[cur0]

CSA Trigger Warning
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How can one deal with flashbacks that they don't remember or understand because of amnesia? For instance not having any memories that resemble the contents of your flashbacks.

In these past few months I'm having body memories and flashbacks that are indicative of child sexual abuse...something which I've suspected happened to me for a long time, but never had any evidence or memories to confirm. It's very confusing. I didn't know my memory loss could be that extensive.

Before I started trauma work with my therapist I was also experiencing this,
I had very intense flashbacks with horrible body memories that made me feel honestly like I was being attacked right that very second,
I couldn't explain it because I couldn't remember being abused like that

As it turns out, my therapist explained to me that sometimes when someone is abused they avoid all triggers and they end up becoming numb to the memories and they end up getting buried, sometimes to the point of being recovered and sometimes they manifest in flashbacks, nightmares and body memories

So when I recovered some of the memories it helped me a little to know my triggers and know What I can and can't handle

[Purple Heart]

Hi

I've had amnesia of the events too. Later in life (age 39) I started to have flashbacks of sexual abuse in childhood. So I guess they've been repressed memories but I don't think my T believes me because she seems to suggest most of her clients remember the memories from the point of the child abuse. I feel very alone as I've been having these flashbacks for 3 years. They never seem to stop but I think it is because I have C-PTSD, multiple abuses by multiple people.

PH

[cur0]

I've done some reading and apparently a large portion of the psychiatric institution believes that it's very rare, if not impossible for memories of sexual abuse to be recovered later in life. :/ So perhaps that explains your therapist's behavior.

All I know is I have pervasive amnesia (One possible symptom of C-PTSD) and have recovered memories before that I could piece together in order to find out what went on. But these memories are different. They're very vague and in them I can't really figure out details of what's happening. I have no idea when, where, or who any sexual abuse could have happened with. I can't even think of any possibilities because I just don't remember enough about my childhood.

[brownhare]

I had fragmented flash backs of being force fed food in a high chair with a plastic tray and screaming. I had no distinct memory just the odd flash of a choking sensation and the sound or sense of screaming and the plastic tray being there. I asked my Grandma about the way my Mother fed me as a baby and she verified that she had witnessed this and threatened my Mother with violence if she caught her doing it again. It added up with memories of force feeding and being threatened with being made to eat my own vomit at a later age when I was too big for a high chair. I believe that early memories can be repressed and surface as flashbacks that point to experienced trauma. As babies we don't make memories, but for sure our brains take snap shots of colours, sensations and sounds. I got all three, the colour of the tray, the sensation of food being rammed into my throat and the screaming being all around me. I have come to believe that a flashback is like a screenshot of a traumatic event, it doesn't have a narrative pattern the way a memory does, but they bubble up as a flash of colour sensation and sound given the right trigger. I asked my Grandma because my Mother and Father lived with her when I was a baby and I thought she might be able to shed some light on what I can best describe as a fragmented none memory of an event that felt like anguish and force feeding and sure enough she corroborated it. It might be helpful to talk to people who were around you at that age and see if anyone noticed anything unusual going on, it is surprising what others can recover for us when we encounter this sort of thing as a fragment of trauma. I have never recovered this memory specifically but Grandma was able to frame the context in which this flashback or snap shot was taken by my baby brain. I'm so sorry that you have had your experience negated.

[cur0]

Thank you so much brownhare, the example helps a lot. I find it difficult to conceptualize things without examples.
I agree with your description of flashbacks, mine are very much the same way. In fact what you described as a sense of the tray being in front of you is very very similar to one of my recent flashbacks

[Purple Heart]

As I said earlier, I've discovered memories and experienced flashbacks later in life. I don't know what is true. Are these 'recovered memories' actual facts about my childhood?? Or was it something completely different. What is the absolute truth of my childhood experience? I may never know. But I do have strong physiological sensations when I think about my older sister and I've had flashbacks of her sexually abusing me. Someone said earlier that psychiatrists don't accept recovered memories later in life - why? Some other posts suggest that the trauma was so incredibly painful that it had to be 'buried' into the sub-conscious mind in order to survive. I think that is the case for me and I'm disappointed that my T does not believe me because it doesn't fit her narrow-view of how childhood sexual abuse should manifest in adulthood.

I'm not sure if others experience this, but i have a pervasive fear of everything in my life - whether eating, walking, driving, at work. I have a fear something catastrophic will happen when I do anything in life, like I will be re-abused like in childhood. Does anybody else experience this??

PH

[cur0]

I'm struggling feeling the same way, though I'm not an adult yet. I'm 17.

I've realized too that the details of my flashbacks are very vivid. I can smell the smells, I know how exactly my body is positioned, and how far certain...objects are from me. And when for a very long time when people bring up child sexual abuse, even mention it, I get a specific image in my head which resembles the content of these flashbacks. It's disturbing.