Right Amygdala Destruction

[m4rius]

This Guy Had a Piece of His Brain Removed. Now He Can’t Feel Fear.

“I'm talking about the fear you'd feel when facing death or serious injury. That's the fear that was removed.”

www.vice.com

"In 2020, Van Rooij and colleagues studied two patients who were diagnosed with comorbid posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), characterised in each case by heightened fear responses to things that reminded them of their trauma. Following laser surgery that targeted the right amygdala, both patients were found to no longer meet the criteria for PTSD. More specifically, the study's findings indicated an improvement in the patients' hyperarousal symptoms, which included jumpiness and hypervigilance, as well as their startle response, which directly measures the fear response triggered by the amygdala."

"The basolateral amygdala is essential for processing fearful stimuli and combining it with contextual information from the hippocampus," Van Rooij explains. "Removing the entire right amygdala could impact this process drastically, and result in an individual no longer experiencing fear when presented with sensory information that typically triggers a fear response."

View attachment 102794




Main side effect: "In most cases of amygdalotomy in humans, there is no substantial evidence of impairment in overall cognitive function, including intelligence and working memory. However, deficits in specific areas of memory have been noted, particularly areas of memory pertaining to the recognition and emotional interpretation of facial stimuli." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amygdalotomy)

Lasering your right amygdala may give one the courage to ctb, but that it could also save you since it'll get rid of any deep traumas and/or gut fears, with a much higher threshold for adrenaline and pain. I recommend reading more about people's experiences over it if you can find. Interesting stuff.

It's so fucking sad that this is what it has come to. Laser destruction for a normal life. It's my own body, and I still would not be allowed. That's what infuriates me the most, the amount of hoops I'd have to go through and still end up nowhere when a solution is right there. Debilitating GAD is not enough for candidacy. I may have to convince a few Indian surgeons abroad if nothing works out in the next coming years.

I refuse to keep living in suffering, to go through emotions of regret and sorrow, emotions injected into me against my own will.

The brain is mechanical. There's people that move on, and there's people that are stuck with memories and emotions that should've been forgotten years ago. There's a clear difference in brain chemistry, in childhood environment and genetics.

I desire to have near, if not, full control over my emotions after all this unnecessary garbage I've been through. Ain't no way I'm taxing my body with any more pointless stress.

I've tried countless drugs I've been prescribed. All to no avail. Every day is a challenge for me to even step a foot outside, to do anything. My condolences to those who have it worse.

Regulating my right amygdala is my only true life goal.

 

[timf]

I find it difficult to see any advantage in removing part of the brain. I think it is possible for one to develop the ability to gain greater control themselves. For example a person who has come to be paralyzed with shame can use his logic to examine the cause. If he has done something shameful, has he made restitution. Once everything useful has been extracted from an emotion, it no longer serves a purpose. If a person is fearful logic can again play a therapeutic role. For example a risk analysis can bring to light the truth about a situation such as walking next to the edge of a roof when there is no guardrail should impart an urgent need for caution. Thinking someone may reject us should not cause us to be paralyzed from saying something or doing something.

We all make mistakes and should be able to learn from them. Crippling emotions can form on their own or be imposed on us by others (particularly when we are young). However, freedom lies in deflating these emotions with the cold light of truth.

 

[m4rius]

I find it difficult to see any advantage in removing part of the brain. I think it is possible for one to develop the ability to gain greater control themselves. For example a person who has come to be paralyzed with shame can use his logic to examine the cause. If he has done something shameful, has he made restitution. Once everything useful has been extracted from an emotion, it no longer serves a purpose. If a person is fearful logic can again play a therapeutic role. For example a risk analysis can bring to light the truth about a situation such as walking next to the edge of a roof when there is no guardrail should impart an urgent need for caution. Thinking someone may reject us should not cause us to be paralyzed from saying something or doing something.

We all make mistakes and should be able to learn from them. Crippling emotions can form on their own or be imposed on us by others (particularly when we are young). However, freedom lies in deflating these emotions with the cold light of truth.

