Originally Posted by
cockerpunk
trauma is a thing.
i read about an experiment with dogs in the book "the body keeps the score" (highly recommend), about dogs who were electrocuted in cages and not allowed to leave. and then after essentially getting used to being shocked in these cages, they opened the doors to let them out. and they stayed in the cages. even when shocked again, they stayed in the cages. the control experiment was done, where they shocked some dogs just once, and then opened the cages, and they ran free out of the cages. the dogs who refused to leave literally had to be physically fought to pull them out of the cages, even though thats where they were being shocked. and they would run back into the cages if allowed to, even when shocked again.
the brain, literally re-wires itself due to trauma with some very very counter intuitive functions. when fear is all you know, its all you are.
interestingly i think the phenomena is not unlike the self-triggering conservative brain. addicted to being angry at everything, addicted to the trigger.