For most of my twenties and thirties, I lived a contradiction I tried to hide from everyone.

On the outside, I seemed to have my life together–running a photography studio, exhibiting my work, and telling jokes when I had the energy. But I kept away from people a lot of the time, because on the inside, I was a wreck. I never knew when a simple “how are you?” would send my jaw locking, my throat clenching, and my entire nervous system into a tailspin that could last weeks. I called it “hiding my tail.” It was a full-time job, and I couldn’t tell anyone about it, because to me, it was absolutely humiliating–something I had vowed to take to my grave. And to make things worse, I had no clue, no understanding of what was going on inside me.

This was the aftermath of a nervous system collapse I’d had when I was twenty-two. I now understand that is was C-PTSD, but at the time was just a nameless catastrophe that tortured me daily. And I was completely on my own with it, having no idea how to find my way back to the luminous joy I once lived.

Then in 1993, six years after the collapse, I started walking into alleys at night with a camera. I didn’t know why, but I knew the second I stepped into one of those dark, abandoned places, the anxious core of me would go very still. It took me a long time to understand what was happening. But here’s what I’ve come to believe: the ruins were echoes–I would say mirrors, but I hated looking into mirrors back then, so echoes it is. And looking into them was the first thing that gave me any real relief.

The Cost of the Mismatch

If you’ve lived with complex trauma, you probably know the feeling I’m trying to describe. There’s a constant gap between what’s happening inside you and what you allow yourself to show on the outside. The world expects–actually, prefers–a certain version of you: one that is calm, present, and engaged. Thus, you spend every waking minute trying to force this mask while a different reality runs underneath.

That mismatch is exhausting and painful in a way that’s hard to explain to anyone who hasn’t lived it. It’s not just the trauma symptoms themselves. It’s the second job of hiding them. By the time you’ve performed your way through a normal afternoon, you’ve burned through more energy than most people spend in a week. Sometimes a 2-minute conversation would make me want to lie down for a week.

I didn’t have language for any of this back then. All I knew was that being around people felt like wearing armor that was slowly crushing me, that I constantly feared had too many holes where my true self was visible. I needed somewhere I could take off the facade.

What the Alleys Gave Me

The time I ventured into a dark, unlit alley alone, in Montreal in 1993, I didn’t know what to expect, but I knew I was walking into a potentially dangerous place. I should have been afraid–I was in a menacing spot, carrying expensive photo equipment, no one knew where I was; a dangerous character could have walked out of the shadows at any moment. Instead, something else happened. The city noise dimmed. The darkness wrapped around me like a warm blanket. And a soothing, peaceful calm settled inside my body.

I wrote later that I felt “a kinship with everything around me.” That’s the closest I could get. Once my eyes adjusted, I could see the brick walls were gouged and scraped. The ground was streaked with old grease and broken glass. Paint was peeling off a doorway. It was, by any normal standard, an ugly, depressing place. But to me, it felt like the first space I’d walked into in years that made me feel at home.

The alley looked the way I felt. Reviled. Forgotten. Ruined. The kind of place most people don’t want anything to do with. And because it didn’t hide any of its brokenness, it couldn’t pretend to be anything else. I had found a place where I didn’t have to pretend either, and I could finally breathe.

I think this is the part most people miss when they see my photos. They assume I was drawn to dangerous places because I was reckless, or because I had a death wish, or because I wanted dramatic photographs. None of that was true. I went to broken places because, for the first time since my collapse, I had found somewhere my outside world matched my inside world. I was alone in the dark, and the exhausting masquerade simply stopped. In a place that was already broken, I didn’t have to hide anymore.

What Happened When I Started Lighting Them

If the story ended there–broken man finds peace in broken places–it would be a sad kind of comfort: a man learning to live in the shadows. But something more interesting happened. The next day, after my first night of shooting in these rundown urban corners at night, I laid out the photographs on a light table.

I had gone out expecting to return with ugliness. I say “ugliness,” because that was the only honest response I had to what I felt inside, and that’s what I wanted to capture. But somehow, what I’d photographed wasn’t ugly. A faraway mercury vapor streetlight had cast green color over the brick. A faint sodium light had made the rust glow orange. And the moonlight had dusted everything with its own unique beauty. I’d wanted ugliness, but I’d come back with a strange blend of both ugliness and beauty.

It was fascinating. 

I went back out the next night, and the night after that. The same thing kept happening. And eventually I started doing it on purpose – bringing my own colored lights, lighting the walls and the doorways during twenty to forty-minute exposures, transforming each ruin into something theatrical and luminous. I never eliminated the decay. The cracks and the rust and the grime stayed visible in every image. I only changed the light that fell on them, and this changed how they were perceived.

