Trauma, Memory, & Behavior: Part 1 {EP 90}

Robyn: So one of the things I think is really fun with regards to learning about memory is that there's just a ton of misconceptions about memory. Right? There's almost this idea that there is this filing cabinet in our head, and we, you know, open the drawer and we pull out a file, you know, when we're having a memory. Memory is, as you can imagine, so much more complex than this idea of kind of like the proverbial filing cabinet. There's these three parts of memory, there's actually more than this, but these are the ones that I'm going to talk about that I think are relevant to really understanding the impact of memory and behavior. But we have encoding and storage, and retrieval of memory. These three processes that occur, that go into making up what we just kind of use the umbrella term memory to describe. 

Robyn: So the encoding of a memory is what's happening when you have an experience, right? That when you're having experiences, your brain is taking in that process, and the millions of million bits of data that's streaming in. And- and because of that, because of having that experience, a pattern of neurons lights up in the brain. This pattern of neurons happens in like the fraction of a second. And it's the lighting up of that particular pattern of neurons that's activated because of that exactly specific experience that I will call the encoding. The encoding of the experience, the encoding step of memory. 

Robyn: What happens next, then, is the storage or not of a memory. The storing- storing memory is really just about like the likelihood that a similar pattern of neurons is going to be activated again, in the future. So storing it0 we can think kind of metaphorically of this met- this filing cabinet where a memory is getting stored in a specific folder. But what's really happening? What storing really means is, how likely is it that a neuronal pattern that's similar to the pattern that was activated during this experience? How likely is it gonna get activated again? Now for some things, it's extremely likely that a very similar pattern is gonna get activated again. Right? Now y'all know me, y'all know that I'm pretty passionate about my morning cup of coffee, it's not something that I miss out on. In fact, I just went on a little Airbnb trip. And I reached out, as I always do, ahead of time to know what the coffeepot situation was, so I knew what kind of coffee to bring. There's nothing worse than like bringing your K cups and they actually have a drip coffee pot, or vice versa. So every morning, I have a cup of coffee. So the experience of having a cup of coffee, right? That activates a certain pattern of neurons. And it's highly likely that a very similar pattern of neurons is going to be activated again in the future. Right? And eventually, yes, I retrieve that memory the very next morning, when I don't have to get out the instruction manual to teach me how to brew a cup of coffee, right? That the previous experience and all the previous experiences were encoded, and then they were stored so that a similar neuronal pattern could be retrieved, activated, again in the future. 

Robyn: Now, how and why neuron patterns are stored in the brain is super complicated, varies based on a lot of things, including the emotional intensity of the experience. And or- like how frequently you have the experience, right? We need a little bit of emotional intensity for the brain to say, yes, let's hold on to this experience, it's important enough to hold on to and store, right? Like if the brain remembered everything, we wouldn't even be able to retrieve anything because our brains would be so cluttered, like if you asked me what I had for lunch on March 24th, 1999, I would have no idea. Unless, of course, March 24th, 1999 was an extremely unusually intense day, right? In a good or a bad way. But like something really important happened on March 24th, 1999 at lunchtime. And then I must certainly much more likely to say well, on that day, what I ate was, you know, a chicken sandwich. I have no idea what I ate for lunch on March 24th, 1999, because my brain didn't store that information. But again, if there had been some emotional intensity, that kind of instructed the brain to say like, yes, this is important, we want to hold on to this, it would have really increased the likelihood that that experience would have been stored and then able to be retrieved later. The flip side, though, of emotional intensity, which we'll talk about later, is that if there's too much emotional intensity, the brain can't store it correctly. So hold on to that a little bit of tidbit, we'll come back to it later. 

Robyn: Retrieval, then I just gave you an example of retrieval, right, that's the activation of a neural pattern, which is similar to but not identical, to the neural net that was activated in the past. So let's just say, I could remember that I had a chicken sandwich for lunch on March 24th, 1999. As I- as I sat here and recalled that, the pattern- the neuronal pattern that would activate my brain, as I'm having that memory of that very important chicken sandwich, would be similar to, but not identical to the pattern of neurons that were activated, when I actually ate that chicken sandwich. Okay, so hopefully, that makes sense. 

