Sufferer Lifelong PTSD Coping with Massive Recent Trauma

[helbredelse]

Hello.. I'm in my late 40s. About eight years ago, I was diagnosed with PTSD from being abused my entire life and have been regularly seeing a trauma therapist since then. Recently, a traumatic event happened to me, triggering my core abandonment issues that I had been slowly working with my therapist on for years. It's like Pandora's Box was accidentally opened and I can't close it. Now I have to deal with a lifetime of trauma pretty much all at the same time, it feels like. I had never been triggered this badly before. If I didn't have those years of trauma therapy and tools, I likely would not be here right now. I am also attending a support group twice a week which is helping. I'm hoping this site will help me as well.

 

[Sideways]

Welcome to the forum - hope it's helpful:)

 

[Freddyt]

Welcome to the forum!!

PTSD is like a jack in the box sometimes, years after something turns the crank and surprise.....45 years later for me...

Hope you find help here.

 

[Tickety-boo]

I had something similar happen. The re-trauma was very different from anything I had experienced before, but the same emotional coping mechanisms worked. It also prompted me to re-visit my therapy for my past, as I found it difficult to address the new stuff without addressing the old stuff. For a period right after the re-trauma, I couldn't imagine ever feeling a positive emotion again. It was absolute hell for about 2 years, but there was a flame I hadn't had before because I knew I had got through stuff before and so I surely could again. I had more fight in me most of the time (certainly not all the time!). I'm coming up on 5 years out now from the re-trama and I'm actually better than I was before that re-trauma. I hope my story gives you hope that you can come away from this stronger eventually, and I hope that you do!

 

[helbredelse]

I had something similar happen. The re-trauma was very different from anything I had experienced before, but the same emotional coping mechanisms worked. It also prompted me to re-visit my therapy for my past, as I found it difficult to address the new stuff without addressing the old stuff. For a period right after the re-trauma, I couldn't imagine ever feeling a positive emotion again. It was absolute hell for about 2 years, but there was a flame I hadn't had before because I knew I had got through stuff before and so I surely could again. I had more fight in me most of the time (certainly not all the time!). I'm coming up on 5 years out now from the re-trama and I'm actually better than I was before that re-trauma. I hope my story gives you hope that you can come away from this stronger eventually, and I hope that you do!

Thank you. That does give me some hope. It's definitely been a struggle for me. I tell myself that I'm still here. I've come a very long way and I'm still here. That I need to take it one day at a time or even one moment at a time. After everything I've been through, I made it through all that and I can get through this. It just may take a very long time and that is okay too. That there is no rush even though I feel it at times. Thank you, again.

 

[caroline_13]

Welcome... this is a great community.

 

[arfie]

It's like Pandora's Box was accidentally opened and I can't close it. Now I have to deal with a lifetime of trauma pretty much all at the same time

great descriptive. . . it fits my reaction to recent trauma to a "t". in my own case, my pretherapy awareness reacted similarly without my having a clue that i had fallen down the proverbial rabbit hole. in my own case, i really am the last one to know when i've slid into the abyss. "it's not me. . . the world is the problem. . . i'm the only perfect homo sapien in the species."

the good news is that each time i mindfully work through another of these flashback series, i come out the other side more stable and healed.

 

[Weemie]

Oh, yah. I view myself as a sort of perma-therapy project. Whether that's on my lonesome or with the gracious help of others.