“If internalizers were shamed for their sensitive emotions during childhood, as adults they may be embarrassed to show any deep emotion. They may say “I’m sorry” when they start crying in a therapist’s office, as though they should be able to talk about their emotional pain without showing it. Some e…”— Lindsay C. Gibson, amazon.com
“To say that we’ve all been here before and that many suspected this all along is an understatement; we simply have not been told this story in quite this way, at this level of frank detail.”— Hank Stuever, washingtonpost.com
“Epidemiological data suggest that as many as 30 percent of mental health disorders are related to childhood adversity, highlighting the widespread impact of early trauma on public health.”— Dylan Gee, vox.com
“The brain gets very confused. And that leads to problems with excessive anger, excessive shutting down, and doing things like taking drugs to make yourself feel better.”— Bessel Van Der Kolk, sideeffectspublicmedia.org
“If you’re an adult and life’s been good to you, and then something bad happens, that sort of injures a little piece of the whole structure. But toxic stress in childhood from abandonment or chronic violence has pervasive effects on the capacity to pay attention, to learn, to see where other people a…”— Bessel Van Der Kolk, sideeffectspublicmedia.org
“It's about becoming safe to feel what you feel. When you're traumatized you're afraid of what you're feeling, because your feeling is always terror, or fear or helplessness. I think these body-based techniques help you to feel what's happening in your body, and to breathe into it and not run away fr…”— Bessel Van Der Kolk, sideeffectspublicmedia.org
“We just did a study on yoga for people with PTSD. We found that yoga was more effective than any medicine that people have studied up to now. That doesn't mean that yoga cures it, but yoga makes a substantial difference in the right direction.”— Bessel Van Der Kolk, sideeffectspublicmedia.org
“But if you're in an orphanage for example, and you're not touched or seen, whole parts of your brain barely develop; and so you become an adult who is out of it, who cannot connect with other people, who cannot feel a sense of self, a sense of pleasure. If you run into nothing but danger and fear, y…”— Bessel Van Der Kolk, sideeffectspublicmedia.org
“The human brain is a social organ that is shaped by experience, and that is shaped in order to respond to the experience that you’re having. So particularly earlier in life, if you’re in a constant state of terror; your brain is shaped to be on alert for danger, and to try to make those terrible fee…”— Bessel Van Der Kolk, sideeffectspublicmedia.org
“The greatest hope for traumatized, abused, and neglected children is to receive a good education in schools where they are seen and known, where they learn to regulate themselves, and where they can develop a sense of agency. At their best, schools can function as islands of safety in a chaotic worl…”— Bessel Van Der Kolk, amazon.com
“Many abused children cling to the hope that growing up will bring escape and freedom. But the personality formed in the environment of coercive control is not well adapted to adult life. The survivor is left with fundamental problems in basic trust, autonomy, and initiative. She approaches the task…”— Judith Herman, amazon.com
“You may have internalized early in your life that your needs were not as important as others’ needs were. Lack of empathy from a parent or caretaker, neglect, blame, criticism, failure to accept you as you are and appreciate your qualities and other such experiences have shaped your belief that othe…”— Nina W. Brown, amazon.com
“If you’re an adult and life’s been good to you, and then something bad happens, that sort of injures a little piece of the whole structure. But toxic stress in childhood from abandonment or chronic violence has pervasive effects on the capacity to pay attention, to learn, to see where other people a…”— Dr. Bessel Van Der Kolk, sideeffectspublicmedia.org
“When we are the children of narcissistic parents, emotionally abusive people fit the profile of what our subconscious has been primed to seek. Yet they often come disguised as our saviors.”— Shahida Arabi, thoughtcatalog.com