PTSD/Traumatic Memories

bettereveryday · June 28, 2019, 1:37pm

I was reading this article this morning and found it interesting that:

Further, two types of brain rhythms – a faster (8 cycles per second) alpha oscillation and a slower (4 cycles per second) theta rhythm – diametrically regulate communications between the amygdala and the hippocampus. Overamplified alpha rhythms from the amygdala to the hippocampus lead to faulty extrapolation of memories among similar experiences while balanced theta rhythms between the two brain regions promote correct discrimination and accurate recall.

Phalmo · March 28, 2020, 12:01am

I experienced 6 months of extreme trauma at age 12 and had total amnesia about it for 29 years. When the memories of the extreme trauma surfaced unexpectedly it blew my mind to say the least. I have lived with these memories and PTSD for another 29 years. The main symptoms of my PTSD are anxiety, dissociation, vertigo, insomnia and mild depression sometimes. I find it interesting that there are 2 brain rhythms and I am thinking of purchasing either the Reprogramed A9-5pps or the M1 PEMF device to experiment with. Has anyone used either of these devices to help alleviate some of the symptoms of PTSD.

bettereveryday · March 28, 2020, 11:44pm

Phalma,

I did try it and what I will tell you is that I lived with PTSD for over 30 years and was suicidal from it. It is totally gone, but I did a wholistic approach. I did diet based on studies where they prevented PTSD with diet and I have used the ICES in TMS mode quite a bit, but I can’t say what got rid of it. I just encourage you to learn about the brain and learn about things like nutrition.

Eat your broccoli.

Here are some of the studies I looked at back when I first got the ICES.

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Effects of vagus nerve stimulation on extinction of conditioned fear and post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms in rats.

LJ Noble, IJ Gonzalez, VB Meruva, KA Callahan, BD Belfort, KR Ramanathan, E Meyers, MP Kilgard, RL Rennaker and CK McIntyre, Translational psychiatry, 22 2017 08

Exposure-based therapies help patients with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) to extinguish conditioned fear of trauma reminders. However, controlled laboratory studies indicate that PTSD patients do not extinguish conditioned fear as well as healthy controls, and exposure therapy has high failure and dropout rates. The present study examined whether vagus nerve stimulation (VNS) augments extinction of conditioned fear and attenuates PTSD-like symptoms in an animal model of PTSD. To model PTSD, rats were subjected to a single prolonged stress (SPS) protocol, which consisted of restraint, forced swim, loss of consciousness, and 1 week of social isolation. Like PTSD patients, rats subjected to SPS show impaired extinction of conditioned fear. The SPS procedure was followed, 1 week later, by auditory fear conditioning (AFC) and extinction. VNS or sham stimulation was administered during half of the extinction days, and was paired with presentations of the conditioned stimulus. One week after completion of extinction training, rats were given a battery of behavioral tests to assess anxiety, arousal and avoidance. Results indicated that rats given SPS 1 week prior to AFC (PTSD model) failed to extinguish the freezing response after eleven consecutive days of extinction. Administration of VNS reversed the extinction impairment and attenuated reinstatement of the conditioned fear response. Delivery of VNS during extinction also eliminated the PTSD-like symptoms, such as anxiety, hyperarousal and social avoidance for more than 1 week after VNS treatment. These results provide evidence that extinction paired with VNS treatment can lead to remission of fear and improvements in PTSD-like symptoms. Taken together, these findings suggest that VNS may be an effective adjunct to exposure therapy for the treatment of PTSD.

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov

Device-based brain stimulation to augment fear extinction: implications for PTSD treatment and beyond.

MF Marin, JA Camprodon, DD Dougherty and MR Milad, Depression and anxiety, Apr 2014

Conditioned fear acquisition and extinction paradigms have been widely used both in animals and humans to examine the neurobiology of emotional memory. Studies have also shown that patients suffering from posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) exhibit deficient extinction recall along with dysfunctional activation of the fear extinction network, including the ventromedial prefrontal cortex, amygdala, and hippocampus. A great deal of overlap exists between this fear extinction network and brain regions associated with symptom severity in PTSD. This suggests that the neural nodes of fear extinction could be targeted to reduce behavioral deficits that may subsequently translate into symptom improvement. In this article, we discuss potential applications of brain stimulation and neuromodulation methods, which, combined with a mechanistic understanding of the neurobiology of fear extinction, could be used to further our understanding of the pathophysiology of anxiety disorders and develop novel therapeutic tools. To this end, we discuss the following stimulation approaches: deep-brain stimulation, vagus nerve stimulation, transcranial direct current stimulation, and transcranial magnetic stimulation. We propose new translational research avenues that, from a systems neuroscience perspective, aim to expand our understanding of circuit dynamics and fear processing toward the practical development of clinical tools, to be used alone or in combination with behavioral therapies.

Thinking about it, I feel like I lost the PTSD quite a while ago, but still had social anxiety. As the PTSD went away, I shifted to other focus.

The social anxiety is exceedingly improved, but now I am looking more at executive function.

It is a process, and I will say you need to make sure you are getting your nutrition at the same time and I am from the Whole Food Plant-Based perspective - and if you are Keto or Paleo - there is a Plant-Based version of each of them.