I've been detaching myself from such emotions ever since I've hit puberty. Realizing what's going on with my emotions, my brain, isn't enough to induce any long-term help.

There's people that move on no matter the hardship they go through, and there's people that kill themselves over the littlest of things.

In general, it is nearly impossible to control your negative emotions and sensitivity to stress if you're especially predisposed genetically, and/or have gone through severe trauma without some major change in the brain. The neurochemistry and morphology of brains between people can vary a lot.

There's case studies of long-time PTSD sufferers getting cured from their trauma by having their right amygdala removed, no amount of therapy truly seemed to help for them except this surgery.

From what I've gathered, there seems to be little disadvantage from having the right amygdala removed too, if one can utilize their logic consistently they'd be able to stray away from danger all while being in better control of their own emotions.

You'd be able to CTB fearlessly anytime you desire after extensive thinking, or carry on with your life with no trauma being able to ever control you. It's a complete win for those with the right intentions.

The actual issue that should be of discussion is the accessibility of this procedure. The surgery is a pipe dream atm, as previously mentioned I'd need to go to a third world country in order to have this performed. It would still cost a few thousands. May as well just fucking end it.

 

[lionetta12]

This Guy Had a Piece of His Brain Removed. Now He Can’t Feel Fear.

“I'm talking about the fear you'd feel when facing death or serious injury. That's the fear that was removed.”

www.vice.com

"In 2020, Van Rooij and colleagues studied two patients who were diagnosed with comorbid posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), characterised in each case by heightened fear responses to things that reminded them of their trauma. Following laser surgery that targeted the right amygdala, both patients were found to no longer meet the criteria for PTSD. More specifically, the study's findings indicated an improvement in the patients' hyperarousal symptoms, which included jumpiness and hypervigilance, as well as their startle response, which directly measures the fear response triggered by the amygdala."

"The basolateral amygdala is essential for processing fearful stimuli and combining it with contextual information from the hippocampus," Van Rooij explains. "Removing the entire right amygdala could impact this process drastically, and result in an individual no longer experiencing fear when presented with sensory information that typically triggers a fear response."

View attachment 102794




Main side effect: "In most cases of amygdalotomy in humans, there is no substantial evidence of impairment in overall cognitive function, including intelligence and working memory. However, deficits in specific areas of memory have been noted, particularly areas of memory pertaining to the recognition and emotional interpretation of facial stimuli." (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Amygdalotomy)

Lasering your right amygdala may give one the courage to ctb, but that it could also save you since it'll get rid of any deep traumas and/or gut fears, with a much higher threshold for adrenaline and pain. I recommend reading more about people's experiences over it if you can find. Interesting stuff.

It's so fucking sad that this is what it has come to. Laser destruction for a normal life. It's my own body, and I still would not be allowed. That's what infuriates me the most, the amount of hoops I'd have to go through and still end up nowhere when a solution is right there. Debilitating GAD is not enough for candidacy. I may have to convince a few Indian surgeons abroad if nothing works out in the next coming years.

I refuse to keep living in suffering, to go through emotions of regret and sorrow, emotions injected into me against my own will.

The brain is mechanical. There's people that move on, and there's people that are stuck with memories and emotions that should've been forgotten years ago. There's a clear difference in brain chemistry, in childhood environment and genetics.

I desire to have near, if not, full control over my emotions after all this unnecessary garbage I've been through. Ain't no way I'm taxing my body with any more pointless stress.

I've tried countless drugs I've been prescribed. All to no avail. Every day is a challenge for me to even step a foot outside, to do anything. My condolences to those who have it worse.

Regulating my right amygdala is my only true life goal.

I have always thought that I'd do anything to get ridd of my PTSD, but literally removing parts of my brain? I don't know about that.

 

[come to dust]

I dont think anyone here has problems related to fear of their inevitable death.

 

[m4rius]

I dont think anyone here has problems related to fear of their inevitable death.

It's not specific to that fear at all, I have no idea where you got that from. It's fear in general, trauma, anxiety, etc.

I have always thought that I'd do anything to get ridd of my PTSD, but literally removing parts of my brain? I don't know about that.