Robyn: Neuronal patterns are never activated in the future exactly identically. There's a couple of really important reasons for that, we're not going to go into that. Just know, they're never exactly identical. But they are indeed very similar. So I think another way to conceptualize memory is to think about how something that happened in the past, helps create my experience in the now and then impacts how I'm going to behave in the future. So let me give you a really quick example, a long time ago, when airplane travel was way different than it is now in this post-COVID world, I was doing a lot of traveling, and a lot of teaching. And I had two experiences of the airport that I use, my local airport being way busier than usual. On one instance, I was still in security, the time that the flight should be taking off. Now, on that particular day, because the airport was so busy. And everybody was caught in like this bottleneck, we- it was so busy, we couldn't get through security, that all flights were delayed, and I didn't miss my flight. On another experience in the same summer, a very similar thing happened to my husband, I wasn't traveling with him. But a very similar thing happened to him and that the airport was so busy, he ended up in security way longer than whatever normally be expected. And he actually did miss his flight. So even though I wasn't there, I still had my own experience, right? Like I was at home learning about how he missed his flight, all of that. So of course, it's still a memory. Now both of those experiences are encoded and- in that moment, and then my brain, in a process I'm not really aware of, decided that they were important enough to remember. I of course don't remember everything about that time I went to the airport where I almost missed my flight, like I couldn't tell you what I was wearing. I couldn't tell you at this point, I couldn't even tell you where I was going. I couldn't tell you if I got anything to eat or drink, though I probably didn't because I was probably booking it down [laughter], right? Like booking through the airport to get there so I didn't miss a flight. You know, there's so much about that experience that I encoded at the time, but they didn't get stored, and I can't retrieve those memories now. But of course, when did get stored is what that unbelievably long security line looks like and how anxious I felt. And like running, running, running, running, running to the empty gates, right? I remember enough of what happened, that that experience is certainly going to impact my behavior in the future, meaning I will get to the airport earlier. Right? So the experience in the past impacted how I feel and behave in the future. That really is as simple as memory is.

Robyn: Okay, so let's go a little deeper into this. And some of this is going to be where it might be helpful to go grab the ebook, because some of the images can help this. But let's go a little deeper now into encoding, right? So we have an experience, there's a firing of a specific neural pattern in the brain. And again, that same neural pattern never fires again twice, but similar neural patterns are fired for similar experiences. And then of course, the more experience happens a struggle, that neural pattern, the more likely we are that a similar neural pattern is going to fire again in the future. So is- for- as an example, I have the experience of drinking coffee every single day. And so I have a pretty strong neural pattern of drinking coffee. You've probably noticed because I talk about my morning experience of drinking coffee a lot. And that's because that neural pattern is so ingrained. Now, neural patterns share neurons. So one neuron can be a part of many different neural patterns. So the firing of one neuron, and one neural pattern can prompt another very close neural pattern to fire. So think of it like this. When you forget something, part of what you do to try to like help prompt your brain is recreate a part of that experience in order to help you remember, right? Like when you walk- you walk into the pantry, and you're like, Oh, why am I here, what I come to the pantry for? And you can't remember it all. So you go back to where you came from, right? Like, like, for me, I would go back out into the kitchen. And then that would prompt a part of my brain to fire which would then help to reactivate in a way the part of my brain that was telling me why I needed to go to the pantry. And so I can kind of, you know, force prompt, you know, these neural firings because neurons are shared by different neural patterns, okay?

Robyn: Now, during the encoding stage of memory, when the- when you're having an experience, and you're processing all of the things that are happening in that moment, what has actually happening is that the brain is taking in 11 million, 11 million bits of information. And that those 11 million bits of information are activating a neural pattern. It's a pattern of everything that's involved in having that experience, both in and out of what you're aware of. And in fact, only- of- of those 11 million bits of data, actually only somewhere between 5 and 60 of those bits are things you are aware of. Okay? So the ratio of things you're aware of 5 to 60, she thinks you aren't aware of 11 million that are still being encoded, right? That's a pretty remarkable ratio of all the things your brain is encoding, but you don't even know it's encoding and potentially storing then that- then has the possibility of retrieval. So that 5 to 60 bits of data. That's what we'll call explicit data. And explicit data is things like knowledge and facts. Explicit data has, what we'll call the felt sense of remembering. That's going to be important later. It's like the timestamp. The explicit data has the timestamp of like this thing happened on this date at this time, right? There's this feeling of it happened in the past and I kind of want you to bookmark that little factoid, because that does become really important when we start talking about how does trauma impact memory, okay? Implicit data, then, as opposed to explicit, implicit data is basically everything else feelings, sensations, perceptions, sensory fragments, everything else that's happening in an experience that we're really not consciously aware of or attending to. There's so- again, it's hard to even like conceptualize this, because it's 11 million bits of data, as opposed to only the 5 to- the 5 to 50, or 60, that we actually are aware of. 

Robyn: It's the explicit data that creates what we're typically talking about when we think about having a quote unquote, memory. When we draw upon a memory, and there's a picture that comes into our minds, we have this very clear sense of like this happened in the past, right? Right, there's even this felt sense of how long ago that memory happened, right? Like, I can draw up a memory with my son from last year. And it feels different in my body, than for example, a memory of him that happened 10 years ago. Right? Like, if there's just a felt tense, it's kind of hard to articulate. I mean, have you ever said to someone like, oh, my gosh, it just feels like that happened so long ago. Right? That's that felt sense. That was created by explicit data, okay? The explicit data gives the memories, the timestamp, that felt sense of remembering in that felt sense of like how long ago that thing happened. 

