Not all people living with CPTSD have a history of childhood trauma, but those who do may struggle relationally because of learned coping mechanisms that served to connect to caregivers in childhood (e.g. perfectionism, people pleasing). Our very first venture in life is connecting with our caregivers; therefore, it is important to understand that children will adopt and repeat behaviors they perceive as aligning with their caregivers.

Such behaviors can and often do cause relational issues in adulthood, as many survivors of childhood trauma do not recognize their behaviors as anything more than how they accomplished that connection in childhood. Many times, these relational issues are explained by attachment styles, but rarely are relational issues connected to learned behaviors related to a lack of safety and choice in childhood.

Those of us with a history of childhood trauma may lose adult relationships because those behaviors that connected to caregivers in childhood are ineffective in healthy adult relationships. My friend Lauren Starnes explained it like this:

“behaviors that served to connect you in childhood serve to disconnect you in adulthood”.

Perhaps the saddest part of childhood trauma is its potential to affect people across their lifespan. Suffering often continues into adulthood and is played out in fractured and lost relationships. Nobody is at fault, really. Usually, loved ones (especially a spouse) are operating with a knowledge deficit.

Knowledge is powerful, and understanding how childhood trauma affects humans has the potential to support survivors of childhood trauma and those who love them. Additionally, trauma survivors are not without responsibility and that is sometimes a hard truth, but healing comes with learning. Knowledge provides safety and autonomy–something those of us with a history of trauma know little about.

But as adult survivors, we can choose to learn and alter ineffective coping, we can choose power, we can learn and we can change. We have a choice now. The work is hard, but it is worth it.

“When you know better, you do better” Maya Angelou

Perhaps one of the most liberating experiences as a survivor of an abusive childhood came when I finally understood the effects of childhood trauma. It wasn’t until I began advocating for survivors that I learned about Adverse Childhood Experiences.

I felt validated and suddenly able to extend grace and compassion for my behaviors that hurt the people I loved. I understood that, given my experiences with abuse and neglect, I was simply doing the best I could with behaviors I had created to survive and connect. There were parts of me that weren’t convinced that I had an abusive childhood, but learning about Adverse Childhood Experiences altered my life and gave my pain a name.

Adverse Childhood Experiences is measured by a questionnaire (10 questions) that probes for abuse (emotional, sexual, physical) and/or neglect (emotional, physical). Also included are separation factors such as severe mental illness in the home (resulting in hospitalization or completed suicide); substance abuse; or imprisonment of a family member. The ACE questionnaire was developed by Kaiser Permanente and the Centers for Disease Control in the 1990s. Originally created as a weight loss study, researchers found a connection between childhood trauma and physical manifestations that caused participants to drop out of the study. Since many survivors of childhood trauma are high utilizers of the health care system (Hargreaves et al., 2019), the ACE study could be foundational to our understanding (and DSM adaptation) of CPTSD.In the meantime, an understanding of maladaptive behaviors that may be present in survivors of childhood trauma could support survivors.

Those who have a history of Adverse Childhood Experiences need social support, but often maladaptive behaviors serve to disconnect them from people. Until survivors recognize these behaviors, they cannot address them. After many fractured relationships, I realized I had work to do including learning healthy ways to connect to my friends and family. For me, two prominent behaviors caused irreparable fractures in important relationships—people pleasing and perfectionism.

People-pleasing can manifest in many ways, but perhaps the most prominent is the inability to say no to others.

Amenability as a child connected me to caregivers, and I learned early to always agree to any plan and never to resist. While this did connect me to my mom in childhood, in adulthood it has served to separate me from people.

For example, when making plans with others, I did not have the language or the ability to simply say “no thank you, that doesn’t work for me,” so I cancelled more plans than I kept. After a while, friends and family stopped asking me to make plans with them. This led to loneliness, shame, and despair.

Once I learned that I simply wanted people to be happy with me and to accept me, I understood that people-pleasing was not the way to deeply connect with them.

Now, when something is asked of me, I do not answer on the spot. My standard is “let me get back to you”—because I know I almost always don’t want to go with that plan. Taking a moment to think allows me to choose to respect the time and energy of my friends and family while also giving me the choice to make a decision based on interpersonal factors (time, energy, desire). Both can be true; I can respect their time and energy, and I can choose to say no–without fear of separation from them.

