Complex PTSD - The Damage from Abuse and Trauma

The Damage of Abuse

Trigger Warning: This post contains personal accounts and detailed discussions of childhood abuse. If you are currently feeling vulnerable or find these topics distressing, please prioritize your well-being before reading.

Childhood abuse is one of the worst forms of torture that a person can endure. It feels like being in a war zone, imprisoned by cruel dictators and forced to live under their every will and command until the law “says” you are old enough to have your own life. I know this because I have lived in this particular “war zone” called child abuse.

I was stuck and I had no one to lean on for help who had my corner. No adult saw my pain and need to feel safe and no matter how much I cried for help, I was ignored.

My own mother had to be “bullied” by my teachers to take me to the doctor when I had an STD. She insisted I was “fine,” and everything was fine. Well, within all that “fine-ness,” I was left to suffer in the hands of cruel sexual predators and neglectful adults. It was only when those STDs turned nasty with infection, and I couldn’t go to the bathroom that adults took notice and told my mother. If they had not, I would be dead.

The same thing happened years later when I suffered several miscarriages from abuse. I had never been told by mother that girls of a certain age would start their periods. I didn’t know what they were, and I was convinced that I was dying. The truth that I was pregnant at age 13–15 was laughed at. I had no boyfriend, and I was a loner at school, so how could I possibly be pregnant?

No one saw the obvious truth. I had “unusually heavy bleeding,” and my mother was angry when I went through packet after packet of sanitary towels. I was sick with cramping and infection that I was in a haze like a zombie and yet mother made me go to school. I got no medical treatment, nor was I taken to the ER. I was left to suffer through them all with the shame and stigma that comes with being a menstruating young girl.

For some of them, I managed to hide by locking myself in the bathroom and just letting the blood gush out of me in painful spasms. It was terrifying! I often bled through my clothes because I couldn’t stem the bleeding.

My final miscarriage was very public in a packed church full of most of my school friends and their families. I started having painful spasms in church, and I couldn’t leave since I was doing a reading. Blood was pouring for everyone to see, as well as a giant red stain on my glowing white dress.

It was one of the most embarrassing moments of my life. Instead of being taken care of, I was laughed at and people whispered and pointed fingers at me. The shame and guilt of being “dirty and un-hygienic” were on most people’s lips.

Taking Stock of the Damage

A childhood full of abuse and neglect will often lead to Complex PTSD. It is one of the worst forms of Post-Traumatic Stress because you feel as if you are still living in the past. The memories keep getting triggered years after the abuse ended.

Complex PTSD causes the body to act and feel like it is constantly under attack, stuck in the “war zone” of hurt.

A person will continue to feel this way years after the abuse happened into adulthood and beyond. It can take a lifetime to feel safe and trust people again. I know because I’ve lived with Complex PTSD my whole life. Everything feels like living through a magnifying glass. I feel different from others, and no matter how much therapy I have gone through, I still cannot change that mindset. I still feel different because I see life in so much more detail. I notice everything around me, even when I pretend I don’t.

Hyper-Vigilance & Alertness

After suffering from years of abuse, the body goes into survival mode long after the trauma has ended. The body still believes it is under attack even though the brain has long made you forget anything that ever happened.

The Body Keeps the Score by Dr. Bessel Van Der Kolk is an excellent book that describes how a survivor feels long after trauma, and how it affects a person in every aspect of life.

Trauma survivors feel jittery, on edge, restless, jumpy, hyperactive, and excitable all rolled into one big mix of emotions.

It’s weird to feel hyper about everyone and everything around you without understanding why. Your body is on autopilot like a robot.

Years ago, I believed that I was different from other people. I didn’t seem to react in the same way people did to noise and emotions. It’s tiring to live like this because you react to every little stimulus that hits you during the day.

You see everyone and everything through a magnifying glass.

A misfiring exhaust on a car can trigger a survivor to instinctively curl into a ball and shy away from the noise. The smell of perspiration in a gym can trigger a survivor right back to the abuse. A crying child can break you out in hives and make you want to ball with pain from sympathy. Heading downtown to shop or even going to your local food market can be exhausting.

Any perceived threats along the way are neutralized by taking a different route or avoiding certain people. This is called dissociation because you disconnect from all stimuli, become numb, and switch off. Life becomes too much. Without addressing the reason why life becomes exhausting, we suffer all over again.

Hyper-arousal

I can only speak about my own experiences as a sexual abuse and trauma survivor when talking about hyper-arousal. It is not something many people admit or talk about because it’s embarrassing and private.

My body was constantly “turned on.” There was no off switch after years of having been “a sex toy.” My body just couldn’t turn itself off. The damage was done.

Living without an off switch brings many problems in later life. As a child, I always struggled to go to the bathroom. I had so many “wet accidents” and smelly discharge. In later life, I’ve always struggled with stress incontinence, like a woman gets after childbirth for a while, or I imagine a symptom of old age. My “little problem” has always been there.

Hyper-sensitivity

A survivor of trauma is always going to be a sensitive and emotional human being, no matter how much you try to hide it through dissociation. It’s always there. I am more attuned to my surroundings and people than others appear to be. People in general have this seemingly “I don’t care” attitude, going through life with a neutral face. We often read on the subway or switch off listening to music or podcasts. We do anything not to be in the moment.

I care about the people around me, and I bend over backward at the cost of my own health to help a wronged human being. I know I do it, but I feel I must help someone in need, whether it is an old lady needing help to cross the street, or a child falling over.

Boundaries are difficult to understand, especially boundaries towards yourself.

I am lucky to collaborate with people who look out for me, and don’t let me work too much. I have always been taken advantage of in the past, but now I am finally learning the importance of having a break.

Relaxation

Relaxation is probably one of the most difficult things to do as a survivor. The body is consistently hyper all over. To relax or even think about relaxing means allowing yourself to feel. That is dangerous because that is when you remember. Your memories come flooding back, and your body reminds you of all the past hurts.

Being on the move and letting your body remain in hyperdrive throughout life is much easier than relaxing. Most people relish the thought of relaxing, but survivors tend to do anything to avoid it. Even if they appear to be relaxed. I can guarantee that they are anything but relaxed.

How to begin to learn to relax

I have always loved water, even though it’s also a source of great pain for me. It was one of the places where I was first sexually abused as a child. I also witnessed a woman being raped and killed in a river. Since then, I’ve worked hard to try to overcome my fear of water. It was, after all, not the water that caused my fear, but the activities in it.

Eventually, I managed to conquer my fear and reset my thinking. I taught myself to have fun and relax in water instead of feeling terrified. Swimming is a great way of relaxing without being still. When I’m in water, I am alone with my thoughts, and no one can talk to me and disrupt me. I can focus on my body and my breathing while my brain can switch off or mull over a problem. Whatever is on my mind, I usually surface feeling better.

If you are a survivor like me, try to see if being in water can help you too.

My name is Lizzy. I’m a trauma survivor, a wife, a mom, a teacher, and an author.

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