Robyn: To think about implicit data, what I want you to picture, if you can, is the memory balls from Inside Out. So if you've seen Inside Out, and gosh, that movie is kind of old now. 2015, I think, so maybe not as many people have seen it as they used to when I first was kind of developing this metaphor. But in Inside Out, they have this- this idea, this metaphor of- of- of memory balls. It’s a pretty decent metaphor for a metory- memory patterns. All these bits of information that kind of come together and form a memory ball or a neural pattern. Okay, so just like all of it is all this information and it all comes together to form one memory ball or one neural pattern. And sometimes, that information goes into long term storage and can get reactivated and retrieved in the future. And sometimes it doesn't. Like sometimes those memory balls get erased, right. And like I already said, like, thank goodness, not every single experience that we have makes it into long term storage, or the ability to retrieve that would be so overwhelming if all of that information was stored in our brain. So it's really, really good that a lot of- a lot of experiences don't make it into long term storage and into the ability of being able to retrieve them later.

Robyn: Okay, let's look at implicit memory just a little bit further. And then I'm actually gonna record a second episode that dives into a very unique piece of implicit memory that will come out next week. For this particular episode, what I want you to know about implicit memory is that prior to age 3, ex- experiences are still store- encoded, stored, and retrieved. But it's almost all done implicitly. So remember that implicit memory are those sensory- sensory fragments, and we don't really have the felt sense of remembering, but think about babies, right? Like, babies don't have this sense of- like sense of, oh, I remember that. Yesterday, I had plums, and it was so good. I can't wait to eat plums again. Right? And not having this felt sense of having a memory. But babies clearly do create memories, which then of course, impacts their expectations about what's going to happen next. Research shows that implicit memory is beginning even in utero. So to stay with the food, the plum, I think that's what I said was plums. The plum example is you know, when my son was a teeny tiny baby and I'd pull out- the pull out baby food. He wasn't having this- explicit thought in his brain of like, yum, I remember when I had that yesterday, and I can't wait to have it again. It was so good, right? He's not having that thought. But he certainly knows what's about to happen next, right? When I get when I would get out the spoon and the dish and the jar that looks like plums, right. And if he loved them, he would absolutely be kind of demonstrating to me with his behavior, the anticipation of what's about to happen, right? Like, you'd be happy and like, Oh, my God, I can't wait for this food right? Now, he can't wait to be fed the food which he knows it's about to happen because of the spoon, and the dish, and actual food. Because there is like, he has a memory of it having happened in the past, and that it was good. But again, an older infant, right? A baby that's starting solid food six- seven months old isn't having this explicit felt sense of remembering that yesterday I had plums and it was good. Okay? The reason that infants and remember is because of implicit memory. And implicit memory, those experiences are being encoded, stored, and retrieved, but just not with that timestamp or with that felt sense of remembering. Now, what happens then as babies grow and develop is that's approximately 18 to 36 months of age, there's this important brain structure called the hippocampus that starts to come online. Now the hippocampus connects the brain structure called the amygdala to another brain structure called the prefrontal cortex. And again, I do have an image of this over in the eBook. So if you'd like to learn through images, you can go check that out. But you can see when you look at the image, or even if you just googled hippocampus, amygdala, prefrontal cortex, you'd see how the hippocampus as a structure has this way that it looks like it's connecting the amygdala to the prefrontal cortex. Now, again, that's another one of those little factoids, I want you to just hold on to the- this connecting aspect of the hippocampus is going to come- it's going to be important later. One of the things the hippocampus does, it does a lot of things. But the thing specific to memory that the hippocampus does, is that it tags explicit memories, and then links them together with like the correct implicit information to store one big memory network. So of that 11 million bits of data, 5 to 60 of them are explicit and the rest are implicit. Part of what the hippocampus does is help them all find each other, and store, and create, and connect up one kind of memory network. So the hippocampus helps those explicit pieces of data, connect to all the implicit pieces of data, and then offers the memory when the memories retrieved, that felt sense that it- that it is a memory, it's something that happened in the past.