The key to recovering from people-pleasing is to choose wisely who you allow into your inner circle.

Be careful about anyone whose presence in your life depends on how many times your will is bent to theirs. For those living with a spouse, it is important to invite them to join you on your healing journey. And if people-pleasing is a behavior you use to connect with others, consider having honest conversations with those in your circle. Recruit them to help you. Ask them to stay connected to you even if you don’t accept those dinner plans.

For those of you who love people pleasers, don’t hesitate to go deeper when making plans or when submitting a request to them; their default may always be to make themselves amenable to you.

When the people pleaser behavior is present, gently guide them back to connection with you that is not based on their amenability to your plan.

The opposite is true, though. Be careful about keeping people in your life whose connection to you depends on your performance. Sometimes this means separating from family members; this can feel brutal, but sometimes it is necessary for your healing. Ask me how I know…

Perfectionism is a common maladaptive coping mechanism that is a result of childhood trauma (Smith et al., 2019). This maladaptive coping mechanism, often adopted in childhood, is particularly difficult because perfectionism can equate to vocational and economic success.

However, perfectionism can cause problems in adult relationships because perfectionists also hold others to high standards. The perfectionist can be judgmental of others, particularly when others don’t meet perfect standards. I learned that perfect grades connected me to my mom, something I deeply desired, and as long as I can remember, I never accepted less than 100% in my academic pursuits.

This became painfully clear to me when I submitted my dissertation to my chair. When she requested a minor revision, and I was unable to accept the revisions as minor and deemed the entire document (245 pages) a failure.

During a subsequent counseling session, I realized that it was never about being perfect; it was about being securely attached to my dissertation chair, whom I highly respected. It was a valuable lesson for me and one that I am still learning.

I am learning that I am not perfect, and I am learning that my friends and family are not perfect. I am learning that we grow together and that life is messy, and that mistakes will be made.

Sometimes I sit in imperfection just to demonstrate that imperfection will not kill me. Those imperfections have nothing to do with my value as a human being.

Perfectionism may have served its purpose in childhood, but it will destroy our ability to maintain strong relationships in adulthood. Learning to accept imperfections may always be a struggle, but I am grateful for supportive people around me who remind me that I am valuable even if I never accomplish a single thing in this life. That is true of you too, my fellow survivor.

You do not need to be perfect to be loved; you just need to be you to be loved. For those of you who love survivors of adverse childhood experiences we need you to extend care and compassion, and maybe even congratulations when we stop trying to be perfect for you to accept us.

Keep reminding us that you love us because we are imperfectly human.

Dear Survivor: you can rest now. You are accepted. You are SEEN. You are KNOWN. You are HEARD. You are VALUED, JUST as you are. Dear loved ones, it is important that you get help too. Don’t give up, keep fighting for us.

Remember, nobody did that for us when we were most vulnerable. The best news? There is help, there is hope. There are armies of people who want to stand in the gap for you. I am honored to be one of them.

Sources:

Hargreaves, M. K., Mouton, C. P., Liu, J., Zhou, Y. E., & Blot, W. J. (2019). Adverse childhood experiences and health care utilization in a low-income population. Journal of Health Care for the Poor and Underserved, 30(2), 749–767. https://doi.org/10.1353/hpu.2019.0054

Smith, M. M., Saklofske, D. H., Yan, G., & Sherry, S. B. (2019).
Adverse childhood experiences and multidimensional perfectionism in young adults. Personality and Individual Differences, 146, 53–57. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2019.03.042

Photo Credit: Unsplash

Guest Post Disclaimer: This guest post is for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing shared here, across CPTSDfoundation.org, any CPTSD Foundation website, our associated communities, or our Social Media accounts, is intended to substitute for or supersede the professional advice and direction of your medical or mental health providers. The thoughts and opinions expressed are those of the guest author and do not necessarily reflect the views of the CPTSD Foundation. For further details, please review the following: Terms of Service, Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer

