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I was spanked as well and I've always been sensitive about it. I think what bothers me the most isn't what actually happened, but about how the people around me view it. **(TW)** People will get on the topic of unruly children and say, "Kids are so bratty these days. It's because parents aren't allowed to spank anymore. I was spanked and I turned out fine." Once I heard someone talking about doing it to their toddler and how it "didn't seem to be doing anything" and timeouts worked much better. (Ya think??) **(TW over)** Honestly, whenever it comes up, I get so angry I can't even speak. None of them have any concept of the harm they might be inflicting or indeed how ineffective it is overall.

I'm so sorry you had to go through that, mourningdove. Same for everyone else who was spanked. But we can help stop the cycle. 

That was one of the best articles I found on Shadow Work when I stumbled across the process this spring. Really good info.

What really disappointed me, however, was how long I spent researching self-help/psychology before finding out about Shadow Work. It helped hugely and yet you don't hear of it much! Probably because "embracing your inner demons" seems counter-productive to improving oneself . . . but it isn't!

Thanks for posting.

I like your comment.
They labelled me as borderline because I met the criteria but now I don't: does it mean I am cured? Or does it mean I never had BPD? What if BPD is another name for saying C-PTSD? I have made a pdf telling Why I had the symptoms of BPD and why some of them seemed right but are actually wrong. I can download here if you want.

Oh my goodness. I was really worried I was going to upset you! (Guess that's the C-PTSD talking.) Thank you.

What I've learned so far is that numerous people have speculated a lot of borderlines are actually suffering C-PTSD because there's so much overlap in symptoms. And some docs aren't up to date, or, as someone once told me, "Someone had to graduate at the bottom of their class," so misdiagnosis is common (as many in this thread can attest to). I think my stance on it is that they are different disorders, as some symptoms are almost polar opposites.

It's hard to say if you're "cured" or just didn't have it. On the one hand, while researching C-PTSD, I realized how far I'd come with managing most of my symptoms (whilst not knowing it was C-PTSD) but also that I would have been far, far more likely to be diagnosed borderline then, than I would now . . . but it still doesn't mean I was borderline then or just don't have BPD now. And I have to remind myself not to look at personality disorder criteria (or other illness criteria) because my anxiety will start convincing me I have that problem--only to later realize I was kind of "molding" myself into the symptoms, if that makes any sense. But as soon as I read about C-PTSD, it was different, because when I read about people's experiences, it was like reading my memoir. When I read about BPD or other illnesses, I felt like I was trying to contort myself.

Thanks Dee and sanmagic!  Don't sweat it, Blueberry!

I hear you loud and clear, having recently found the same relief of actually knowing why the occasional "meltdown" happens.  It's certainly good to know that it is caused by an injury rather than some inherent defect, and can be sorted out!  This morning I woke up terrified, but it was comforting to know why, which in turn helped me to face and then dissolve the fear (it had been caused by a dream I was having regarding past events).  Previously I would have spent the day becoming "scared of being scared" (if that makes any sense) until I could no longer function.  So even knowing what's going on can lead to progress.

Like yourself, I have done regular online "search binges" finding various possibilities, however that search can end as CPSTD seems to describe my experiences with 100% accuracy!  Wishing you good luck on your path to recovery.

Are we twins? I woke up the same this morning! I just felt awful. I can't even remember what I was dreaming, but I felt gross for ages.

I am well versed in "scared of being scared." It used to haunt me for years but did become more sporadic with time. The only way I shook myself out of the habit was one day I realized that it was kind of hilarious in a way, started laughing like a maniac, and "put the blinders on" until I got absorbed in other activities. I am not a great practitioner of that, however, and still have areas in my life where it creeps up (like being afraid that I will be too afraid of insomnia to sleep) and I have GAD, so I am one to talk! Anyway, I feel you on that one and I am rooting for both of us. I hope you're feeling better now!

Omg yes! I have been doing this all my life, everytime, everywhere.
The best thing is to see the present as it is, no matter how much it hurts. I know it's not the answer you wanted, but if the recovery was pleasant, it wouldn't be that hard. I think we daydream because we have lost the connection to reality, you need to regain that connection. Stopping daydreaming isn't something we can control, it is something that happens when we regain our connection to our true emotions. At least that's is how I see it. When you're in the present, you don't daydream. Maybe that's not your case. I don't know.

