Hello,
I started to develop some rather odd and strange outcomes of my PTSD. I'm wondering what I can do about it...
I was raped my by then-girlfriend 7 years ago - I didn't realize it was a rape until half a year later, it was dark times but was able to manage it with a good psychologist, I'm basically now at a stage where it very very rarely affects me emotionally, I've fully accepted it and am beyond it in terms of grieving and processing. Now, since it happened, I always felt very sensitive to the word "rape". Whenever it was uttered, I was reminded of this unjust thing happening to me, so I started to fear the word. I spoke with my therapist about this and he said that this is my body protecting me, essentially a nice thing of it, although the effect is uncomfortable - I become dissociative, not too much, it's not very noticeable from the outside, but it's quite exhausting within, I feel stressed, cannot concentrate as well, self-confidence decreases, etc. It is difficult to describe. I'm sure you can somehow relate - it feels that just some of my body functions don't work anymore. But in general it was okay - the word doesn't come up very often in everyday life.
I was living my life, studying, when 4 years ago I took a psychedelic drug on a festival. I had a bad trip, thought I was going crazy for a long time, it was a horrible experience for a couple of weeks, where I rarely slept. What happened afterwards is that also the drug's name (2-CB), together with the words LSD or Acid (although I didn't take that then - only when I was younger, but that was without any problems. It is because I associate the effects with each other, as they work in a similar way), started to have the same effect on me as the word rape! It took me quite a while to figure this out, as back then I didn't make the connection, and ultimately the realisation, that I wasn't going crazy because of the drug, but that my body simply copied it's defense mechanisms from my traumatic experience to this other experience, which was also quite bad (obviously not as horrible, but my body seemed to apply the method, just to be sure, so to speak).
This was rather annoying, as now my triggers got multiplied. Hearing the words was bad, saying them myself was even worse.
So I asked my psychologist, why is it that it's only the words that trigger me? Why specific words? If I talk about "sexual abuse", or "psychedelic drugs", nothing happens, so why is it that when these exact words are uttered, my body starts to do this? He told me that my subconsciousness can't differentiate as my rational mind can - it decides "for me" what it finds triggering. This was in the beginning of 2020, right at the start of the pandemic. I was probably already slightly fragile, and this information really worried me, scared me. I had this image of an uncontrollable force inside me, something that had power over me, leaving me impotent to these expositions. So, what happened is that this same word-mechanism applied to the word "subconscious", "subconciousness" as well....But it didn't stop there, it even started with just the presyllable "sub".
And this is where I am right now. I get triggered every single time someone says "subjective", "subtle", "subpar", "subtitles" etc. My brain made kind of it's own rules regarding how bad these words are. Rape by now isn't the worst word for example, acid is the strongest - I don't quite know why. Reading them is no problem, writing them by now is also okay (it used to be not), hearing over zoom is bad but in real life it's worse etc. - a whole system of rating these triggers by intensity. Of course it also depends on the day, sometimes it's better, sometimes worse.
In the end of 2020 it became really bad. It started to reach out on every sort of drug. "Weed", even if it was inside a word, i was learning polish back then so even words where the syllable "...wied..." happened triggered me slightly for example, or just the letter "H" (short for heroine) - this period went over fortunately.
Because I was able to get out of this real bad state, where basically everything triggered me, I was hoping that by saying "sub" a lot it would help me as well. It's true, that it feels liberating to say it, but it's always followed with quite a long amount of time of unconcentration and stress. When I trigger myself heavier, like explaining these things to someone, or saying acid and sub in one conversation, it can take up to 2 days until I feel as calm as before.
Yoga and meditation helps a lot, but this whole thing is just so insanely exhausting. I haven't had a normal conversation since almost 3 years without my brain always scanning and being worried that some word with "sub" gets said.
So....does anyone have an idea? How can I approach this? I was able to get rid of some things (like weed & pot etc), but they weren't as ingrained as "sub", "rape", or "acid", as I haven't said those things for quite a while - I only started doing recently. Sometimes I thought that it helped, and maybe it did, but....If there is progress, it's very very slow, and I even feel that the paths in which my brain thinks are still there. What I mean by that is that my brain is so directed towards these very words, I would love to concentrate on something else lots of the times, but I just can't.
I'm okay if it takes time to better this, but I just don't know if what I'm doing by saying these things, or flooding me sometimes is the best option. My psychologist also didn't know any further ideas.
I'd like to point out that these triggers by now have nothing to do with the original situations anymore. I feel that they are completely a thing of it's own. They don't trigger me emotionally at all, it's just stress and exhaustion.
Thank you very much for reading - If you have any idea on what could help me on my way, i'd be very happy :)
Hope you have a good day <3
Alex
I started to develop some rather odd and strange outcomes of my PTSD. I'm wondering what I can do about it...
