How to get rid of disturbing mental images, advice needed asap

[Glitterknickaz]

Without going into too much detail I have learned some disturbing information about a fatal accident that involved a very close friend of mine. The accident was several years ago and I'd come to terms with what I knew, but I found this new information was only told to me today.

I now have disturbing mental images... my emotions are naturally stirred up and in fact emotionally I am back where I was immediately after the accident.

I will be dealing with this with my regular counsellor on Thursday, I was just wondering if anyone knew of any methods to stop these thoughts in their tracks when they come into my head?

Its hard to judge without knowing details and I dont know how you go about removing them. I think they are natural as it is how we react to danger. IE when kids are playing near stairs, I have a sickening disturbing image of them falling and breaking their necks, but it is precisley that image which makes me keep them from the stairs and in turn prrotect them IYSWIM

I also think when you are told something, you always relate it to what you know in the here and now.

I didn't actually see anything at the time, I wasn't there.

I'm just visualising and it's very hard to deal with.

It is hard and it is actually possible to be traumatised by having something like this described by you. It won't be easy to stop the thoughts especially at night. During the day you can jsut keep busy.

One thing you can try: spend some time envisaging your favourite place, be it on the beach or on the sofa watching a dvd with your dh/dp/dc. Think about it in detail so you can see it in front of you. When the unwanted images come say a firm stop and replace it with the happy thought you created. This takes practice.

Another trick is mindfulness - in brief occupy yourself totally with what you are seeign and feleing right now - if you are washing up feel the suds on your hands, the smoothness of the plate, the floor under your feet, the touch of your waist band whenever you breath out. This helps me when images get me really distressed and no one is around to help.

sorry meant described TO you

Thank you, I am dong my best to do all that wst.... I really appreciate this.

I'm very disturbed by it.

I suffer from similar images. I werent at the scene either but have seen the place and my brother afterwards. I try and switch the images so i see my brother smiling and joking and for memories i have.

I get this, too. Horrible, I know

The one piece of advice I'd add to what has already been said is to talk about it. If you can't with family or friends, could you ring and tell the details to the Samaritans or write out the details here? Anything to put the images somewhere beyond your own head.

I used to get this all the time. Giving up coffee helped, I realised that I seem to be particularly sensitive to it, and get over-emotional.

Hi,

I'm a hypnotherapist and I work with birth trauma. What you're experiencing is a traumatic response, even though you didn't actually witness the incident first hand.

With intrusive images you can rid yourself of them quite easily. This "memory" is over-active and intrusive.

What can be very effective is to break the neurological links between the images and emotions. Sounds complicated, but it's actually really simple and i8ncredibly effective. Sorry I can't do it on a Mumsnet forum.

Consider finding a hypnotherapist locally (look for a H.Dip qualification) and see if they have experience in NLP. It should only take one or two sessions and you don't need to be hypnotized for it to work.

Best of luck, hari xx

www.safebirth.co.uk

marmite - with lots of respect for your profession and your intention, I struggle with you so easily saying that trauma can be cured in two sessions. Please be careful what you say - trauma can go back to deeper roots and require some work on the past eg my birth trauma was linked to supressed child abuse issues). And NLP can have a tendency to gloss over causes to get to solutions. It is not right for everybody.

This of course is my personal opinion only.

I have this at the moment, what helps a little is sitting down and just taking deep breaths focusing on my breathing and i begin to clear the images out my head. it is difficult and i am waiting to get extra help from my gp.

I'm talking specifically about this thread Not trauma in general.

Best wishes, x

If you are worrying about the intrusive images happening and deliberately trying to suppress them it may actually make them stronger and more powerful and scary. An example of this is people with OCD have horrible intrusive images and thoughts and have behaviours or compulsions to neutralise them. However ultimately these compusions actually make the thought/image more powerful and beleivable.

One girl i worked with with OCD who had horrible intrusions told me "they went away when they knew they weren't wanted". Getting to this point took 12ish sessions. Your appraisal of the images is likely to be linked to how your are as a person and what's made you the way you are (not a criticism).

The mindfulness suggestion is excellent. there's a 3rd wave of CBT now "mindfulness based CBT" uses zen techniques coupled with cognitive and behavioural stretegies, plus it sounds like some exploarory type approach may be helpful too.

Best of luck, please be assured that this can be overcome no matter how horrible it seems just now. x

I have never met anyone else who has these images before, and when I've tried to describe them to people, I can see that they dont really know what I am talking about.

Thankfully, I dont get them any more, but they were horrible while they lasted.