The Neuroplastic Narrative and Neuro-Ecological Diversity: Translating conceptual research into practice

We're looking for partners in translation!

Could the non-pathologising framing of The Neuroplastic Narrative and the concept of Neuro-Ecological Diversity be helpful in your space or to consumers, families and carers you work with?

To read more about The Neuroplastic Narrative please go here and to see why I do this work keep reading....

Realising I wasn't sick, that I wasn't mentally ill, that there was nothing 'wrong' with me, but there was something wrong with what happened to me was my first step out of the shame vortex that threatened to suck the life out of me.

I had adapted to my experiences to survive, to get by as best I could, but part of that adaptation was anticipating more similarly awful things would happen! I needed some better experiences to adapt to!

But how were the experiences shaping my brain, my physiology? And why did they shape it so I anticipated more of the same sorts of experiences?

And that was the beginning of the Neuroplastic Narrative and the concept of Neuro-Ecological Diversity .... If you resonate with this, or work in a space where others may resonate with it then we want to hear from you...

This below statement of The Neuroplastic Narrative and Neuro-Ecological Diversity may be useful to anyone with complex or transgenerational trauma, so may be useful for people with mental health issues associated with complex trauma such as in the mental health system or in the criminal justice system and for people who have and continue to experience transgenerational trauma including Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander Peoples who carry the adverse impact of colonisation. Please do get in touch if you would like to think about how it may work in your context.

Statement of the Neuroplastic Narrative and Neuro-Ecological Diversity

  1. That complex and transgenerational trauma creates and carries shame which drives distressed and distressing behaviours which are themselves responded to with shaming responses of being pathologised and/or criminalised, thereby driving a vicious cycle.
  2. Use the neuroscientific/evolutionary lens of the Neuroplastic Narrative and the concept of Neuro-Ecological Diversity to reframe distressed and distressing behaviours associated with shame and trauma as evolved strategies that help us to survive in variously difficult, dangerous and/or unpredictable familial / community ecologies.
  3. This reframing casts these distressed and distressing behaviours as evolved adaptions to particular ecologies revealing that responses that pathologise and criminalise individuals are misdirected, foregrounding the need for alternative responses that a) reduce the shame/shaming of individuals and b) support the ecologies that shape individuals
  4. From this there are two opportunities for transformation and anticipated outcomes of value:
  • The recognition that their own distressed and/or distressing behaviours are evolved adaptations to their ecology will help transform the internal shame that people with histories of complex and transgenerational trauma carry (potentially) into pride in their Neuro-Ecological Diversity and their resilience and capacity to survive.
  • The recognition that the distressed and/or distressing behaviours of others are evolved adaptations to ecologies will help transform the external shaming judgmental responses of others that pathologise and/or criminalise people with histories of complex and transgenerational trauma (potentially) into recognition of their Neuro-Ecological Diversity generating empathy and respect for their resilience and capacity to survive.

Together, these outcomes will reduce the shame that drives the vicious cycle of complex/transgenerational trauma leading to less pathologising and criminalising of individuals and will orientate resources towards promoting social justice and supporting struggling ecologies.

Please get in touch: haley.peckham@unimelb.edu.au