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The Trauma Spectrum: Hidden Wounds and Human Resiliency
A neurologist's view of our response to trauma. Our experiences of trauma sow the seeds of many persistent and misunderstood medical problems such as chronic fatigue syndrome and various maladies of the immune system. Because of our inadequate understanding of the relationship of mind and body in processing these traumas, many of us suffer needlessly from our exposure to life's traumas. Robert Scaer offers hope to those who wish to transform trauma and better understand their lives.
328 pages, Hardcover
First published July 17, 2005
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
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May 6, 2017First reaction a few chapters in:
OMG SRSLY you want us to read about a study where they drowned newborn chicks? Without even a "BTW this research is hella f'ed up"? I can't even pay attention to your other points. (p. 54)
Okay, after getting stuck on this for a while, I tried to return to reading the book. Unfortunately, now I was at the point where he gets into prenatal/ perinatal/ infant trauma. I could tell I was going to object when he started out the chapter with: "As a society, we treat our infants with considerable nonchalance. We tend to assume that they are resilient and adaptable, that they should be able to handle a variety of styles of caregiving. . . . We place pacifiers in their mouths, prop them up with pillows, and let them cry themselves to sleep. Early in their infancy, we drop them off with babysitters or even at daycare centers. In the majority of cases, they are bottle-fed. At times we seem to feel the infant should adapt to the needs of its parents." (p. 99)
I think this is some serious hyperbole. Infants ARE resilient and adaptable and they CAN handle a variety of styles of caregiving, as evidenced by the wide, wide range of parenting practices across the globe. That doesn't mean the cultural style of caregiving doesn't teach specific cultural values (something Scaer also argues, and which I think is probably true). But we don't have any way to say that one style is better than another. And except in cases of serious abuse or neglect, the studies about relationships between caregiving styles and adult outcomes are a lot more complex and conflicting than Scaer indicates here.
Also, in hunter-gatherer societies (which people espousing this point of view LOVE to cite), babies were totally left with "babysitters" or "daycare". Village grandmas and grandpas have usually been responsible for child care when mamas and papas had work to do. I'm no anthropologist, but I've often read of women in agricultural societies leaving their babies (unattended or with another adult) in little huts near the field and returning to them at regular intervals for feeding. I know that "babysitter" and "grandma" seem like very different things to us adults, but the baby just cares about having a consistent, loving, attuned caregiver, no matter whether that person is paid or unpaid, a stranger to the family or a relative.
I could argue like this with almost every point he makes in this chapter, and many that he makes in the following one (about societal trauma) (for example, his unlikely claims that child abuse levels have been on the rise in America). I've done quite a bit of reading in the area of child development and attachment, and I thought his work on this mostly consisted of references to a certain body of literature which he treats as definitive, without truly considering contradictory research. This made me question his claims in other areas (about which I don't have as much knowledge). Ultimately, I just couldn't find it in me to finish the book.
OMG SRSLY you want us to read about a study where they drowned newborn chicks? Without even a "BTW this research is hella f'ed up"? I can't even pay attention to your other points. (p. 54)
Okay, after getting stuck on this for a while, I tried to return to reading the book. Unfortunately, now I was at the point where he gets into prenatal/ perinatal/ infant trauma. I could tell I was going to object when he started out the chapter with: "As a society, we treat our infants with considerable nonchalance. We tend to assume that they are resilient and adaptable, that they should be able to handle a variety of styles of caregiving. . . . We place pacifiers in their mouths, prop them up with pillows, and let them cry themselves to sleep. Early in their infancy, we drop them off with babysitters or even at daycare centers. In the majority of cases, they are bottle-fed. At times we seem to feel the infant should adapt to the needs of its parents." (p. 99)
I think this is some serious hyperbole. Infants ARE resilient and adaptable and they CAN handle a variety of styles of caregiving, as evidenced by the wide, wide range of parenting practices across the globe. That doesn't mean the cultural style of caregiving doesn't teach specific cultural values (something Scaer also argues, and which I think is probably true). But we don't have any way to say that one style is better than another. And except in cases of serious abuse or neglect, the studies about relationships between caregiving styles and adult outcomes are a lot more complex and conflicting than Scaer indicates here.
Also, in hunter-gatherer societies (which people espousing this point of view LOVE to cite), babies were totally left with "babysitters" or "daycare". Village grandmas and grandpas have usually been responsible for child care when mamas and papas had work to do. I'm no anthropologist, but I've often read of women in agricultural societies leaving their babies (unattended or with another adult) in little huts near the field and returning to them at regular intervals for feeding. I know that "babysitter" and "grandma" seem like very different things to us adults, but the baby just cares about having a consistent, loving, attuned caregiver, no matter whether that person is paid or unpaid, a stranger to the family or a relative.
I could argue like this with almost every point he makes in this chapter, and many that he makes in the following one (about societal trauma) (for example, his unlikely claims that child abuse levels have been on the rise in America). I've done quite a bit of reading in the area of child development and attachment, and I thought his work on this mostly consisted of references to a certain body of literature which he treats as definitive, without truly considering contradictory research. This made me question his claims in other areas (about which I don't have as much knowledge). Ultimately, I just couldn't find it in me to finish the book.
July 23, 2016
Excellent - a must read. Every health care provider should be required to read and understand this material. But just like psychologists who haven't done their own inner work, some don't want to hear this stuff because then they would have to acknowledge just how much unconscious, unintegrated emotional content is driving their bus!
