06.13.09
Body Memories – The Body Remembering
In the television show “One Life To Live” — Bess tried to rescue Jessica one more time by taking baby Chloe and going on the run. Their secret had gotten out — baby Chloe belonged to someone else and the dear little one was not Jessica’s baby at all.
Tess was angry with Bess for trying this last stunt. Every time Bess looked in the mirror, she would see Tess’s angry face making comments to her. Tess had plenty to say — she was not at all impressed with Bess.
Meanwhile, Jessica was tucked way down inside. She had no awareness that she had driven hundreds of miles away from her home. She didn’t know she was in trouble or that she was about to lose her baby. She wasn’t aware of much of anything.
Despite Tess’s protests, Bess was determined to do what she defined as protection of Jessica. It was Bess’s mastermind plan to switch the babies so that Jessica would never know that her own baby had died at birth. She was determined to never let Jessica feel the pain of having lost her baby. She really believed she was helping by hiding out of town.
But they were found. Their safe person, Broady, found them. (That’s quite an appropriate name for the safe person, don’t you think?!!!) 
With the secret out, Bess had no other option but to let Jessica remember the truth of what had happened. Bess did not know if Jessica was strong enough to handle the emotional pain, but there was no more blocking out the reality or dissociating away the truth. Jessica was going to remember.
And Jessica did remember.
Painfully, reliving minute by minute, even having body memories of giving birth to her child, Jessica remembered detail after detail of the incident that had previously been totally dissociated from her awareness. For months, Bess had completely held those memories from Jessica, but the dissociative walls between the two of them were no longer necessary. Bess was letting Jess remember.
Jessica remembered going into labor, birthing the child, and seeing that her child had been stillborn. She recalled the plan of switching her baby for another newly born baby, and she knew that she had to return baby Chloe to her rightful mother.
Jessica was addressing her pain. She was remembering in an emotional and physical way. She felt the labor pains, and recalled the birth of her baby as if it was happening all over again. She felt the emotional agony of losing her child. She remembered all that had been dissociated from her awareness.
And she was strong enough to handle the pain. And by doing so, she will be able to heal.
The writers of “One Life to Live” provided a fairly accurate portrayal of this process, for sexual abuse survivors with dissociative identity disorder even if it was fast-forwarded in typical soap opera fashion. But for a television show, they did pretty good.
In real life, body memories are a common occurrence for trauma survivors.
For most survivors, the body memories are much more involved, and occur as a much longer process. They will happen more frequently, and not come in such a neat package. But the point is, the body will remember the trauma, and the body will feel the same physical sensations all over again as it “tells the story” of what happened.
Body memories are the body’s way of remembering, storing, and telling the trauma. The survivor’s mind may have blocked out the pain and created dissociative walls around the traumatic experience, but the physical body itself can remember the trauma through cellular memory.
Sometimes survivors experience the body memories separately from intellectual understanding or emotional remembrance of what happened during the trauma. Dissociative survivors will feel intense body pain and have no idea why they are hurting. When the body remembers the traumatic incident at a different time from when the mind remembers the incident, it can feel very crazy making. The therapeutic goal is to put the various pieces together so that the survivor can work through, process, and heal from the memory as a whole.
The body feels the trauma in much the same as in the original incident and the various physical attitudes occur as if the trauma was happening all over again. The physical pain, shaking, trembling, jerking, physical reactions, intensity, and various body responses happen in a similar fashion as in the original trauma.
For most sexual abuse survivors, body memories will also involve feelings of pleasure or physical response. This creates a particularly difficult emotional dilemma for the survivors, as it is difficult to reconcile the pleasure responses that occurred during the middle of an abusive event. But the body, being a biological entity, cannot distinguish safe touch from abuse, and if stimulated correctly, it will naturally respond. Survivors often feel a great deal of shame about this reality, and will need to discuss this situation in their therapy.
Body memories are an important piece of the healing work. The body can say a lot about the incidents of abuse, and it really is impossible to re-create a body memory when there was no memory in the first place.
Because of that, body memories are often helpful in breaking through the denial layers of dissociation. The body may remember moments of the abuse that were too emotionally difficult for the survivors to manage, but by truly listening to their bodies, survivors can learn a great deal about their histories.
