Something my doctor told me about trauma

[Invisiblewoman]

You don't always need to rehash difficult memories, or stay in a difficult headspace to heal.

Occasionally do the heavy lifting to deal with difficult emotions when they come up but give yourself moments of joy, and simple moments. Let yourself remember that life is good and most often people can be trusted.

I told him I feel like my issue is my trauma is not a mental thing. It's almost a physical thing where I have exaggerated startle reflexes, and whenever I used to have to deal with family, I had this dreadful feeling that something bad could happen. This feeling affects other parts of my life and affects me socially.

It's not so much the accessible memories of what happened but the sense of being easily startled, and how it sometimes takes me longer to come back to centre once I have been triggered.

[Call Me Cordelia]

That's generally all true but you are right, emotional flashbacks are the hallmark of CPTSD and the experience of them is not really within your control. That is, you are not deliberately "staying in a difficult headspace."

It's both. You are educating yourself and learning and pursuing healing and joy in your life and positive relationships. And this is really crazy hard stuff that you can't just make disappear.

You are still relatively recent on beginning healing and having established boundaries with your FOO, yes? It's okay that you need time to come back to center when stuff upsets you. It's understandably all pretty raw and well, of course! It is in your body. You can feed yourself positive thoughts, and that is very good, but it's in your body and it takes time and most often a lot of deliberate effort to rewrite that trauma so the response is significantly diminished for you. You've learned for good reason that when you interact with people things could go way badly. Your guard being up is very natural for you and it made sense for the life you've had thus far. It's not just in your head. It will take a great many positive and safe interactions with people to undo that response.

I feel like I'm saying the same thing over and over, but I'm getting the feeling of an element of shaming in your doctor's comments. Or, at least, that he doesn't fully get it. Please do be patient and gentle with yourself. You really have been through so much.

[Invisiblewoman]

I don't think he meant to be shaming, I think he said that sometimes you have to just give yourself time.

Grounding exercises are so important. It's not a weakness.

It's my first anniversary of no contact and I am giving myself a pat on the back for recognizing the harmful and disrespectful behaviour sooner

[moglow]

You don't always need to rehash difficult memories, or stay in a difficult headspace to heal.

Occasionally do the heavy lifting to deal with difficult emotions when they come up but give yourself moments of joy, and simple moments. Let yourself remember that life is good and most often people can be trusted.

I kinda like the way he put that actually. Reminding you that it's a process, and it's not necessarily predictable. I suspect that like me, you never knew where or when it was coming, just that it would. So you became hyper vigilant. I don't startle easily, I went way the other direction where I hide in the dark in a corner and watch. I isolate. I can't be surprised from my corner, always watching, observing. Noticing how my body reacts to people. That hinky sense of "s/he can't be trusted"  has rarely failed me.

With that, over time I've become more accepting of people, mainly myself. I may keep a dab of distance and may be quicker than most to shut down situations that don't feel right. No means no, and trying to push me beyond that No is going to shut me down harder. I don't accept guilt like I used to. 

It's truly a process, Invisible Woman, one where our job is to be gentle with and good to ourselves first, then let that spill over. Anniversaries such as this help us see how far we actually have come, give us a place to reflect and build from. 

[Invisiblewoman]

You don't always need to rehash difficult memories, or stay in a difficult headspace to heal.

Occasionally do the heavy lifting to deal with difficult emotions when they come up but give yourself moments of joy, and simple moments. Let yourself remember that life is good and most often people can be trusted.

I kinda like the way he put that actually. Reminding you that it's a process, and it's not necessarily predictable. I suspect that like me, you never knew where or when it was coming, just that it would. So you became hyper vigilant. I don't startle easily, I went way the other direction where I hide in the dark in a corner and watch. I isolate. I can't be surprised from my corner, always watching, observing. Noticing how my body reacts to people. That hinky sense of "s/he can't be trusted"  has rarely failed me.

With that, over time I've become more accepting of people, mainly myself. I may keep a dab of distance and may be quicker than most to shut down situations that don't feel right. No means no, and trying to push me beyond that No is going to shut me down harder. I don't accept guilt like I used to.

It's truly a process, Invisible Woman, one where our job is to be gentle with and good to ourselves first, then let that spill over. Anniversaries such as this help us see how far we actually have come, give us a place to reflect and build from.

I relate strongly to staying in your little corner and observing others until you feel safe to engage more, and becoming very good at non-reactivity because Narcissists love it when you give them a reaction.

Anyone who doesn't take no for an answer gets shut down very quickly.

I am kind of a combination of hyperarousal and hypoarousal. Unknown situations take time for me to adjust to.

[JustKeepTrying]

For me, it's those moments of joy that keep me grounded. Keep me moving forward and make life worth living.  Make those flashbacks bearable. 

It's a balance. Finding the right balance and not living in either realm too long.

[Lmoody333@gmail.com]

I know my body holds it all, as the memories aren't that triggering. Other things trigger me. My nervous system has been so acclimated to being in flight that I am just now learning how to really relax ( I thought I knew haha). Leaning into actual fun and good feelings gives me a break from all the body stress and body pain I feel. I try to hold onto those feelings or access them throughout the day to make life a little brighter. I think your doctor was just saying to try and notice the moments of fun you have, nurture them and help them grow so that they can take over more and more space from the bad feelings. We can do this!!! We deserve a fun and peaceful life!