A Spotless Mind - A break from Q&A
If you’ve never seen Eternal Sunshine of a Spotless Mind, go rent it…or better yet, go buy it. It is one of my favorite movies, if not my #1 favorite, of all time. Why the hell am I playing Siskel & Ebert or Ebert & Roeper….or whoever the hell the sidekick is??? Well, I started thinking about the movie when I read about a new pill that will make memories of traumatic events less intense. http://msnbc.msn.com/id/10806799/
Basically, the drug is supposed to be medication for PTSD. Would you take it if it promised to zap your memory?
I don’t know if I would. Not that I like hanging on to anger or anything, and not that I like the fear that the memories cause, but I think that knowing the things that happened to me makes me who I am. I can tell you that if there was a pill that would make me not have nightmares about things that happened in the past, I would take it in an instant! But, I think that’s different from totally zapping the memory all together.
If I could be promised less of an emotional reaction to the memories and not complete loss of the memories itself, I might consider it. But – Im not sure that I’d want my emotions dulled either.
What if you could totally erase memories….as if the events or the people never existed. Maybe there is a memory zapper and we’ve all been zapped so we don’t remember it! :)
A lot of memories hurt….even the good ones, so if you could forget things, would you choose good things to forget too? For instance, when I remember certain things about Linda, even though the memories are good, they hurt….because those times are gone. Would I choose to forget those things so I wouldn’t hurt? Where do you draw the line?
Anyway, the pill is just supposed to make memories of certain traumatic events “fade”, not completely go away:
“It’s amazing how a traumatic memory can remain very much alive. It doesn’t behave like a regular memory. The memory doesn’t decay,” Brunet said.
To try to make it decay, researchers ask people to describe the trauma as vividly as they can, bringing on physical symptoms like racing hearts, then give them propranolol to blunt “restorage” of the memory. As much as three months later, the single dose appears to be preventing PTSD symptoms, Brunet said.
What do you think? Do you suffer from PTSD? Do you not? I’d like to hear from both sides.
posted by Jil at 10:59 AM
6 Comments:
Well, I do suffer from PTSD, and though it was triggered by a specific incident it has gone far, far beyond that now. It's as if my mind, now that it knows what it's capable of doing in the flashbacks department, just randomly chooses memories that weren't particularly heinous when they happened and pulls its PTSD tricks on it and me until I'm a wreck.
So even if I did the therapy with the one triggering event (something I would be happy to forget entirely), I don't think it would work because my brain would just continue to play its merry little games using other memories as inspiration. And no, I'm not willing to lose those other memories just because my brain is squirrely.
You're right about memories being who we are. It is my continuous memory of myself that forms my stable identity. I would worry that a pill like that could wreak havok on my sense of self and what good would that do?
11:33 AM
I suffer from PTSD. Two things have helped -- and the meds for my bipolar are not one of them.
The first is simply to learn to relax when the bad memories come back. Deep breaths. No clutching to look at them more closely. No responding to them.
The second is to trust in time. As I gather more memories, the nasty ones become a smaller percentage of the total.
I am told that taking SSRIs helps heal the brain damage by increasing the serotonin levels.
Are memories who we are? I don't care to simplify it so. I'm also the eyes watching the vertical cursor produce words in the little white box.
4:20 PM
Another movie that shows how bipolar disorder can be aggravating for a family and how kindness helps is BLUE SKY. Jessica Lange won Best Actress for her performance in that.
4:22 PM
I don't have PTSD but bipolar, and either my meds or my illness made most of memories fade, which I'm glad some of them are gone, especially high school, but I've forgot my older son's childhood, which is very sad. So it isn't worth it.
7:07 PM
Oh, my gosh--I have gone through this entire thought process SO many times. I'm not bipolar, but the spouse of a bipolar man who, when in the grip of severe mania and not himself, put me through the most painful experiences of my life. When the pain was fresh, I thought, "Heck, YES, PLEASE--someone give me a way to forget any of this ever happened!" But now, while I still wish the bad things hadn't happened, I've grown past the pure need to retreat from it all. I respect him all the more in his stability, and his commitment to never go down the path of ruin again.
You are a thoughtful, sensitive person, and I'm glad I came here.
4:50 PM
I was diagnosed with PTSD and Dissociation due to childhood sexual abuse. Would I take a pill to erase or bring down the emotional side of the memories?
No.
It's a hard choice. But I think society needs to SEE the damage that abuse does to a person. Otherwise society will not be motivated to address the abuse.
Life dealt me this hand, yet I will still succeed. Despite it.
Not all anger is bad. Anger can be motivating. Although I work on separting the non-productive anger from the productive anger, I would not allow my emotions to be dulled by a pill. Negative emotions have a positive place in our lives.
Good blog.
6:35 PM
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