Robyn: So here's another example, I'm going to bring to my mind the memory of last year's first day of school, versus the first day of school from when my kid was in kindergarten. So that's about 10 years difference, maybe even a little bit- a little bit more. So, in normal memory processing, on each of those different first days of school, the brain encoded all the data, right? The 11 million bits of information, you know, conscious and unconscious awareness, it's linking up the explicit and the implicit, right? And it's creating one big memory network. So if I looked at a photo from the first day of school last year, right? I would have a memory of last year. And my experience in the now, which is having the memory, is going to activate a very similar but not identical neural pattern from the actual day last year when it was the first day of school. Right? And the same thing would happen if I think about the first day of school or saw a picture the first day of school from kindergarten. And I can notice how thinking about last year's first day of school, it feels really different than thinking about the first day of school from kindergarten. Like I just had this feeling in my body. That one was so much long ago than the other. It's the explicit bits of the data, of the memory, that allowed me to call up the memory, know that it's a memory, and also have a felt sense of how long ago it was. 

Robyn: Okay, so now we're gonna go even deeper. Okay? We're gonna go one more layer down into understanding, memory processing. And we'll look at the difference between a memory you know, that's encoded, stored and retrieved. That wasn't a traumatic experience. And then we'll look at, you know how that changes if the traum- if the experience was traumatic. So when I have the luxury of teaching this with accompanying like images, or slides, or videos, how I teach this concept is that I flash up a picture of my son who is now 16. When he was an infant in the picture, he's 15 months old. And I flash up a picture and if you want to see the picture, you can go and you can see it over in the video series or in the accompanying ebook. But I flashed a picture up while I'm teaching. And I tell the story of the picture. And here's the story of the picture. The picture was taken at my youngest brother’s, I only have one younger brother, so my younger brother's wedding. And the picture is so preciously adorable, My son is sitting on my husband's shoulders. So you can't really tell that from the picture. Just I know that because I just- I remember it. And He's drooling. He's got his hand in his mouth, he's definitely teething. He's drooling. You can see the drool. He's so happy. And my older brother took the picture. And as I remember the picture being taken, and I remember my younger brother's wedding, I also remember that when he got married, at the wedding venue that him- he and his wife got married at the night before their wedding, there was a KISS concert at the wedding. And so I remember all the things that go along with being in a hotel where there's a KISS concert happening. So you can just imagine that, but let me just say that it was really fun. I didn't actually go to this KISS concert because I was doing wedding things. But everyone else in the hotel was going to a KISS concert. So they were the KISS concert kind of people and they were dressed to go to a KISS concert, and you could see the KISS concert from our hotel window. So you can probably even tell in my voice, even though we're on audio and you can't see my face, you can probably even tell in my voice how happy this memory makes me, right? Like I think of it I'm not even looking at the picture. I'm just- have a memory of the picture in my mind at the moment. I- just having a memory and brings up all- all the happiness, right? So as I remember, my brother's wedding and my baby son’s precious, adorableness at the time of this wedding. What happens is like a neural network that has implicit and explicit data really well integrated gets awakened. Right? And so I look at- I look at the picture, I have the memory. And I can remember all the facts. Right? Like I remember the story, I remember the KISS concert, I remember that my older brother took the photo, I remember even though it's not in the picture that my son is on my husband's shoulders, right? Like, I remember all these facts and those details. Right? And I have a felt sense in my body about how long ago this was, which I cannot believe was 15 years ago. Right? And that's a long time. Right? And it feels like it was a long time ago. It doesn't feel like it was maybe possibly yesterday, right? It gets not confusing at all that this was a very long time ago. Right? And in addition to me remembering the story and the facts, and knowing that it happened a long time ago, and having the felt sense it happened a long time ago. I'm also clearly having all the implicit parts of the memory activated too, right? Like the emotions, it was fun. I'm smiling without even thinking about it. Right? The memory in my body is that this was a pleasant experience. And those feelings come into my body now. Like in this moment, I'm smiling, and I feel happy. Now that- that- what's so important to understand here is that because the implicit data with explicit data from this particular experience are integrated. I know that the feelings I'm having in my body right now, the smiling, happy, joyous, like, oh, so cute feelings. Those are feelings I'm having now, but they are about the wedding. The memory is pleasant, and I'm enjoying that pleasant experience in my body now. And recording this podcast for you is pleasant as well. But the feelings are different. And I'm not confused about which feelings are coming from the memory versus which feelings are happening in the here and now because of what's actually happening in the here and now.

Robyn: So it was a pretty significant experience, right? Like my younger brother's wedding, the KISS concert, all these things made the experience, you know, impactful enough that I encoded, stored, and have the capacity to retrieve the memory, right? Like if it had been unimportant, I wouldn't remember it and I wouldn't be able to retrieve it. But it was important enough, and it wasn't traumatic. So the implicit and explicit pieces of the memory are encoded correctly, the hippocampus helps with that. And what you can think of happening is that all of the millions of bits of implicit, they're all touched in some way by at least one piece of explicit. So all the implicit data, which doesn't have a timestamp, all of it gets a timestamp because it's connected to the explicit. And what that means is when I feel happy in my body, because of how precious my son was at the wedding, I know that the feelings in my body right now. Yes, I feel happy right now. But it's related to that memory. It's because those implicit pieces of data are connected to explicit and they have a timestamp. Now again, there's an image of this that I think helps over in the eBook, if you want to go check out the ebook, or even watch the video, which is going to sound a lot like this podcast, because I'm using the same outline to record this podcast, but you can go see the image. And that might help you. 

