New to Group (Possible Triggers)

[Brick]

Hello, I am new to this forum and I am already grateful for it

I immediately identified with others' introductions. There has been so much pain absorbed by so many. And there is so much triumph in life's consolations.

I am a 45yr old male. I entered counselling when my short marriage disintegrated two and a half years ago. She was an abusive N. She began by identifying with me, then depersonalizing me. I left, and I sought help.

My FOO is a mess. My father was an angry, violent, alcoholic N. He manipulated the household, mostly my schizophrenic mother. I have two much older brothers. Both express CPTSD; one is diagnosed with PTSD, and I respect his limited contact. I stay in low contact with family. That works best.

My mother rejected the infant me. She had a psychotic event at my birth, and her own trauma expressed itself through dissociation. She became another her. One that hadn't been pregnant and didn't want this baby foisted on her. She was institutionalized for most of my first five years, starting immediately after my birth.

Her presence has been an impenetrable mix of disturbed logic. There were many, many episodes. Both parents were terror. Neither could trust or be trusted. There were no "I love you's" until I started handing them out in my twenties.

I cannot discern a timeline of my first five years, because everyone gets caught in their own trauma. I stayed mostly with one set of relatives, and it is there that I must have received whatever love it was that has preserved my life.

I don't have an articulate memory of home life, other than the oppression. It was daily violence, threats of violence, yelling, screaming and broken glasses, lamps, doors, windows, and walls. There was no mercy.

Everything was sufficiently covered up for family or friends, but my brothers and I each found our own ways to act out the violence. My own memories of dishing it out are not accessible to me. I've had to piece it together through therapy.

I was aware of dissociation as a child. I'd snap out of something, knowing time had passed. I asked people right then, and I've never been satisfied with what they tell me. Sometimes I was violent, and I have no working memory of that.

To look deeper is to associate that I likely could not bear the experience because I was BEING an overpowering violence that had already happened.

I've recently discovered this part of myself that has been locked away. I was 5 and 6 years old and now must forgive the child I was.

I've 'coped' for decades. Moving, moving, moving. A doormat. Helpless, entirely at others' mercy. Always in poverty. Financially and spiritually. I sought and found answers in literature and music. I lived out the invisibility and worthlessness that was programmed into me. I can see how my hunger for connection opened the door for abuse. Over and over.

I've been candy to any N's I'd meet. When I began to recognize their foulness, I had to leave my job (N boss) and limit a number of my professional contacts.

I have nowhere to go but forward. No task but to survive, and sometimes I even thrive. But the EF's are so numerous and pernicious. I can't always drown out the voice that hates me. My dedication to healing requires more.

Two long-time associates and 'friends' recently colluded to steal from me. I handled it professionally, and it's all over. But my triggers were pulled, and I can't get through to the emergency vehicles in my head to stop. Stop running the sirens, stop ramping up my heart rate, stop focusing on defending against a threat that will never arrive.

Again, I am grateful that this forum exists, and that I can safely say all those things I was warned never to tell anyone.

[Trees]

Welcome Brick!       I am sorry your childhood was so full of chaos and rejection and terror, but I am glad you decided to post here among so many others with stories similar to yours.  Yes, this is a place where it is safe to tell the truth about the dark years.

And you write vividly of the effect on one's adult years.  I could very much identify with your remarks:

"I've 'coped' for decades. Moving, moving, moving. A doormat. Helpless, entirely at others' mercy. Always in poverty. Financially and spiritually. I sought and found answers in literature and music. I lived out the invisibility and worthlessness that was programmed into me. I can see how my hunger for connection opened the door for abuse. Over and over."

I hope you will read around the site and make yourself comfortable here.  Our purpose is to support and comfort one another, and to share information on complex ptsd, as we all deal with this condition that so dramatically shapes our lives.

Our most highly recommended reading is Pete Walker's book, "Complex PTSD:  From Surviving to Thriving."   This book is my personal favorite as well.  It conveys a great deal of information about the condition and in such a warm and compassionate way.  And it fits with what I have learned along the way in my own long journey with cptsd.

