Introducing myself

[amiej220@gmail.com]

Hello Everyone

Recently (as in today) my therapist told me she believes I have complex PTSD. I started seeing her recently after years of explosive anger, irritability and overall unwillingness to establish and maintain intimacy. My mother was murdered when I was two years old, and I was moved  from the west coast to Kentucky by my father. All within a year I was sexually abused by his sister's husband and moved from foster home to foster home. My mother's younger sister flew across the states and took me back to the west coast. But the abuse continued with her and her husband. She was not prepared to take care of a child who had experienced such trauma as well as her NINE children. She was critical and cold and I grew up believing I was not as loved as her own children, with that came guilt because I felt it was wrong to see my aunt that way even though her abuse was and still is obvious. Her husband was both physically and sexually abusive and a few of her male children were also physically abusive. Now I have put alot of distance from my family, even though we live on miles apart, most of my siblings are heavily addicted to substance, I have luckily avoided this. I am a student and a self taught artist, but I still feel as though these events in my life are controlling my direction. A few years ago I had a reoccurring night terror where I was unable to breathe, I woke up sweating, panting and with a racing heart. My therapist believes this could be related to the way in which my mother died, she was strangled to death. I still have alot of issues with talking about these things, I feel as though i'm playing the victim "was it really that bad?" and it is hard to accept that my family has abused me.

[Three Roses]

Hello and welcome! So glad to have you here with us.

I'm having a hard time with language atm, hope this will be coherent.

First of all, I'd like to suggest you change your displayed name; please make sure you can remain safely anonymous.

I'm so very sorry to hear what you've been thru, and about your mother's murder. You are not "playing the victim". Sometimes I think people just say that sort of thing as a way to avoid the subject, get us to not talk about it,  or to engage in victim-blaming.

It is very difficult to think that our families hurt us. I'm sorry to hear this is also the case for you. I'm glad you are here, though, and happy to hear that your therapist is identifying you as complex ptsd. So many therapists don't know the distinction, it seems. We're a group of people who will listen & hear you, and validate your feelings,  so thanks for joining.

[Blueberry]

Welcome!
I'm pretty new here myself but have already felt lots of support. I hope that you will too.

I know that many of us with C-PTSD ask ourselves if it really was that bad. The answer is: yes it really was that bad. I don't ask myself so much anymore, partly because enough people have showed me that it was really bad, even worse than I thought. Hope this helps you too.

[sanmagic7]

welcome amiej,  very glad you're here.

i'm happy for you that you've been able to get out and away from those people and their abuse.  so terrible what's happened to you. 

i've found tremendous support and caring and validation here, it's helped me so much to keep recovering.  i hope you find the same.  best of everything to you.