That's exactly what I thought in the beginning too, I felt as though this was too extreme and that SURELY there may be an alternative. Well, knowing that my life is currently in a state of emergency mental health wise, I can't give it decades for medical technology to advance. Mind you, I've tried a lot of drugs and experimental research chemicals out of desperation too, again all to no avail. Choices are running short.

After some more thorough reading of the possible implications behind amygdalotomy including both studies and anecdotal evidence, I found that it is quite safe as a procedure with our current tech with little to no effect on cognition. It seems as though the only issue is a slight delay in processing faces and names of people, that is if you ignore the risks of becoming fearless too, you'd need to make sure your logic is functioning at all times to preserve you from danger but that is meaningless to someone depressed and/or anxious whose close to suicide. It's all or nothing now.

Amygdalotomy - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Shadowlord900]

Sorry but when I read the topic title I couldn't help but think of the Bloodborne boss also called Amygdala.

 

[m4rius]

Sorry but when I read the topic title I couldn't help but think of the Bloodborne boss also called Amygdala.

I love those games and hated that boss.

 

[Celerity]

I'm skeptical of the viability of this procedure, but I understand where you're coming from. If such a medical procedure really worked, I would sign up in a heartbeat.

I would sign up even if it meant sacrificing what it means to be "me". Earlier today while at work stewing in my familiar irritability, I recalled a conversation I had with my psychiatrist about my recent change in medication. The long and short of it is that I had to quit an effective medication because of potentially serious physical side effects. Well off of it now and on another kind of (inferior) psych med, I have not felt more likely myself in almost a year, and that is exactly the problem.

It is a cliche that people complain about medication making them "emotionless/like a zombie" or how they're "not themselves" on them. To me, such signs point to the med actually fucking working. Take my character traits, take my dreams, take my fucking memories. I really DGAF. Just make my day-to-day so that I don't feel the need to take a short stroll into traffic.

 

[Dot]

Thre r othr treatmnts whch hve also shwn gd rsults fr ptsd & trma/anxty whch mght b easr 2 accss in th/ interim -- thy r jst nt prescribd in /& mainstrm yt

Mght b wrth googlng 'somatc xperncing' whch hlps 2 re-regul8 th/ nervs systm whch = oftn trappd in paralyzd st8 aftr suddn or rpeatd trmas

Hve also lookd in2 amydla ablation bt am nervs thr rsults r nt cnsistnt

 

[m4rius]

I'm skeptical of the viability of this procedure, but I understand where you're coming from. If such a medical procedure really worked, I would sign up in a heartbeat.

I would sign up even if it meant sacrificing what it means to be "me". Earlier today while at work stewing in my familiar irritability, I recalled a conversation I had with my psychiatrist about my recent change in medication. The long and short of it is that I had to quit an effective medication because of potentially serious physical side effects. Well off of it now and on another kind of (inferior) psych med, I have not felt more likely myself in almost a year, and that is exactly the problem.

It is a cliche that people complain about medication making them "emotionless/like a zombie" or how they're "not themselves" on them. To me, such signs point to the med actually fucking working. Take my character traits, take my dreams, take my fucking memories. I really DGAF. Just make my day-to-day so that I don't feel the need to take a short stroll into traffic.

I need to bump this.

To reply, the viability is the main concern, but to be honest, it hardly is one. I can try to contact Indian clinics pretending I have epilepsy affecting my amygdala or something. This is if you can bypass their diagnosis and skip straight to the procedure, I am sure if you can try hard enough you'll find some holes you can manipulate and fraud your way into getting the laser surgery.

I'll fraud and then keep lying. My own body, my fucking choice. It shouldn't even be questioned considering I am at the verge of suicide every. single. day. I'm sure I'll find a way.

I mentioned this already but the most ironic part about all of this is how destroying your right amygdala will grant you the ability to kill yourself with no survival/fear instinct, while also simultaneously destroying your capacity to carry on trauma, and any long-term fear/anxiety, allowing you to live a completely new life that can be potentially enjoyable.

This is incredibly hilarious. What a fucked up world.

