Emotional abuse, if continual, can cause long-term damage to one`s feelings, self-confidence levels and happiness. It is also generally acknowledged that emotional trauma can cause victims to develop both PTSD and C-PTSD.
Narcissistic abuse, however, can leave much more than just emotional damage. According to recent studies, narcissistic abuse can lead to actual brain damage. Narcissistic abuse can happen to anyone and it can come from abusive partners, an abusive partner or employee. The effect is always the same.
But how is physical brain damage involved? —When suffering consistent emotional abuse, victims experience a shrinking of the hippocampus and a swelling of the amygdala; both of these circumstances lead to devastating effects. The hippocampus is crucial in learning and developing memories, while the amygdala is where negative emotions like shame, guilt, fear, and envy come to life.
The hippocampus plays an important role in short-term memory. When it comes to learning, short-term memory retention is the first step. Any piece of information is first stored in short-term memory before being stored as permanent memory or deleted. Which means that the shrinking of the hippocampus, caused by abuse, affects one`s learning abilities.
How does emotional abuse shrink the hippocampus of the brain?
When we feel stress, our body releases a stress hormone known as cortisol. According to researchers, cortisol attacks the neurons of the hippocampus thus causing it to shrink. Since abuse causes constant stress of high levels, the hippocampus continues to reduce in size.
Another physical part of the brain affected by abuse is the amygdala. The amygdala is known as the reptilian brain, because it controls our primal emotions and functions, including lust, fear, hate, as well as heart rate and breathing.
When triggered, the amygdala is where the fight or flight response is made. Narcissists keep their victims in a state where their amygdala is constantly on alert. Eventually, these victims fall into a permanent state of anxiety or fear, with the amygdala reacting to the slightest signs of abuse.
As we said, the hippocampus is attacked by cortisol (which is released when we feel stressed), thus affecting our learning abilities. Amygdala, on the other hand, is stimulated by the cortisol, which turns our thoughts and neural activity from increasing our mental acuity to worries and stress.
Narcissistic abuse must be taken seriously! What many fail to realize is that emotional and psychological distress is only one side of the coin that victims of long-term narcissistic abuse experience. Brain damage caused by the abuse is the other side of the coin.
Sources: Psych Central, Hack Spirit