Oh, I definitely agree! It's going to take time to really see reality for what it is--and instead of running from it, live in it.

I've had periods where I didn't do it as much. This was when I went travelling across Canada for 3 months this fall. It was a nice break but it kind of blew me away when I settled down and started daydreaming constantly again. It's mostly because I'm unemployed and hermitting in my apartment, so definitely not the enriching environment it could be! I think I do it out of loneliness more than anything. And because I don't know what else I'd think about, haha . . .

Hi, I have been misdiagnosed with BPS, and I gotta say it was horrible. My (in that time) psychologist knew what I gent through and used to tell me that I should "forget it".
I gotta say, I don't believe personality disorders exist, *Please, if you don't wanna read more, quit it now*, because, what are mental disorders? Most of them can't be verified through physical methods, except for some of them... For a mental disorder to "exist", a group of doctor have to debate whether it exists, which are its symptoms... what I'm trying to say, is that mental disorders aren't like physical ones... you can't see a virus, a bacteria or a malformation in the brain (except for some disorders like I said) and verifie through that that the disorder actually exists. What doctors do is see some people, "treat" them, argue what is "wrong" with them and by consensus say what is the disorder they have.
Personality disorders are very insulting because saying someone has a personality disorder is equal to saying their personality is "wrong". It's like labelling the person as utterly wrong. If you ask a person labelled as Borderline if s/he have had a hard childhood, I'm 100% s/he is gonna say yes. Labelling a person as Borderline is just an excuse for treating that person who's personality you don't like with medication that makes more harm than good. Understanding that psychological problems aren't something you can verify by scaners but rather something people have "invented" by consensus by seeing people "that do weird stuff" or that "they don't like" is the first step to change the system. Despite what some people say, labelling someone as Borderline or with other "PD" is insulting. It's bascially saying that there is something wrong with their personality. There is nothing wrong with their personality, what is wrong is what people have done to them. If we want to change the stygma there is in psychology, we have to stop believing there is something "wrong" with people and start believing that what is wrong is what other have done to them. We don't want to be labelled as utterly wrong, we want to be cured! We don't want people to say that our personality is wrong and should change, we want them to say that what they made to us was wrong and we need the support we deserve! Stop labelling someone as "with a personailty disorder" and start making other names for "mental disorders". The name you give a disorder matters. "BPD" causes anxiety, but no one labelles it as an anxiety disorder. C-PTSD causes changes in personality, but no one labelles it as a personality disorder. The name matters. Please stop labelling people.
Thanks for reading!

I think you make some really good points and I've thought about this before as well. How can it really be quantified? You can't measure thoughts. There's so much we don't know about the brain--we haven't even solved the mind-body problem!

But, from what we do know, you can detect noticeable differences in neurological functionality when comparing brain scans between healthy individuals, and those with mental illnesses or personality disorders. I take that with a grain of salt, however, as those are usually composites of a group average, and that composite doesn't actually match any individual in that group. If you want to learn more about that, I read a good book called "The End Of Average". But, overall, it is something physically detectable at this point in time, with what we know, and I have faith it's a good step forward in terms of treatment.

I will say, however, some personality disorders, such as narcissistic/sociopathic are useful for diagnosing, as those can be a good label for someone who is generally destructive and probably can't be cured. But on the opposite side of things, I agree that things like histrionic/avoidant/borderline should not be under the "hopeless" umbrella, nevermind that it's possible those diagnosed with those disorders may have C-PTSD instead. In general, the key is that people with personality disorders aren't supposed to have the self-awareness that they have a problem--it's everyone else who has a problem in their mind. Again, it's possible more people are being misdiagnosed with it than those that actually have that personality disorder. But, at the end of the day, I think it's really sad people treat them as a lost cause--BPD was originally coined to categorize people who were "lost causes" to signal other practitioners not to bother with them, from my understanding. And that's truly sad.

End of the day, I think people do tend to put people too much into boxes and then decide, based on the label alone, to not accept them. I mean, I've seen my fair share of "advice" that you should cut out depressed friends because they'll just "bring you down with them." People's personalities come in all sorts of shades and spectrums and I think we have a lot of work to do towards just accepting them, flaws and all, and trying to work with them--because labelling them as "hopeless" or "defective" is not going to do that!

I live up in the land of polar bears, igloos, and beavers. Oh, and moose. Yes, I live in dark, wintery Canada!

