Feeling my childhood pain for real

[sambellscoup]

I'm struggling today. NC had released a lot of childhood hurt. Hurt that I wasn't allowed to feel or express. That I got punished for recording involuntarily through crying and screaming.

I'm struggling with work and hobbies and everything. I'm not able to get lost in things. At night I'm staring through the TV instead of actually watching it. There's so much to feel that I don't know what to feel, and my mind sort of... goes numb from sheer overwhelm.

My parents really were awful. They could have been worse, but they were bad enough. My mind is now throwing off the lies it told itself that they're "ok" people and accepting the full force of how lousy they have been as parents in particular. So up comes a bunch of emotion that hasn't been allowed to fully surface ever before. And it's just hard.

[moglow]

It IS hard, incredibly horribly hard. And you know what, it was hard when you lived it the first time only you weren't allowed to express it or feel or fight back for yourself. So you work through it now, possibly more than once while you feel it and let go of some then feel something else. It's a process. The important part to me is that you keep moving through it.

This is mourning, honey. It's grieving that child and all you should have had with the parents you didn't. There is no shame and no rush and no timetable. And you know what else? You're not alone in it, not by a long shot.

Write it out. Write it all out, stream of consciousness style. Put it down for a while then pick up later whenever the mood strikes or your mind won't let go. Read it later or don't,  but when you want, think about destroying those words and all the pain they hold. Me, I like fire - build a damn bonfire and throw that pain off into it.

Share with us, talk to us. Not one person here will doubt or question how you feel, but we will hold you through it.

[bee well]

Hi Sambellscoup,

What Moglow said is so true. I'm glad you had this good motherly advice and hope you will read it again.

It's okay if you feel badly and don't wan't to do anything, even what usually feels good. You don't have to feel any particular way. If thoughts are swirling through your head, that's okay, they will pass. If you can't think at all that's okay too. Later you will.

When struggle with work I try to remember that with all I have gone through, it's not surprising I would struggle. It's okay to take a few minutes to remember that.

Be kind to yourself. Please come back here when you can. You are in good company here, and there's there's no worry about showing up "the right way."

[NarcKiddo]

Now you have to be a parent to yourself. The parent you never had. Be kind to yourself. Let yourself grieve, free in the knowledge they can't hurt you from here on in, because you won't let them. Past hurt needs to be worked through as and when you feel strong enough.

[treesgrowslowly]

It IS hard, incredibly horribly hard. And you know what, it was hard when you lived it the first time only you weren't allowed to express it or feel or fight back for yourself. So you work through it now, possibly more than once while you feel it and let go of some then feel something else. It's a process. The important part to me is that you keep moving through it.

This is mourning, honey. It's grieving that child and all you should have had with the parents you didn't. There is no shame and no rush and no timetable. And you know what else? You're not alone in it, not by a long shot.

Write it out. Write it all out, stream of consciousness style. Put it down for a while then pick up later whenever the mood strikes or your mind won't let go. Read it later or don't,  but when you want, think about destroying those words and all the pain they hold. Me, I like fire - build a damn bonfire and throw that pain off into it.

Share with us, talk to us. Not one person here will doubt or question how you feel, but we will hold you through it.

It won't be like this forever. The unexpressed emotions are painful at the start, and you will get through this.

This list has helped me many times over the years:

http://www.pete-walker.com/13StepsManageFlashbacks.htm

Trees

[Cat of the Canals]

This list has helped me many times over the years:

http://www.pete-walker.com/13StepsManageFlashbacks.htm

Trees

I'd also highly recommend Pete Walker's Complex PTSD book, if you haven't read it. I'm almost finished reading, and it's been incredibly eye-opening. He also has a lot of in-depth, practical things you can do to manage such feelings.

But above all, be gentle with yourself. Grieving is hard and is rarely a linear process.

[sambellscoup]

Thank you everyone for your kind replies. I'm feeling better today. I think that initial wave of pain is calming a bit. I'm having all these ups as well as downs now. I think my inner child is overjoyed that it's over... And she's also really sad that it couldn't be over while she was still a child. And I keep swinging been these two feelings.

I'm not sleeping great, but I'm not lying there in distress either, my mind just isn't winding down no matter what I try. I hope that settles down after a while.

[treesgrowslowly]

Hang in there Sambellscoup.

When I think back on the first year after I went NC, I would say that one of the practices I didn't understand well at the time, was the value of what I'll call "distractions"...i.e. watching something on tv that isn't too activating (i.e. something you can enjoy but doesn't activate all sorts of strong emotions). Like cooking shows or that sort of thing.

When I was newly NC as you are, I under-estimated how much time my brain needed to just be in a non-aroused state. And I'm just using tv as an example. Another example might be, doing a puzzle or reading mystery fiction books or play candy crush on the phone.

Back then, I did not understand my Complex PTSD as a neurological injury. Few therapists did either at that time since this was quite a while ago.

I underestimated the real value (to my brain) in activities like listening to music I enjoy, or just watching tv that let me doze off for naps during the day (because like you, my sleep was messed up too back then).

We learn a lot about our own personal journey through recovery - and each one has our own path. Now that it has been so many years, I can look back and say oh, there's something I wish I had done more of back then. (honestly I am so glad there is more knowledge now a days about how trauma actually works). When I went NC, the thinking was that this was an emotional process and a psychological one (which it is) but now more people understand that healing is a neurological process as well.

The analogy for me is that our brain is trying to 'defrag' after trauma, and a lot of the time, we just need to give it the time it needs to do that.

