The Brain & Traveling Back In Time

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(This post was rewritten on August 25, 2025)

Do you ever feel like your brain is traveling back in time? Stopping and starting without your knowledge.

Yesterday, when I was tying the branches of a tomato plant to the stake to hold up the tomatoes, a scent was released that transported me back to childhood.

It’s hard to explain that scent. Woodsy. Pungent.

I was back in my Granny’s garden with the rows and rows of vegetables. The tall corn plants were waving giddily in the breeze. The sound of cicadas marked the season. I felt the heat of the sun press down on the top of my head.

Did you know that smells have a stronger link to memory and emotion than any of the other senses?

The Power Of The Brain:

The brain is complex and quite powerful.

I know now why my senses can instantly bring on flickering snapshots of the past. Sometimes it brings on this strange sensation, but I don’t know what triggered it.

I realize that my brain is on high alert. That I am waiting for some memory to seep into the present. But it drifts around like a bee buzzing and won’t form. Then it feels as though I’m being lifted to a different place. Sounds recede. A calmness descends.

I can’t recall any traumatic events during that time. But I can remember how my arms felt itchy when they brushed against the leaves of a tomato plant. And that memory travels all the way back to my childhood.

So some memories live on, and others can be pushed down out of sight. This is because our brain is trying to protect us within the complex workings of our bodies.

The Amygdala:

The amygdala recognizes and gathers information for us and helps determine whether to feel fearful if it determines a threat. Sensory stimuli can trigger overactivity if the brain perceives these stimuli to be somehow connected to the traumatic event or events.

The hippocampus stores and retrieves memories. It is part of the limbic system of the brain that differentiates between past and present experiences. Studies have proven that with PTSD, the volume of the hippocampus might become smaller.

The trauma can trigger fear, stress, and anxiety if the brain perceives reminders of the trauma in the present environment. A victim cannot differentiate between the past trauma and the present. Their fight-or-flight response can be activated because the brain perceives a threat.

The ventromedial prefrontal cortex is the part of the brain that regulates emotions. It is involved in decision-making, integration of cognition, and affects recognition. It’s the encoding of emotional values and the processing of facial signals. It is where risk and fear are processed.

Trauma Can Interrupt Normal Brain Responses:

In normal circumstances, the amygdala will sense a negative emotion, such as fear, and the prefrontal cortex will react to this.

But after trauma, this rationality might be overridden, and the prefrontal cortex could have a hard time regulating emotions and fear. Thus, the three parts of the brain, the amygdala, the hippocampus, and the prefrontal cortex, are the most affected due to emotional trauma.

Neuroscientists have discovered that when you see, hear, touch, or taste something, sensory information first heads to the thalamus. It acts as your brain’s relay station.

The thalamus then sends that information to the relevant brain areas, including the hippocampus, which is responsible for memory, and the amygdala, which processes emotions.

But with smells, it’s different. Scents bypass the thalamus and go straight to the brain’s smell center, known as the olfactory bulb.

The olfactory bulb is directly connected to the amygdala and hippocampus. This might explain why the smell of something can so immediately trigger a detailed memory or intense emotion.

My senses can instantly bring on flickering snapshots of the past. Sometimes it brings on this strange sensation, but I don’t know what caused it. Or what actually triggered it. But the trigger is typically sounds.

Losing Time:

Sound, scent, and hearing have elevated me to a somewhat primal state at times. It can cause a lapse in memory. What they call “losing time.” Similar to blacking out.

It can take me to a more rudimentary state of mind. I know there is a memory related to this heightened feeling. But I can’t reach out and grab it. It is floating in the ether just beyond my reach.

Finally, the feeling lessens and disappears. And I always wonder what my brain picked up on. What it was trying to tell me. Or in the case of my brain protecting me, what it was trying not to say to me.

A psychiatrist told me that this is the brain’s way of protecting you. She said it typically begins in early childhood. And, she said, once the brain learns something, it can’t be “unlearned.”

You can’t put the toothpaste back in the tube.

This is formally called dissociation.

The Brain & Dissociation:

Dissociation has been defined as: a “disruption of and/or discontinuity in the normal, subjective integration of one or more aspects of psychological functioning. This includes, but is not limited to – memory, identity, consciousness, perception, and motor control.”

Dissociation includes involuntary intrusions of sensory and cognitive information, bringing it into conscious awareness.

Yet it is like sand drifting between your fingers. It’s there and so quickly it is gone. It is the elusive butterfly you cannot catch.

It protects you from memories that you were too young to process adequately. So it is actually a gift.

Symptoms Of Psychological Trauma:

• Exhaustion
• Confusion
• Anxiety and/or agitation
• Sadness or depression
• Numbness
• Blunted affect (decreased ability to express emotion through your facial expressions, tone of voice, and physical movements)
• Dissociation

Even when very young, our psyche can separate part of itself from the traumatic event as it is occurring and can seal itself off in a necessary disassociation.

Fear Circuitry:

The area of the brain called the prefrontal cortex contains groups of brain cells that help us to freeze or to run, depending on the level of danger. The brain is incredibly complex. It does everything from making your heart continue beating to forming what your personality is like.

A significant role of the amygdala is to detect fear. With PTSD, the amygdala can become hyperactive. This can lead to chronic stress, heightened anxiety, and increased irritability. These reactions make it harder to calm down and/or sleep.

When a person is experiencing a traumatic event or experiencing extreme fear, their “Fear Circuitry” may kick in. Then the prefrontal cortex begins to function less effectively. This means that in the midst of trauma, at a time when someone needs to be able to think most, they might not be able to.

They may feel stuck because their brain won’t compute what’s going on, and they might not have the wherewithal to make a decision or call for help. While it’s in survival mode, the brain shuts down to its most necessary functions. It rejects new information and refuses to store it long-term.

According to research, emotional trauma and PTSD can cause damage to both your brain and your body. After the event, the brain might need to be “rewired.”

How To Rewire The Brain:

To heal the brain after trauma, you will need a sound support system, an optimistic mindset, and learn healthy stress-coping skills.

Some of the therapeutic practices involve physical exercise, learning to be more mindful in your daily life, and trauma-focused therapy.

One of the best therapies to rewire the brain is neurofeedback. Through this training, your brain creates new pathways so that it can resume normal function. And then you possibly find long-term relief from the symptoms you’re experiencing.

How To Rewire Your Brain: 6 Neuroplasticity Exercises

What Is Neuroplasticity?

Neuroplasticity is the brain’s capacity to continue growing and evolving in response to life experiences. Plasticity is the capacity to be shaped, molded, or altered; neuroplasticity, then, is the ability for the brain to adapt or change over time, by creating new neurons and building new networks.

Historically, scientists believed that the brain stopped growing after childhood. But current research shows that the brain can continue growing and changing throughout the lifespan, refining its architecture or shifting functions to different regions of the brain.

The importance of neuroplasticity can’t be overstated: It means that it is possible to change dysfunctional patterns of thinking and behaving and to develop new mindsets, new memories, new skills, and new abilities.

There is a pain so utter that it swallows substance up
Then covers the abyss with trance—
So memory can step around—across—upon it
As one within a swoon goes safely where an open-eye would drop him—
—Bone by bone  –

Emily Dickinson

The meaning behind the Emily Dickinson poem is that at some point, our brain may need forgetfulness to heal.

All in all, it means that sometimes a force takes over that is beyond our comprehension or cognition. And that force, our brain, as it travels back in time in the form of memories, protects us when we most need protecting.