why do i blank..?

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(01-21-2014, 01:54 PM)nats Wrote: why, when i feel upset or attacked does the mind go completely blank? this is really not a helpful survival mechanism. imagine being in the middle of an argument, not knowing what they've just said that upset you. not knowing what you've just said that upset them. trying to pretend you do. don't necessarily even think it's switching. the crucial information just disappears till the challenge is over. makes it very difficult to explain ourselves or provide a verbal answer to a question. how is this useful!!?

Out of my depth. I'll try to come up with something. What stuck with me is that "the crucial information just disappears till the challenge is over." So, you recall after the crisis has become less acute. But, you don't lose the ability to speak at any time.

Ideas:
You've partially shut down verbally, as the result of a severe anxiety, panic, reaction. The analogy, in terms of survival value that comes to mind is of a little fawn hiding in the forest, able to do so by giving off as few relevant signals as possible.

Yet you're able to speak; just temporarily missing data, the expression of which might have escalated the encounter by triggering the aggressor. Hence, a behavioral reflex that did serve to protect you and/or someone else in the past. Maybe something you repetitively witnessed.
Interesting conjecture, which I accept as a possibility.

Maybe you retreated into a more primitive consciousness, but that's too much of a stretch. Doesn't add up by itself.
How about unaware co-presence? That makes sense.

I hope I've been able to help, and not caused too much discomfort.
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