Autonomic dysregulation is behind so many health conditions it is ridiculous - irritable bowel, migraine, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, chronic pain of all kinds - and the current medical model is woefully lacking in its ability to help - but this fault lies in a universal condition - we are all defended, highly defended, from doing emotional inner work, and seeing our bodies as a manifestation of our subconscious minds.
Dr. Scaer presents a great overview of some unrecognized sources of autonomic dysregulation - early childhood life events especially - preverbal - so people have no way to make the connection as to what is happening in the present.
Autonomic dysregulation is behind so many health conditions it is ridiculous - irritable bowel, migraine, fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, chronic pain of all kinds - and the current medical model is woefully lacking in its ability to help - but this fault lies in a universal condition - we are all defended, highly defended, from doing emotional inner work, and seeing our bodies as a manifestation of our subconscious minds.
Dr. Scaer presents a great overview of some unrecognized sources of autonomic dysregulation - early childhood life events especially - preverbal - so people have no way to make the connection as to what is happening in the present.
November 1, 2011
Robert Scaer is considered one of the earliest and most influential physicians who studied trauma and the human body's response. I love him for that.
However, in this book he connects nearly every human ailment with trauma and it feels like too much. While trauma has a whole person effect for the sufferer, it doesn't follow that every human pain and problem may have its source in repressed or expressed traumatic response. I suppose that can happen when you study the human being through a single lens for so long. Everything looks like it comes from the same place.
I found his "The Body Bears the Burden" to be a better and more helpful look at the effects of trauma and the human experience.
However, in this book he connects nearly every human ailment with trauma and it feels like too much. While trauma has a whole person effect for the sufferer, it doesn't follow that every human pain and problem may have its source in repressed or expressed traumatic response. I suppose that can happen when you study the human being through a single lens for so long. Everything looks like it comes from the same place.
I found his "The Body Bears the Burden" to be a better and more helpful look at the effects of trauma and the human experience.
November 20, 2015
Incredibly validating as someone who has experienced a myriad of physical symptoms pertaining to PTSD and is also very interested in neuroscience, the body-brain continuum, and healing methods. I would pair this book with something more easy-going though because at times it is very academia heavy. It took me a while to get through, but was well worth the effort as I learned quite a bit. My opinions of the psychiatric and medical scene were both verified and more informed of its failures to integrate emotional physical pain/PTSD and conservative science/medical treatment. Overall a great read that leads to hopeful conclusions.
October 31, 2014
A very interesting book about how Dr. Scaer arrived at his more holistic understanding of trauma and its effects in the body. This book is written more in laypersons' terms than his earlier book The Body Bears The Burden, but it is still pretty heavy duty. The only thing I didn't like about is was that it mentioned experiments on animals, which made me want to drop everything and rescue all the animals!
November 9, 2018
Loved the subject matter but not the way he writes.
I don't even know how I came upon this book but its subject appealed to me because of my own life.
This was a heavy book to read. I can't tell you how many times I had to re-read sentences. It seems he is speaking to fellow doctors instead of patients or laymen. This was the most frustrating thing about the book to me. I guess that's why he repeatedly uses the term "in other words" throughout his book. Usually I finish 3-4 books in a week but this book took me a week on its own.
The subject-trauma and the diseases it produces was a very interesting subject. I learned a lot-from our bodies remembering the trauma and acting out in certain ways or diseases, to human and animal bonding (what happens when they don't), even to allergies, fibromyalgia and chemical sensitivities being related to trauma and PTSD, all relating to what's called a 'freeze response' during traumatic events and how that affects our bodies detrimentally.
Apparently the answer lies partly in this: " Healing the wounds of trauma inevitably demands altering the meaning of memories and thereby altering the memories themselves...." I am interested enough that I would like to try this out because of his writing about case histories and success rate with some of his patients.
This was a really great, but very hard read for me. In addition, it's apparent in his wording in almost every chapter that he believes heavily in evolution and the reptilian brain but I didn't want to throw out the baby with the bathwater, so to speak, so I finished the book.
I am glad I read this book, but because of the way he writes, I am taking another of his books out of my cart and seeing if I can't find another author who writes more clearly on the same subject.
I don't even know how I came upon this book but its subject appealed to me because of my own life.
This was a heavy book to read. I can't tell you how many times I had to re-read sentences. It seems he is speaking to fellow doctors instead of patients or laymen. This was the most frustrating thing about the book to me. I guess that's why he repeatedly uses the term "in other words" throughout his book. Usually I finish 3-4 books in a week but this book took me a week on its own.
The subject-trauma and the diseases it produces was a very interesting subject. I learned a lot-from our bodies remembering the trauma and acting out in certain ways or diseases, to human and animal bonding (what happens when they don't), even to allergies, fibromyalgia and chemical sensitivities being related to trauma and PTSD, all relating to what's called a 'freeze response' during traumatic events and how that affects our bodies detrimentally.
Apparently the answer lies partly in this: " Healing the wounds of trauma inevitably demands altering the meaning of memories and thereby altering the memories themselves...." I am interested enough that I would like to try this out because of his writing about case histories and success rate with some of his patients.
This was a really great, but very hard read for me. In addition, it's apparent in his wording in almost every chapter that he believes heavily in evolution and the reptilian brain but I didn't want to throw out the baby with the bathwater, so to speak, so I finished the book.
I am glad I read this book, but because of the way he writes, I am taking another of his books out of my cart and seeing if I can't find another author who writes more clearly on the same subject.
February 10, 2015
It's certainly not an easy read, but it was a very insightful book about the manifestation of trauma. The book goes through many studies that have been done, and explains theories on various behaviours. I learned a lot; it's definitely worth a read!
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