The AIP model is widely used to explain “observed results” (Hill, 2020) of EMDR therapy. The AIP model is a good start for understanding why EMDR is demonstrating efficacy in patients with PTSD, as well as patients with PTSD with a comorbid severe mental illness (Hase & Brisch, 2022

However, there is still much unknown about EMDR, and even though the AIP model helps researchers understand what is happening, there are still great questions as to why this modality helps with PTSD and provides immense relief for patients. Two schools of thought are worth noting here and are the lynchpins of EMDR. First, EMDR is thought to mimic slow-wave sleep (Pagani et al., 2017). Slow-wave sleep is of much interest to researchers as professionals become more aware of the importance of sleep for general health and memory consolidation (Putilov et al., 2017). During slow-wave sleep, memories are consolidated as more recent research describes the brain (in slow-wave sleep) as an “optimizing memory consolidator” versus the waking brain working to process stimuli (Rasch & Born, 2013). The mechanism of slow-wave sleep is much more complicated than is presented here; slow-wave sleep involves much of the brain’s anatomy and neurotransmitters (Rasch & Born, 2013). Slow wave sleep is recorded using an electroencephalogram (EEG), and brain waves during bilateral stimulation in EMDR are almost identical to slow wave sleep on the EEG (Pagani et al., 2017). These findings help researchers understand the mechanisms of bilateral stimulation on the brain and help explain why EMDR is effective for PTSD, as negative memories are consolidated during bilateral stimulation, much like sleep memory consolidation (Putilov et al., 2017). Understanding how the brain consolidates memory and under which conditions is essential for researchers—this study by Pagani et al. (2017) supports the hypothesis that memory consolidation during these slow brain waves explains why EMDR effectively treats trauma, as bilateral stimulation mimics slow wave sleep. Still, researchers still do not understand much about EMDR. However, there is a second point of interest to researchers. EMDR is thought to tax working memory, making reprocessed memories less vivid and traumatic for patients (Van Den Hout et al., 2011).

Before addressing how EMDR taxes working memory, it is prudent to summarize the hypothesis of why EMDR works to reduce symptoms of PTSD. It is thought maladaptive memories are consolidated less vividly under bilateral stimulation conditions, causing less distress for the patients. Patients are asked to focus on some of their worst memories during bilateral stimulation.  It is thought that dual taxation of working memory causes the memory to consolidate less vividly than before bilateral stimulation (Manzoni et al., 2018). Symptoms are measured using Subjective Units of Disturbance (SUD); the Manzoni study demonstrated a reduction in SUD scores.

PTSD can be debilitating, and EMDR demonstrates great promise in helping patients live everyday lives without traumatic flashbacks and other ills of PTSD.

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog post do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

Johnny’s mom finally asked his doctor for ideas to calm him as he was beginning to isolate and reported poor sleep habits. After a referral to a specialist, Johnny was diagnosed with General Anxiety Disorder. His clingy behaviors, concerning tantrums, and increased symptoms meant a change was necessary, as Johnny needed to learn to navigate his GAD over the course of his lifetime.

“Generalized Anxiety Disorder (GAD) is characterized by persistent and excessive worry about a number of different things. People with GAD may anticipate disaster and may be overly concerned about money, health, family, work, or other issues. Individuals with GAD find it difficult to control their state of worry. They may worry more than seems warranted about actual events or may expect the worst even when there is no apparent reason for concern.” [1]

GAD in children is more difficult to diagnose and its symptoms are more diverse. Children’s brains are still developing and when hormones are introduced, their battle with GAD can become more intense. According to the Mayo Clinic, symptoms of GAD include:

• Feeling overly anxious to fit in, but also retreating from social events at the last minute
• Feeling overly critical (strives for perfection)
• Feel the need to repeat tasks because they aren’t perfect the first time.
• Feeling the need to spend excessive time doing homework
• Feeling an extreme lack of confidence
• Feeling the need for approval
• Feeling the need for a lot of reassurance about performance
• Feeling the need to remain at home because of frequent stomach aches or other physical complaints
• Feeling the need to avoid social situations.