Robyn: Okay, I want you to try this on it- on your own, have think of a memory look at an image, you know, just allow something to come to mind from, from several years ago, if possible. Not like a memory from last week, or even last month, but maybe from several years ago. And then notice that you have the facts of the memory and you have also the sensations and the feelings that are arising in your body that go along with that memory. But again, you aren't confused that all of a sudden something is happening right now that's causing you to feel those feelings in your body. You know that those feelings are related to that memory. And you have a little bit of a felt sense of how long ago that experience happened taking into the account that without question COVID and the pandemic has made our sense of time a little wonky, right? Right? It's like was that really two years ago? How long ago was that that? Feels like yesterday, that feels like a million years ago. All of that has to do with how our implicit or explicit, and our memory processing and all that stuff got a little bit jumbly because of COVID. So I'm trying to, you know, in this experiment, think of something that happened, pre-COVID. And just notice- notice how the feelings and the sensations and arise- arise as well. And you can feel those feelings and sensations and you're like, oh, yeah, I had those feelings and those sensations at that time. And yes, I'm having them now as well. But I'm positive they're not about what's actually happening right now, they're related to the memory. That's what happens in typical memory processing. 

Robyn: Let's think about what happens- or what has the potential to happen to memory processing after a traumatic experience. Okay, now in this episode, I'm going to focus on experiences that happened after age three, when the hippocampus is helping to create both explicit- is helping to create explicit memories and link the explicit and the implicit together. In next week's episode, I'm going to talk about yo- implicit only memories, and how implicit memory is formed prior to age three, and how that impacts us in the here and now. Whether those were good experiences or traumatic ones, but for today, we're talking about, generally speaking, experiences that happened after age three, where both implicit and explicit data is involved. 

Robyn: So if something traumatic is happening, right, and I sense that my life is in danger. My brain wants me to do what I need to do in order to stay safe and react in a way that keeps me the most safe. So, once the brain determines like, ‘uh-oh, major danger here’. And this happens in like a fraction of a millisecond. Then a whole bunch of stuff starts happening in the brain and the biet- body and the mind, and there's hormones and chemicals, and all sorts of things are happening, that are helping me focus on staying alive. And one of the things that happens during all of that is that the brain intentionally dampens the hippocampus, right? And it's the, remember, it's that hippocampus that connects the part of the brain called the amygdala to the prefrontal cortex. Now the amygdala is a component of fight, flight, freeze, okay? That's not all of it by any stretch of the imagination. This is all very complicated. But there's aspects of fight, flight, freeze that are, you know, associated with the amygdala. And then the prefrontal cortex is really kind of more like our thinking brain. So the lower parts of our brain are faster, they're more sensation based, they're more instinctual. We're not doing a lot of time thinking about acting, when we're actually you know, what- when we're using mostly our lower brain. 

Robyn: So in a, you know, potentially dangerous experience, the hippocampus very intentionally disconnects. Kind of that instinctual fight flight brain from the thinking brain. This is so we don't spend a lot of time thinking about what the best thing is to do next, because we don't really have time for that. Right? Like, if you're in a scary situation, you don't think. You just do. I remember driving home from work one day, a long, long time ago, and coming upon an intersection. And, can’t even remember the circumstances or what was really going on? But I do remember, as I got through that intersection, whatever had happened in the intersection was super duper scary. It must be that cross traffic as I'm- as I'm talking this through, I'm remembering this more. Cross traffic ran or ran a red light. So I'm going through the intersection and all of a sudden cross traffic, you know, someone like cross traffic runs the red light. And I don't want my thinking brain in those moments to slow down and think, ‘huh, what's the safest thing to do to get through this intersection alive’? I just want to go through the intersection alive. And I remember very consciously being aware, after I had cleared the intersection and not gotten hit, like how much my brain had to like process in less than a millisecond to know, like speed up, slow down, swerve, right? Like, what do you do to stay as safe as possible? Now, obviously, this doesn't always like work. And sometimes the impending, dangerous thing does happen. But in that moment, I was so glad that my prefrontal cortex stopped conscious thinking like, ‘huh, I wonder what the best thing to do to clear this intersection safely is’, right? Like I just reacted, and I got to the other side of the intersection, and I didn't get hit. So we'll just assume my brain made a really, really great choice. If I'm in danger, I just need to feel and to react fast. Right? So it's so important that the hippocampus goes offline, takes my prefrontal cortex, clunky thinking brain out of the equation, and my feelings, sensing, reacting parts of my brain just react, right? Now, and that's super important. I'm really glad the brain does that. But like many things that are great, sometimes there's an unfortunate byproduct. And what can happen is that this brilliant brain mechanism that kind of dampens the hippocampus and prevents- prevents my prefrontal cortex for getting too involved in what I should do in order to stay alive. If that- if the hippocampus doesn't come back online quickly and get you know, quickly involved in the memory processing process. Then, memory processing gets disrupted. And the hippocampus’s job which is to integrate and hook up and link up those implicit and explicit pieces of data. That job doesn't go quite correctly. So all the data still comes in, all the implicit data still comes in, all the explicit data comes in. But it doesn't get connected. They're like puzzle pieces that do have a match, but they aren't- they haven't found each other yet. So we can think about like fragments of explicit data and fragments of implicit data, that in normal memory processing would find each other. But because there was a traumatic experience in the hippocampus, when offline, normal memory processing gets interrupted, the pieces don't find each other. And then what happens is that the implicit data doesn't get the timestamp. 