That’s when I started to understand what I was actually doing.

I wasn’t just identifying with these places. I was rehearsing something. Each photograph was a small, repeatable demonstration that something broken could become beautiful without ceasing to be broken. The damage was still there. The light just made it visible in a different way. Over twenty-five years and more than 1,200 nights, I performed that demonstration over and over, in alleys and ruins, until my nervous system finally started to believe it.

What Environment Has to Do With Healing

I’m not a clinician. I can’t write a paper on this. But I’ve thought about it for a long time, and here’s what I keep coming back to:

Recovery, at least the kind I needed, isn’t only about what happens inside your head. It’s also about where your body is. The right environment may not fix you. But the wrong one – the one that demands you perform an exhausting, unsustainable version of yourself–can keep you stuck, and beating on yourself for years.

For me, the “right environment” was the one most people would have called “wrong.” Dark, dirty, dangerous, abandoned. And yet these places allowed me to breathe and to be myself. They didn’t ask me to be anything I wasn’t and that let me drop my armor. And once I could just let my real self be out in the open, something else became possible: I could start working on the broken parts instead of hiding them.

I think a lot of people in recovery are looking for a place like this without knowing it. I don’t recommend you start hanging around alleys and ruins at night for 25 years, but maybe your place is a forest, a garage, a kitchen at three in the morning, a long drive with no destination. Whatever it is, it’s the place where you don’t have to waste energy pretending.

For twenty-five years, mine had broken windows and graffiti and the smell of wet rust. And every time I walked into one of those places, bringing light to the darkness, a little more of my buried light–hiding deep inside of me–started to find its way back.

Photo Credit: Author

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 Weight You Carry

You wake up each morning with a heaviness that makes even lifting your head from the pillow feel impossible. The weight isn’t physical—it’s the accumulation of emotional wounds, betrayals, and the exhausting effort of pretending to be okay when you’re anything but.

There’s a peculiar kind of loneliness in walking through the world carrying this invisible burden. People pass by with casual greetings—”How are you?”—a question that forces you into an impossible choice: lie and say “I’m fine” while wanting to die inside, or risk the vulnerability of honesty when so few truly understand the depth of your pain.

So you smile. You nod. You perform the dance of normalcy while inside, a voice whispers that continuing to exist shouldn’t be this unbearable.

The Fog of Invisibility

In this state, it becomes frighteningly easy to picture a world without you in it. Not because you’re actively planning to leave, but because you fundamentally believe you don’t matter—not really. Even when people insist you’re important to them, their words can’t penetrate the dense fog you’re lost in.

You don’t even remember when you started believing you don’t matter. It feels like a truth you’ve always known, buried deep in your bones. There seems to be no amount of love, affirmation, or validation that will make it register in your soul that you truly matter. The narcissist didn’t create this belief, but they identified it with unerring precision and exploited it until it grew to consume your entire reality. Palpably feeling loved seems like something “other people” get to have, but it seems impossible for you.

For many survivors, the only tether keeping them anchored to this world is their children. The thought of abandoning their kids is unthinkable—the one line they won’t cross. But this creates its own cruel trap: they don’t want to be in this harsh world, yet they can’t leave it. They’re caught in limbo, neither fully living nor able to escape.

This brings crushing waves of guilt. They grieve the time they’ve lost with their children while battling this internal darkness. They mourn not being the parents they desperately want to be—fully present, engaged, and joyful. Instead, they go through the motions, knowing their kids are growing up, that these fleeting years are passing, and that irreplaceable stretches of precious parent/child moments have been robbed by this struggle.

They’ll never get that time back. And just knowing this doesn’t magically end the struggle. So they face the heartbreaking knowledge that more days will be lost, more precious moments missed, before their children are grown and gone.

The Silent Struggle: Loss of Will to Live

Victims may feel deep apathy, hopelessness, or a loss of motivation to engage in life or pursue future goals. In narcissistic abuse and complex trauma, this often comes from prolonged emotional, psychological, or relational distress caused by the abusive dynamic.

This isn’t about wanting to die—it’s about no longer feeling capable of living. It’s waking up each morning, believing you don’t have what it takes to survive in this world. And you can’t imagine having to endure more days, months, decades feeling this way. Thinking about the future feels overwhelming and triggering because you’re bracing yourself for the next wrecking ball.

For survivors of narcissistic abuse, this silent struggle often goes unrecognized. Friends and family might see someone functioning—going to work, maintaining appearances—while inside, that person feels panic and dread about their own existence.