The Mayo Clinic also reports physical symptoms of GAD in an attempt to help parents, as addressing early is an important component in treating and managing the disorder. If children are in a state of “fight or flight”—which is a term we use when a portion of the brain goes “off-line”—they can not rest or digest. Therefore, it is imperative for parents to listen to the silence, and let their symptoms tell the story.

• Digestive or bowel problems, such as irritable bowel syndrome or ulcers
• Headaches and migraines
• Chronic pain and illness
• Sleep problems and insomnia
• Heart-health issues

Chronically ill children, especially those that report stomach aches should be evaluated for GAD. GAD is often accompanied by other mental health issues including:

• Phobias
• Panic disorder
• Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)
• Obsessive-compulsive disorder (OCD)
• Depression
• Suicidal thoughts or suicide
• Substance abuse

All of these disorders need professional intervention.

The causes of GAD are not known, though a number of factors are in play, including genetics, familial status, trauma, and other factors outside of human control. While there is no way to prevent your child from GAD, there is hope in treatment and educating the child on their diagnosis. It is important to verbalize thoughts and concerns to your child’s doctor. It is also important to ensure that your child does not feel broken. It is vital to remove shame and confusion by helping them accept their diagnosis just as they would accept a broken arm diagnosis. When we remove the stigma for them, we set them up to live happy and productive life. It is important for us to teach them skills to live with GAD. There are tricks and tips to help children when they are in a hyperreactive state and when GAD has commandeered their brains.

When a child (or any person for that matter) is in a state of reactivity, the prefrontal cortex literally stops working. The PFC is where a lot of executive functions, impulse control, and short-term memory occurs. When the PFC is “offline”, the brain loops continuous and largely unhelpful thoughts. When this happens, there are some tricks to bring the PFC online, thereby calming the nervous systems.

• Body movement is an excellent way to “change the narrative”. I often encourage parents to ask their activated children to go complete a task that would require them to move their bodies. Parents can use this trick to instill self-confidence and make them feel appreciated for helping. As children enter adolescence, organized sports or any activity that gets them socializing and physically moving their bodies (a part-time job they enjoy is a great example) can diminish their GAD symptoms.
• Physical touch is a proven way to help bring the pre-fontal cortex online. Though some children may not receive this from a parent, self-soothing techniques also work. These include washing hands with cold water or any other activity where there is a physical change or touch to the skin.
• Memorizing a list, affirmation, or prayer and then reciting also brings the pre-frontal cortex online. Parents can use this technique using questions about something they love that would require them to recall a list or an event. This literally shifts the brain out of fight or flight, even if only for a short time.

GAD in children can also be treated with medication, but it is important to add counseling into the treatment arsenal. Unless their brain “grows out of it”, it is likely your child will need to navigate their diagnosis over the course of their entire lives. Educating yourself and your child will go a long way to making their diagnosis manageable. Since substance abuse is prominent in this subset of people, it’s important for parents to dialogue openly with their children from the beginning. Also, if trauma is present, other disorders like PTSD offer more symptoms and different treatments.

As with all mental illnesses, Generalized Anxiety Disorder in children must be top of mind, we must stay aware, we must remain proactive, and we must advocate for them. Awareness is everything and when coupled with Hope, children can live full lives with GAD.

Parents, it’s your job to get them to the promised land of hope and healing, and oftentimes that comes from merely paying attention and then using every tool at your disposal to help them

Because their mental health matters.

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

As a people, we were not created to bear such global trauma and civil unrest. It touches the very core of our fears, we long for safety within our families and communities. As a CPTSD patient, my world is rocked, my brain is full and I am out of tears. Watching the world fall apart is scary and many of us need help navigating some of these uncertain and scary waters. Besides fear, a prominent emotion is that of empathy for those who have suffered and who are suffering. Empathy alone can serve as fray in the fabric of our beings, and empathy overload can and will take us to places we don’t want to go, and the road back is difficult.

In his book, “Get Your Life Back”, John Eldredge suggests a few ways we can give our brains a rest. He cites that the amount of information we consume on any given day would crash a computer. His wisdom in this book is good for everyone but it is particularly good for the trauma tribe. I found this book and some of these principles helpful as I make my way back to a calm nervous system absent of the ills of an activated one. Paying attention to those things that activate our trauma respects the hard work of healing. A few of Eldredge’s principles can transition our emotional brain into our safe present with relative ease.