Jokes aside, I started with regular intermittent depression at 12 and it morphed into mostly just seasonal. This is my third year of using a light box in the mornings and I've found it really takes the edge off--sometimes I feel like my mood is still "meh" but at least it's not a raging depression, and usually fends off more episodes later in the year/the depression becoming a year-rounder. I've also found it helps with some weird anxiety I get in the springtime (I think it's related to the time change, that's all I figure). I tend to use it from October through March.

Vit.D probably isn't a bad idea. I've done it sometimes but didn't personally find a difference, but then, I do plenty of walking year-round. I take Omega-3's though since it's supposed to be good for mitigating the neurological wear that happens with chronic stress/depression/etc.

The only thing to really be careful of with the light therapy is:

1) Build up usage gradually. 5 mins for a couple days, 10 for a couple of days, 20, etc.; around 30-40 mins usually does it for me in the darkest depths of winter and I use more/lower usage depending on how much I'm sleeping. If you start with too much, too soon, you'll feel like you're buzzing with electricity/get insomnia/etc.
3) Some people split the therapy up through the day or do it in the afternoon. I heard it was best in morning so that's what I do; but experiment!
2) Some people get mania when they use light therapy. I'm sure it's rare but I thought I'd throw it out there. Generally I hear it's safe with most antidepressants/meds but check with a doctor.

Overall I totally recommend them. It's not too much of a pain to read or use a computer while you do the therapy first thing in the morning, and it makes the winter much more bearable. If you have a membership, Costco sells them for a really good price.

Mine:

-The faintest whiff of criticism.
-If someone even disagrees with an opinion sometimes (though this has improved thank gods).
-Yelling/outbursts of anger.
-Crying, unfortunately.
-Being cussed at/made fun of in a friendly or non-friendly way.
-Making a mistake.
-Not knowing what to do.
-People who remind me of FOO/toxic people in general/my actual FOO.
-Trying to get medical treatment. Even if they're nice I'm still left in pieces but apathetic doctors or people who don't understand the severity of the problem (because I'll find myself downplaying my problem automatically) are huge, huge triggers.
-THINKING I'm not liked. If I find I'm not liked for real, I'm not particularly bothered. It's just the threat of it!

I'm sure there are more to discover but that's off the top of my head.

My EFs:

-Intense sadness (to the point of sobbing/screaming)
-Avoiding eye contact
-Acting small, talking in a small voice
-Avoiding help from people/isolating behaviours
-Suicidal urges/self-hate
-Other self-destructive behaviour/urges like wanting to starve myself, purposely not leaving bed in the morning, saying I'll never talking to anyone again even though I want to, etc.
-Rage usually makes an appearance
-Helplessness of such that I'll know what I need to do to get help, or get out of the spiral, but will refuse
-I'll panic if I'm around other people because I don't want them to see/help
-Wanting to run and hide
-My chest gets this weird feeling--kind of like relief but I'm not sure. Just this different kind of tension in a way?

That's all I got for now. I'm sure there are more subtle EFs I have yet to discover.

I've been exploring the possibility I do this, too. It's not so much that I escape into a story, per se, but for the last ten years, I am constantly having/preparing for conversations with people, or exploring possible disasterous situations and what I'd do . . . but the conversation thing really gets to me because I'll make expressions/hand movements as if someone is there, and I can't seem to stop doing it.

It's definitely a coping skill, as that's where I have my arguments, where I stand up for myself, where I say the things I really want to say . . . and end up woefully falling short in real life.

I'm in the same camp. I thought I had an Internet addiction but on reading about C-PTSD, I realized how often I was turning to the Internet's endless depths of distraction in order not to sit through or work through an issue. I'd really cut down this spring but after travelling for a few months, I decided to settle down for a bit. It's been emotionally rocky and I've found myself just glued to YouTube or researching psychology material, even stuff I've already seen before, because it's calming and I guess I can't calm myself!

I can attest to mulling over the same idea RE: changing one's last name. I went NC in June and definitely considered it as I don't want the name and it's also awkward-sounding anyway. For the time being, I created a Facebook with a name of my choosing and I'm liking it a lot so far. I'm hoping to get published at some point (once I, you know, finish my book . . . eventually . . . lol) and all the "cool kids" get a pen name, so I've been considering for even longer what that would be--but who knows? I might change it by then. It seems simple enough of a process and takes a bit of mental weight off.

