Hi there, everyone! I'm new to these parts, and new to PTSD forums in general, so forgive me if I'm not totally sure how this works...
Complex PTSD here, 12 years in therapy and still going. I'm 24, and I was very, very lucky to have been working with the same T my entire journey; I saw a few psychiatrists, and did a brief in-patient hospitalization when I was 13, and those experiences were horrific, but my T has (slowly, painstakingly) gained my trust, and I credit our relationship with how far I've come along in my journey.
Much of my trauma comes from my experiences with my mother, who is a narcissist and a sadist, and physically/emotionally/psychologically tortured me for most of my life. I was also sexually abused by an uncle, raped by a boyfriend, and recently got out of an emotionally abusive relationship around a year ago. My trauma is also complicated by my brother, who is schizophrenic and suffered a very different - though equally severe - sort of abuse. My mother directed a more sexual focus towards him, and her boyfriend - a martial artist and diagnosed sociopath - physically and emotionally abused him for years, resulting in my brother suffering a psychotic break around 6 years ago. He's only recently returned to the area where I live, and while I love him dearly and he's stabilized, sometimes discussing his trauma (and my guilt for not protecting him) compounds my own.
Due to the aforementioned emotionally abusive ex, I moved back to my mother's house around a year ago. It's been very difficult not only living in the house where the trauma took place, but also living with my mother, who still engages in the same psychologically manipulative behaviors as she did when I was a child. So... yeah. I'm also still reeling from the end of a promising but short-lived romantic relationship, which ended amicably but brought up a whole lot of abandonment/attachment trauma that I've never really dealt with.
So... now that I've said all of that, here's a plot twist: I'm actually in a very healthy emotional place. I've spent 12 years developing emotional regulation skills, mindfulness, and my self-esteem. My episodes of depression are infrequent, I've got a positive outlook, and I'm no longer living in Trigger City. (Five years ago, my symptoms were so bad that I couldn't get out of bed; I tried to kill myself more times than I care to count, and had horrible flashbacks every day. I still have nightmares and triggers, but they don't hit me as hard as they used to, and I've got strong resources for coping with it.)
That's the caveat, I guess: I feel half-healed. On a surface level, I'm higher functioning than ever, but there's still this undercurrent of emotions and body sensations from the past that keep interfering in the present, where they just don't belong. My social relationships are dominated by my intense fear of abandonment and feeling unsafe. I know it has to do with my past, but talk therapy has stalled out; there's not much more it can do. I've recently started EMDR, but I don't know how EMDR works when it's just feelings and body sensations. I have many memories, and I've become desensitized to talking about it just via talking about it for 12 years (though I've always employed the strategy of using humor to detach from it, so I don't think I fully processed any of it; I just split the visual from the emotions.)
Does anyone else have this experience? Of being able to talk about the trauma just fine, but still having unresolved emotions (intense fear and sadness) that come up in the present? If so, has EMDR worked for you?
Also: wow, long post, sorry about that. Hi, everyone!
Complex PTSD here, 12 years in therapy and still going. I'm 24, and I was very, very lucky to have been working with the same T my entire journey; I saw a few psychiatrists, and did a brief in-patient hospitalization when I was 13, and those experiences were horrific, but my T has (slowly, painstakingly) gained my trust, and I credit our relationship with how far I've come along in my journey.
Much of my trauma comes from my experiences with my mother, who is a narcissist and a sadist, and physically/emotionally/psychologically tortured me for most of my life. I was also sexually abused by an uncle, raped by a boyfriend, and recently got out of an emotionally abusive relationship around a year ago. My trauma is also complicated by my brother, who is schizophrenic and suffered a very different - though equally severe - sort of abuse. My mother directed a more sexual focus towards him, and her boyfriend - a martial artist and diagnosed sociopath - physically and emotionally abused him for years, resulting in my brother suffering a psychotic break around 6 years ago. He's only recently returned to the area where I live, and while I love him dearly and he's stabilized, sometimes discussing his trauma (and my guilt for not protecting him) compounds my own.
Due to the aforementioned emotionally abusive ex, I moved back to my mother's house around a year ago. It's been very difficult not only living in the house where the trauma took place, but also living with my mother, who still engages in the same psychologically manipulative behaviors as she did when I was a child. So... yeah. I'm also still reeling from the end of a promising but short-lived romantic relationship, which ended amicably but brought up a whole lot of abandonment/attachment trauma that I've never really dealt with.
So... now that I've said all of that, here's a plot twist: I'm actually in a very healthy emotional place. I've spent 12 years developing emotional regulation skills, mindfulness, and my self-esteem. My episodes of depression are infrequent, I've got a positive outlook, and I'm no longer living in Trigger City. (Five years ago, my symptoms were so bad that I couldn't get out of bed; I tried to kill myself more times than I care to count, and had horrible flashbacks every day. I still have nightmares and triggers, but they don't hit me as hard as they used to, and I've got strong resources for coping with it.)
That's the caveat, I guess: I feel half-healed. On a surface level, I'm higher functioning than ever, but there's still this undercurrent of emotions and body sensations from the past that keep interfering in the present, where they just don't belong. My social relationships are dominated by my intense fear of abandonment and feeling unsafe. I know it has to do with my past, but talk therapy has stalled out; there's not much more it can do. I've recently started EMDR, but I don't know how EMDR works when it's just feelings and body sensations. I have many memories, and I've become desensitized to talking about it just via talking about it for 12 years (though I've always employed the strategy of using humor to detach from it, so I don't think I fully processed any of it; I just split the visual from the emotions.)
Does anyone else have this experience? Of being able to talk about the trauma just fine, but still having unresolved emotions (intense fear and sadness) that come up in the present? If so, has EMDR worked for you?
Also: wow, long post, sorry about that. Hi, everyone!
