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  • Soothing the Threatened Brain by Dr. Susan Johnson

  • So Jane and Carl seek out Emotionally Focused Therapy or EFT.

  • Before their first therapy session,

  • Jane lies in a MRI machine for a brain scan.

  • She is signaled that a shock to her ankles might be coming.

  • Alone in the machine, her brain lights up like the fourth of July sky

  • and if or when the shock comes, she reports, "It hurts."

  • When a stranger holds her hand, the results were the same.

  • When Carl holds Jane's hand, her brain activity again

  • indicates real alarm and she says the shock is painful.

  • Contact with her husband does not soothe or calm her brain.

  • After Jane and Carl's last therapy session and bonding conversations,

  • Jane is again alone for the fMRI and her brain lights up when she sees the X,

  • indicating that a shock is coming and the shock hurts.

  • When a stranger holds her hand,

  • her alarm response and her pain are a little less.

  • But this time, when Carl holds Jane's hand and

  • she sees the X, there's a powerful difference.

  • Little brain activity indicating any kind of anxiety or threat can be seen.

  • The loving contact she now receives from her husband's touch changes

  • how her brain encodes this threat and

  • she reports that the shock is just uncomfortable.

  • Now that is interesting.

  • In fact, these kinds of results make us forget that

  • we are academics and stuffy old researchers

  • and remind us how to do a touch down victory dance with the best of them.

  • But what does this study, especially the brain scan part of it, tell us?

  • First, that when we make sense of love,

  • we can tune into the attachment channel

  • and shape loving feelings in therapy.

  • Yes, you can evoke this mysterious thing called love

  • just by talking in a new way,

  • a deeper, more emotional way with each other.

  • And when we shape this connection,

  • we can change the way our brains respond to threat and pain.

  • Love is a safety cue that literally calms and comforts the neurons in our brain.

  • Second, these results support all the research on adult love and bonding.

  • They confirm that secure bonds offer us a safe haven

  • from the perils of life and a respite from anxiety.

  • Not just when we're two or three years old, but as adults.

  • The quality of these bonds then have profound implications,

  • not just for happiness, but for mental and physical health

  • and our ability to face life and its uncertainties with poise and grace.

  • This is just the beginning of the new science of relationships.

  • Is there anything more important for us to understand and shape?

  • We all fear facing life alone,

  • and we all long for loving connections.

  • A hand to hold that changes our world

  • into a safer place and soothes our brain.

  • This reminds me of a saying by Jackson Brown,

  • "Life is slippery, take my hand."

  • drsuejohnson.com

Soothing the Threatened Brain by Dr. Susan Johnson

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