[TrailRunner14]

Ok.

I’ve really been struggling with this and something just clicked.

I wanted to see if anyone could relate to it and maybe have some advice or encouragement.

I’ve come to a really important part of my healing, I believe.

I’ve been stuck for a while trying to sort out a traumatic event. There’s only a fragment that I can visually see and then it shuts off.

I’ve done EMDR with this and a protector part stepped in and shut it down. My mind went completely blank and I couldn’t think during the session when this happened.

It feels like there is no closure for this until the Protector will back up and let me see the rest of it.

So I’m just standing there unable to see past it and other things have come up that pertain to this in other ways.

I do dream and until, I think, this happened I could recall most of them. Some of my dreams have been very vivid and I’ve taken them as part of this healing.

Now. I dream but I can’t recall any visual memory of them. I can “feel” it and my mind goes to it throughout the day but I can’t get to it.

A part of me knows it but there isn’t anything there that I can see or connect to.

My “wait a minute” earlier today made me wonder if it’s a/the Protector part doing its job in my sleep. I am wondering if it’s keeping its vigil and not allowing whatever is there to be processed and integrated.

Does that make sense?

I know that it may be something that I’m not ready for and when I’m ready to handle it, the Protector will, supposedly, let me see it.

That’s fine in theory and when I read it, it makes complete sense. It doesn’t feel very good and I have an analytical part that is mashing it’s foot on the gas.

I hope that makes sense.

Has anyone else experienced a Protector part in the same way?

Thank you!

ETA: I wanted to add that what contributes to the discomfort of not being able to see or “get to” the dream, is that I believe that I’m feeling the anxiousness and other emotions from it but I’m just unable to understand it.

[sugarbeeMe]

When I hit a block riddled with anxiety I’ve meditated on it. I make friends with it, give a sense of color, texture. I thank it for helping me I acknowledge its “love” for my wellbeing. I sit quietly in this space. Sometimes I do this process many times. Eventually I explain to this protector, again, how appreciative i am that it has worked so hard to keep me safe. Then I lovingly explain that I’m no longer a child, and I have stronger coping skills than ever before. And that protection is very important but now we (that protector part and my adult conscious part) can work together, as a team to face the world.
For me, this process seems to help integrate these seemingly opposing desires in my mind, allowing me to let down my guard a bit. Fighting that protector part with impatience, for me, just entrenches it more. Best of luck! Wishing you blessed discoveries on you road to healthy awareness!

[Amyjay]

The protector part may also be working off "old fears" rather than thinking you are not ready to know. The script she is using will probably be the same script she adopted during the trauma time, rather than being of current awareness, if that makes sense. For us, our shut down protectors were terrified of getting hurt more for telling, for instance. They felt adult to us so we thought they were about present day adult things, but we discovered they were young children who "appeared" adult and terrifying to shut us down in childhood, so we wouldn't get hurt more. They just kept doing the same job in the same way for all those years.
T used IFS techniques to help us make contact with those shut down protectors and it was actually very easy to change their script once we had oriented them to the present day and the fact that we couldn't be hurt by the abusers for telling anymore.

They responded by allowing some of the worst memories to seep through in way that was undeniably real and we've been out of denial since then.

[Out There]

Something clicked for me from your other thread too. I realised I have a scared child part protecting the early memories of a recent trigger , so I let it know it's safe now for it to allow access to the trauma ( I have done much EMDR and it's quite a channel this is in ). My T said I've got a part that wants me to go to Starbucks for coffee instead of accessing trauma too ! But EMDR does mimic REM sleep so if it's freed up processing wise it should go through while you sleep. I've has weird dreams lately but I see them as healing.

[TrailRunner14]

Originally Posted by sugarbeeMe

When I hit a block riddled with anxiety I’ve meditated on it. I make friends with it, give a sense of color, texture. I thank it for helping me I acknowledge its “love” for my wellbeing. I sit quietly in this space. Sometimes I do this process many times. Eventually I explain to this protector, again, how appreciative i am that it has worked so hard to keep me safe. Then I lovingly explain that I’m no longer a child, and I have stronger coping skills than ever before. And that protection is very important but now we (that protector part and my adult conscious part) can work together, as a team to face the world.
For me, this process seems to help integrate these seemingly opposing desires in my mind, allowing me to let down my guard a bit. Fighting that protector part with impatience, for me, just entrenches it more. Best of luck! Wishing you blessed discoveries on you road to healthy awareness!

Thank you for this!

I’ve been gently talking to that part.

It’s distantly listening.

[TrailRunner14]

Originally Posted by Out There

Something clicked for me from your other thread too. I realised I have a scared child part protecting the early memories of a recent trigger , so I let it know it's safe now for it to allow access to the trauma ( I have done much EMDR and it's quite a channel this is in ). My T said I've got a part that wants me to go to Starbucks for coffee instead of accessing trauma too ! But EMDR does mimic REM sleep so if it's freed up processing wise it should go through while you sleep. I've has weird dreams lately but I see them as healing.

That is so cool!

I’ve never made the connection of the eye movements in EMDR mimicking REM sleep. That makes complete sense.

I see what I think you’re saying. If I do EMDR with this, even if I don’t get past it in session, maybe it would free up the Protector in my dreams.

I have a part that wants to go to Mocha Mugs and get a cinnamon roll coffee with whipped cream on top.

[TrailRunner14]

Originally Posted by Amyjay

The protector part may also be working off "old fears" rather than thinking you are not ready to know. The script she is using will probably be the same script she adopted during the trauma time, rather than being of current awareness, if that makes sense. For us, our shut down protectors were terrified of getting hurt more for telling, for instance. They felt adult to us so we thought they were about present day adult things, but we discovered they were young children who "appeared" adult and terrifying to shut us down in childhood, so we wouldn't get hurt more. They just kept doing the same job in the same way for all those years.

T used IFS techniques to help us make contact with those shut down protectors and it was actually very easy to change their script once we had oriented them to the present day and the fact that we couldn't be hurt by the abusers for telling anymore.


They responded by allowing some of the worst memories to seep through in way that was undeniably real and we've been out of denial since then.

I’m kind of wondering if denial is a big part of this. I think it would have an effect on the Protector part.

[Out There]

It is important to keep the humour ! Yes , things have happened but humour helps us not get dragged down into that negative space. I think things that help with trauma held by the body are important too , that's recognised by your counselor which is cool , my EMDR T says it needs the holistic approach.

[Ididitmyway]

Yes, I completely relate to this..:-(

I haven't been able to recall my dreams for the past 7 years, since the time I ended the relationship with my unethical therapist :-(..It's like someone has shut down the channel through which information flowed..I'm very distraught about this because it feels like something important that was helping me heal has been cut off from me.

I don't feel though that this is my Protector part that does it because it knows that I am not ready to deal with something. In my case it feels more like I intentionally cut myself from the outside world, from people, from relationships all together because I was betrayed and hurt so severely in relationships so many times in my life..It's like in 2011 some part of me said "that's it, I am done with this crap" and so I don't need any material to come to my consciousness about that..

I think, with me it happened because I understand dreams and all unconscious material best through talking about it with someone and since I decided to not do that any longer, the flow of information has stopped..So, if any Protector was involved in that, it was the one who cut the outside world from me so I wouldn't get hurt again. I don't know if that makes sense..