Where Do We Draw The Line As To What Is "past"?

[Tinyflame]

I am a bit leery to post this but am wondering how we determine what is 'past'? I seem to be triggered by my present, even by reminders of the struggle to surpass the past.

The only thing that gives me pause is that I heard today, small thoughts or actions (positive or negative) can snowball. I know I take myself with me, I wonder if this is the cause. As Abstract said in another thread it (I can) take self-hatred to new heights. I wonder for myself if the suicidal ideation is an attempt to escape myself, my own thoughts and the pain of feeling?

I also wonder if this is what people experience when they up and leave everyone and their lives, spouses and marriages of years, etc.?

How can I leave the past behind when the present is full of reminders, reminders of even trying to recover? Or do I simply get away from my present and any triggering reminders? Or am I just afraid, afraid to move forward or something, with what I've never known?

Any thoughts or clarity is much appreciated.

 

[kahlan]

Past, present, and future all all a tangled web. Without the past there wouldn't be a present, and no present means no future. I can totally understand the want to run away from everything and start fresh even though that can never actually happen because, while no one else around you knows anything about you or your past, you still know it.

The best I can work out in my head with this is to do what I can to make peace with what's happened before, or at the least acknowledge that what hurt me before can't hurt me that way now.

I don't know if that's what you were really looking for with this thread, but that's what I felt when I read it.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

If you didn't have the snowballing, would the thoughts be manageable?

I ask because I've known for a long time now that it's my obsessive looping thoughts that is my worst symptom. Nothing helped but medication, but then I had to stop the medication. Last month, the obsessing just stopped, as in one day it was gone and I thought "hmm this is different". Every day I hope this reprieve lasts just one more day, and so far I've been lucky in that it does. Without the obsessive looping, I no longer hate myself; I no longer think I'm evil; I no longer think any of those horrible thoughts about myself.

When I was a prisoner of my thoughts, I would have moments of peace in which I'd say "in my moments of clarity I know I'm a good person; I know I'm not evil; I know people love me, etc"

Looking back, I remember forcing a wedge into my thoughts. I knew there was the PTSD me that was a prisoner of all those bad thoughts and then there was the real me that quite frankly is pretty awesome if I do say so myself. It really helped to see this dichotomy in my thoughts and behaviors. I often thought that there was this monster that took over that wasn't me. I got to the point where I could recognize the monster creeping in and was able to be compassionate with myself and cut myself some slack.

Maybe I was finally able to drive that wedge deep enough so that the good overpowered the bad? I don't think I'll ever know for sure, but one thing is for certain....words cannot express how grateful I am for the negative obsessive thoughts to be gone.

I'm not sure if this is anything like what you're experiencing, but I thought I'd share.

 

[Hashi]

I think what is past is what has been processed.

Processing can take different forms and different people can have different ideas about that. Whatever form it takes for the individual, processing is what puts things in the past. And if it's still in the present, then it hasn't been processed and it needs to be.

 

[Abstract]

I think it's possible you could be including a wide range of very different things in this that may need to be dealt with very differently. I could be wrong of course - it's a guess.

1. We have the true past (according to our brains) where we know and sense it is no longer in the present.
2. We have past events that feel present and are present according to our brains that need to be processed properly in therapy in order to become the past.
3. We have reminders of no 1.
4. We have reminders/triggers of no 2.
5. We have world views or distortions or incorrect concepts which are founded on 1 and 2 and which can keep us hopping around in circles and end up sending us around and around through 1 and 2 so we can't truly see the present or engage in it healthily.
6. We have cascading thoughts, thought loops and obsessions that stop us being able to see the present as it is.
7. We have old views of ourselves and old patterns of attempting to cope that stop us from being able to see the true present and engage with it healthily.

Does what you were thinking fit into that Junebug?