Robyn: So then what happens next is something happens in the here and now that activates the implicit data of- the- of a memory from the past and from a disintegrated memory network. So the implicit data becomes activated, it comes back online, it's flooding the body with the feelings, and the sensations, and the perceptions, and the body movements, all that kind of stuff from, you know, the memory. But because memory processing was disrupted, that implicit data doesn't have a timestamp. And so the body believes that those feelings and sensations that are coming alive in the body now are related to now. It gets confused and thinks, oh, my gosh, these sensations that are telling me something really dangerous is happening must be related to something happening right now, because it doesn't know that no, in fact, those scary sensations are just a memory of something scary that happened in the past. The body believes it's in danger now. So the thing that caused the fight, flight, freeze collapse response in the past, the body believes it's actually happening now. So then the body reacts as if it's happening now. And then behaviors like aggression, lying, stealing, sexually acting out, all these different kinds of behaviors happen in the now. Right? And the body feels like there's life threatening danger happening in the now because it doesn't know that then sensations are actually a memory. 

Robyn: Now, here's another tricky part of it is that our brain really likes to write a story that helps us make sense of what's happening, and create kind of its own subjective experience. Right? And so our brain, right, feels like what is happening, these sensations in my body are- they must be related to what's happening now because it feels like it's related to what's happening now. And then it decides that what's happening now is dangerous. Like, for example, what's happening now is, I don't know, dinner is just a few minutes late getting to the table. So the sensations are coming up in the now that are related to the past, but they feel like they're happening now and are correlated. They evoke behaviors that are fight flight behaviors- fight flight, freeze, collapse behaviors, again, like aggression, dissociation. So we- we see our kids and we're like, why is this child having this enormous behavior to something that's a very, very, very tiny problem? Well, there's a couple explanations for this, one of its sensitized stress response system, but the other is this memory processing. Right? That the thing that happened in the here and now away- awakened something from the past. And the brain didn't know like, oh, no, that was the thing that happened in the past. The brain thinks the sensations that are coming now are- are in the now in related to what's happening in the now. And then behaviors of fight, flight, freeze, collapse happen in the now. 

