've opened up more in therapy, and as more and more body memories and flashbacks come up, I've started to question that (kind of). I know my mother did some things that I guess are pretty terrible (my T labels them abuse), but pushing me down steps??? That seems a bit far-fetched. And yet, I can think of several things she did that were worse, so there's that. And it feels true (even just typing that makes me cry). But is feeling true enough?
Apologies for how long this is. I think I'm wanting to rewrite and process and disbelieve and believe all at the same time.
landa
born2write, Liese and AG,
Thank you so much for your replies, all of which have shaken me up a bit. To be honest, I think I was hoping people would say the flashback can't possibly be true if it doesn't match what I was told so then I could call myself a liar, file it away and pretend it's not happening. As hard as I work in therapy, there's part(s) of me constantly trying to rewrite the past so at least one of my parents was safe. Every time a new flashback comes up, it makes a lie of my rewrite and I fall apart again.
Last week, I had a tough T session largely revolving around trust and safety and their importance in childhood - big trigger topics for me, and since then I've been dealing with a lot of body memories and feelings of sadness, confusion and fear. And this one new flashback.
Many years ago, my father told me how I'd gotten three scars near my hand. He said it happened when I was around three years old. My mother and I had been going outside to get some washing in and I was carrying the washing basket. She told him I fell down the concrete back steps and a piece of the basket snapped and cut into my wrist. He laughed about it when he told me and said I was a clumsy kid, always covered in scratches and bruises. Prior to the flashback that started Thursday night, I had no memory of the incident at all (the first ten years of my life are an almost complete blank), and it hasn't appeared in flashbacks before.
Where the flashback and my father's story differ, is that in the flashback my mother pushes me down the steps. I feel her hand on my back, feel her shove me, feel myself falling forwards, see concrete path coming towards me, feel fear, and hear my mother laughing.
I don't often have vivid flashbacks, mostly it's body memories and emotional flashbacks, and over the past few months I've been getting occasional visual/aural/physical flashes of things I don't really understand. But there are some incidents that I re-experience in flashback form when triggered.
So do I believe what I'm experiencing in this one? Or is it my mind playing tricks on me? My default state is to disbelieve myself and believe what I was told throughout my life (they were good, I was bad, anything they did to me was my fault). But as I've opened up more in therapy, and as more and more body memories and flashbacks come up, I've started to question that (kind of). I know my mother did some things that I guess are pretty terrible (my T labels them abuse), but pushing me down steps??? That seems a bit far-fetched. And yet, I can think of several things she did that were worse, so there's that. And it feels true (even just typing that makes me cry). But is feeling true enough?
Apologies for how long this is. I think I'm wanting to rewrite and process and disbelieve and believe all at the same time.
landa
((((Landa)))) I'm sorry, I know it's really painful and confusing when this stuff is starting to break through. Don't apologize for being long (you weren't) and keep coming here to talk about it as much as you need to. This is really hard work to face and you deserve support.
When we are small, we need to see our parents as loving in order to have any sense of safety in the world. If that wasn't really true, then coming to that realization is just massively painful. But if that is what is going on, trust that it wouldn't be happening if you weren't strong enough to face it. I'm sorry for the pain you are in, I remember it all too well. But there's another side of this, it won't always be so painful.
When we are small, we need to see our parents as loving in order to have any sense of safety in the world. If that wasn't really true, then coming to that realization is just massively painful. But if that is what is going on, trust that it wouldn't be happening if you weren't strong enough to face it. I'm sorry for the pain you are in, I remember it all too well. But there's another side of this, it won't always be so painful.
(((LANDA))))
It sounds like you are in that weird space of not knowing what is trustworthy and what is not and that is so scary. Especially when you don't even know if you can even trust your own memories and essentially yourself. I've lived in that space and know how freaky it can be.
I am going to offer another interpretation only because I know how hard it is to be in that space. It might not be as bad as you think. Or it might be. I don't want to make excuses for your Mom or say what you remember happening didn't happen but it could be that she gave you a push because you were going slow not intending for you to fall and hurt yourself. My sister laughs when other people are in pain and it seems like she is actually enjoying the experience. It's a very unnerving thing to witness. I don't know if your Mom is like that too.
Not intending here to invalidate your memory at all. It's so hard to see that our parents are different people than how we needed to see them. IMO, we can only confront who they really are when we are ready. I'm 48 and I still struggle with that a lot.
It sounds like you are in that weird space of not knowing what is trustworthy and what is not and that is so scary. Especially when you don't even know if you can even trust your own memories and essentially yourself. I've lived in that space and know how freaky it can be.
I am going to offer another interpretation only because I know how hard it is to be in that space. It might not be as bad as you think. Or it might be. I don't want to make excuses for your Mom or say what you remember happening didn't happen but it could be that she gave you a push because you were going slow not intending for you to fall and hurt yourself. My sister laughs when other people are in pain and it seems like she is actually enjoying the experience. It's a very unnerving thing to witness. I don't know if your Mom is like that too.
Not intending here to invalidate your memory at all. It's so hard to see that our parents are different people than how we needed to see them. IMO, we can only confront who they really are when we are ready. I'm 48 and I still struggle with that a lot.
Thanks, AG. I don't feel strong, most of the time I feel very small and very afraid. But without really understanding why as I don't remember being very small.