I think you start by dealing with 5, 6 and 7 so that when you hit on 3 and 4 you can contain it. When we are ready we deal with 2 and work through 4 and when we do that then we are going to be in a whole different place. :)

 

[Tinyflame]

no present means no future... those around you knows anything about you or your past, (but) you still know it.

The best I can work out in my head with this is to do what I can to make peace with what's happened before, or at the least acknowledge that what hurt me before can't hurt me that way now

Thank you Kahlan, yes I would quote your entire post if I could that is exactly what I meant. The first statement quoted above is the problem, the second part does make me feel better, so that must mean something plays back to the past. Thank you.

@Solara , yes I'm sure as per self-esteem or self-worth or hope the cessation of thought looping would help. I am very glad that you were able to drive that wedge in, or whatever combination of factors occurred. Sometimes I find physical pain most notable when it is absent, I do understand that part. Thank you.

@Hashi , yes that of course is what I think also, thank you. The difference here is that it seems applicable to 'now'. My analogy would be, you walk every week to therapy in a skyscraper building and see yellow flowers along the way. You originally are happy or neutral about yellow flowers. You leave therapy feeling crappy- to be expected, and lots to process. Pretty soon you can't stand skyscrapers, or yellow flowers, or any other number of things.

To me a true trigger originates from the trauma(s). The rest I could call 'associations'. But what if in split seconds like a domino effect, one's mind starts connecting memories and jumps from: (eg) reminder of dealing with (processing) trauma to reminder of the struggle to reminder of the trauma itself? Perhaps that still means there's more to be processed. But I hear it over and over on the forum, and I can't recall any answers when one suddenly finds 'normal' things triggering- not just skyscrapers and flowers, but their H, their kids, their house, their occupation. Their life, really. I thought it was always a matter of cognitively seperating what is so from what isn't. Now I'm not so sure. Just that I understand what they mean. The triggers have spread. I never expected that. :(

Thank you @Abstract , perhaps the problem is I'm at #3 and #4 as is. But this doesn't seem thought out or anything to do with beliefs or in some ways (far) past triggers, not that I'm aware. Well maybe the past but the triggers in the 'now' start the chain of associations to the past. I really don't get it. I'm sorry it sounds like whining, as I see no short-term solution except to avoid it, and no long-term solution except to avoid it, or carry on being subject to it and feeling like crap, having no present and therefore no imaginable future as Kahlan said. Or keep facing it and feeling like crap and see if it improves or goes away. But at this point I can't see how it would.

Thank you everyone for your help and input.

 

[Hashi]

I really don't get it. I'm sorry it sounds like whining, as I see no short-term solution except to avoid it, and no long-term solution except to avoid it, or carry on being subject to it and feeling like crap, having no present and therefore no imaginable future as Kahlan said.

Junebug, I don't think you're whining. To me, you don't sound very grounded, certainly not grounded in the present. When I read your last post here I actually had an image of someone floating around ghostlike and tragic in a long white gown. The thing with ghosts is that they are unable to let go of their past and be in the next stage of their existence, and therefore they hover in the present without fully being in it.

The way I experience it is that if you're starting to associate things in the present with healing/therapy, which is associated with your trauma, then the work you're doing in healing/therapy isn't contained enough. It's leaking out into everything around you.

I agree that it's hard to keep things separate with only cognitive approaches. I use imagery a lot (the "putting things away in a box until next time" type of image, lots of them, all the time). However, if you aren't connected enough to anything in the present or future, that won't leave you with anything... so yes, in the present you will still be lost in the past. And pretty much all roads (or associations) will lead straight to the past.

Maybe it's the present you need to make peace with, enough to accept that you're in it and it will have to be good enough for now. Even if it isn't the present you would have wanted.

For example, no-one nurtured me when I was little, and I've been extremely aware of that during therapy sessions but I don't have to dwell on it every day, or every time I see a parent and their child interacting. If it comes up I can set aside time to journal about it, and the rest of the time I can move my thoughts onto something else knowing that it's taken care of without taking me over. Otherwise, I am always peeking under the bandage that covers "no-one nurtured me when I was little" instead of allowing that bandage to contain it until it's the right time to look at that some more.