 

[m4rius]

Pros:

1. Fearlessness: Ice in your veins.
   
   
2. Protection Against Trauma: Future traumatic events won't impact you as severely—thus, they are likely no longer traumatic. Existing trauma, meaning trauma experienced before the procedure, fades away within a year, with rapid improvements.
   
   
3. Enhanced Emotional Stability: Stressful emotions are suppressed, anxiety is gone, and anger is minimized, which can lead to a calmer and more focused state of mind. This suppression can improve concentration and reduce emotional interruptions in daily tasks. Additionally, it may enhance decision-making by minimizing impulsive reactions driven by intense emotions.
   
   
4. Calmer Body, Better Sleep: With reduced sensitivity in your central nervous system, your body is likely to be calmer. You'll experience less touch sensitivity, be less ticklish, and flinch less. Vigilance is diminished. Nightmares are suppressed and redefined. All in all, this contributes to a more relaxed body and mind, and better sleep quality.
   
   
5. Health Benefits: Reduced stress responses could have positive effects on physical health, potentially reducing the risk of stress-related illnesses.
   
   
6. Increased Empathy: Without the fear of judgment, empathy grows. With less emotional reactivity to stressful or negative stimuli, you'll have more mental energy to empathize with others' feelings and experiences. Also, hateful feelings likely become harder to maintain due to its relationship with stress and the fear processes of the amygdala.
   
   
7. Increased Pain Tolerance: The emotional processing of pain is suppressed, pain becomes easier to ignore.
   
   
8. Reduced Embarrassment and Shame: The feelings of embarrassment and shame are diminished in intensity in both general contexts and social contexts. You retain your logic, this would not mean you become entirely disinhibited.
   
   
9. Reduced Disgust: The emotional intensity of disgust is diminished. (Slight pro, not really relevant.)
   
   
10. Reduced Depression Symptoms: Overall, you'll likely feel less depressed.

Cons:

1. Fearlessness: While a pro, it can also be a con.
   
   
2. Memory Deficits: In general, there may be a slight delay in remembering people's faces and names. Threatening faces and threatening people are especially no longer remembered as quick.
   
   
3. Suppressed Fear Processing: Sometimes it will be confusing when others panic due to the deficit in fear processing.
   
   
4. Poorer Emotional, Negative Memory Storage: Emotional, negatively impactful memories are not stored as effectively.
   
   
5. Loss of Instinctual Threat Detection: At first, you'll need to relearn how to avoid dangers, scams, and threats to some extent.
   
   
6. No Emotionally-Induced Adrenaline: Physical adrenaline is still possible, but you'll lose fear-related reflexes. Even if you practice being observant and cautious, you might have a few slip-ups in your lifetime.
   
   
7. Need for Stimulation: This could lead to risky behaviors like thrill-seeking, workaholism, or abusive relationships, and etc.
   
   

---

Evidence:

1. PTSD:

• https://sci-hub.se/https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/32259241/#&gid=article-figures&pid=figure-3-uid-2
  
  Case study with two patients for epilepsy and PTSD. (right amygdala and anterior hippocampus lasered off)
  
  "Compared to traditional open temporal lobe surgery, stereotactic laser amygdalohippocampotomy provides a minimally invasive, highly selective approach that minimizes collateral injury and yields a more positive impact on cognition. By targeting the persistent amygdala hyperactivation that is observed in treatment nonresponders, amygdalotomy likely reduces hyperarousal, making trauma-focused therapy more tolerable and effective."
  
  
  
  
  
  
  
• https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/pdf/10.1080/14737175.2023.2218034
  
  Second link is a review over the first case study.
  
  "In our case series, we observed that patients did not completely recover from all PTSD-related symptoms after ablation; however, they did recover sufficiently such that they no longer met the clinical criteria for PTSD. One of the patients in our case series reported that six months after surgery, she was still checking for danger but not feeling the fear she used to feel. By 12 months post-surgery, she no longer reported these behaviors. These findings may indicate bottom up learning, which eventually overrides previously learned behaviors. If persistently heightened amygdala reactivity prevents extinction learning, ablation may allow a break in this cycle and permit a return to a more adaptive state of extinction learning. What we also have yet to investigate is the effects of potential retraumatization after amygdala ablation.
  
