Feature Health & Medicine

Trauma distorts our sense of time and self. A new therapy might help

The therapy has helped veterans struggling with mental illness imagine their future selves

An illustration of a shattered clock face with cogs, gears, bits of glass, and other parts scattered around.

Trauma can interfere with a person’s sense of time, shattering the continuity of their life story.

KATTY HUERTAS

By Sujata Gupta

Trish Tran narrates her life in staccato notes.

“I remember carrying my little sister on my back because she’s too tired and walking through the huge sunflower fields … and me feeling so tired I didn’t think I could walk another step.”

“I remember being in a taxi with my mother, coming back to the man who had been violently abusive to all of us….