books on ancestral healing and intergenerational trauma

Therefore, the rats developed a fear response to the smell of cherry blossoms. The original experiment had the rats experience an electric shock when the smell of cherry blossoms was pumped into their cage. One of my favorite studies on intergenerational trauma came out of Emory University and it was done on a group of rats. And the DNA I inherited is post-holocaust DNA, which may make me more prone to having big fear when someone cuts me off in traffic. Inapplicable terms this means, that my grandmother’s DNA was not the same before and after the holocaust. One thing we are discovering through the field of epigenetics is that trauma and experiencing trauma, have the capacity to rewire our DNA and that rewired DNA gets passed on. We can have an isolated Trauma (like a car accident or a hurricane) or chronic trauma (like emotional neglect or misattunement in childhood): note the capitalization of the “T” and “t” to delineate the difference. You may have heard of this concept being termed “intergenerational trauma.” Trauma is anything that happens to us that exceeds our nervous system’s ability to cope. Legacy Burdens and Intergenerational Trauma My fear of being taken hostage and losing my life, in dialoguing with it, I learned that there was nothing it was doing to promote control or wellness in the system. A legacy burden is a part that is inherited but does not serve much function in the system. Every part has a specific job, and its own complex life and history, and the path to healing is about developing a trusting a loving relationship with these parts so that they can transform. The modality purports that we have many parts inside of us. This is a modality practiced by healers and therapists alike all over the world. Richard Schwartz’s model called Internal Family Systems or IFS. Speaking of the founder, the term legacy burden comes from Dr. More info about that can be found in this conversation with the founder of IFS here. Legacy burdens don’t have to be clear or named to be deeply felt. Unconscious things that we carry around that keep us separate from one another and allow us to dehumanize each other for seemingly no reason. Racism, sexism, misogyny, homophobia, and transphobia are some of the legacy burdens we see playing out in our culture every day. Many families and cultures have ever present legacy burdens being passed and carried on without ever naming them.

So much so, that I never really pressed her about it. Even then, the details were couched in tears and palpable emotion. For example, my grandmother never spoke of the atrocities she experienced until I was an adult. It is something that may never even be mentioned verbally in the family line but something we can all feel and all deal with in our own ways. What is a Legacy Burden and Do I Have Them?Ī legacy burden is something we inherited from our ancestors. “A legacy burden” is a term that could be applied to this fear. A fear that is not serving me in any way. But, when you look at the fear in the context of my family’s lineage, all the pieces come together.Ī family of holocaust survivors, in experience and passed down DNA, my ancestors did have their lives stolen from them. When you consider this fear in the context of my life, it makes almost no sense. All my life, I have had moments where someone might look at me in a way that triggers this fear, and all of a sudden, I am convinced that they are going to come into my home and take me hostage and my life will be over. We were working through a fear that I have about my life being stolen from me for a reason I don’t understand. This is a vision I had in a session with my therapist. I can see my grandmother returned to her original state. I can see my great grandfather in his glory, loving life and laughing with his loved ones. I can feel my body tingling, as we are letting go of the fears we inherited when the Nazis stole my family’s sense of safety in the world. “This is the power of doing your work,” I think to myself and I gaze out into the expansiveness of the ocean before me. The ocean water is carrying away the fears and the trauma of our lineage. We are all in the water and the sun is shining, making priceless diamonds as it reflects on the blue-green ocean. It’s cradling my stance as I look next to me and I see my grandmother and her mother standing in a line with all of my cousins, my father, my aunts and uncles, and my grandmother’s cousins.

I can see the white sand that’s sinking my toes into its body. I can feel the clear blue water around my calves.

Books on ancestral healing and intergenerational trauma