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oh boy, absolutely, Boatssr!  it's awful but it's a comfort to realise so manyof us experience this too. it makes it more bearable somehow and i'm grateful i spotted this thread. 

i beat myself up often about being so ga-ga, but  reading this thread i realise what a whacking dose of stuff i am on: 30mg citalopram and 50mg Trazodone... no wonder my brain is so fried. i am not surprised now tht i can't seem to concentrate for more than ten minutes unless i am stuck in front of brainless tv. (currently 'Bones' re-runs).

i wish i could go back on sertraline, it really was the best anti-dep i have found for me, but it also exacerbated my arthritis greatly so i had to stop it. also it may have been part of the cause of the microscopic colitis i develped. 

like you say, Danaus, one * of a trade-off.  personally it's a price i daren't not pay at present, as it's stopping the downward mood spiral. don't feel wonderful, but also not at suicidal stage, which has to be good! 

and i wonder if i am kidding myself about being ill!!??

MoonHare, i was in this position five years ago. i ended up leaving with nothing but a few bits of furniture and my personal stuff.  but i am testament to the fact that even without much resources, i am still here, settled in a little (well, tiny, but hey  it's fine) flat, and i am surviving, and i feel like have a chance to start to heal. it was the hardest thing i ever did, but i am so glad and relieved that i did. i have cptsd, but i am not in an abusive situation any more and have no contact with all the toxic people who so damaged me.
just wanted you to know that if the worst does come to the worst, you will survive and have the space at last to heal and flourish.

Can an EF occur on a longer timescale as well? For example, this feeling I describe can last for weeks.

my personal experience would suggest that yes, Sesame, definitely. an emotional flashback is a bit different from a visual or auditory type flashback.  i think of it more a s a feeling state where i am living in the emotional turmoil of the traumatic times even tho i am not in them at the moment. i may or may not be able to identify the trigger. sometimes it's an event, often it could be a dream, or even just something i watch or read - it can vary. it is horrible, i have to admit.  i guess, having spent so many decades in a hyperaroused emotional state, i just havent managed to learn how to turn the volume down! 

i find that repeating to myself that 'nothing bad is happening to me at this moment. i am ok at this moment' and things like that, help to get me through the worst moments of fear and anxiety. a sort of 'on the go' adaptation of Pete Walker's EF management techniques. when i can get it together i do try and sit down and go through these, but i find one of two of them a bit triggering, partic around thought control, so i am not too good at them, tbh.

i think for myself that learning how to turn down the volume and regulate my emotional state is the key to being able to move on into some kind of life. it's not easy, i know.

don't know if this is any use to you, Sesame. just thought i'd share 

wow. beautiful, woodsgnome. 

today has been a flat kind of day, and it was very hard to get going this morning. i suspect if i hadn't had to get up i would have just stayed in  bed. but i did get up and did manage to clean the ratties' cage, which is a big job that i tackle every sunday and seriously didn't feel like doing.  taking on the responsibility for these little creatures has been good, it means that i have to do things like this, looking after them and giving them a lovely life, the best i can - after all, they didn't ask to be my pets and they deserve the best for the joy they are bringing into my life.
ate some of the first strawberries out of the garden today. little joys mean a lot if you take time to appreciate them.
and my flowers are blooming, lots of colour in my patio pots.
and, wonder of wonders - my resident blackbird, who visits my  patio daily for food, upon finding nothing to eat this afternoon, sat on the patio in sight of my doors and sang loudly, to make me come out and feed him.  he got the supper that he sang so beautifully for!

it's good to notice these things, when my emotions are sad and flat. little joys. helps a lot.

 

yep, i agree. it's one thing apologising for upsetting someone, quite another taking responsibility for fixing their feelings. the first is good, the second has to be their job.  you did good!

I have decided to stick with love. Hate is too great a burden to bear. Danaus that is so beautiful i am adopting it for myself. thank you.

my thoughts are with these people in Orlando who have borne such a terrible cost of others' hatred. may their families and loved ones find the grace inside themselves to 'stick with love' too and not allow the haters to win.

thought also are with Jo Cox's family (the British MP killed by hate this week) especially her little ones and her husband. i don't understand how hate can so consume a person but i suppose it must for them to be able to justify these actions.

i refuse it. i will not become a hater. the human cost is too great the world over. 

after a couple of days of being triggered every time i think about journalling, i am finally feeling i might be ok to do it today. i am not pushing myself in this becos i have to limit the amount of triggers i deal with at the moment.  i think it's becos of the whole starting to face myself and my inner turmoil again. it is very difficult to do it without getting terribly anxious. but better this than the black depression that was enveloping me.

my success story today is that i have gone for a walk (actually i did yesterday too). only 20 mins or so each time, and only round the block where i live but it's a start on the road back to getting my body back into some kind of fitness.  that and the more sensible eating which i am trying to do, with variable success.  i think the thing is to keep trying little bits at a time and not beat myself up if i don't do well.  i have done this before, clawed myself back to fitness. i must be able to do it again. 

i am back in the state where i find even walking past a person in the street triggers me.  i actually got a pain in my chest when i was walking today from anxiety. had to do a bit of self talking 'everything's fine, i am ok, nearly home' etc. but i still managed my little circuit round the roads, so i can feel proud of that.

