Trauma Or Biology?

2024 Author: Harry Day | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 15:43

I often hear about this opposition, about the attempt of psychologists to figure out what they are dealing with: with psychological trauma (and then it seems like it is possible to influence this situation with the help of psychotherapy) or with a mental disorder of a biological nature (and then decisive help can be provided medicines).

But this opposition, it seems to me, is erroneous.

Let me explain with an example.

Imagine an infant whose care was objectively very poor. For example, in the first months of his life, his mother was deeply depressed, absorbed in herself and barely coped with functional service, and the emotional connection was completely ruined.

And this is a traumatic situation with which this baby's life began, and it has psychological reasons. But at the same time, of course, such an early traumatic effect will lead to the formation of such biological structures and connections in neurons, which in the future can trigger a wide variety of mental disorders, from depression to psychotic states. And then, although the initial breakdown was provoked by a traumatic situation, one cannot do without drugs. Or, rather, you can try to do without them, but with drugs, the client has many more opportunities both in life and in therapy.

Moreover, without drugs, if the strong background of mental disorder is not removed, with a high probability any, including absolutely normal, interaction with the therapist, the client will be interpreted in the mainstream of reproducing the trauma, and there may simply not be a chance for a change in the internal model of relations.

Now let's imagine the opposite situation. Let's say that the mother was completely normal, but the child is so sensitive and vulnerable due to its original biological reasons that the slightest and inevitable mistakes of the mother hurt him very much. And in the subjective inner world of the child, this situation is experienced as exactly the same catastrophe as in the case of the first example.

And, of course, even though biology launched this breakdown, in the inner world it is perceived and experienced as a trauma and generates exactly the same traumatic psychological constructs as in the first case. It is quite possible (and necessary) to influence them psychologically. But only if this initial biological cause, which turns absolutely any interaction into a traumatic one, has ceased to actively influence at the present time. This can happen as simply over the years: for example, in childhood there was a certain biological pathological process with the psyche, but over the years it seemed to have exhausted its potential, ended. Or, stopping or extinguishing the pathological process can be achieved with the help of drugs. And then there is an opportunity for psychotherapy.

Summing up, we can say that these two imaginary situations, although they began as diametrically opposite, in the end can lead to an absolutely identical picture. And therefore, it is not so important what was the root cause of the client's problems, it is only important to what extent, at the time of contacting the therapist, the client's mental capabilities allow for therapeutic intervention. And is it really possible to expand these possibilities with the help of drugs.