I am looking forward to hearing more from you, when you feel like it.  All the best to you in your journey.   

[mourningdove]

Welcome, Brick

I'm so sorry for the horrendous abuse you have suffered and I am glad you are here.   

[VeryFoggy]

Yes, welcome Brick!  I am so glad you found the site, and thank you for sharing your story.  It is horrible and awful, and nobody deserves to be treated like that.  I am so sorry! 

It is a tough journey you have decided to take, but I believe it is a good decision.  I am sure you already know that other choices only led to more of the same.  So you have decided to do something different, and I applaud you and your courage!

I know for me, finding a place of safety and calm was the only thing that helped me be able to have enough space in my head to sort out what I needed to do.  So I hope for your sake you do soon find a space where you feel safe, as that will definitely help the "emergency vehicle's sirens" to stop screaming.

I second Trees recommendation of Pete Walker's book 'Complex PTSD From Surviving To Thriving'. It definitely helped me start coming to terms with CPTSD. So I hope you will consider reading it. Most of us here have found it tremendously helpful.

Again welcome and you are safe here! 

[Brick]

Thank you for your kind welcomes.

I ordered Pete Walker's book today. I have seen it mentioned many times here. In fact, when I read the page on EF Management on his website, I knew then that I must order the book and introduce myself to the forum.

All through childhood, I assumed that what was true in my life was true in everyone else's. I would be in the home of a friend and think, "These people aren't fooling me...I know what really goes on..." That type of thinking worked into my interpretation of EF's, as well.

I figured everybody else had constant intrusive thoughts, too. The only difference is that they were so much better at dealing with them than me, for one elusive reason or another. I only began to face them for what they are within the past year. Which makes me a Newbie to emotional management.

Thank you, VeryFoggy, I have been in a comparatively safe place for some time. When I left my ex, I began to stay at a friend's. He soon after moved in with his fiance (now wife) allowing me to inhabit a house alone. My T and I agreed that such an opportunity was rare and to be seized. I've allowed myself time to grieve and process-to step forward a little and step back a little. It has been a painful and a fruitful time. I am grateful, grateful, grateful. I'm ultimately grateful that my ex moved on to another man (another supply) right after I left. It made leaving easier. It hurt, but that was really just ancient hurt finding a contemporary outlet...

A few months ago, I started to venture back into the world, beyond minimum interaction (the things I do for $). The level of trials we all face are sending me to exacerbated levels of anxiety, depression and anger-my three oldest friends. I'm no longer faking it from day to day, which means I'm pretty raw sometimes. I'm drinking in Pete Walker's 13 behavioral techniques!

Trees, I look forward to exploring the site! So much here to discover!

Thank you, Thank you

[Boatsetsailrose]

Hi brick thank you for sharing

'I can't get through to the emergency vehicles in my head to stop. Stop running the sirens, stop ramping up my heart rate, stop focusing on defending against a threat that will never arrive'

Now these words you have written are so identifying for me with cptsd - and to have the identification and give it a name has been such a relief to .. This forum has been so liberating Also - to meet others who experience similar
My foo were crazy and the noise in the house was deafening
Just like the noise in my head some 24 yrs after leaving the chaos house
I have just received Pete walkers book today and was delighted to find how big a volume it is - very grateful

'I have nowhere to go but forward. No task but to survive, and sometimes I even thrive. But the EF's are so numerous and pernicious. I can't always drown out the voice that hates me. My dedication to healing requires more'

I've felt like this always - thank u
I have just completed 12 wks with a child trauma therapist and it was amazing - she is very talented at what she does -
I haven't had the self hatred anywhere near like as it was - that was the part that got the worst -
It felt like it was literally killing me
I feel stronger than I have in a long time - I also am getting recovery for an eating disorder and that is amazing after all this time

Pete walker and many others have walked this path before us and each and everyone of us here has a very real chance of re setting back to a healthier mode ..
For liberation and freedom - to get to become who we were meant to be all along