Have I Misunderstood " Hypervigilance"?

[cherryblossom]

I think Nicolette has it spot on. You need to commit to therapy 100%, and accept that life will be pretty damn tough during this time. If you feel like complete crap for 3 months, 6 months, 12 months during therapy, but then you feel much better, and able to function better, deal with problems better, that is better than a life time of feeling crap. Therapy isn't just about the 1 hour a week that you spend in session. You need time to process what has gone on in therapy, and do your own work, in between sessions, to really benefit. It is tough, and it is hard, it's an emotional rollercoaster. I think we have to accept that we will feel awful at times, we will feel depressed and anxious, and possibly even suicidal. But we also need to believe 100% that these feeling will pass, and all the pain will be worth it in the end. Otherwise we may fall back to using 'bad' coping mechanisms which we have used in the past. Following therapy, I think we need to do our own analysis. So you come back and acknowledge how you feel, why you feel it. What was the hard part of therapy, what parts felt good to get out. What do you need for yourself, now? Sleep, crying, support from family, reassurance, to be alone etc? What didn't you get out, that you perhaps should have done? What do you want to discuss at your next therapy session? This is where you need to be selfish. Allow someone else to worry about the bills, or what to have to eat. Ask your family to do household tasks that you would normally do. Reduce as much stress factors from your life as possible, and give over that extra time to looking after you.

 

[anthony]

Then please tell me how I'm supposed to 'fall-out'. Please. Because t I can't deal with how intense the fear is and how I'm feeling right now.

What Nicolette seen was not fallout from trauma therapy... but was still fallout from other things.

Fallout is dealing with the, as you say "Intense fear right now", in any more positive manner than adding a negative, ie. in a bottle or drugs, OD'ing prescription drugs, etc. Its about knowing that it will pass, giving it an actual effort to find that it will pass, instead of turning to something that only drowns the issue until it passes, thinking that by repeating the negative behaviour, the negative fallout goes away... but all you do is create one very nasty cycle because you don't deal with it, you avoid it through substance abuse. This could even be avoidance through workaholism and other negative behaviours.

 

[jadebear]

This was the first time that I didn't ,as Nicolette said, shove back down what I just pulled out'. I didn't do much of anything at all and only worked a few hours instead of working everyday, I stayed away from people and places that stress me out as much as I could , and I tried to just chill instead of going about my normal routine.

I won't lie, I was tempted to get totally wasted, and stay that way for awhile, but I didn't. My anxiety is still pretty high right now, but I realize it's not as high as when I do drink.

 

[snugglepuss]

The problem with therapists is... they don't understand the full spectrum of PTSD. Yes... you shouldn't be wasting your money right now on therapy, not if you are drinking and your home environment is up and down... you must get a relatively stable home environment, you must get alcohol / drugs under control. I don't refer to any prescription medication, I refer to any use of illegal drugs. You must get rid of them, you must get alcohol to use level, not abuse or dependence.

Trauma therapy outside of these parameters is counter productive and just wastes all concerned parties time.

Support... yes, we all need that... trauma therapy itself... counter productive if you don't have those two things in order.

If you can't go to trauma therapy and come home, expecting and knowing you are going to have fall-out, and not be able to fall-out... you are then harboring and building within negative emotion, which only hinders further trauma work. Same with alcohol or illegal drugs. Nothing worse than seeing someone go to trauma therapy then think a bottle will make it all go away and ignore what they just went through with a bottle... to only find its still there when they sober up, usually worse. You need support in your life for trauma therapy to truly work... you need stability.

I don't know that I agree with that idea. I was using when I first started therapy, and it was very beneficial for me. Expecting someone to stop a coping mechanism without offering them something to replace that way of dealing is completely unfair, and unsafe. People go through a variety of stages when it comes to quitting anything, be it overeating, using drugs, or drinking. If no one went to therapy until their addiction issues were under control, therapists would have one hell of a go of having clients.

I think that referring to any level of trauma therapy as counter productive and a waste of all concerned parties time unless the person seeking the help is completely addiction free is actually quite offensive.

 

[snugglepuss]

I don't think you need me to answer that.

I will add though... if your therapist tells you that its ok to be abusing any of these substances during trauma therapy, then you need to get a better therapist, because their just taking your money and pissing in your pocket so you keep coming back and paying them.

A trauma therapist should be telling anyone in such a situation the same as I am here. If their not... you may want to seek a few more opinions from other experts in your area... because someone is lying to you, and its not me. Therapists are not created equal when it comes to trauma therapy.

