Recently started with EMDR for CPTSD. Two weeks ago I had my first session with my therapist who is a trauma therapist. After the first session I felt strange and foggy for the rest of the day.
Yesterday we plannend another EMDR session, but instead of diong so, we talked. It was a very emotional conversation, and my therapist was asking a lot of questions. We where searching for mental images to use for EMDR, but instead of finding one image a whole bunch of images and situaions came up.
Again I found myself talking about my childhood and the things that happend while I was a child. I felt some sence of undefined urgency to get it all out, once again. This time my T asked emotional questions like: What do you feel now? Most of the time I couldnt asnwer his qeustion, i didnt know what I felt. Then he started to mention what he felt while I told him about the things that happend. I told him how I used to feel numb while some traumatic events took place when I was a child. It was kinda shocking but good to hear what kind of emotions my story raised inside him. When I left my T I felt anxious.
When I came home I started to feel very depressed and panicky. And it rapidly got worse. I felt myself sinking deep into desperation and hopelessness, it scared me. I cried for the rest of the day, and freaked out a lot. I felt anxious and suicidal. I started to believe I was falling into a deep depression once again. ( because this is mostly how it starts)
But...today I slowly started to realise, that those feelings of despair and hopelessness are most likely an emotional flashback. When I was a child I turned numb because there was nothing I could do to make the abuse stop. I turned numb because there was no escape. I turned numb as a child because it was so hopeless and things would never be become better...
This is exactly the same thoughtpattern I have when I get depressed. "I cant escape', 'Things will never get better', 'There is nothing I can do to make a change', 'There is nothing I can do to make it stop'. I feel helpless when these thoughts and emotions come up, it's horrible.
I believe it is an emotional flashback instead of the start of a depression. I believe I am starting to connect the dots between how i must have felt when I was a child, and the feelings that overwhelm me as an adult.
Can someone relate to this?
Yesterday we plannend another EMDR session, but instead of diong so, we talked. It was a very emotional conversation, and my therapist was asking a lot of questions. We where searching for mental images to use for EMDR, but instead of finding one image a whole bunch of images and situaions came up.
Again I found myself talking about my childhood and the things that happend while I was a child. I felt some sence of undefined urgency to get it all out, once again. This time my T asked emotional questions like: What do you feel now? Most of the time I couldnt asnwer his qeustion, i didnt know what I felt. Then he started to mention what he felt while I told him about the things that happend. I told him how I used to feel numb while some traumatic events took place when I was a child. It was kinda shocking but good to hear what kind of emotions my story raised inside him. When I left my T I felt anxious.
When I came home I started to feel very depressed and panicky. And it rapidly got worse. I felt myself sinking deep into desperation and hopelessness, it scared me. I cried for the rest of the day, and freaked out a lot. I felt anxious and suicidal. I started to believe I was falling into a deep depression once again. ( because this is mostly how it starts)
But...today I slowly started to realise, that those feelings of despair and hopelessness are most likely an emotional flashback. When I was a child I turned numb because there was nothing I could do to make the abuse stop. I turned numb because there was no escape. I turned numb as a child because it was so hopeless and things would never be become better...
This is exactly the same thoughtpattern I have when I get depressed. "I cant escape', 'Things will never get better', 'There is nothing I can do to make a change', 'There is nothing I can do to make it stop'. I feel helpless when these thoughts and emotions come up, it's horrible.
I believe it is an emotional flashback instead of the start of a depression. I believe I am starting to connect the dots between how i must have felt when I was a child, and the feelings that overwhelm me as an adult.
Can someone relate to this?
