Sufferer Cptsd and me

[bhm]

Ok, so somehow i managed to survive 47 years, how or why I'm still breathing is far beyond me, my earliest memories are of abuse that ended when I figured out at twelve that I was safer on the street, drugs, alcohol, violence, at least it was my choice, I'm now finally sober, after running the gauntlet, pills, heroin, speed, psycadelics, the last time I o.d.ed I went into full renal failure, spent months in the hospital and was on dyalisis for almost a year and half, got clean and listened to the doctor's and made a full recovery, after being clean for about three years I began working in the community, I felt strong and thought I was in a good place and tricked myself into thinking I'd done the work of dealing with my trauma, until I started working graves at a residential program and was exposed to a group of individuals that had a sort of predator club/group type thing, which in turn led to me being turned out on "stress leave" after learning staff wasn't reporting incedents out of personal fear, after the last of several people I had to pull out of one individuals space, it was horrific, when I learned reports weren't being made I gave him a choice, out the window or by the ankles down the back stairs where there was no camera, either way he was going out, I'm finally getting help and for the first time and have a great team working with me, I feel super lucky and found this site researching emdr therapy, I'm still totally messed in the head and am scared having read many horrible stories of people having negative response to emdr that suffer from complex trauma, anyone has any advice I'm all ears, cheers.

 

[mumstheword]

Welcome! You are with many who will understand, listen, support and will share parts of our own horrific stories and recoveries.
I haven't done EMDR either, yet, and have the same sorts of reservations and fears about undertaking that kind of therapy. I too suffer from complex trauma and was a homeless teen too, not as young as yourself.

I've had drug, alcohol, teen pregnancy, DV, and plenty other crap to deal with.

So I hope you feel at home and like you are in relatable company!

You have had an extremely rough journey, by the sounds and I commend you for making it this far!
Join us as we travel the long road-less-travelled to recovery and better quality life!
I'm glad you made it here. :-)

 

[EveHarrington]

Welcome!

 

[bhm]

Hey thanks mums, I'm three sessions into emdr, the person I'm working with is great and also has a background of trauma, which i think is huge and really makes a difference, and they aren't hell bent on having me re live every gruesome detail of my existence, but acknowledging where I came from and what I've seen and accepting the fact that somehow ive managed to survive and remain somewhat human with intact morals and ethics, beginning to become aware is frightening, I feel like this is my last shot at potentially actually being somewhat comfortable with myself and perhaps maybe even learn how to be happy, if that is really a thing, but I'm going to try even if it kills me, ha! But for now I still feel like I've gone insane.

 

[mumstheword]

Hey thanks mums, I'm three sessions into emdr, the person I'm working with is great and also has a backgrou...

That's reassuring. I don't know if I'll get access to that kind of treatment. I live in regional Australia so it's not very available here. I am going into an excellently recommended trauma program as an inpatient for 3 weeks early in the new year but I haven't heard that they offer EMDR though.

Some of my rapes, well all of them really, I was extremely dissociated and I'm not sure how beneficial it is to mess with that because, you know, let sleeping dogs lie, and all that. But my functionality has been at an all time low this year, it's taking too much energy to try to keep it together with a huge backlog of trauma in my trunk so at some stage, EMDR might become an attractive option.
I got some good relief with TRE, which stands for Trauma Release Exercises. If you're interested, there is lots of info on YouTube about that.

I'm really glad to hear you feel you are in good hands :-) i too have some fantastic therapeutic support at the moment. I'm feeling held like I never have before. :-) very timely and I'm feeling blessed and very grateful for it. :-)

 

[bhm]

Yah I'm with you on the let sleeping dogs lay, I'm worried about unlocking memories, I mean I've spent my whole life trying to forget all the horrible things I saw happen to me and other kids that were in it with me, but I also have become almost completely dis functional again finding it hard to anything other than completely isolate myself as am triggered by what seems almost anything, and being forced on stress leave has been impossible, our union claims are handled by an insurance company and I've been fighting my claim for a year this January, I still haven't gotten paid, I lost my place and almost everything I own and have been homeless again since March, got a call today tho and allegedly I'm to finally receive a payment tomorrow so may actually be able to have a safe place again, it's incredible how hard it is to access proper treatment even in a major city, oddly enough I had incredible trouble in the big city and didn't find any proper help until I left and moved to a smaller community, my current therapist did some TRE with me to gauge me before commencing with emdr, I'm still really disassociative, I hope you have a good experience in your up coming treatment, I'm always afraid that treatment will go wrong, I've had really bad experience in the past finding the work other clinicians tryed with meade me even worse, I truly believe as sufferers we know ourselves and need to be aware if a certain treatment is adversly effecting us, I'm glad you also feel your getting good support, it's rare, we are blessed for that I reckon :)