Getting Better, Feeling Worse

[Taina]

I learnt I had PTSD 2 months ago. I have had in over ten years untreated (I'm 25).

I'm fairly committed to the idea that I can get help, but the work has to come from me. I therefore can't be held back by self-pity/self-hate. I have a lot of healthy thoughts and cries about how hard this is, because I think self compassion seems to be an important part of the cure. But I don't want to be *held back* by it. Because I'm so desperate to just get out of the woods, I just want to be moving forwards. I think this is actually a good mind set because two months in my world has been turned upside down. I've built the beginnings of a support system, which for me has never existed. I've always been isolated, lying to myself and others about how hard things are. For me to be open about it and really trying to use the help of other ppl to move forwards and find professional treatment is huge. Work knows, family knows, friends know... it's a big turn around for me. And I can see the objective improvements. I'm talking to people with less rehearsal in my head. I'm learning about myself--what things I never thought were PTSD are just that. I can have angry outbursts and realise afterwards that it wasn't real, and I'm therefore having less. I don't perceive myself as being preyed upon as much... really just lots of things.

But, as things get better... inside I feel more fragile, more in the cooker. It's like I'm losing my coping mechanisms (which is good, because they are part of a mind set of surviving with PTSD not surviving PTSD, as it were) but because of that I'm feeling the pain more.

I've always felt like my mind is in prison, but now as I get better I can see the juxtaposition in which I'm not really in prison, it just feels like that... and for some reason that hurts more.

As I get better and better, it gets harder and harder.

 

[MesaRock]

I'm in the same spot - started therapy in August (somatic experiencing), 20 years untreated, all the old "coping" mechanisms falling away = pain. Not what I expected. I think it's a shedding of the old skin, a lot of vulnerability, plus also we survived by, in a sense, not feeling. I've definitely also felt a sharp increase in pain and it scared me - my therapist said it's very normal and very typical, because it's the healing beginning and etc etc etc. She said it's that (a) we have to re-learn how to feel and that at first, the brain just doesn't know how to calibrate itself going from living in a kind of stoic suppression to being in a place where we've given ourselves conscious permission to feel and heal and confront. And (b) there's a lot of purging of old emotions that happens at first and so that's why it feels worse, since it's stuff that would otherwise have been felt a long time ago, and once the mind/body has permission not to hold it in, it just dumps it out quickly all at once; and (c) a lot of the self-protective survivalist shell dissolving leaves one really raw, literally more sensitive skin underneath and that's a good sign because it's an indication that we've found a safe place to heal. (d) And that a new healing method/mindset/tool can't really start being used until we shed an old one that wasn't working. So there's a little interval between the two stages, like a bird out of its shell. It's navigating this interval that is confusing to me.

I'm sure there are people who have been at this longer than you or I have who have some answers. I know I could use them!

the one thing I hold onto - some days better than others - is that this is a finite period, and that allowing ourselves to experience a kind of grief and loss as truths about our pasts show up, and live quietly in a vulnerable, new, raw state is the crack that's going to let the healing pour in. I'm hoping the faster way through this stage is to listen to all the advice I get: talk nicely to oneself, do a lot of deep breathing and relaxation techniques, build a sturdy support network, tell yourself that it's okay to feel, and above all that IT IS A STAGE and it's a good sign.

With you in spirit on this one. Hope some more experienced people have a few travel tips for navigating this stage...

 

[Taina]

Thanks MesaRock!

Yeah everything your therapist said to you rings so true. Best of luck with your journey.

 

[kona355]

@Taina
I just read your post from Sept 13 and was wondering if it's getting any better?

What really caught my attention was that you said you feel the pain more. When that began happening to me in therapy, I quit. The last thing I wanted was more pain.

If you've been able to do this, like deal with the increasing pain, what kind of methods help you cope with the intensity of it?