I was raped my by then-girlfriend 7 years ago - I didn't realize it was a rape until half a year later, it was dark times but was able to manage it with a good psychologist, I'm basically now at a stage where it very very rarely affects me emotionally, I've fully accepted it and am beyond it in terms of grieving and processing. Now, since it happened, I always felt very sensitive to the word "rape". Whenever it was uttered, I was reminded of this unjust thing happening to me, so I started to fear the word. I spoke with my therapist about this and he said that this is my body protecting me, essentially a nice thing of it, although the effect is uncomfortable - I become dissociative, not too much, it's not very noticeable from the outside, but it's quite exhausting within, I feel stressed, cannot concentrate as well, self-confidence decreases, etc. It is difficult to describe. I'm sure you can somehow relate - it feels that just some of my body functions don't work anymore. But in general it was okay - the word doesn't come up very often in everyday life.
I was living my life, studying, when 4 years ago I took a psychedelic drug on a festival. I had a bad trip, thought I was going crazy for a long time, it was a horrible experience for a couple of weeks, where I rarely slept. What happened afterwards is that also the drug's name (2-CB), together with the words LSD or Acid (although I didn't take that then - only when I was younger, but that was without any problems. It is because I associate the effects with each other, as they work in a similar way), started to have the same effect on me as the word rape! It took me quite a while to figure this out, as back then I didn't make the connection, and ultimately the realisation, that I wasn't going crazy because of the drug, but that my body simply copied it's defense mechanisms from my traumatic experience to this other experience, which was also quite bad (obviously not as horrible, but my body seemed to apply the method, just to be sure, so to speak).
This was rather annoying, as now my triggers got multiplied. Hearing the words was bad, saying them myself was even worse.
So I asked my psychologist, why is it that it's only the words that trigger me? Why specific words? If I talk about "sexual abuse", or "psychedelic drugs", nothing happens, so why is it that when these exact words are uttered, my body starts to do this? He told me that my subconsciousness can't differentiate as my rational mind can - it decides "for me" what it finds triggering. This was in the beginning of 2020, right at the start of the pandemic. I was probably already slightly fragile, and this information really worried me, scared me. I had this image of an uncontrollable force inside me, something that had power over me, leaving me impotent to these expositions. So, what happened is that this same word-mechanism applied to the word "subconscious", "subconciousness" as well....But it didn't stop there, it even started with just the presyllable "sub".
And this is where I am right now. I get triggered every single time someone says "subjective", "subtle", "subpar", "subtitles" etc. My brain made kind of it's own rules regarding how bad these words are. Rape by now isn't the worst word for example, acid is the strongest - I don't quite know why. Reading them is no problem, writing them by now is also okay (it used to be not), hearing over zoom is bad but in real life it's worse etc. - a whole system of rating these triggers by intensity. Of course it also depends on the day, sometimes it's better, sometimes worse.
In the end of 2020 it became really bad. It started to reach out on every sort of drug. "Weed", even if it was inside a word, i was learning polish back then so even words where the syllable "...wied..." happened triggered me slightly for example, or just the letter "H" (short for heroine) - this period went over fortunately.
Because I was able to get out of this real bad state, where basically everything triggered me, I was hoping that by saying "sub" a lot it would help me as well. It's true, that it feels liberating to say it, but it's always followed with quite a long amount of time of unconcentration and stress. When I trigger myself heavier, like explaining these things to someone, or saying acid and sub in one conversation, it can take up to 2 days until I feel as calm as before.
Yoga and meditation helps a lot, but this whole thing is just so insanely exhausting. I haven't had a normal conversation since almost 3 years without my brain always scanning and being worried that some word with "sub" gets said.
So....does anyone have an idea? How can I approach this? I was able to get rid of some things (like weed & pot etc), but they weren't as ingrained as "sub", "rape", or "acid", as I haven't said those things for quite a while - I only started doing recently. Sometimes I thought that it helped, and maybe it did, but....If there is progress, it's very very slow, and I even feel that the paths in which my brain thinks are still there. What I mean by that is that my brain is so directed towards these very words, I would love to concentrate on something else lots of the times, but I just can't.
I'm okay if it takes time to better this, but I just don't know if what I'm doing by saying these things, or flooding me sometimes is the best option. My psychologist also didn't know any further ideas.
I'd like to point out that these triggers by now have nothing to do with the original situations anymore. I feel that they are completely a thing of it's own. They don't trigger me emotionally at all, it's just stress and exhaustion.
Thank you very much for reading - If you have any idea on what could help me on my way, i'd be very happy :)
Hope you have a good day <3
Alex