Exposure therapy is when someone directly confronts that which they fear. For example, people who are afraid of heights are taken to high rise buildings, people who are scared of spiders remain in the same room with them and people with social anxiety — the fear of being in social situations — are encouraged to partake in group activities. Research studies have provided empirical evidence that exposure therapy works.
Viewing from long term memory, Exposure therapy seems to strength the past painful memory instead of reducing it. This process would increase brain's workload for processing more information, which require focus and concentration to change the memory within the unconscious mind, is there another approach to handle this memory better?
Do you have any suggestions?
Thanks you very much for any suggestions
When seeing a dog, unconacious mind would remember painful ecperience, and internal body will trigger any chemical reaction with body for running. Memory does not hurt, but chemical reaction to prepare for running make body stress and directly effect on emotion, if any approach can calm down this chemical reaction, it would be great.
Do you have any suggestions?
Thanks you very much for any suggestions
On the other words, brain triggers false alarm and trigger any chemical reaction within body based on memory.
Referring to following articles, does human emotion come from gut? People with certain favorable gut bacteria might be less sensitive to pain than others. If I improve the levels of favorable gut bacteria, would it help to reduce emotional feeling?
The gut and brain have a steady ability to communicate via the nervous system, hormones, and the immune system. Some of the microbiome can release neurotransmitters, just like our own neurons do, speaking to the brain in its own language via the vagus nerve.
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While the hormonal system that regulates fight-or-flight, rest-and-recovery, and everything in between is easy to conceptualize, the second underlying system, the immune system, is far more complex and works at a cellular level. Our bodies aren’t particularly sophisticated when it comes to facing off against stress. Our stress response doesn’t readily distinguish between mental and physical distress; your heart pounds and you tremble with anxiety when you are in an uncomfortable meeting with your boss, when such a reaction is not helpful in that situation, though it might have helped with the lion. And not only to we respond to the tough day on the job with a hormonal response, but also an immunological one. When our body is under stress, it releases what are called inflammatory cytokines, little chemical messengers that bring a certain part of our immune system into high alert. In a sense, our body reacts to all stress as if it were an infection, and to chronic stress as if it were a chronic infection.* Now the immune system works wonders and inflammation saves your life nearly every day from all the pathogens out there like the flu and strep, but chronic levels of inflammatory response also lead to all sorts of chronic disease, for example depressive disorders, high blood pressure, atherosclerosis, autoimmune diseases such as ulcerative colitis and multiple sclerosis. Immune system activation can also determine whether or not we develop cancer. Where does the gut get involved? Well, it turns out the gut microbiome plays a key role in regulating our immune response. Thus the make-up of our gut microbiome could make the difference as to whether we are sick or well, both mentally and physically.
Ref :
https://www.psychologytoday.com/blog/evolutionary-psychiatry/201404/the-gut-brain-connection-mental-illness-and-disease