  Notably, a study by Koenigs et al. in 2007 suggested that individuals with brain damage to areas including the amygdala and the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) did not develop PTSD compared to control subjects with injuries to other brain regions. Their data suggested that PTSD is associated with the overactivation of the amygdala, with correlations to a lack of inhibition by vmPFC and decreased hippocampal function, which again indicates the importance of the amygdala."

2. Fearlessness/Anxiety:

• https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3030206/
  
  This mainly goes over a patient named "S.M.". She's got bilateral amygdala damage, not the best example but most of her lack of fear/anxiety stem from the damage done to the right amygdala. Read more about her here: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/S.M._(patient)

3. Self-reports of improved mood, anxiety, and depression.

• https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC10637769/
  
  Resection of left amygdala does not improve mood as much as the resection of the right amygdala. Likely the right amygdala has a significant role in mood.

I can't be bothered to go over and dissect every single detail—though I'd love to. Unfortunately, having unmedicated ADHD makes things more difficult when you have the attention span of a goldfish.

It's pretty irresponsible and lame considering the number of claims I've made in the above list, but I promise there are more references I can link, I'm probably never going to finish it in a readable format. You can also find them yourself through Google Scholar if you wish to read more.

---

Anecdotes:

We'll be using our boy here, Jody Smith—the guy who inspired me to look into the brain and its right amygdala. He had more than just his right amygdala removed due to epilepsy, although we can confidently differentiate his postoperative effects.




His Reddit user is lagospeare. This is his AMA thread where many questions were already answered:

 

[Dot]

Hve cnsidrd ths in pst also

Mght lk in2 agn bt = dffclt havng doctrs belve n.ethng tht slf tll thm

Nuro-psychtrst rfusd 2 C slf & sd tht needd 'spch therpy'

 

[justwannadip]

Well, let us know if you ever get this done. Would love to hear how it worked for you

 

[m4rius]

Hve cnsidrd ths in pst also

Mght lk in2 agn bt = dffclt havng doctrs belve n.ethng tht slf tll thm

Nuro-psychtrst rfusd 2 C slf & sd tht needd 'spch therpy'

Yeah, unfortunately it's not feasible having this procedure authorized. I understand it since it's literal brain damage, but does it really matter if I'm looking down a shotgun barrel every day? Being treatment-resistant sucks ass.

Well, let us know if you ever get this done. Would love to hear how it worked for you

For sure. I'm planning on saving up and getting it done by next year.

Probably by the beginning of autumn. But I'll also have to give a couple of months to see what it's like and write down everything. Sooo early 2026 then.

 

[Placo]

Sorry but when I read the topic title I couldn't help but think of the Bloodborne boss also called Amygdala.

Now that triggered my amygdala.

 

[willitpass]

Finding a doctor willing to do this would be incredibly difficult. For one, the amygdala is very deep in the brain, to reach it for surgery would mean a MAJOR operation. I suspect any doctor will expect you to have tried every other option (extensive psychotherapy, many medications, less invasive procedure such as ECT and TMS, etc.) before being willing to do such a drastic operation. And removing the amygdala can have many, many undesired side effects. The removal of fear is not just the fear of CTB or the anxiety associated with trauma, it's the jump in your gut when you see a car coming while crossing the road, it's the fear of pain if you touch the hot stove, it's any sort of fear. And you risk memory impairment as well. Even if you have the money a doctor will likely refuse this unless you've exhausted every possible option. A lifetime of cognitive impairment and the major risks associated with deep brain surgery are not something any doctor or surgeon take lightly and I don't think you should either. I would recommend looking into less invade procedures such as ECT first.

 

[Placo]

This thread reminded me of the story of a guy who suffered from terrible OCD and who one day, unable to take it anymore, shot himself and by shooting himself he hit the very area of the brain that made him suffer and he went back to having a normal life, practically an attempt of suicide that makes you heal, at the moment I don't have sources to document the story that I only heard on Youtube so it might not be true but I sincerely believe it, it doesn't make much sense to make up a story like that and maybe by doing a search you'll find something.

