Hello All - CPTSD

[Sad Nicola]

Thanks

Thanks for all your help - all of you who have replied. It's 3 weeks plus since I last self-harmed and am feeling strong here.

The thing that bothers me most at the moment is an increasing dependance on drink. I manage the odd night without, but then the lure becomes so strong I think I'll have just one or two - then the bottom of the bottle is loomimg. I fear what I am doing to my body with this - how long can a liver hang out I wonder. I think for me it's much the same thing as cutting - self-destructive behaviour that takes off the edges of the pain.

Last time I felt so angry that I wanted to do something mad and bad I drank an entire bottle of wine then rolled naked in the wet grass. Crazy no doubt, but it did the trick - cooled the blood. My partner nearly died laughing. Just hope the neighbours weren't watching - it was dark at the time, so hopefully not.

Having a tough time at the moment after ending a series of therapy sessions. In the UK we get allocated a maximum number of NHS sessions then that's it. Doesn't matter if you're ready to finish or not. They sprang the last session on me early too, which sent me into a mad spin. the grief at losing my very skillful and supportive therapist was terrible and activated my triggers - abandonment, rejection etc. he wouldn't even take a phone call from me a week later.

Then came an attemt to take more antidepressants - venlafaxine (?sp) was what they wanted me to take but the side effects were so dreadful that I had to quit after two days - wanted to die. Since then have been making some progress using meditation - the key for me seems to be to keep my arousal levels down.

 

[Nishkaa]

Hi 'Nicola,

Good one on keeping from the self-harm! Well done!

Ah the drink-- that can be tangly too. It can also add to depression symptoms and anger.

Abandonment is hard too, especially when you had a good connection with your therapist-- hey, but you are not alone here. It's also normal to be going through some grieving process at a recent loss. There are some fun ways to handle anger that aren't self-destructive, but can help in releasing the anger energy (e.g. I'll take a bucket of ice cubes and thrown them up against the shower stall-- no-one gets hurt and it's easy clean up, and some satisfaction in releasing some of my built-up anger ;-) )

The challenge is to learn some healthy coping skills for the symptoms, and that takes time to build and to discover what works best. There's lots of people here with good experience and good insights to help with coping skills practice and development.

I'm really glad you are here.
See you around :)
~ Nishkaa

 

[Sad Nicola]

Hi

Thank you all for your helpful replies. It's been well over over a month since I last self-harmed and am feeling way calmer.

I have found meditation enormously useful. It helps me keep my arousal levels down so that I don't spiral out of control. I realise that this is just a 'holding' measure but I'm hoping that if I keep it up the habit-cycle will be broken. The triggers still happen but I find that just being aware of them straightawy helps and I can address them, to some extent at least.

I'm still drinking and smoking way too much so that needs addressing at some point, but hey, one step at a time.

I get to see a 'rewind' therapist tomorrow and am extremely apprehensive. That's why I'm still up at this stupid hour writing this.

Dreading tomorrow

Nicola

 

[Sad Nicola]

I thought it was time I went into some detail about what led up to my problems.

I don't know if I'm unusual in that I'm 54 years old and have just started experiencing CPTSD. Maybe not. Some of the traumas are pretty recent so I guess that is more important than my actual age.

I am the child of a bi-polar father and inattentive mother, and got beaten around a fair bit as a child. My Uncle sexually abused me when I was seven or eight years old. I grew up feeling somewhat neglected and unloved.

At 15 I became pregnant and gave up the child for adoption - I really wasn't given much choice. I was a pretty dysfunctional teenager. After that time I was anorexic at times and very promiscuous.

Nevertheless things went well thereafter - I met my husband when I was 19 years old and we married a few years later and are still together. I studied, he studied, we both have good jobs. We have two beautiful children, now grown up - born in '86 amd '88. I have always been faithful to him since we married.

The problems started in 2004, when my birth child turned up unexpectedly. He is brain-damaged from drug-abuse. He made me feel very bad as he claimed to have had a hard time accepting the fact that he was adopted. He was abusive and aggressive and created the most appalling turmoil in the family. I tried my best to 'mend' things - to fix the unfixable - but it was no good. In the end, after about a year of trying, I was left with a hostile, abusive husband and two upset teenage children. At the time I was suffering from PTSD although I had no idea what it was. I drank rediculous amounts, cared about very little and became quite depressed, angry and isolated.

Things calmed down again and I began to take up the threads of my life gain. Then in 2008 several great whammies shot me down. My parents started to fall apart, we moved house twice, I had several months of weird and scary neurological symptoms followed by breast cancer - had all the treatments: operation, chemotherapy and radiotherapy. Was convinced that this was the end.