in the past few days i have also:  washed up, hoovered, sorted out the washing, gone food shopping and cooked a meal.  all things that are very hard to do at the moment and it has taken a few days like i say, but i did them.  i wrote myself a list and ticked the things off as i did them.  such small strategies are helpful.

i guess when i read back what i just wrote it, i realise that i really am quite poorly at the moment.  most of the time i am berating myself for being weak and stupid and ineffectual but actually, i think it's just this damned illness. it is an illness. it is not becos i am bad or stupid or weak or selfish. i am actually sick.  in my mind.  and it's not my fault.  -  why is it so hard for me to believe this? why do i feel such guilt about it? why do i think i am a fraud and bad? why do i still believe that what has happened to me is my own fault, that my victim mentality is the reason why people have taken advantage of me - becos i let them, was too stupid to stop them, deserved their abuse becos of not being wise enough to see it and strong enough to stand up for myself?. is it not more likely that people taking advantage of me, abusing me, was what turned me into a victim in the first place?  which comes first, horse or cart, chicken or egg? what would i say to someone else in this situation? why do i not believe the same for myself? my mind is so  messed up at the moment it makes my head hurt.

stopping now, getting upset.  more another day.

sending you a  LanaBanana, just cos u need one  hope you will feel a bit better today. it's good to post and i notice that like me you tend to feel guilty for asking for support.  it's so hard isn't it? yet when i read your posts i have no difficulty in wanting to reassure you that it's fine to ask.  praps if we all tell each other that, we will slowly get it into our own heads too?? !! anyway, thinking of you, LanaB 

yes, me too!! especially neighbour noise, neighbour dog barking, engines revving, people shouting/arguing, too-loud cinema speakers, loud music, crowds, traffic, human noise in general i guess!..
the sounds i love are birdsong, wind, thunder, rain on the roof, my ratties eeping at each other in the cage, mama ewes and lambs in the spring, cockcrow at dawn, the waves on the seashore, the sound of a river rushing, and a brook babbling, some music, sometimes - and the sound of silence. these are soul soothing sounds, healing sounds, they don't hurt my soul. 

i really know what you mean, Sesame, it's a horrible feeling to have, and nothing will change the past, no matter how much we wish. BUT...
i guess for me one thing that helps is to have a small project on the go, something that makes me feel creative or that gives me satisfaction. without any time limits for completion, or obligation to finish at all if i don't want.  i guess just making or learning or doing something nice makes the present moment a bit better, and somehow makes me feel more hopeful for the next moment and future moments.  my thing at the moment is to learn to make a willow basket. sounds daft but it helps. maybe my dream (to be a potter) is not going to happen this year or maybe ever (no money, no premises, and anyway, my mind is too poorly), but i can do something small with the resources i do have, this week.

the other thing is to try and remind myself that there was a lot in the my past life that was worthwhile, even if it wasn't as it should have been. what happened to me was wrong and unjust and terrible. but...
  i got two honest and beautiful kids, who love me, out of it, i learnt how to love and how to endure without sacrificing my moral integrity or becoming like the people who were abusing me.  no matter the bad stuff, and how awful it all ended up, those things were valuable, i have them inside me, and they formed me in some way. am i making sense?  i guess i just mean i am trying to keep myself from throwing the baby out with the bathwater.  black and white thinking are a weakness of mine (i wonder if they are symptomatic of cptsd too?) and i have to remind myself that life is many shades of colour.
maybe it's not so much about what i achieve but who i am?

no need to apologise, i like reading what you put! feedback and another's experience are helpful to me.

radical, you could have been me writing there!!  the burning of bridges, the loss of belief system, and the thing about no longer giving away our power , even tho we have no real idea what to do with it when we keep hold of it.

it helps enormously to realise i am not alone feeling this way. thank you

yes, Boatssr, that's the challenge for me too at the moment i think - not beating myself up about the fact that i am in EF so much of the time.  it's been a bit of a revelation, the fact that i feel so guilty when i have them.  i really feel as if i should be able to not 'give in' to them, and that it's  selfish and sinful to do so.  it is weird how i never really noticed that before. 
today's small step was to go down the Post Office and post my dad's Father's Day gift. and i managed to do it. i know it's a very small step but it is very hard to do this stuff at the moment so i have to tell myself to be proud of doing that.  and also i am trying really hard to sort out my eating and go back to my healthy eating style instead of the carb/sugar/fat bingeing i seem to do when a) my microscopic colitis is in flare and b) my soul is in pain.  a and b combined are the reason why i have piled on weight again.  my 'nod' to exercise was to come home from the PO the long way round.  baby steps. 
it's funny how this tentative re-engagement with things is causing me such disproportionate pain. and a continuous kind of flashback into deep anxiety and guilt and discomfort.  i hope it really is the right way to go. today i spent quite a bit of time on and off telling myself over and over 'nothing bad is happening to me at the moment' - it helps a little when i start to panic etc.   i mustn't let myself get back into the bad state i was before xmas last year. that was dangerous and i still don't really know how i managed to survive.

feels like life is a bit out of control, like i am walking a tightrope between engaging and going too far - i really fear getting bad again.
i find it very difficult to gauge how i am doing becos i have no feedback and no one to bounce things off of.  that is the one downside of self isolating. hopefully journalling here will help again. it's nice when people respond a bit, so thanks you guys.