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My earliest memory (around age 5) is of having PTSD anxiety, so I know what it's like. Took decades before I was properly diagnosed. Welcome, and I hope you find a healing path.

I agree with @Mee that tough times can send you backwards, or at least it will seem at the time that you have taken a step backward. Although I've seen my trauma therapist for about 2 1/2 years, I did a psychoanalytical approach for about 10 years before that. That wasn't too productive, but...

I love it! The cover invites all kinds of feelings and fantasies and experiences ....

I did a year of stabilization with my EMDR therapist before we did EMDR, and then we spent a good amount of time doing "resourcing" EMDR where we worked at establishing safe people & safe places. If you decide to try EMDR, I suggest talking to potential EMDR therapists about their approach, and...

Yes, I have had this, too. it's almost like I am hearing the beep-beep-beep back and forth in my head while I work through something. And I often call in my safe people and places that I learned in EMDR therapy.

Mrs. W got dvds of Saturday Night Live for her birthday. We watched a 1976 episode (season 1) including a skit with John Belushi as Capt. Kirk and the music of Leon Redbone.

Having done both parts work and EMDR, I think the EMDR can speed things up, but the parts work is absolutely the big key. If I don't have access to the right parts, doing EMDR is like doing surgery on the wrong patient--doesn't do to much. So your strategy makes a lot of sense to me! We are...

I tried psychoanalytical for a long time, with some progress, but very slow and frustrating. I tried CBT, and that felt great at first, but then a lot of internal pressure built up. Tried somatic therapies, and that didn't work. Tried DBT, and that was awful. What finally worked was when the...

I'm in the middle of the 1949 version of "All the King's Men"--a fictionalized version of the rise & fall of Huey Long in New Orleans. Cool film noir feel to it. Also, Little Wendell is trying to figure out how to grow up sexually, and there is something about the non-graphic sexuality of...

Support has been hard for me for years, but I am getting better. I have my wife for most things, and my therapist that I trust with just about everything. I have an old high school friend that I have gotten re-acquainted with. I have a friend from here who is no longer a member. But the high...

Maybe it helps to get to know Protector outside the therapist's office, and without any plan or agenda other than getting to know her. I know my teen kids talk more the fewer the number of questions I ask them. Do you know if Protector is interested in anything? Has a favorite place? Is...

I like your photos more than mine, @berlinda ! I like how bright the light is under the walker's foot, and how there is that brilliant gap between foot and shadow. Fall is here. I was walking toward my favorite park when I saw this tree blossom that mistakenly came out about 6 months early...

Hi, Berlinda. I am happy to sit with you, maybe have a cup of tea. We can show each other favorite photos we have taken. I'm sorry you are feeling low. It's good that you are asking for support.

I have mostly male parts, but in the past year two female parts came up--one teen, and one adult. They both have a strong sense of hetero female sexuality. I can't tell if the female parts arose because of the trauma, or whether the trauma suppressed the appearance of the female parts. So for...

It sounds like your protector part is feeling very vulnerable. I wonder if it's that part that needs to feel safer? I found out more about my parts by giving them pages in a journal (we make collages of pictures we find in magazines and the internet), writing stories, and letting them draw...

I read The Body Keeps the Score as homework with my therapist shortly after I was diagnosed with PTSD. The book was useful in helping me see the many ways that PTSD affects us and understand why my prior talk therapy (with another therapist, and prior to being diagnosed with PTSD) had not...

The refrigerator is empty (two teenagers in the house), and it is time to go to the store. Just the basics, mostly.

An old classic: Silas Marner, by George Eliot. I love her narrative voice. We're discussing it at my book club tonight.

As you get ready for the first few steps, remember that whatever you do, you'd like to stay within your "window of tolerance". Sometimes my therapist suggests something, and if I know that's too big of a step, I will tell her just that. Other times, the Big Wendell part of me will explore with...

This box turtle clearly doesn't have PTSD. I don't know why it did not tuck its head in! We said hello on a hike a week or two ago.

Congratulations on getting your paper done!! revisions done!! and acceptance without re-review!!! A lot of Ph.D. students struggle with getting papers done, and we have post-doctorates who after getting their Ph.D. just don't have the drive or creativity or skills to really turn the corner and...

Good question! I really agree with @MrMoonlight ! Find & make safe spaces. I had to create a space that was safe from noise and people coming in. Looking back, since some of my trauma was being surrounded by sexuality and alcohol, making that safe space was trauma work. I put pictures in...

Explaining how to solve a calculus problem to my daughter ...