In my previous posts on the neuropsychological tension in the perception and living of the military invasion of Ukraine, I offered my vision of the mental life of Ukrainians, which changed dramatically on 24.02.2022 at 4.50.
First, I defend the position that everyone who stayed on the territory of Ukraine is in a state of deep overstrain of body and mind.
TENSION
For your attention! The state of tension at the physiological and mental levels is a sign of a healthy body and mentality.
A state of overstrain, as a state of excessive discharge or rest, are destruction criteria, i.e. not health.
The duration of staying in a state of super strain indicates whether a person is in a state of nervous and mental stress (its activity is up to 3 months) or has entered a state of chronic stress. That is, it turns into a condition of illness in the body or the formation of a disorder in the psyche.
So, up to 3 months of being under superstrain, the body and the mentality still can do something about it. Healthier physiology and a strong psyche can sustain it for up to 6 months. People who are physically unhealthy and mentally weak cannot withstand this tension for the first two weeks or a maximum of one month after its formation.
Nervous and mental stress has three stages. Each stage has its manifestations and course. The end of one triggers the next.
THE FIRST STAGE
If you recall, the first stage of neuropsychological stress is a purely physiological and physical factor in our lives. We are talking about the body. Yes, the body was the first to take on the perception of horror, dividing life in half.
Life BEFORE! It is the life where we heard about the war only from the stories of our grandparents and saw it in fiction or documentaries.
And the life AFTER! It is the life in which the body is numb from all-encompassing internal overstrain and the inability to change anything, being in total dependence (actual or imaginary) on the madness of the enemy. This point, which divided all of us into before and after, is the truth of our present life. We are faced with madness, and the body’s normal reaction to it is shocking.
So, the first stage of nervous and mental stress is characterized by an extremely high level of tension. Physiologically, people become “encapsulated”. The state of super-concentration observed in such types of energy accumulation, for example, ball lightning, later turns into shock, the numbness of the body in the face of a situation of genuine destruction.
I also expressed the opinion that this first stage – the conditional impression of the body – has one extremely negative consequence – the epicentre of the superpower unfolds in the body horizontally (covering an increasing radius of the cerebral cortex, leading to the destruction of consciousness) and vertically (penetrating deeper systems of the body and blocking various levels of metabolism, we are talking about the activity of the immune system at all levels, from the organs and their Systems to the level of metabolism in the cell). At this stage, the target of the epicentre of stress is the immune system.
THE SECOND STAGE
The second stage is the adaptation of the mentality to the modified reality. It is important to remember that the psyche is inert. It refuses to give up pleasures very poorly and, to put it simply, does not want to change at all. Therefore, any changes in the mentality are always stressful reactions that manifest in a subjective sense of loss of control over one’s life and inability to create prospects for the future.
There are two manifestations at this stage. Initially, the psyche is maladaptive and fails to perceive reality and to circulate in the new environment. The mentality blocks the perception of other new things and, most importantly, tries to reproduce the lost lifestyles by all means.
The next manifestation is forced but still an adaptation. It is the most difficult for the mentality. It seems to wake up. First, you feel apathy and discouragement. Later, sadness and even a sense of grief can “cover” a person. But as soon as it happens, a subjective feeling of affirmation in the new environment appears. The mentality seems to wake up. A kind of childishness and any of its manifestations disappear. We are talking about childish fantasies, violent phantom reactions, childish faith and fears, childish expectations and whims. Our whole being is becoming an adult. Illusions leave the imagination, and the purpose of life takes its place.
THE THIRD STAGE
The most complicated stage of neuropsychological stress is humility.
It is the formation of inner meaning, attitude and acceptance that reality controls a person. That is the stage of accepting and appropriating oneself in the new reality and reality in oneself. It is the stage of admitting that things will never be as they were. And in this position of awareness, two possible ways of further life open up to a person.
The first is optimistic. The psyche, recognising the state of the body at the present of life and acknowledging that it will be exactly like that and not otherwise, combines with the body and begins to control itself in a new reality. It is almost as if one is born again and begins a new stage of life. Psyche transforms the changed reality into a new way of living. It does not suffer anymore. It chooses the life he has and begins to treat it in a radically different way.
The pessimistic stage occurs when the psyche does not accept the new reality. The mentality goes into deep resistance and plunges into all those internal states that reinforce its negative assessment of itself and reality. After that, internal destruction begins. The psyche begins to immerse into the inner world. It avoids reality in every way possible. It shuns its own body. It turns away from itself more and more. A person becomes a stranger to himself.
Initially, clinical manifestations, such as acute anxiety inconsistent with the inner sense of self and reality, will appear as an airbag. Over time, the longer its impact on the entire internal picture of the world and attitude toward oneself lasts, persistent mental states appear that will completely deform the psyche, personality and behaviour. We are talking about the transition of aggression into anger, which will hit the person in the middle. The active phase of somatisation of neuropsychic tension will begin. During this phase, the body will not take the whole load and will start to get sick, and the psyche will have to serve the “disease”.
Subsequently, this disease will be formed on an organic level by medications, which a person will use to load the body. He will do everything to make his body sick.
Why is this so? Because the psyche must always act. Destroying the ability to work with a modified reality will create an internal reality of illness, which will become a new incentive not to live but to survive. How many years will it take? As long as it takes, as people say. The only thing is the quality of this life.
So, can we survive, even in a war? Yes, we must. In both optimistic and pessimistic scenarios, people can continue living. The price and quality of life are different. But, as you can see, people will still move on. The question is how, with what, and in what direction? It’s up to you to choose!
PS: Ukrainians have never been exhausted in the fight for their freedom. Yes, 20 per cent will feel exhausted, but this is not exhaustion from the struggle but the mental weakness of the body and psyche. It means that the person was born unable to withstand the super strain. People around them should take care of such people promptly and not leave them alone at such historical milestones in the life of the people and their country. They are fighters but on a different front. Remember that!
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