Struggling with something I learned about myself

[storyworld]

I just got off the phone with my sister. During our conversation, I asked her some pointed questions that felt (feel) important for me to be able to honestly discuss my childhood hurts. She had said something in a past conversation regarding my "way" of expressing my emotions as a kid, and so I followed up and asked what she meant. She said during one particular period in my early teens, I would become enraged, and it was like someone had flipped a switch. She said I would yell and swear, and that my mom later said she didn't know how to deal with me. I now don't know how to process things during that time period. Honestly, I feel like my parents were justified in certain things, and if not justified, then I can at least understand. I acknowledge how many of their behaviors and actions prior were hurtful and harmful, and I can see how those things may played a part in my displays of rage. But based on what my sister said, if I had been my parents, I would've sent my teen off to military camp or something. And I really don't know how to process this.

[Kizzie]

To be honest Storyworld it sounds like you were being a teen, but with an extra layer of hurt and pain on top of the usual hormones teens have raging through them that send them into fight mode. Those hormones can make teens fairly primal at the best of times, some more than others. I wasn't there of course but as a fellow survivor I hope you won't be too hard on yourself about something that could be expected of a teen with CPTSD.    

[storyworld]

Thank you, Kizzie.

[Kizzie]

 

[Blueberry]

To be honest Storyworld it sounds like you were being a teen, but with an extra layer of hurt and pain on top of the usual hormones teens have raging through them that send them into fight mode. Those hormones can make teens fairly primal at the best of times, some more than others. I wasn't there of course but as a fellow survivor I hope you won't be too hard on yourself about something that could be expected of a teen with CPTSD.    

 

Also, I don't know enough of your story off-hand to know, so excuse me if this is off-base, but it could be your sister is exaggerating or doesn't actually remember exactly, or it could be she's exaggerating or distorting what your M said. That's what went on in my FOO. One of my brothers passed information on to me and it wasn't completely true, it wasn't both parents who said how crazy I was or that I might commit violence     , it was just F, and probably said jocularly not 100% serious, because that is just how he is. For the record, for the time period B1 was referring to, the only violence I might have committed was against myself, not against anybody else.

[storyworld]

Thanks, Blueberry. I'm sorry to hear about what you experienced. That must have been quite painful. 

[Armee]

Yeah everything already said there by Kizzie and BB, StoryWorld.


My sister was angry and difficult as a teen. My mom didn't hesitate to tell everyone. Everyone including our kind aunts thought she was a terrible teen. But the reality was she was reacting in a healthy and rational way to the way she was being treated and what was happening around her. So maybe you were angry and difficult, but that is likely the effect not the cause. Speaking of, my sister loves a song by the white stripes called "cause and effect."

[storyworld]

Armee, what a gift to your sister you must be. I'll check out that song. I'm processing through all this. I'm not exactly how to process it all at the moment. But I appreciate all the responses I have received.

[Blueberry]

Thank you storyworld for saying that. It was painful, devastating, felt like a betrayal. It was also long before I was in therapy of any sort never mind trauma therapy. Anyway, I hope you have a somewhat easier time getting through this.   

[storyworld]

Sending hugs back.