Eldredge’s principles are reinforced by one statement in the book.

“We were not created to bear the burdens of the whole world but of our village”—John Eldredge

Here are a few key points from Eldredge’s book, in deference to brevity, it is impossible to provide them all here.

• Practice the one-minute pause. Eldredge and his team created “The One Minute Pause” to get us to do just that: pause. Available also on a web browser, this encourages us to stop– twice a day, breathe, meditate and ground ourselves to our present safety.
• Practice Benevolent Detachment. This is the ability to let go of that which does not belong to you, or that which you simply cannot control. This stops empathy over-load and protects our own mental health. We can still care about the sufferings of the world yet understand our own limitations. Protect yourself from vicarious trauma, because your brain cannot delineate your own trauma from that of the world.
• Practice Beauty Hunting. When we focus on beauty, we engage our emotional brains in beautiful things, literally switching your consciousness to your present safety and not your activated trauma.
• Put your phone down. It has been said that the computers we hold in our hands are more powerful than NASA computers. The ease of information is dangerous and we must practice some detachment from the barrage of information.

A prominent California pastor encourages this about cell phones and I have found it helpful in my own journey of protecting my peace and healing.

• Divert Daily—this is the practice of putting our phones away for one hour a day. Eldredge’s research demonstrated the average person picks up their phones eighty times a day!
• Withdraw Weekly—this is the practice of putting your phone away for one full day a week. The exception is those things phones were actually meant to do, but this is a practice that has helped me immensely.
• Abandon Annually—this is the practice of putting your phone away for an entire week. This is the hardest one of them all. I have successfully done this for two years and I was a little sad with reentry. I simply had no idea what immense amounts of screen time were doing to my nervous system.

As a trauma tribe, it is so important to protect your peace and healing during these times of unrest. Perhaps utilizing some of these practices will calm your nervous system down, and you can continue to live the life you deserve because YOU MATTER!

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.

Henry Lee Lucas and Otis Toole ultimately admitted to hundreds of murders, one of them being my step-sister, but most notably Adam Walsh.  Both men were friends with my stepfather and so we saw them often. We were responsible for feeding ourselves, so my sister and I worked odd jobs.  One of my jobs was cleaning the serial killers’ house. I was seven years old and have vivid memories of washing dishes standing on a step stool. I often feel fortunate to be alive.  There really isn’t a logical explanation that either one of them did not add us to their murder roster.  Even though I didn’t know it at the time, this was a time God showed up. His will trumped the unspeakable evil in those men and as a result, I am alive to tell you about the faithfulness of God.  He is, indeed, faithful and so good regardless of how it looks.

Otis Toole was arrested for the murder of Adam Walsh and Henry Lee Lucas disappeared after he killed my step-sister.  Eventually, they both ended up on death row where they died of natural causes. But, their arrest did not protect me from other men abusing me. My mom continued to send us to unsafe places with unsafe people.  Ultimately, because of her neglect, there would be 7 different men who decided I was their property.  At about age 7, I decided to pick where I was going to hang out, but even I picked unsafe places.  And it was at that age abuser number one stole my innocence along with the innocence of several other kids in the same room.  For years, I could not remember who the man in the room was. There were so many nights I fell asleep talking to the air, hoping somebody was listening.

About 3 years later, I was at my friend’s house when we opened the door to a man and a woman offering free candy if we wanted to go to church.  To be honest, I viewed going to church as another place I could be that wasn’t home.  I was all about jumping on that yellow bus and going to church.  What I found there changed the course of my life forever.  That “Air” I had been talking to had a name and it was Jesus, and He had a plan for my life. The people at church told me I was important and valuable.  I’d never felt so loved.  Every time the doors were open, I was at church.  As it would turn out many years later, God used that church and those people for a season of my life when I had nobody but them.  God continued to remain faithful and I know that knocking on the door changed everything for me.  However, it was difficult to reconcile how a “good” God could allow all that happened to me up until that point.  I wanted to know this Jesus and as I sought to know Him, I clung to His promise to never leave me because everyone else had.

