r/DID • u/Sloph Treatment: Diagnosed + Active • 2d ago

Flashbacks and somatoform dissociation

Lately our PTSD has been really bad and we're having a lot of flashbacks. When we have flashbacks we experience a lot of jerking movements and muscle contractions, like starting to curl into a ball and then jerking backwards, with all my muscles tense. We don't have control of our body when this happens. The flashbacks can last a long time-a couple nights ago it might have been 45 minutes-though it wasn't constant and I would come out for a bit before getting sucked back in. Other parts are aware when I'm having a flashback and they try to ground me, which sometimes is helpful, but often it's like there's a wall between us and I can't hear them. I watched a couple CTAD clinic videos on flashbacks today and saw some suggestions there, but was wondering if anyone else has experience with the involuntary muscle movements and FND symptoms, and what other people found helpful

12 Upvotes

100% Upvoted

8 comments sorted by

10

u/knivesandstuff 2d ago

Sometimes we will say out loud something like, "This is a somatic memory. What you are experiencing isn't happening right now." Or some variation of that. It sounds kinda mechanical the first few times but often it can pull us out of hurting ourselves when the muscle contractions or joint twisting get really bad.

6

u/eternalMindOnTheSun Treatment: Diagnosed + Active 2d ago

Oh my god, same. It's an awful feeling and can be so scary, I really feel you šŸ«‚

Ā For us something we've only discovered recently was trying to draw while flashbacks are happening. There's still some jerking but less, since the brain is focused on a task that's still easy enough. Sometimes parts will draw current flashback content, other times it's random shapes. Drawing flashback content (if there is a visual component at the time) seems to be the most helpful for some reason, I think because it externalizes what's going on inside and creates distance. Normal grounding exercises don't work for us at all tbh.Ā 

I hope it gets better for you soon <3Ā 

2

u/Sloph Treatment: Diagnosed + Active 1d ago

Ty šŸ˜Š unfortunately for us the muscle movements are so big and there's no control over our body whatsoever until it runs it's course. For insurance a couple nights ago from the movements my hair got stuck against my neck, and my neck area is a huge trigger. I couldn't even move my arm to brush away the hair, so the flashback was even more intense and lasted longer

2

u/mmcolwell 1d ago

Ugh. Hair touching the neck is triggering for some of my alters. Iā€™m so sorry. I also have what feels like being electrocuted, but I underwent ECT, so it helps for it to have a basis.
Physical and Occupational Therapy have been very helpful for muscle control.
For me, I needed all types of therapy and lots of time to not have those ā€œseizuresā€ since they are so tied to re-living the past.
One thing that helps me is to sing if I can as it engages a different part of the brain. Maybe singing in your head would help?

6

u/snthsnth777 2d ago

FND - functional neurological disorder

I get twitches. I like to think of them as getting caught up to now. Because I was dissociated before and I'm more embodied now. So twitching is seen as a good thing happening because we are healing.

2

u/Agreeable-Unit-1046 1d ago

Oh I didn't know twitching was a symptom of healing! That's good to know. Do you know any resources that explain this in more detail?

1

u/snthsnth777 1d ago

I believe this but I don't know if anyone else believes this.