What I wish someone had explained to me back then is that there is a lot of value in just doing things that let you feel "not-aroused" emotionally, be it watching cooking shows or old re-runs or whatever it is.

I remember trying to learn new hobbies that had a lot of steps to them, and then realizing I was better off just doing more familiar things - baking recipes I already knew how to do instead of trying to learn some new complicated technique for something. My brain kept working on healing, and had I done more 'relaxing' and 'distracting' things at the time, I think I would have benefitted greatly. Once I DID catch on to this (a few years ago), I realized how much 'defrag' time my brain needed back then.

The brain can heal from trauma, as you know. As you are experiencing. It is a process. You're doing the right things.

Trees

[Boat Babe]

Spot on info above. As Trees says, you are dealing with physical injury and this takes time. You are working on rewiring your brain, not your mind, to become less reactive. What helped me was learning about brain chemistry, the addiction models, polyvagal theory,  Mindful Self Compassion and aspects of Buddhist psychology and practice.  And all the great info and support here. It's an everyday process that is steadily improving my inner world and my relationships and my ability to function in a healthy and skillful way. 

You too will find what works for you.

[NarcKiddo]

I'd like to add to the point Trees made (thank you, Trees, it's a very good one).

I recently started therapy and one of the questions my therapist has asked is whether I do any meditation/mindful relaxing sort of stuff. I don't, really, and I've tried, but my brain just skitters away and although it doesn't generally go to awkward places it sometimes does. At any rate I finish a session somewhat annoyed with myself or frustrated more often than not, which is clearly not the idea!

Thinking about it with my therapist, though, I've realised that I have naturally come to use exercise in that way. My coach finds it slightly unusual how receptive I am to programming that involves lots and lots of slow repetitions. And I've realised that it is my form of meditation. I concentrate on the physical feelings and counting the timing and the reps and that is enough to keep my brain occupied so it can't skitter around, but not enough to be arousing. It's worth a try if you enjoy exercise.

[bee well]

Hi Sambellscoup,

It's been a few but I just thought I would come back and say hello!

Thanks to all that posted information here. It is all very useful on this end.

Focussing on simplicity, and slowing down is fundamental, although sometimes it's very hard to do. I agree with NarcKiddo that "slow repetition" of exercise can be a form of meditation. Thanks for pointing that out.

( I have observed that while sometimes breathing can help to get relaxed or off to sleep, also for me, long periods of still meditation can be too much.)

I find walking to be a good form of meditation. Taking a different route in a familiar place is sometimes a good distraction. It's not complicated, but noticing new things keeps me focussed on the now. Also, it reminds me how much there is to see, even a short distance from home.

[sambellscoup]

Yes I'm a big fan of dumbbell weights for exercise, I too respond well to the steady focused repetition that is tied up in a physically demanding activity.

I've had a really bad boy of insomnia this last couple of weeks. It feels like it's gone on forever. Then suddenly I slept for 11 hours yesterday. I hope tonight I sleep well again but I don't know if I will.

I've started watching some of Jerry Wise's videos on YouTube and am excited to learn about differentiating self from others, and inner bonding. I'm already starting to think about any rushes of bad feelings/any sensation of my mind racing, and asking myself are these my thoughts and feelings or are they from the family system I grew up in? And already a few times I've found myself able to just drop it, whatever it was, and immediately feel better and calmer.

It's funny to think that I thought I'd done most of my internal work already, turns out I'd really mainly worked towards going NC in a grounded, nonreactive way, which is still good, but it's really only the beginning. But it's also really exciting, because who knows how far I'll go and how my life will change now?

[Call Me Cordelia]

It's funny to think that I thought I'd done most of my internal work already, turns out I'd really mainly worked towards going NC in a grounded, nonreactive way, which is still good, but it's really only the beginning. But it's also really exciting, because who knows how far I'll go and how my life will change now?

[sambellscoup]

So at the moment my insomnia is crazy bad, the heat isn't helping, but it's hard to switch off. There's a lot changing inside my head. My parents' voices are becoming very muted and their untruthful cruel words and actions and inactions just look wrong, and pathetic, and messed-up. They no longer feel like they hold weight. I don't need to believe them anymore.

Every so often I feel like they're fighting back. Or rather, the party of me that protected itself by believing them/believing I deserved what they dished out to me fights back. I can look rationally at the situation I'm reacting to, and logically see what's really going on is an old, learned reaction, and stop doing it... but it's just a lot of yo-yoing in my mind and it's keeping my mind totally wired.

On top of all that is the surprising mental quietness that comes with kicking my parents out of my head and making more room in there for me instead. It's so strangely calm and positive and focused, and everything in everyday life is so surprisingly easy compared to before, that my inner child has a little panic and tried to find something to be reacting to, but there's nothing there. And my logical, rational mind comes and talks down the hyped-up inner child again, and around I go in this circle all day and night.

The disappointment and the sadness that i was naive to dream of a unified family based on respect and maturity... That weighs heavily on me. I don't know how to stop thinking about that. It's constantly on my mind. "I just wanted us to move forward together. I thought the older adults would be more adulty than me and would be only too happy to grow up and deal with everything and work towards a real relationship. I was so wrong, but I wish it wasn't so. It was all a silly fantasy."

I guess it's just grief. I tried as hard as I was able to make this whole situation right, but it was never on me to do that. It is the responsibility of the perpetrator to put their abuse right, it is not their chosen target's job to take the reins and be the only one trying to make it happen.

It's just disappointment on top of disappointment. And that's a lot of disappointment to deal with. Just like every day came with great disappointments growing up.