I do have clear memories of running away from home when I was six, and a couple of vague memories of other incidents, plus an aunt told me once that she'd witnessed me being beaten by my mother when I was two (neither the aunt nor my father did anything to stop it), but everything else about the first ten years is a blank.
Then from ages ten through twenty, when I finally got out, it was hell. Both parents, different methods. Except I keep rewriting those years so they weren't hell. So that either my parents were both okay, or that only one of them was unsafe at any given time. So that it was all my fault. I used to - and still do - tell myself that all the time: that it was my fault and if I could just do something different then all the bad stuff would stop. I just never figured out what the something different was.
And now the body memories and the feelings and the flashbacks are all making a lie of my rewrites. And not only that, they're also adding more detail and completely new stuff and that just scares the crap out of me.
Anyway, thanks for listening, AG, and for the hugs and support. I appreciate them so much.
landa
I do have clear memories of running away from home when I was six, and a couple of vague memories of other incidents, plus an aunt told me once that she'd witnessed me being beaten by my mother when I was two (neither the aunt nor my father did anything to stop it), but everything else about the first ten years is a blank.
Then from ages ten through twenty, when I finally got out, it was hell. Both parents, different methods. Except I keep rewriting those years so they weren't hell. So that either my parents were both okay, or that only one of them was unsafe at any given time. So that it was all my fault. I used to - and still do - tell myself that all the time: that it was my fault and if I could just do something different then all the bad stuff would stop. I just never figured out what the something different was.
And now the body memories and the feelings and the flashbacks are all making a lie of my rewrites. And not only that, they're also adding more detail and completely new stuff and that just scares the crap out of me.
Anyway, thanks for listening, AG, and for the hugs and support. I appreciate them so much.
landa
Hi Landa,
Sorry for such a short response but I need to get to bed. There's a post on my blog I think might help in terms of you feeling like it's your fault (I have also struggled a lot with those feelings). Hope this helps!
What I Learned in Therapy Lesson 4: It wasn't my fault
It really wasn't your fault, you were NOT the problem, you've just been lied to for so long it feels like the truth.
AG
Sorry for such a short response but I need to get to bed. There's a post on my blog I think might help in terms of you feeling like it's your fault (I have also struggled a lot with those feelings). Hope this helps!
What I Learned in Therapy Lesson 4: It wasn't my fault
It really wasn't your fault, you were NOT the problem, you've just been lied to for so long it feels like the truth.
AG
Liese,
Sorry it's taken me so long to reply, I needed to go away and think about what you said. My initial reaction was to say, "Yeah, see, it was an accident, of course it was, what was I thinking, making something out of nothing, my mother didn't do anything bad, I'm bad for even thinking that" etcetera. And I needed to let that sit for a while and see how it felt.
It feels wrong. Untrue.
It's not that you were invalidating my memory, it's that your version instantly appealed to me as I always invalidate my memories, my feelings, my flashbacks, my experiences. I've realised that my first response is always to excuse or rewrite anything and everything my parents did, even when my mind and/or body are telling me not to. Even when the scars and the flashbacks and the pain and the damage done are telling me not to. Even when everything points to abuse and trauma, I'm still scrambling around trying to excuse or rewrite.
I think that needs to stop.
I need to stop the excuses and the rewrites and start listening to the voices inside. My voices, not theirs. Listen to what my body is trying to tell me. Listen to the things my heart and my gut tell me when I'm around my son. Listen to my feelings. Listen to the flashbacks and the body sensations. Listen to my instincts. Listen to the things I know for certain and the things I don't yet know. Listen to the things I've read and heard that resonated, even though I have no idea why they did. Listen to myself. Listen to my T.
Ack, sorry, that was a really long-winded way of saying, "Thanks, Liese, your reply really got me thinking!". Thanks for the hugs, too.
landa
Sorry it's taken me so long to reply, I needed to go away and think about what you said. My initial reaction was to say, "Yeah, see, it was an accident, of course it was, what was I thinking, making something out of nothing, my mother didn't do anything bad, I'm bad for even thinking that" etcetera. And I needed to let that sit for a while and see how it felt.
It feels wrong. Untrue.
It's not that you were invalidating my memory, it's that your version instantly appealed to me as I always invalidate my memories, my feelings, my flashbacks, my experiences. I've realised that my first response is always to excuse or rewrite anything and everything my parents did, even when my mind and/or body are telling me not to. Even when the scars and the flashbacks and the pain and the damage done are telling me not to. Even when everything points to abuse and trauma, I'm still scrambling around trying to excuse or rewrite.
I think that needs to stop.
I need to stop the excuses and the rewrites and start listening to the voices inside. My voices, not theirs. Listen to what my body is trying to tell me. Listen to the things my heart and my gut tell me when I'm around my son. Listen to my feelings. Listen to the flashbacks and the body sensations. Listen to my instincts. Listen to the things I know for certain and the things I don't yet know. Listen to the things I've read and heard that resonated, even though I have no idea why they did. Listen to myself. Listen to my T.
Ack, sorry, that was a really long-winded way of saying, "Thanks, Liese, your reply really got me thinking!".
Thanks for the hugs, too. landa
AG, thanks for the link. I've read that post before, but filed it away under "Makes perfect sense ... for other people ... but in my case it was ALL MY FAULT!" 
I'll add it to my list of things to listen to.
landa
I'll add it to my list of things to listen to.
landa