The Inner Struggle: Beyond the Surface

When Words Fail

For many people actively struggling with the loss of will to live, simply forming words to describe their experience becomes impossible. They may receive a text from a concerned friend asking, “How are you?” and find themselves staring at the screen, utterly paralyzed.

This isn’t merely an emotional block—it’s rooted in brain biology. When trauma overwhelms us, our nervous system can shift into a protective shutdown mode (what scientists call a “dorsal vagal state”). In this survival state, the thinking and language parts of our brain temporarily go offline. The brain literally deprioritizes our ability to form words and sentences while it focuses on basic survival functions. This is why trauma researchers sometimes refer to this as “speechless terror”—the experience is so overwhelming that the brain’s language centers cannot process or express it.

To someone who hasn’t experienced this state, it seems inconceivable that a person couldn’t muster a simple response. But in these moments, language itself becomes inaccessible. How do you translate the vast, formless void inside you into words? How do you explain that you’re simultaneously numb and in excruciating pain? That you feel nothing and everything at once? And you’re literally incapable of expressing it.

So the message sits unanswered. Adding another layer of shame, another reason to withdraw further, believing you don’t have what it takes to live in this world.

“But My Abuse Wasn’t That Bad”

A common obstacle to seeking help is the belief that their experiences “weren’t bad enough” to justify their deep suffering. Survivors often downplay their trauma, thinking:

“Other people have it so much worse.” “I wasn’t physically harmed, so why am I falling apart?” “They didn’t mean to hurt me, so this isn’t really abuse.” “I’m just too sensitive.”

Many struggle to accept the word “abuse,” finding it hard to connect it to their experience. This minimization isn’t accidental—it’s often shaped by the abuser, who downplays the harm they cause and makes the victim feel like their reactions are overblown.

This cycle of self-doubt deepens the pain, layering shame about the struggle itself on top of the original trauma.

The Protective Part That Wants to Give Up

In the internal family systems (IFS) therapy model, the part of us that wants to stop living isn’t trying to harm us—it’s trying to protect us in the only way it knows how. It’s not a destructive impulse but a misguided protector that sees ending the struggle as the only solution.

This part formed when other coping strategies failed—when fighting didn’t work, fleeing wasn’t an option, and freezing no longer brought relief. It whispers, “I can make the pain stop,” believing it’s offering mercy, not destruction.

Recognizing this as a protective response, however paradoxical, can help survivors replace fear and shame with self-compassion.

Living Minute by Minute

For someone in acute crisis, even “taking things one day at a time” can feel overwhelming. Their world narrows to surviving moment by moment, unable to imagine a future beyond the next few minutes.

They genuinely don’t know how they’ll exist from one hour to the next. Basic tasks become monumental achievements—eating a meal, taking a shower, responding to a text. On particularly difficult days, the only goal might be to eat three small meals or simply not resort to hospitalization.

These individuals often develop elaborate ways to avoid potential triggers. They may:

• Avoid all public places or social media for fear that one negative interaction with a stranger could push them over the edge
• Stop watching any shows with suspenseful or emotional content
• Experience panic at notification sounds, dreading the task of responding
• Rehearse casual conversations to prepare for inevitable social interactions

It cannot be overstated how fragile someone can be during these periods—existing in a constant state of pain and torment, where the slightest additional stress threatens to break them completely.

The Invisible Wounds

Beneath the surface of daily life, survivors of narcissistic abuse carry unseen wounds that impact every part of their being—their thoughts, emotions, physical health, and spiritual well-being. The harm runs deep because it attacks their very sense of identity and self-worth, leaving them questioning their right to exist.

Causes:

Existential Shame and Humiliation: Beyond ordinary shame about actions or behaviors, narcissistic abuse often creates a profound existential shame—the feeling that your very existence is somehow wrong or flawed.

This isn’t simply feeling bad about something you did; it’s feeling that who you fundamentally are is defective. The narcissist’s constant criticism, devaluation, and manipulation create a state of existential humiliation where you feel inherently unworthy of taking up space in the world. This deep shame becomes a core identity, making the thought of continuing to exist feel pointless or even wrong. You’re embarrassed at your own existence.

Emotional Exhaustion: Victims of narcissistic abuse often endure relentless invalidation, neglect, and emotional turmoil, leading to extreme fatigue and loss of motivation.

The constant vigilance required to navigate a relationship with a narcissist—walking on eggshells, managing their unpredictable moods, defending against accusations, and trying to make sense of reality when someone keeps distorting it—taxes every emotional resource you have. Eventually, your emotional reserves are completely depleted. You have nothing left to give—not even to yourself.