My mom continued to bring danger into our home. Ultimately, the state got involved and removed me from her care.  They told her if she would make her pedophile boyfriend leave that they would bring me back home. She agreed, and I was elated that she’d chosen me over the man that would have been the 8th person to abuse me.  The social workers drove me to our house and from the car, I could see a yellow sticky note on the glass front door.  The note had 5 words on it: “Gone to get married, Mom.” Those five simple words made me an orphan, alone and abandoned by the one who gave me life and should have loved me.  The social workers walked me back to the car, their tears matching mine.

They drove straight to the courthouse where I watched the judge sign off on paperwork terminating my mom’s parental rights. I literally belonged to nobody, except the state of Florida.  I stayed with my pastor and his family for 18 months before being placed in a children’s home in Tampa, Florida.

I often tell people that the years I spent at the children’s home were some of the best years of my life.  However, when my foster parents dropped me off there, it felt like another abandonment.  My already fragile heart shattered into a million pieces as I watched them drive away from the children’s home. The first weeks were brutal, but my faithful God provided for me from the first day.  I was immediately loved and cherished by the people there, and that was a time when the Air I’d been praying to felt palatable to me; it felt like He just picked me up and carried me.  By the time I got to the children’s home, it felt like I’d lived 3 lifetimes.  But the truth is I’d only traveled around the sun 14 times. I’d survived more trauma than most people would see in a lifetime.  But He was still there, He changed the narrative and got me out of situations where abusive people would be added to my roster.  Even at that young age, I understood that I would not survive all that happened without Him, and I was and am confused as to how people live their lives without Him.

While at the children’s home, I had many opportunities to tell my story, and I did.  We traveled to churches around the country and I would stand in front of hundreds of people and tell the story of the serial killers. I testified that neither one of them hurt me because that is what my memory told me.

But memory is a weird thing and once I was safe at the home, I began to remember other things that I’d buried in a memory bank that I wished was permanently closed.  Even so, I thrived there and after graduating from college, I moved back to Jacksonville where I met and married the next name to be added to my roster.

By the time Henry Lee Lucas died in 2001, I had all but forgotten about him, but remained fearful of the things that would withdraw themselves from my memory bank.  By that time, I was in the throes of an abusive marriage. There were times I wished the serial killers would have chosen me for one of their victims. I’d survived 7 different abusers as a child and now was living with, being hit by, and controlled by a monster.

The prison room of my childhood was merely replaced by a prison house where I was isolated from friends and got very good at hiding bruises for when I was allowed to leave the house. He’d crowned himself both judge and jury and his game was isolation. He craved power and knew that controlling me was controlling the narrative of our crazy lives.  I no longer trusted the faithfulness of God. The pain was too much and I began to believe that I was alive for the sole purpose of being the prey of others.  I stopped going to church, stopped reading my Bible, and I definitely stopped talking to the Air. I survived by self-medicating which, in turn, became a full-blown addiction to pain pills. Remembering things I’d forgotten coupled with the war waging in my own home was too much for me.  I didn’t want to be alive. I took a handful of pain pills, washed it down with a bottle of wine, and was shocked when I woke up the next morning.  I knew something had to change and I needed help for the pervasive sexual and physical abuse that had firmly placed itself in the forefront of my memory. When I woke up that morning, grateful I didn’t die of an overdose, I started talking to the Air again.  I wanted to end my decade-long standoff with God.  I found a Bible and begged God to change the story in my home, but also thanked Him for His faithfulness.   Jesus met me at the intersection of hope & despair. It turns out that Jesus was exactly where He was when I decided to ignore Him and I craved a relationship with Him—even if He didn’t change the narrative at home. I was very close to leaving my husband, but could not see my way clear to that since he had effectively taken all access to money away from me.  The tipping point was the night I woke up to a massive headache as a result of being hit with a .45 caliber gun.  I knew then that one of two things were going to happen.  He was going to either pull that trigger and it would all be over, or I would find a way to leave him.  So, with less than $1,000 I left him, spending some time in Canada first because of how dangerous he continued to be.  Ultimately, I moved back to Clearwater where I went to college. Even though only a few of my friends lived there, it was important for me to get as far away from him as possible.