[TW: Brief description of emotional abuse, and some about suicidal thoughts.]

TW: Brief description of emotional abuse, and some about suicidal thoughts.

Hello all!

I came across the term C-PTSD recently and I was blown away. Reading about it and how other people experience it, I was just like, "I could have written this!" for the first time in my life. One of my bad anxiety habits is to search the Internet for info/reassurance when I was experiencing mental unpleasantness. What's this coping mechanism? What's this? What's that? Is this a disorder? And so on. Only I'd hit the personality disorders now and again and then be absolutely terrified I had them, even though I didn't think they described me at all. So I'd be like, it's sort of BPD, but not really. Sort of PTSD, but not really. Sort of GAD, but is it really?  . . .

Since I was twelve, I've had depression on and off (it's now strictly seasonal for the most part) and anxiety really started to kick in hard when I was fifteen. It was actually so bad at first that I entered some weird dissociative state in which I had memory problems in the realm of "I can't remember what happened this morning" and "I can't recall any long-term memory" and had other cognitive problems. This lasted for three years until I finally broke out somehow. I seemed to be making good progress with both the anxiety and depression until I realized how many things in life I wanted, but avoided, due to anxiety/distressing feelings that would come up, like dating, having close friends, driving; even writing, which I love, has been tainted by my persistent dread--I used to be able to do it for hours a day but almost don't even touch it now out of, ironically, the fear of not wanting to do it or discovering it's terrible.

As for the family: I was homeschooled (hoo boy) with two older siblings and my little sister, who is eight years my junior. Dad was the totalitarian ruler; Mom was the emotionally unavailable codependent. Us kids got the blame when they were stressed, and got put down and/or punished when experiencing negative emotions (even unrelated to them). M/D are fairly self-absorbed and doled out about equal amounts of emotional abuse/neglect, with the occasional lies/manipulation sprinkled in. A couple of my favourite examples are:

1) My older sister was hurting herself/on the verge of suicide at age 16. My parents found out, and promptly grounded her, made her quit her job, stop seeing her friends, and could no longer use the computer.
2) When my anxiety started I had a persistent sense I was about to die soon. I unfortunately told my mother about my extreme distress, my one hope at the time for some comfort (for some reason). She awkwardly told me it was PMS and never brought it up again or questioned the ensuing erratic behaviour, including my development of disordered eating.

Since I spent most of the time in the country, in my teens living isolated without friends, it was difficult when I moved out at nineteen and started working in retail, because that's when all the troublesome relationship problems really came out of the woodwork--I didn't even know how to have a conversation with people, much less emote rationally.

For years, I felt so ashamed of my "meltdowns." I didn't understand why I couldn't be sad or mad like other people--I'd get absolutely hysterical every time. And as I was sensitive, it happened at least a couple of times a week; CBT (started two years ago) toned it down to about once a month, until no amount of rationality could hold back the floodgates. I couldn't explain why I felt fine-ish most of the time, then to be hit, in circumstances bearing any resemblance to childhood trauma, with a deluge of rage, despair, and suicidal thoughts. I think the latter was the most confusing of all--because it was so incongruent with how I felt about living.

But, I think after a particularly rough week in which, for the first time ever, I actually considered doing something--I get real triggered by getting medical help and I was trying to get a psychiatrist AND a therapist and nothing was panning out--I realized the suicidal urge was felt, in some part of my brain, to be the only defence I had left; that I couldn't change the situation any other way. I usually think of it in terms of "Do it and people will realize they hurt you/miss you/loved you/you weren't terrible" and now I see how sad it is that some part of me believes the only way I can get those basic things from people/my family is by not existing.

I felt incredibly relieved when I stumbled across emotional flashbacks because finally, I could not only explain what I was experiencing (and it was not due to some flaw in willpower or personal integrity), and that others experienced the same thing, too. Unfortunately it's a slippery slope in which flashbacks trigger suicidal thoughts, which trigger more flashbacks, and the cycle just seems to go on forever, unless I numb out. But it's a step forward and I've been getting better about releasing steam without going nuclear--so I have good hopes for the sadness side of things.

I am not diagnosed CPTSD obviously but I should be on the road to it. I feel so much better knowing I'm not alone and I can get better. Not sure how this got so long but I really look forward to getting to know you all!