One of the clearly missing links in any discussion or plan for weight loss is… safety. If we do not feel safe being slender, fit, and sexually more attractive… we WILL NOT. Our primitive brain will kick in and have us drop out of a successful program, binge, sabotage, ANYTHING to return to the safety of being obese. This makes total sense if one understand the role of undischarged trauma and how it affects our biology and behavior.
Dr. Robert Scaer, a leader in the field of trauma and healing, shared his years of research with us in a recent interview. With 30 years of experience, and extensive study of the human brain and its response to traumatic events, he brings an unique insight and understanding to this process, including key components of healing from trauma (such as connection and support, and somatic or body components such as tapping).
We learn to disassociate… and it is also instinctual. For better or worse, we learn “coping” mechanisms from Mom and Dad and other early caregivers. Our primitive brain instinctually dissasociates us both in the freeze response and whenever pain or injury would keep us from fighting or fleeing. Energy Tapping (EFT) can certainly help! Tapping can calm the primitive brain and help release old patterns of behavior.
In the Trauma and the Primitive Brain video, we talk about Flight, Fight, and Freeze responses. Let’s go into a bit more detail here. Say you are a 5-year-old kid on the playground swinging. You’re enjoying the day and the warm breeze. You are all alone, lost in your own daydreams. Suddenly, the 8-year-old school bully pulls you off the swing and threatens to hit you. You have three instinctive responses.