I have CPTSD and severe toxic shame from CSA that started when I was 6. I kept it hidden my entire life and only started therapy a few years ago, now in my 40s.
I feel like my world has been shattered recently. I’m realizing what I did to someone I loved over 20 years ago, and I can’t handle it.
I had a pattern of disappearing from people, but this… this was different. I had a girlfriend I loved deeply. What we had was real, intimate, and meaningful. And I just… vanished from her life. Completely.
At the time, I didn’t understand any of my trauma. I was dissociated most of the time. When things shut down in me, it’s like she disappeared from my mind too. I’ve tried to explain it in therapy as if she just stopped existing to me in any accessible way. I know how insane that sounds, but it’s the only way I can describe it.
I remember wanting to call her. I remember thinking about it. But I couldn’t move. I couldn’t make myself pick up the phone. It felt like I was physically paralyzed. There was this harsh, controlling voice in my head that I obeyed without question, even though it went against everything I actually felt. Eventually I just… stopped trying.
I didn’t want to lose her. I loved her. And I still left her like that.
Now it’s all hitting me at once. I can’t stop thinking about what that must have felt like for her. The confusion, the hurt, the abandonment. She had no idea about my past, no idea I was dealing with trauma. I didn’t even know myself.
I wake up crying almost every day. I feel sick when I think about what I put her through. She was kind, genuine, trusting—and I disappeared on her like she meant nothing.
I don’t understand how I didn’t feel this then. How could someone I loved just vanish from my awareness like that? How is that even possible?
I feel like I can live with the other times I disappeared—from friends, jobs, people—but not this. This feels unbearable. I feel like I destroyed something good and hurt someone who didn’t deserve it in the worst way.
And it’s too late. I can’t fix it. I can’t even find her. I can’t tell her she did nothing wrong. I can’t explain that I was lost in something I didn’t understand.
All I want is for her to know she wasn’t the problem. That I loved her. That I didn’t leave because of her.
Has anyone else gone through something like this? Realizing years later the damage you caused when you weren’t even aware of what was happening inside you? How do you live with it? How do you carry this?
Because right now it feels like I can’t.
I feel like my world has been shattered recently. I’m realizing what I did to someone I loved over 20 years ago, and I can’t handle it.
I had a pattern of disappearing from people, but this… this was different. I had a girlfriend I loved deeply. What we had was real, intimate, and meaningful. And I just… vanished from her life. Completely.
At the time, I didn’t understand any of my trauma. I was dissociated most of the time. When things shut down in me, it’s like she disappeared from my mind too. I’ve tried to explain it in therapy as if she just stopped existing to me in any accessible way. I know how insane that sounds, but it’s the only way I can describe it.
I remember wanting to call her. I remember thinking about it. But I couldn’t move. I couldn’t make myself pick up the phone. It felt like I was physically paralyzed. There was this harsh, controlling voice in my head that I obeyed without question, even though it went against everything I actually felt. Eventually I just… stopped trying.
I didn’t want to lose her. I loved her. And I still left her like that.
Now it’s all hitting me at once. I can’t stop thinking about what that must have felt like for her. The confusion, the hurt, the abandonment. She had no idea about my past, no idea I was dealing with trauma. I didn’t even know myself.
I wake up crying almost every day. I feel sick when I think about what I put her through. She was kind, genuine, trusting—and I disappeared on her like she meant nothing.
I don’t understand how I didn’t feel this then. How could someone I loved just vanish from my awareness like that? How is that even possible?
I feel like I can live with the other times I disappeared—from friends, jobs, people—but not this. This feels unbearable. I feel like I destroyed something good and hurt someone who didn’t deserve it in the worst way.
And it’s too late. I can’t fix it. I can’t even find her. I can’t tell her she did nothing wrong. I can’t explain that I was lost in something I didn’t understand.
All I want is for her to know she wasn’t the problem. That I loved her. That I didn’t leave because of her.
Has anyone else gone through something like this? Realizing years later the damage you caused when you weren’t even aware of what was happening inside you? How do you live with it? How do you carry this?
Because right now it feels like I can’t.