I think that many therapists would vehemently disagree with you here. The main issue here is that of harm reduction. Yes, someone might be dealing with addiction issues at the same time, but that does not mean that they do not deserve the opportunity to learn new ways of coping. Sometimes the brain has a huge need to get rid of some of the shit before it can let go of the need to numb. All of the counselling I have had over the past 5 years, (the past 4 years I have been clean) the therapists have not made an issue of my addiction. Yes, they might have expressed concern about my using, but they never attempted to shame me for how I was coping.

Therapists might encourage someone to work on the addiction too, but to say nope, you can't have any help until you are sober is just downright cruel. I would hope that any therapist worth their salt would help to educate their clients about other coping mechanisms that can be tried before starting trauma work.

 

[Nyx]

Not my experience Nyx... this is based from leading trauma experts in the world... not what I think. What I think is irrelevant for helping people with trauma... I use what some of the best trauma experts in the world have either taught me through discussions or what I have read from them.

Okay. I thought you were speaking more from your experience, since you were having problems with alcohol too when you started...

 

[cherryblossom]

Hi Snugglepuss,
I think you may have misunderstood. From my undertsanding, Anthony has said that trauma therapy (not therapy) is a waste of time if you have substance addiction. And you have hit the nail on the head.

I would hope that any therapist worth their salt would help to educate their clients about other coping mechanisms that can be tried before starting trauma work.

Exactly, get you addictions under control, before starting trauma therapy. If this includes help from a therapist, to learn new coping techniques etc, there is no issue with this.. Anthony is talking specifically about trauma therapy, not any other therapy.

 

[jadebear]

There is little difference to what you do here and on the PTSD forum.........you keep finding issues to discuss which stop you from actually acting.

I didn't really catch this sentence before when I read your post. Correct me if I'm wrong, but isn't discussing things the whole point of being a member of these forums? If people didn't discuss things and ask questions, what would be the point of having a ptsd or sexual abuse forum? Or is it just me that shouldn't be discussing things?

Maybe I'm having a rough day, or taking it the wrong way, IDK, but I feel offended now.

 

[cherryblossom]

Hey Jade, I think perhaps you have taken it the wrong way. Certainly, You are more than welcome to post and discuss anything you need to here, ok. And I imagine it to be the same on PTSD forum. In both cases, so long as you post within the rules (which as far as I have seen, you do) there is no issue.

Nicolette said this, and it may not be my place to explain, but I will give you my take on what she said. My understanding is that you may talk about lots of issues (big credit to you, in my opinion), but maybe you spend too much time talking about stuff and not enough time doing stuff to resolve things. Maybe too much time procrastinating?

I'm not entirely sure that is the case. I more get the impression that you just don't talk about the positive things you've done. For a while you talked about your alcohol issue. My undertanding is that you no longer drink. I could be wrong. But I don't think you give yourself any credit, when you do something positive, or when you remove something negative from your life. I don't know where you are at drugs wise. Whether you are still using cannabis, or abusing cannabis? Whether you have used cannabis to 'help' you in therapy or not. Also going back to the weapons by your bed. Have you managed to reduce the number of those weapons?

You tend to focus on the negative things in your life, when you post. You do not even mention, or give credit to any positive things you have done/are doing. This leads to one of 2 conclusions - either you take things on board and make changes (however small), but don't tell us about them. Or you don't make any changes at all, and find some other negative aspect to focus on. Only you know which conclusion is true.

 

[jadebear]

I more get the impression that you just don't talk about the positive things you've done.

You're right....I don't. But it's because when I do make changes, I don't want to be told it's not the right way or it's not good enough.

 

[cherryblossom]

Please remember that pretty much everything said here is to try to support and help each other along the way. I seriously doubt that anyone here would critise you for trying to make improvements. We all understand that things cannot be changed overnight. But we encourage positive steps, so you should share those with us too!

 

[snugglepuss]

Cherry blossom

No I got that he said trauma therapy. Withholding treatment to trauma survivors based on whether or not someone is deemed to have addiction fully under control is not ethical. That is placing a judgement value on people who are addicts, who have disordered eating or struggles with self injury.
Treatment protocol indicates that skills should be taught but it ultimately is up to the trauma victim/client to choose how they want to cope. Often times people who are abstinent from drugs will replace them with another coping mechanism, such as myself. When I got clean my self injury turned more destructive. 4 years on and I still struggle with that and disordered eating but I also use some of the other coping skills I have learned through counseling, seeking safety program and DBT.
My therapists have known about my cutting and eating and would never deny me the opportunity to access trauma therapy.
Treatment protocol does encourage a level of stability in the clients life but that also has to be realistic for people who are dealing with trauma, especially people who are dealing with rape/incest/molestation/sexual assault.