By Lucie Ritchie
If you had told me ten years ago that technology could relieve complex PTSD and optimize the human brain, I would have been skeptical (and probably cringing). Technology, rewiring trauma? Please...
You hear it all the time, “Change your thoughts, change your life.” And while it is essential to shift maladaptive cognitive patterns, healing the effects of chronic trauma requires full nervous system regulation. Introducing, neurofeedback! By optimizing brain functionality through electroencephalography (EEG), we can alleviate the impact of trauma and unlock optimal human performance, both mental and physical.
This is the story of how neurofeedback (the neuroplastic science of regulating brain networks) propelled me from recovery into levels of focus and performance I hadn’t known were possible.
From Surviving to Thriving
Like many, my story begins with survival. I grew up in environments filled with constant threat, developing developmental PTSD around age 12, and later a more acute form of PTSD at 16. I relied on people-pleasing, but I was always on guard, scanning for what my brain and body saw as inevitable threats. This high level of vigilance not only caused me to rebel, which is common among survivors, but also made trusting others difficult. At twenty-eight, an ex-boyfriend said, “You should talk to a therapist about your past.” I thought his unsolicited advice was ridiculous. “What could a stranger tell me that I didn’t already know?” I told him…
Turns out, it was more than enough.
My 'Good Will Hunting' moment came from a psychologist after I shared my story with her. “It’s not your fault,” she insisted. This statement felt as shocking as some of my histories. “What do you mean? How could it not be?” Her view was so different from mine that it was enough to hook my curiosity into a new life quest! I completely changed my career, went back to school, and studied everything I could about trauma, especially developmental trauma, all the way to the doctoral level, until I understood it at the neurobiological level! As I journeyed through learning numerous approaches to treating trauma, I had to try many of the leading talk therapies in practicum trainings, both with a therapist and as a therapist. I grew increasingly frustrated over the years because none of these methods reached the toxic sense of shame, panic, and fear beneath my skin. These approaches were not strong enough, in my opinion, for talk therapy to be the only answer. Turns out, I was right.
The lightbulb lit for me when I landed on chapter 19 of Bessel van der Kolk’s seminal book, The Body Keeps the Score. It was all about Neurofeedback. “Why haven’t I studied this method?” I thought to myself. By then, I was already a clinical traumatologist; I also held a professional graduate certificate in trauma studies, a master’s degree in counseling psychology, and was just starting my doctoral work in traumatology. Still, with all this education under my belt, the field and recent research were largely continuing to focus on talk therapy methods (working with the cortex). Neurofeedback sounded like it could be the one! I quickly enrolled in the neurofeedback training program at Bessel van der Kolk’s Trauma Research Foundation (yes, THE Trauma Research Foundation!) and grew to specialize in the modality. In other words, it worked! I found a pathway to healing the self after developmental trauma!
Within twenty sessions of EEG neurofeedback, I felt something I hadn’t felt in decades: a reconnection to my authentic self. “What is this sorcery?,” I thought to myself. I then applied it to clients who were struggling to connect with their children, who were reactive, and who were highly dissociative. All of them, not one, all of them got better and also felt more like ‘themselves.’ This intervention felt miracle-like, but it turns out that the brain is naturally built to optimize itself out of rut-like patterns when it is supported at the neurobiological level, not just conversationally. We need both!
A Closer Look at the Network Responsible for the Sense of Self
At the center of healing developmental trauma is the default mode network (DMN), often called the brain’s autopilot, where the sense of self is felt. It’s the network that lights up when we are daydreaming, reflecting, or ruminating. For those with dissociative or developmental PTSD, the DMN gets stuck in survival loops. Instead of resting in calm, reflective awareness, the developing self continuously fires with survival networks. And because “what fires together, wires together,” the sense of self becomes tied to survival networks. Hence, developmental PTSD is not exactly a cognitive disorder; it is a disorder of the self (Terpou et al., 2020).
When we develop in threatening environments, our sense of self forms under survival influences of the brain. This means survivors feel most alive later in life in risky situations since the felt experience of danger triggers the self to activate. In other words, threat is what activates the programmed neurobiology of our self—the self stuck in survival, not the authentic self.
Groundbreaking research by Ruth Lanius and her team at Western University shows this in fMRI scans. In people with developmental PTSD, the “self” lights up under threat. In people without trauma, the self is activated in contexts of safety. This can explain why we reenact our traumas later in life as well. We unconsciously gravitate to risky environments, not because we want to, but because it feels familiar. This moral conflict, then, is not a you thing, it’s a brain thing.
(Lanius et al., 2020)
A final note on the traumatized brain: If safety feels unfamiliar, then safety itself can feel threatening to the traumatized brain. Neurofeedback helps change that by targeting the self’s network (the default mode network).
How Neurofeedback Helps Us in the Gym
So how does this apply to the gym? Because the same DMN that traps us in trauma can also scatter our focus under the barbell. If your brain is chewing on stress, receiving fear signals from the person working out next to you, or feeling like you’re being judged, etc., your performance will suffer.
Neurofeedback helps us break free from survival loops and step into the present. It enhances the brain’s ability to remain focused and attuned to the task at hand. It calms unnecessary chatter, increases reaction speed, improves physical precision, sharpens focus, reduces anxiety, and helps the body and mind work in harmony, one rep at a time.
I noticed the difference in my own training. I used to be on guard, unable to fully engage in my own experience, which sabotaged my focus and left me disembodied. I didn’t realize at the time that this was trauma. After neurofeedback, I noticed a difference in my own training. I could be present, embodied, and focused on my own internal experience, forming a new way of relating to myself. I felt present and optimized.
Healing Meets Performance
Neurofeedback isn’t just about reducing symptoms of PTSD or anxiety, though it does that effectively; it’s about using neuroplasticity to restore the brain’s natural rhythm, freeing survivors from identity stuck-points and supporting pathways to higher levels of performance. Once the brain reestablishes its rhythm, its abilities can surpass the baseline and reach new levels of optimization. That’s why athletes often use neurofeedback to achieve peak performance. As an athlete and trauma psychotherapist, I use it both for recovery and optimization, and that’s the connection I want to share: healing doesn’t have to mean returning to a baseline; it can mean going beyond limits and reaching optimal performance.
Who I Am Today
My name is Lucie Ritchie, and I’m the founder of Heal Psychotherapy in Toronto. I’m a psychotherapist, an academic, a neurofeedback provider, and an instructor. Neurofeedback regulated my survival brain and DMN, and by doing so, I was able to reconnect to a stronger, more authentic version of myself. It helped me heal, sharpen my performance in the gym, and reminded me that strength is both inner and outer.
Now, my mission is to help others experience the same. Whether you’re struggling with the impacts of trauma, want to feel more connected to who you are, or if you’re chasing athletic goals, remember this: what’s getting in your way may not be a you thing, it may be a brain thing. And the brain, like the body, can be trained.
It is easier to change the mind by going directly to the brain than trying to change the brain through the mind — Sebern Fisher
Learn more about me:
Lucie Ritchie, RP
IG: @HealPsychotherapy
IG: @LucieRitchie.RP