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Intergenerational Trauma Part 4: Theories of Transmission Innovation LAB

Posted on May 24, 2018 by Uri Noy Meir November 7, 2018 @ 9:00 am
- January 3, 2019 @ 5:00 pm
“When a crime against humanity occurs, all of humanity is affected,” said Christie Tcharkhoutian,
speaking at the symposium, Inheriting Genocide: Intergenerational Transmission of Trauma. Learning Journey to Senegal
December 20, 2018 - January
In that spirit, I’ve tried to apply what I heard that day very broadly. Right now? I’ve just watched footage 5, 2019
of still another school shooting. Children dead. Hundreds more traumatized by what they’ve gone
through. Millions of parents and kids affected as well, as they realize, once again, that there is no place Theatre For Social Healing in
of safety, that in our society guns have more rights than human life. Politicians are complicit in the Thailand
slaughter. Gun manufacturers profit from it. No one is left untouched. April 26, 2019 - April 28, 2019

“Most trauma,” said Dr. Andrei Novac, “has fallout in society.” View All Events

This installment, however, will briefly share theories about the transgenerational effects of trauma. How
is it transmitted? There’s no single explanation. Instead we have to look at the individual, at the
interplay of biological and psychosocial factors.

As Dr. Natan Kellermann pointed out, even within a single family, not every child inherits the burden of
secondary trauma. He asks about content, process, and timing: what the child learned, how it was told,
and when—and how the child reacted to this knowledge.

When the parent’s trauma remains silenced, psychoanalytic theory would say the repressed
experience is transmitted as a shadow over the child, and it’s the child who must now process the
experience. On the other hand, sometimes there’s too much talk of the traumatic experience, repetitive diciembre 20, 2018 - enero 05, 2019
and obsessive.
Journey To Senegal
Tactics that helped a person survive there may carry over in habits here. The second generation feels
the effects even if the mechanism is not clear. Senegal

Parenting style makes a difference. For example, survivors may be overprotective while others have
made with ♥ por
no patience with any sign of weakness.

See previous events

Today there’s a lot of interest in the biological or epigenetic factors, the way the biological stress
response in the mother is transmitted to the child during pregnancy.
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PTV 2018 – ImaginAction Lab in LA
In just one line of research, as Dr. Andrei Novac explained, when a person perceives a potential threat,
Healing the wounds of History in
the impulse goes first through the frontal lobe which evaluates whether or not the alarm needs to be
Berlin
heeded. In people who’ve been traumatized, the amygdala doesn’t wait for the stimulus to be
Intergenerational Trauma Part 5:
evaluated. Instead it releases a flood of adrenaline. For most people, this then triggers the release of
Childhood Amnesia
cortisol which has an initial calming effect. But people diagnosed with PTSD show below normal levels
Intergenerational Trauma Part 4:
of cortisol. Once an alarm is triggered, the organism doesn’t calm down—and it turns out children of
Theories of Transmission
people diagnosed with PTSD are more likely to develop PTSD themselves if experiencing trauma.
The Intergenerational Transmission
They show the same low cortisol levels.
of Trauma Part 3: Surviving Survival

We tend to use the term “PTSD” for any negative consequence of trauma. For those of us who work
with survivors of any sort of trauma, Dr. Novac stressed that PTSD is actually the least common ImaginAction recommends
diagnosis, though the most severe and needing the most treatment. The most frequent diagnosis is
Teatro Ritual
depression followed by anxiety which may be accompanied by substance abuse.

Dr. Kellermann reminded us that vast majority of survivors and their children function well.
Consequences are unpredictable; most people will recover from trauma though everyone, depending
on context and at different times, can experience either vulnerability or resilience. Every survivor had a
history and a personality before the horrific event, during it, and after. When we generalize, we lose
sight of the individual as well as the individual ways in which people interpret and make meaning from
or find meaning in their life experience. Past Events
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When we focus solely on the negative consequences of trauma, we may overlook the positive. As
practitioners we can honor and support the strength, the sense of identity, solidarity, and commitment,
the drive to achieve and never waste the life we’ve been given, all the motivating power that
accompanies Post-Traumatic Growth.

Thanks for accompanying me this far. One final installment still to come.

Till then, be well,

Diane

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