ABSTRACT
Implicit memories are non-conscious in that they cannot be consciously recalled and so the emotional response to a threatening situation is not available to be recalled or verbalized. In the therapeutic context, Michael White proposed an image of a person’s experience of trauma as one of them being swept along in the turmoil of a fast-flowing river, not knowing what is up and what is down. The stories that are brought forward in this way can be developed into rich or thick accounts that provide a different experience of ‘self’ and a different place to stand in relation to what have been traumatic. The memories are based on language, though with a complex interplay of non-verbal or felt memories, and being verbal, they are stored in the explicit memory system. The theory of a ‘fight or flight’ that came to be described through the action of the autonomic nervous system was first described by American physiologist Walter B Canon.