If I doubted the faithfulness of God at all, what happened next could not be scripted by the best of storytellers.

Signatures on divorce papers didn’t make the danger go away and I was constantly looking over my shoulder as my abusive, now ex-husband continued to threaten my life. Even though I left him, it felt like abandonment, again. I spent much of my time trying to understand God and when He would decide that I’d had enough.  So, I stopped talking to the Air again; but Jesus was not going to let go. I remembered a big church on the corner not far from my apartment.  So, I decided that I would give it a try.  While that decision felt like my own, I can see now that this was another place where Jesus met me in that painful place. He picked me up and carried me.  Again.  I met friends at that church that stood in huge gaps for me and are still part of my healing today.  While I was trying to figure out God, they were talking to him on my behalf, a lot.

Attempting to figure out God is exhausting.  As it turned out, that big church on a corner had a school and I’d landed a teaching job.  Both the church and work became a refuge for me. As long as I was at either of those places I was ok, but the real war came at night.  And I was simply tired of fighting monsters that I could not see.  I didn’t see it then, but I do now. God had handpicked that church, that school, and more importantly those friends for the sole purpose of holding me up, because I couldn’t do it alone, no matter how hard I tried.  And believe me, I tried.

I’d been in Clearwater about a year when all of the trauma caught up with me, and my body rebelled in grand fashion.  Every day felt like adrenaline was running through my veins, sleep was rare, and eating was even rarer.  One night I laid in bed staring at the ceiling and every time the clock indicated another hour had passed without sleep, I took a Klonopin.  By the time morning came, I’d taken 9 pills.  I still went to work and about my day.  For reasons that I can’t explain I told one of my bosses what I had taken the night before.  As I spoke to him I felt like I was looking into the eyes of Jesus, because his compassion and kindness lead to a decision that probably saved my life.  An hour later, one of my friends was driving me to the hospital.  I signed myself into the psych ward, where I spent the next 5 days.  The doctors began throwing around words like Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and nervous breakdown.  While I was there I felt free for the first time in my life to just breathe.  Nobody wanted anything from me there, my only job was to eat, rest and breathe.

After getting out of the hospital the real work began.  Memories were still stealing sleep and therefore my health was rapidly declining.  Most of the PTSD flashbacks didn’t make sense, but I continued to have one very strong flashback and that was the first abuser and that hot dark, room when I became the world’s youngest adult.  I had several years of these flashbacks and I survived them because of my commitment to and participation in solid counseling.  I knew there were things I simply could not remember, except in parts.  As I got healthier both physically and emotionally, new layers of memories would present themselves.  Most of them were benign in nature and I was able to use some of the skills I learned in counseling to mitigate the terror.

However, I had a true crisis of faith when my worst fear came true, remembering something I’d forgotten. Henry Lee Lucas was one of those things I’d forgotten. It was him, he was the one in the room. The realization of this crashed down on me in many ways.  I ebb from grateful he did not kill me too guilty for the same reason. This has been a difficult realization because I understand that I easily could have been a victim of more than sexual abuse from Henry Lee Lucas.  Remembering things like this that my brain has “forgotten” has driven me to my knees more than once in recent years. I would be lying if I didn’t say I am still fearful of the things I don’t remember. But, again, Jesus won’t let go, and so I find myself begging Him for grace to trust Him more if I do remember more things I have forgotten.

I realize that I cannot breathe without my Air.  While my life is defined by abandonment, there is One who has never left, and who never will.  I understand that He knows my pain as He himself was abandoned on the cross.

Because He is, in fact, good–even when the reality isn’t.

Guest Post Disclaimer: Any and all information shared in this guest blog post is intended for educational and informational purposes only. Nothing in this blog post, nor any content on CPTSDfoundation.org, is a supplement for or supersedes the relationship and direction of your medical or mental health providers. Thoughts, ideas, or opinions expressed by the writer of this guest blog do not necessarily reflect those of CPTSD Foundation. For more information, see our Privacy Policy and Full Disclaimer.