What is Reddit's opinion of The Myth of Repressed Memory: False Memories and Allegations of Sexual Abuse?

From 3.5 billion Reddit comments

I honestly haven't seen that show, however, repressed memories have been thoroughly debunked in the scientific literature. You can start here...

https://www.amazon.com/Myth-Repressed-Memory-Memories-Allegations/dp/0312141238

If you are not ready to know, do not let your therapist push you into trying to recall said memories. It should always be up to you and your timing, not the therapist's.

That's the first and most important answer. My second answer is my opinion:

I'm a therapist. I also have worked with DID. Because DID is so hard to recognize unless you know what to look for, I had never had a case until this year. Because I hadn't had any training on it, I have essentially read every single book and article I can get my hands on in order to do my best in helping my client.

With that out of the way, I will say I would never use hypnosis for memory recall. I specialize in PTSD and trauma in general. I treat PTSD using EMDR. I have never, even once, worked on a traumatic memory with an individual whose memory was recalled using hypnosis. If an individual doesn't remember what happened to them (which is almost never the case), I will never go digging to find out. That's because attempts at recovering memories are notoriously unreliable and are prone to contaminating and creating false memories from scratch.

In fact, one of the reasons DID is even a "controversial" diagnosis has to do with the memory wars of the 1990s. Also known as the "Satanic Panic.

After everything that happened in the 90's with regards to recovered memories, I will never use hypnosis to retrieve previously repressed memories. The reason for that is because there is simply no way whatsoever to determine if the memory "retrieved" is genuine or manufactured. There are too many cases of individuals falsely believing they were ritually abused when in fact no such thing happened on the basis of memories retrieved using hypnosis by careless therapists. I would never use a technique with a client that could potentially make them believe something bad happened to them that never happened unless there were some way for the client to verify if the memory is true or false. You don't need the added stress in your life on top of everything else.

All the trauma work I do is based on memories you can recall while alert, without the aid of hypnosis, and while using as few leading questions as possible. Traumatic memories are never really forgotten. The brain just doesn't work like that. In the case of DID, your memories haven't been forgotten, they're still in there, I 100% guarantee it. They're just dissociated and hidden from you (if something bad did indeed happen) for a good reason (your own protection).

If you can't remember yet, it may simply just not be the right time for you to deal with those memories (which it seems you already agree). With my clients, the memories have come back gradually and naturally over the course of therapy. Almost always the previously forgotten memories come back as alters get to know one another and start working with each other. There were many things the host of the system I've worked with didn't know when I initially met her, and over time, as the alters slowly revealed themselves and she learned about each of them and how to work with them rather than fighting them, their memories slowly were shared with her, so much so that her past is much clearer now than before. And none of these discoveries of traumatic memories happened as a result of me pushing her to find some under hypnosis. The memories come back in due time when you're ready and if therapy is working the way it should be.

I would ask your therapist "what's the rush?" and how it is she's able to ensure that memory retrieval using hypnosis isn't going to be as unreliable as the history of this practice has shown it to be.

At the end of the day, working with DID is difficult stuff, and there's always stuff to work on. It's hard enough to do this kind of work right, so why on earth would I then introduce the possibility of contaminating your memory on top of everything else? Your brain knows when it's time. And the way it knows when it's time is because you have an Internal Self Helper who is managing the alters and the memories behind the scenes to protect and help you. If your ISH doesn't think it's time, trust their judgment. The ISH knows you much better than any therapist ever will.

If your therapist still has questions, ask them if she knows what an Internal Self Helper is, and if they know how to talk to it. If not, they should find out how, because the ISH knows all of your memories and that of your system. The ISH is a far more reliable source of memory retrieval than hypnosis.

But once again, regardless of everything I just said, only do it if you are ready and you want to. No trauma therapist should ever push anyone into confronting potentially traumatic memory material before they're ready.

Good luck!

https://www.amazon.co.uk/Myth-Repressed-Memory-Memories-Allegations/dp/0312141238

The psychologists that promoted the idea that you could imprint false memories were in fact pedophilies, that wanted to discredit victims.

I agree that memories can be hazy and evolve over time, but the issue of PTSD's effect on memory is overblown. There's a great book on the subject called The Myth of Repressed Memories http://www.amazon.com/The-Myth-Repressed-Memory-Allegations/dp/0312141238 It talks about the common occurrence of these 'repressed memories' being complete fabrications that the person truly believes.

There are things that a trauma victim won't remember clearly, but they will remember base sensory things, like feel, smell, sound, and position. When a person lies about rape, physical positioning is one of the hardest things to keep track of in the lie. It is also one of the easiest things to remember when telling a true story.

The majority of rape cases today do not involve trauma or PTSD. Those words are thrown around so commonly that they've lost their meaning. A girl raped with a gun to her head is probably traumatized, but a girl who drinks too much and regrets sex the next day is not.

And as for knowingly lying to cover something they don't want to say, well that is a real problem. If the entire case is based on the victim's testimony and the victim lies about some things, well then the biggest piece of evidence in the case is tainted.

And your points are victim-centric. We could turn those arguments around and say a guy sleeps with a drunk girl thinking everything is fine only to have the cops show up and arrest him a year later. He didn't know he committed a crime, and maybe he didn't, but the girl's 'repressed memories' came out during counseling and he is now to blame for her problems. And at this point, he doesn't remember what happened and will look like a liar on the stand.

I'm not trying to downplay true victims that come forward. But policing over the past 2 decades has improved greatly in regards to sexual assault victims. Now, we are seeing an influx of false allegations which spits in the face of true victims, making them less likely to be believed by peers, families and juries.