The Effect of Trauma on the Brain

The Effect of Trauma on the Brain
In John Rigg’s talk on the effect of trauma on the brain and how it impacts our behaviors, I learned that when we talk about the human brain we are actually talking about two brains—the intelligent brain and the animal brain. The intelligent brain is what allows us to reason, think and essentially “rule the world” as Rigg (2017) puts it. The animal part of the brain, which is smaller, but is still very much a part of the brain, is what reacts to the environment and controls the body’s response. So, in the example Rigg uses, if he were to challenge us to run across the street but to keep our hearts from beating, we would not be able to do it—and the reason is that our animal brain is in control of that function for us. It is not something that we control with our intellect. Our intelligent brain allows us to pick want we want to have for lunch, what we want to study at school and who we want to marry. The animal part tells our bodies how to react to our environment and to that degree that we are in an environment full of stimuli, our bodies are essentially out of the control of our intelligent brain.
The idea sets the stage for how trauma impacts us. Trauma is an experience related to our environment. We experience something in our surroundings that is particularly shocking to our system. The animal brain is actually responding by triggering our body to release hormones. The brain is actually hyper aroused—it is in a state of primitive animal-ness, to coin a phrase. The brain is operating at another level than the intellect. And a traumatic experience can be something that triggers the brain to be in a state of hyper arousal. Riggs explains it this way: “When the brain is hyper aroused, if it’s stressed out, certainly this is the situation that I see in military personnel who have been involved in combat but everybody gets stressed out: bills, family relations, neighbors making too much noise or whatever, OK. That hyper arousal, that primitive animal brain is pumping out stress hormones, interfering with sleep, keeping you up” (Riggs, 2017). The symptoms that people identify as symptoms of trauma or of PTSD are actually symptoms of the brain’s hyper arousal. It is not that people who have been traumatized have bad memories—it is that their brain is in a state of hyper arousal and is focusing the body and mind on things other than what is happening in front of one’s face that one is supposed to be listening to. A person’s PTSD is simply an effect of too much stress. The best way to deal with stress, says Riggs, is through exercise. Physical exercise can help alleviate the body’s stress and reduce the animal’s brain’s state of hyper arousal. This allows the person to focus and be more mindful in his day to day life.
This connects to me personally because I often feel stressed about life—just as Riggs said: bills, family, friends, work, school—all of it adds up. One does not have to be a veteran of a foreign war to know what stress can do to you. I have always wondered why I feel better after exercising—and now I know. I am relieving my primitive brain of its hyper arousal. By getting the animal in me out in the gym, I can get back to the intellect in me, which can help me to focus, process and get through all the tasks and chores I have in front of me.
I thought this was a great learning experience and it is a relief to know that one’s trauma does not need to be treated with drugs or therapy. Physical exercise is really what the animal brain is yearning for—because it is associated with our primal need to sweat, to work, to use up our kinetic energy. Once we do that, we can feel our stress disappear and get back to a healthier lifestyle.
References
Rigg, J. (2017). The Effect of Trauma on the Brain and How It Affects Behaviors
(Transcript). Retrieved from https://singjupost.com/john-rigg-effect-trauma-brain-affects-behaviors-transcript/