I am not trying to push you away from the ICES. I use it. Most of the results I had, I accomplished with the M-1. I moved to the C-5 so that I could double the stacks trying to get deeper parts of the brain as I try to restore executive function.

My brain is definitely still improving, but I have been on hiatus from the PEMF for quite a while. I feel like taking time off helps the brain not to adapt, but that is just my personal concept. Bob might know if other people bear witness to that.

bettereveryday · March 28, 2020, 11:55pm

Phalmo,

If those are your two choices, get the M1.

That is my recommendation and it is because there are many settings.

People are individual in their responses. I love Schumann, but other people love Omni.

I loved having the TMS settings to experiment with because I was copying a lot of TMS studies and this is a much milder version of TMS, but it is useful to have multiple settings.

With the M1, there are settings that the self-hackers asked specifically for and there was a reason for all of them.

For instance, the M-1 has a gamma setting and MIT used pulsed gamma in their Alzheimer’s study.

The M-1 has alpha, beta, gamma, theta and those are used for things like focus for tests or sleep or relaxation.

The M-1 has settings if you ever break a bone or are in pain and when I originally got it, I had chronic pain of my ankle and that has gone away. Studies of PEMF with pain say that it is similar to a mild opiate and if you ever need surgery or get injured, the M-1 will pay for itself.

I bought the C-5 partly because I will be using it to see about preserving cartilage in my knees and hips.

I paused because I got sensitive to it and that happened a few times to me and I take a break for a while and go back.

But that sensitivity is different on different settings and different powers. I personally do best when it is low power and I can’t hear it, but I know other people feel comforted by the sound eventually. I am sound sensitive so being able to switch settings to a quieter setting helps me often.

The M-1 is more mobile and it is light weight.

When I was injured, that was the most important part.

With the C-5, I mostly only use it for a few hours at a time when I use it so being plugged in isn’t a bad thing for me.

bettereveryday · March 29, 2020, 12:13am

Phalma,

It might help you if you study and learn some of the mechanisms of PTSD.

It helped me.

It gave me patience for the process.

For instance, just learning that there are things like oxidative stress and inflammation involved and that there have been studies where they prevented it through diet helped me understand that the M-1 lowering inflammation alone is valuable. There are other mechanisms but you don’t need to know all of them, but knowing some helps.

Phalmo · March 29, 2020, 3:12pm

bettereveryday,
Thank you for the info. My diet: I work for an organic food company so i eat a lot of organic nuts and seeds(raw, sprouted and sometimes roasted), gluten free grains like sprouted buckwheat, quinoa and gluten free oats. Also dried fruits like pineapple, papaya, and cranberries. I eat organic veggies and fruits(some shortages here in NY) I was a vegan for many years and I visited a naturopath who told me I should be eating meat and my cholesterol levels did go down after I started up with meat again. I eat eggs, turkey, chicken and bison. I think I am going with the M1.
I couldn’t read the study that involved rats because it triggered very unpleasant memories while working for a company back in the 70s that supplied baby chicks for studies to drug companies, medical schools and Fort Dietrick.

bettereveryday · March 29, 2020, 7:45pm

Sorry about triggering the memories.

I went in the opposite direction. I went Whole Food Plant-Based with lots of organic superfoods. Lots of broccoli sprouts and blueberries and turmeric and kale and legumes and some sprouted whole grains. No processed food. I am no oil, low sodium, no sugar. I had actually tried keto before this, but kept vomiting and it just wasn’t good for me. My cholesterol went down going Vegan, but I think while you are losing weight, cholesterol always goes down no matter what diet you do.

I watch my fructose - only get it from fresh fruit and I watch my saturated fats, both related to studies on fatty liver and insulin resistance.

As a vegan, I eat foods with ALA and I supplement Omega 3’s and B12 and D and sometimes zinc because those are the main deficiencies. Vegans can either have the lowest homocysteine of everybody or the highest depending on whether they supplement B12 sufficiently.

I know that I went through each thing that affects the brain. Blood sugar/insulin resistance, homocysteine, blood flow/circulation, copper/zinc ratio, sleep, exercise, having enough antioxidants, etc. There are very long lists of factors, but things like clogged arteries and aluminum and other heavy metals in the brain are up there.

I have become much more sensitive to animal studies since going vegan. Plus, I am more aware of how many of these global pandemics came from eating animal products and farming them and hunting them.

Everybody around me still eats meat, but emotionally it would be hard for me to go back now. I am really happy WFPB.

I did the math and with eating animals 3 meals per day for a lifetime, I would have had way too many die for me.

I actually had developed an allergy to meat anyway and oils make me sick to my stomach every time, so Whole Food Plant-Based was a better fit for me.

I probably go back and forth between the different styles of Whole Food Plant-Based and technically, ones like Nutritarian aren’t vegan to begin with. I just couldn’t ever go back.

Good luck to you.

TajD · March 31, 2020, 6:06am

Prior to using the M1, light therapy surfaced experiences 20 years prior allowing me the opportunity for healing. Prof Margaret Naeser, PhD has multiple published studies on light therapy and PTSD. Wishing you peace and healing.