PTSD raises it's ugly head AGAIN

[Starfire]

It happened again. Haven't had a PTSD episode in awhile for which I'm grateful. Then a couple Sundays ago, a person in a similar position of my abuser, also don't know him well, came up behind me and gave me a hug. Immediate!y PTSD event with dissociation and then became completely numb. Went to my therapist, tried to rationally discuss what happened. My T explained it's not something that can rationally be fixed. It's an emotional response. I wanted him to fix it..

He scheduled some extra sessions and was very helpful. He reminded me of things I learned a long time ago. There is still fear when we are in the same room with this guy. We keep track of his every movement. We aren't dissociating but there is this numbness. No feelings about anything.

World is coming to an end. Ah OK. A friend lost her home to a wild fire. Ah. OK. There is absolutely no feelings about anything. Colleagues are out celebrating a win that has taken us months to accomplish. Ah, OK. I came home. Intellectually know this is a problem and I should be doing something cuz this could go on forever. But ah, OK. I know in the past I've become suicidal and had repeated dissociation following this numbness but Ah. OK.

What I want is for somebody here to say do A, B, C and the numbness will stop. Know nobody can do that. Perhaps, tho others here have had similar events and came thru them.
Thank you

 

[Movingforward10]

Frustratingly and annoyingly, healing isn't a linear journey. Going to be bumps in the road. BUT, you DO have all this time of healing, all these new tools in the box to help with grounding, and reorientating to the here and now, than you had before. So the pattern of numbing, disassociation, all leading to SI doesn't need to be the same. Maybe the length of time will be shorter. Or the intensity. Or both. But it doesn't need to be the same
. what's great is that you recognise what is happening.

What techniques have you learnt so that you can give yourself the ABC of things to do?

Things that work for me are connecting with my body somehow. Swimming outdoors in the sunshine seems to be the best thing for me. It's a gentle activity that doesn stress my body out too much and the warmth and the movements help me. Little ones inside love swimming, so it also helps to bring feelings back. So, does some form of exercise help you?
Or what works for you?
It's usually a bit of a battle to do swimming though. Because my brain wants to not move and not be connected to my body and not being seen by people etc. But if I can take control and get past that refusal, it really helps.

 

[Friday]

What I want is for somebody here to say do A, B, C and the numbness will stop. Know nobody can do that.

Close enough, though… (read below)

Stressor vs. Trigger - What Is A Trigger?

Whilst I do not engage most conversations here nowadays, I have been reading this word "trigger" get thrown about more and more over the past months, most of which I found to be completely incorrect for what a trigger actually is. It has gotten to a point where I feel members are getting way off...

www.myptsd.com