I would suggest a lot of work on containment and some radical acceptance of how things are.

 

[Tinyflame]

The way I experience it is that if you're starting to associate things in the present with healing/therapy, which is associated with your trauma, then the work you're doing in healing/therapy isn't contained enough. It's leaking out into everything around you... if you aren't connected enough to anything in the present or future, that won't leave you with anything... so yes, in the present you will still be lost in the past. And pretty much all roads (or associations) will lead straight to the past.

Maybe it's the present you need to make peace with, enough to accept that you're in it and it will have to be good enough for now.

I would suggest a lot of work on containment and some radical acceptance of how things are.

Dear Hashi thank you very much. I think you are right, that's exactly how I feel.

And when I read 'containment', I thought 'containment', what's that?

I have always been lousy (also) at self-soothing, well, so I thought but perhaps it's because I've tried to manage things that should have been contained (some times). Everyone needs limits, that is true it feels like I'm getting buried alive.

The radical acceptance I have resources for, and use, is it posiible you could point me where I would find anything about 'containment'? My biggest problem with visuals is that I feel they leave me at less of a means to protect myself, or something. Can't relax enough. Same with a 'safe place' (to visualize), can't find one or a way yet. Yes I know, weird. :rolleyes:

Thank you very much @Hashi .

 

[Hashi]

is it posiible you could point me where I would find anything about 'containment'?

Wow, I wish I could. I absolutely don't understand why there's so little information and resources about it. I'm going to come back later and say what this means to me, when I've organised my thoughts to be a bit more presentable - it's hard for me, because I don't think this stuff in words to myself, so I have to try to "translate" it into language.

By the way, I think the idea of a safe place is one of the most unhelpful ideas in trauma therapy. So I wouldn't worry if it doesn't help you or resonate - I think that's probably true of about 80% of survivors doing trauma work. Sorry... I have got up on my soapbox and I'm ranting... because it drives me crazy. And I know I need to do something about this in terms of a project I'm working on in real life. But in the meantime I want to say, never mind if you don't find the safe place idea helpful, most trauma therapy clients don't.

I'll come back and explain more what I meant. :)

 

[Tinyflame]

Oh @Hashi , thanks very much, especially when it's difficult for you to do. I really appreciate it. It certainly sounds like a missing puzzle piece. Perhaps too why I've never read much on here in response to managing when this occurs, really couldn''t come up with anything that would explain it (at least I might know why now), but then to deal with it is the hard part.

And thanks, too, aboout the safe place. Whew. Am glad to know it's common, that feeling to me is more a 'feeling' than a place or space.

I have to throw one in Hashi- :hug: :)

 

[Tinyflame]

Maybe it's ok to just say "I'm getting triggered by virtually Everything." I mean just say it when possible. As opposed to just reacting to it, such as isolating? Since the fault lays with me. But then again mostly one cannot say that, or it's misunderstood. Perhaps no purpose to say it. I mean, can't explain why, not sure how to fix it, and even irrelevant to most if not all. Maybe more productive than pretending otherwise though. Or maybe it will pass. I fear something horrible will happen (to others), sometimes, to 'knock sense in to me', also. Because sometimes when I've felt this way -removed- it does. :( I know that's not 'accurate' but the 'feeling' remains.

Sometimes I wonder if gratitude and such is lacking, that it would change my perception, and even consequentially make everything/ everyone feel safer? Maybe all of it originates because of a feeling of panic. Then everything/ everyone looks like or equates back to some version of a trigger, or just a shame reminder?

 

[Tinyflame]

Oops, I missed the edit.

I think it's all just running-together. :( I can't figure out/ remember I'm in the present. I'm not quite sure what the 'present' is. I know it should be obvious. My present however is tenuous, it's hard to even define it too.