I developed a nasty case of health anxiety - perhaps not surprising - then after a series of drug treatments for 'depression' that just made me worse, my Mother died in April this year. I think that put the lid on it. That's when it all blew off - cptsd: full-blown. raw, bloody and painful with cutting, disassociation, alcohol abuse and self-harm. I have some quite powerful triggers.

I am just about holding onto my job, but it is a close-run thing.

Another sad story to add to the list of sad stories on this forum. Anyway, I am not going to let this thing beat me. I will survive. I will get better. I have to.

Nicola

 

[James B.]

Best wishes to you Nicola. Wishing much strength on your path to a better life.

 

[Iam]

Hi Nicola,
I am not sure why C-PTSD hits so many of us full blown as we get older. It hit me 9 years ago when I had a breakdown, though I had it before then, it just wasn't diagnosed. It took me until this last June before I started to understand what have PTSD means and finally accepted the truth of it all. Maybe it's because the kids are grown and have moved out that I can finally take the time to concentrate on me. Fighting PTSD has certainly has become a full time occupation for me right now.

I'm with you, I am not going to let this beat me or steal the rest of my life. Though there are times when I dip low enough to just want to end it all. I have pulled out of it every time. I'm hoping that I am actually learning that the horrible feelings, the most despairing moments do pass and eventually things look more hopeful.

I am glad you are a fighter/survivor. You are doing the work to learn to manage this disorder. Kind of like diabetes, we have to learn how to manage it and we can.

 

[Sad Nicola]

Hi

Still no cutting and nearly 2 whole months have passed. Think I might finally have got this thing beaten. The more time passes, the less I think about it, so there's definitely a 'habit' element in there. Also, the longer I go, the more of a failure I would feel if I gave in, so that keeps me going too.

Still lots of work to do on triggers, health anxiety, drinking and irritability but hey, one step at a time and all that. I see the path forward, and that is important.

Growing stronger
Sad Nicola

 

[James B.]

That is so great what you wrote, Sad Nicola.

And am very happy to hear about the progress you mentioned too. One step at a time, me too. 2 months is really good. :thumbs-up

 

[Gloria]

Dear Sad Nicola,

I have read your posts since you joined and I can see beautiful healing happening. So glad that you are not cutting yourself. I have been asked by T and psychiatrists if I cut myself. I don't self injure but I am very sure that if I ever tried it, I probably would have a very time stopping. I am so pround of you.

I really appreciate that you are here and I'm so glad!

Big Hugs!!

Gloria

 

[Sad Nicola]

Thanks Gloria, and to everyone who has supported me.

In fact, I am feeling anything but healed tonight because tomorrow I have to go to the hospital for tests that will tell me whether my breast cancer has spread into the rest of my body.

I don't know what to do with myself, the anxiety is overwhelming. Meditatation helps, but the terror keeps getting away from me.

Good vibes from you would be good. It has been shown to help.

Thanks
Nicola

 

[amethist]

Hi Nicola

I hope all goes well for you tomorrow. You will be anxious, anyone would, with or without PTSD.

Good vibes and thoughts are with you right now, and I am sure many others will send their good wishes to you soon.

Take care, my prayers are with you.

Amethist

 

[Sad Nicola]

Well, thankfully, no more cancer it seems - the physical symptoms I was having turned out to be nothing more than normal 'aging' which was helped along by chemo to knock out what remained of my hormones. So, health anxiety aside (and I have it pretty bad) I am feeling much better on that front.

Have still resisted the urge to cut, which is getting less as time goes on and so I am feeling much more normal. I can't tell you how much the cutting affects my self-esteem - it makes me feel so sick and deviant.

I think I have got past the worst of the grief for my mother's death too. I still feel sad about it but not desperate anymore. I had to make so many tough decisions when she was ill and dying - whether to risk infection by visiting her when she was in hospital and I was immumo-compromised - or whether to stay clear. I mostly chose the latter, which I've had a hard time coming to terms with since she died. I know I can never regain that time. Guilt, guilt guilt, but I think I have to forgive myself and think what she would have done in my position. I know she would have been sensible about it.

Main source of angst at the moment is about my mentally ill birth-child, who has now been sectioned due to yet another act of violence on his part. he keeps writing/texting/phoning me begging for help to get him out of the secure nursing unit he is in. I am scared. He is big, strong and nasty and at times not at all well disposed towards me. I have a real fear that one day he will turn up one day and attack me. I try to keep calm about this but it is not easy. I have no rights to know what is happening to him - how long he will be sectioned for, his treatment plans etc. He refuses to share this information with me and it seems I cannot find out. I fear for my daughter too - she is only 22 and lives very close to him. There is something very wrong with the system here. All the control is on his side, it seems. I cannot answer the door or the phone. I feel I have no place of safety.