Robyn: So I'm positive everyone listening knows the experience of being with our kids, or really with anyone, and watching them react to something that's just completely baffling to us. Right? It feels like this enormous overreaction or that you know, there was just a small misunderstanding with a huge overreaction. Or there's this reaction, this behavior that just feels completely irrational, completely over the top. When you understand that what seems like an overreaction is actually the perfect size of a reaction. Because your child's brain feels as though that past trauma is happening right now. Then, we as parents, don't feel as baffled, we don't feel confused. And that helps us stay more regulated in the moment. That helps us respond to our child's pro- problem with more attunement, which tends to mean which, you know, we're able to respond to- to kind of what the real problem is. So let me give another example. I already said something about, you know, dinner’s five minutes late. So let's run with that one. You're getting dinner ready, it's even clear that you're getting dinner ready, you're actively getting dinner ready. And your child says, I want food right now. And you say, dinner will be ready in five minutes. And what happens when your child has the experience of not getting food immediately upon request, is that that activates a, probably extremely old memory, of when it actually was life threatening to not get food upon request. Now your 10 year old, 12 year old, 15 year old, whatever, is not life threatening to have to wait five minutes eat food. They can wait. They're not- they won't die. Like I know that you know that, and your child's thinking brain knows that too. But if your child ever had an experience where they were, in fact, so hungry, or so delayed with food, or they were asking for food, it wasn't given to them. And it actually was life threatening. That potentially isn't experienced, that's now stored in their memory banks, and is in this moment retrieved. So even though they're wildly different, right, like? As you're getting ready to make food and ask your child to wait five minutes, it's wildly different than in the past, when they were in a life threatening situation, were not getting the food they needed. It's- they’re related enough that the memory was retrieved. But because it was a memory that wasn't tagged with the ex- with the explicit timestamp, that lets- that would tell your child's body like oh, I used to be- I once was so hungry, I thought I might die. That happened in the past, that’s not happening now, I can wait five minutes to eat food, I won't die. That- that needs- that means the sensations of if I don't get food, I'm gonna die has the timestamp that tells your child this is a memory. If those sensations don't have the timestamp, because of the traumatic nature of it. Now the I have to eat right now I'm going to die sensations come online, and your child thinks that they are related to what's happening right now. And they actually really are at risk of dying. And so now there's this enormous fight, flight, freeze, or collapse response, that to you makes no sense but to your child, and to what's happening in their body and in their memory networks, it makes perfect sense. And you've heard me say a million times all behavior makes sense. And this is one more reason why it makes sense. And when we know it makes sense, then we can stay a little bit more regulated. And when we can stay more regulated. We are more likely, though certainly not with perfection or 100% of the time, we are more likely to be able to respond with empathy and compassion. Still a boundary, but empathy, and compassion, and regulation with our own owl brains instead of anger, or frustration, or are punishing the fact that they just like flipped over the table because dinner was going to be in five minutes. Anger, frustration, and even punishment because it's all just flipped over the table because dinner was in five minutes instead of right now makes sense. It makes sense that you'd respond with anger and frustration. And responding with anger and frustration, while it makes perfect sense, isn't helping that memory processing, let's call it a memory processing jam, that is leading to your child's reaction in the first place. 

Robyn: But when we can respond to these behaviors that are born from traumatic memory reenactment, when we can respond to those behaviors with compassion and empathy and boundaries, we actually create the possibility of- of helping the implicit and the explicit memory that- that are lost that haven't found each other. While you're creating the possibility of helping them find each other. It's like the possibility of jump starting or kind of kick starting that delayed or impaired memory processing. So we might respond, you know, if I can understand what's happening with my kid, I might be more likely to respond to something like, ‘Oh, it's so hard to wait even five more minutes for dinner! Waiting feels like you'll never eat dinner again’. You may even consider offering a snack, immediately offering a snack even though dinner is literally five minutes away. Right? Or maybe not, you might not offer a snack/ That might be an appropriate you know, decision. But you may just respond with empathy and compassion, instead of an angry response. That might sound like ‘oh my gosh, you're being so irrational, you can see that dinner's almost ready, you need to wait, you're not going to die’, or, you know, punishment, because they just flipped over the dinner table and made a huge mess. So again, your anger would make perfect sense. There's shame, out of responding with anger. However, it isn't going to help the memory have the opportunity to actually integrate, which could have the potential to create some healing in the brain, actual healing in the brain, which might then decrease the likelihood that they'll have this trau- this reaction based out of a trauma in the- in the future. Right? When your child is having a trauma- a trauma reaction, like flipping over the table, because dinner is five minutes from now instead of now. And the caregiver, you- you respond with compassion and empathy and a boundary, instead of anger. The brain is surprised! Your child's brain will be surprised. It's- it's expecting anger, and a whole ‘nother episode to explain why it's expecting anger, just take my word for it. When your child is behaving that way, their brain is expecting you to respond with anger and frustration. When you respond instead, with compassion, and empathy, it's still a boundary because it's not okay to flip over the table, their brain is surprised. And it's this surprise, the fact that what happens is different than what they were expecting that creates the possibility of jumpstarting the memory processing that would eventually help that implicit and explicit data find each other. And when that memory processing, the- the memory processing, that didn't get to happen all those years ago, because it was a trauma. When it has the potential to get jumpstarted now, you're having the- you're creating the potential that the implicit and explicit was gonna find each other. So that then, in the future, when your child has to wait five minutes, and that memory of- of how dangerous it can be not to get fed, right when you need to. When that memory is activated, it will be more likely to feel like a memory instead of what's actually happening now. So it's not necessarily going to feel good. It'll still be like a pretty crummy memory. But your child's brain and body will know though that's a memory. I don't need fight, flight now. It's a memory and it was sad, and it felt bad. And I can grieve and be unhappy about it. But I don't need a fight, flight, freeze reaction, because it's not actually happening now. And so then what might happen is when you have to tell your child, you have to wait five minutes to eat dinner. Right? They’re- they might grumble or be disappointed or even unhappy. But that's okay. Those are fine, and appropriate expressions of a feeling. Right? They can have a feeling that's based on reality, which is like I don't really want to wait for dinner. And that's a disappointed feeling or grumbling feeling. But it's not a I'm going to die if I don't eat right now feeling. Which then is of course, correlated with pretty big, challenging behaviors. 