What is your body saying to you?
What does your body remember that your mind refuses to think about?
What does your body remember that you don’t want to hear?
What will it take for you to listen to your body? Your body was there for the abuse too. Maybe it knows more than you think it does.
__________
By:
Kathy Broady LCSW
thelittlestsurvivor said,
June 13, 2009 at 3:47 pm
i hate body memories..
gobbies said,
June 13, 2009 at 4:35 pm
This post combined with the shame post… feel like I am being beat about the head with a 2×4. (metaphorically speaking of course)
Its so hard. And, I sometimes have trouble distinguishing body memories from just my body being weird. But, some things I know are body memories and it is really not cool.
Kathy Broady said,
June 14, 2009 at 12:53 pm
Hi Gobbies -
Sorry to hear you are having such a hard go with your trauma work right now. Some days are just really tough! Keep working on it — you’ll figure it out. Be sure to ask everyone inside what they know / recognize about the body memory – the more you can learn about the traumatic situation, the more you’ll be able to heal.
It’s such hard work tho’ — I hope things get better for you soon –
Thinking of you,
Kathy
Kathy Broady said,
June 14, 2009 at 1:01 pm
littlest survivor,
yeah, they’re tough to deal with. Not fun at all — but important clues to your understanding of what happened….
Be brave – and remember, you already lived thru’ it, so… the end of the story is… that the trauma stops, the abuser leaves, and you make it out alive… No, the abuse was not ok, not at all. And … it does come to an end… Find that place.
Kathy
Kathy Broady said,
June 14, 2009 at 1:44 pm
Just a thought…..
Do you remember when your abuse came to an end? Don’t stay stuck IN it. Find the ending point and experience the relief of knowing its over.
That will help….
Kathy
oompaa said,
June 16, 2009 at 6:16 pm
just had a body memory last night and my teenager came out to hurt the body because the body responded. i hate this crap!
oompaa
asrais said,
June 25, 2009 at 9:36 am
I don’t have any concious memories of being abused. I have the logical arguement on denial days that it never really happened. but my body remembers and I can’t ignore that. But something/someone inside is holding those memories and will not let me access them. It’s very frustrating at times to be panicking but have no idea WHY.
Kathy Broady said,
June 25, 2009 at 3:33 pm
Hi Asrais,
Thanks for your comment. Yes, it is very very hard to ignore body memories — they have a way of just grabbing all kinds of attention, don’t they?!!! If I am understanding you correctly, your body remembers, but your mind is still blocking on the info? Are you dissociative? (considering the nature of this blog, I’m going to assume so…) So… assuming you are DID, try finding the parts inside that know about they memories. They won’t be blocked on any of the memory info — it’s just that you are blocked from them. Those insiders will know all kinds of stuff about what happened, so… if you can find a way to reach your internal people, you will be able to get your questions answered about the trauma and the panic too.
Good luck!
Kathy
body memories « life in the plural said,
September 17, 2009 at 3:40 am
[...] just dawned on me that some recurring physical sensations I have are ‘body memories’. This post is helpful in explaining what body memories are. Also, it’s likely that post worked its way [...]
sallysmith86 said,
November 8, 2009 at 3:01 pm
body memories make me feel so ashamed and the majority of the time I dont know what to do with them… so I just go away …. Is it normal to have insiders that don’t know and don’t believe that the body is not being hurt anymore?
Mona said,
November 8, 2009 at 11:04 pm
I like what Kathy said about finding the mental place where you know that the abuse has stopped and holding on to that. I write about the body memory so I can affirm to my child self that I believe it. Then I write or tell myself what age I am now and how I am safe and the abuse was a long time ago. I have to say it aloud or write it down to believe both the abuse and the fact that the abuse is no longer happening. When I am able I share the memory with my therapist, but I struggle with that. If she believes it is a real memory I have a tendency to try to dismiss it as made up. Then I have to work at letting it be, just letting the words live on the page and not judge them. Believing it is true, even when my body has remembered, is a process. It doesn’t happen right away. If I can stop myself from self-harm as a punishment for telling or remembering,that process is easier. If I self-harm it is harder to move to a place of accepting the body memory as true. I am my own hardest judge.