 

[m4rius]

The removal of fear is not just the fear of CTB or the anxiety associated with trauma, it's the jump in your gut when you see a car coming while crossing the road, it's the fear of pain if you touch the hot stove, it's any sort of fear.

The fear of pain from touching a hot stove yet still touching it would be more like frontal lobe damage, where a person lacks self-control. I know it's not what you said, but it would be the only time where I'd share any concern over it. Or having bilateral amygdala damage, that's another since your recognition of threats I think is much worse and in being able to remember.

At least with Jody Smith's case, he does not have the instinct, but he can still rationalize and understand that it's not worth going through pain, and that processing can happen very quickly with a feeling of tension or pressure. As a result, I see him being able to avoid harm easily after getting used to his new brain.







Please read the above screenshots. I understand they're only anecdotal evidence, but right now I think it's better than nothing.

I understood that the biggest side effect is harm avoidance, which even then isn't that bad, based on the way he described it. You have to relearn what's threatening in the beginning and know to avoid it, which he eventually caught on to. I'm going by anecdotes because there's limited data on unilateral amygdala damage to the right side.

The harm avoidance part, I think, potentially would get worse when both amygdalae are damaged. If you read about the S.M. patient, you'll see that she essentially never felt what threats are. The complete removal of fear in every aspect beyond just emotion where you'd act almost if not, full-on idiotic or disinhibited, is something where you can't even understand what threats are. Probably even worse memory recall for emotionally impactful moments as mentioned before. She had the damage since childhood too, so that also plays a role.

 

[m4rius]

Finding a doctor willing to do this would be incredibly difficult. For one, the amygdala is very deep in the brain, to reach it for surgery would mean a MAJOR operation. I suspect any doctor will expect you to have tried every other option (extensive psychotherapy, many medications, less invasive procedure such as ECT and TMS, etc.) before being willing to do such a drastic operation. I would recommend looking into less invade procedures such as ECT first.

Oh yeah. The first thing I thought about was accessibility issues. It's no stroll in the park, but it should be possible.

Regarding the procedure, you don't have to go through open brain surgery. There's Gamma Knife radiosurgery and Laser Interstitial Thermal Therapy (LiTT), which are safer and minimally invasive in comparison.

Look here though—desperation knows no bounds. I'll do everything it takes to get that procedure; I'll fly abroad and fake everything if needed. Carefully planned. I think a lot of users here can sympathize—severe anxiety is fucking abysmal. I have things I want to do, I don't need my brain to get in the way with its mental noise because of some shit that happened when I was a kid, shit I had zero control over. Fuck that, let me get over it ASAP. This isn't an impulsive decision. Over the years since a teen, I've tried: anxiolytics, antidepressants, antipsychotics, mood stabilizers, psychedelics, and research chemicals. I don't want to experiment with rTMS or whatever magnetic-the-fuck therapy. I've had enough of trial and error. There's a solution out there, and I'm going to get it. It's not an exact "cure", but it's a solution. A bit of sacrifice is fine with me; you only live once.

Besides, I gotta say, being fearless sounds ideal for my goals and standards. So with me, there's added benefits to consider plus the desperation to diminish a counterproductive negative that is anxiety, with side effects that... don't even seem to be debilitating? My IQ remains the same? My capacity for emotions largely untouched? Oh, I can't process threatening faces as quick? Poorer memory for negative events? Difficulty in adding context to memories that should be seen as negative? Oh that sucks, anyway... So on and so on which are all expected with fearlessness.

If there are more cognitive impairments, especially related to memory, please include them all here with one reference and one highlighted example. I would appreciate it. You have to consider that the impairments need to be significant enough for it to outweigh its benefits. So far from the evidence I could find, it does not seem that impairing. If my hippocampus were to be affected though, that would be a different story.

I don't mean to come off as arrogant, btw. I hope it's taken well; I really wanted to express myself here.