Robyn: This brings me back then to what we've talked about in this podcast all the time, changing how we see our kids changes our kids. Changing how we are interpreting their behavior as a disruption in their memory networks, as opposed to they're spoiled, they can't wait, they're impatient, they're entitled, they're a bully. All the other reasons that would make sense to explain that behavior. But it's really- they're just not true. What's true is that their memory processing has been disrupted. And they're behaving in a way that makes perfect sense based on what's happening in their neurobiology. Right? And when we change our see- we how we see our kids, that changes our kids. And there's a moment there where memory processing might just get jumped started. And even if that doesn't happen, the next possibility of thing that- the next thing that does happen, though, is that our kids over time will be able to see themselves for who they really are. And who they really are as a child who's struggling. They're not a child who's bad. The child who's struggling in a swept away, and needs help. And a child who believes that they're struggling and has been swept away by feelings and just needs help. They ultimately- they end up behaving differently than a child who just thinks they're bad. When we think we were bad, we- we have behaviors that match ‘I'm bad’. When we have- when we have a belief of sometimes I struggle, and I need help. We eventually shift our behaviors to match that. And the behaviors of a child who knows that their struggling child who needs help, are very different than the behaviors of a child who just believes they're bad. 

Robyn: Oh, holy smokes, y'all. Okay, so I don't know how long I've been recording. I should keep track of this. But it's been a lot longer than what I anticipated. And positive of that. This is a lot of information to put in one podcast episode. So let me remind you, I basically used my notes from when I created a video, based on the same topic that is over on my website. You can access it for free. The video is closed captioned, and it has images that really can help the learning and help it make sense. In addition, there's a free ebook you can download. So if you were like, Oh my gosh, this information is amazing. But I'll never remember any of it. Head over to my website, go to RobynGobbel.com/VideoSeries. And again, you can sign up to watch the video series, and then get the ebook. So you can help your brain and encode and store this information better. So you'll be more likely to be able to retrieve the information that I just taught you in this podcast at some point in the future. RobynGobbel.com/VideoSeries. Now, if you are loving all of the neurobiology tidbits that I give you in this podcast, and you also would like some more supports and integrating all this information into your real life, there are a couple of ways you can do that. One is if you're a parent, or a caregiver, or you're a professional who supports parents or caregivers, you can come and join me in The Club, when it is open for new members. The Club is a membership community that has a huge educational on-demand library. It has a super active members forum. And we have three, usually at least three live meetings a month. And so because we're actually hanging out together, and I'm very, very active in the forum. I respond to probably 80% of the posts, and then my team is always catching the rest of them. Because I'm so active in the forum, I get to help you take this information and actually like make it useful in your life. So if you're finding you need that, like Oh, I love all this information, but I'm just not sure how it applies to my family, I don't know how to use it, then The Club might be just what you're looking for. So RobynGobbel.com/TheClub to see when the club opens again in the future, put yourself on the waiting list. 

Robyn: Now if you're a professional, and you want to work with families in this way, what you can check out is my program Being With which is a year long immersion program and supporting the parents, the caregivers of kids with vulnerable nervous systems, big baffling behaviors. And that program runs January through December, you can go check it out, depending on when you hear this- this podcast will depend on kind of where we are in the process. We might- I might be in an accepting application process. I might be in an enrolling process. You just never know. So RobynGobbel.com/BeingWith and that's an amazing program where you can get really, really steeped in all the science, all the neuroscience, all the neurobiology and then also get very, very practical tools on how to help the parents of the kids that you're working with. So again, specific to this episode, the trauma,, memory, and behavior stuff, RobynGobbel.com/videoseries. I, as always, am just Uh, let me just take another breath. So grateful. I mean, especially this- this episode was really long and pretty dense. So if you've gotten to the end, you're amazing. Thank you for just continuing to show up for yourself, right? That your- your- your- your seeking ways to help- to help you feel better, to help your kid feel better, to help the kids that you work with feel better. And I'm positive, you don't hear enough that it matters. It matters a lot. It matters. Even if you aren't seeing behavior change. I promise that your work- the work that you're doing, to shift to this neurobiology lens, it matters. It matters to you, it matters to your kids, it matters to the future of I really believe that matters to the future of- of humanity to the planet. So thank you. Thank you. Thank you. 

Robyn: Next week, I'm going to do another episode about memory. And it's going to be specifically about implicit memory only, and memories that are only implicit. So experiences basically that happen when we're babies, infants, toddlers, and how that is still impacting memory, and how that is still impacting our behavior, even though we don't remember experiences from our infancy and toddlerhood. Those experiences are still stored in our memory networks and still impact us to stay in actually pretty profound ways. So we'll do that next week. Thank you so much. Can't wait to have you back next week.