Hopelessness and Worthlessness: Narcissistic abuse can erode a person’s self-esteem and sense of worth, fostering feelings of being trapped and powerless.

After years of being told you’re not enough, that your feelings don’t matter, or that you’re the problem, you begin to see yourself through the narcissist’s distorted lens. Your achievements become meaningless, your dreams seem ridiculous, and your future appears pointless. Why bother living when you’ve been convinced your life has no value?

Cognitive Dissonance: The conflict between reality and the narcissist’s false narratives can contribute to confusion, self-doubt, and despair, making life seem meaningless.

Living in two worlds—the real one and the narcissist’s version—fractures your sense of truth. You doubt your own perceptions and memories. This constant state of uncertainty exhausts the mind and spirit, making simple decisions feel overwhelming. Life becomes a maze with no exit, where nothing makes sense anymore.

Identity Erosion: When someone systematically strips away your sense of self, you may eventually forget who you are outside of the abuse.

The narcissist slowly replaces your authentic self with the version of who you must become to survive. Your preferences, boundaries, dreams, and even your personality become shaped by their demands and criticisms. When you finally emerge from the relationship, you may feel like a stranger to yourself, unsure of what you like, what you want, or who you are meant to be.

The Layered Nature of Trauma: Many survivors of narcissistic abuse carry previous wounds from childhood that made them vulnerable to narcissistic manipulation in the first place.

Childhood emotional neglect, attachment trauma, or growing up with narcissistic parents can create the perfect foundation for later narcissistic abuse. The narcissist didn’t create your wounds—they simply found them with unerring precision and exploited them. This layering of trauma upon trauma creates a compounding effect, making recovery particularly challenging. You’re not just healing from the current relationship but from a lifetime of having your sense of self and worth undermined.

Grieving What Was Lost

Survivors of narcissistic abuse often carry an unspoken, invisible grief—a mourning that few recognize or validate. Unlike grief caused by death, this loss is ambiguous, complex, and deeply personal. What has been stolen isn’t just a relationship or a period of time—it’s a sense of safety, trust, identity, and sometimes, even the belief that joy is possible.

You may grieve the person you were before the abuse—someone who once moved through life with more ease, trust, or optimism. Or perhaps you grieve the time you lost—years spent trying to make things work, trying to be enough, trying to survive in an environment that was slowly eroding you. Some mourn the family they never truly had, realizing that the people who were supposed to love them were incapable of doing so in a way that was safe or nurturing.

Grief may also appear in unexpected ways: feeling waves of sorrow over memories that now seem tainted, feeling anger over what you tolerated before you understood it was abuse, or feeling deep sadness when you witness healthy relationships and realize what you never had.

Many survivors struggle with self-blame in their grief. They wonder, Why didn’t I see it sooner? Why didn’t I leave earlier? Why did I let it affect me this much? But this is not a failure on your part—it is a testament to how deeply you loved, how hard you tried, and how much you deserved better.

Grieving is painful, but it is also proof that you are healing. It means you are recognizing what you lost, what was taken from you, and what you still deserve. True healing doesn’t mean erasing the grief—it means making space for it while also making space for what comes next: reclaiming your life, your identity, and your future.

Living in the Shadow

When the will to live has been eroded by narcissistic abuse, survivors don’t just think differently—they experience the world differently. What was once colorful becomes gray; what once brought joy becomes empty; what once felt meaningful becomes pointless. This isn’t simply a shift in perspective but a fundamental alteration in how reality is experienced moment by moment. The outer persona may continue to function while the inner self has gone dormant, creating a shadow existence where one merely goes through the motions of living.

Manifestation:

Emotional Numbness: Victims may experience detachment from their emotions, as the constant invalidation and gaslighting make it difficult to trust their own perceptions.

Survivors often describe feeling like they’re “dead inside” or “just going through the motions.” This numbness isn’t a choice—it’s the mind’s way of protecting itself from overwhelming pain. When feelings have been weaponized against you, shutting them down becomes a survival strategy.

Reduced Capacity for Joy: Simple pleasures and future aspirations become difficult to connect with, as the narcissistic relationship strips away a sense of purpose and hope.

Activities you once loved bring no satisfaction. Future dreams seem pointless or unattainable. The present moment feels empty. This isn’t depression as most people understand it—it’s a profound disconnection from the very things that make life worth living.

Self-Isolation: Withdrawal from social connections and neglect of personal care are common as the person feels disconnected from the world.

The energy required for social interaction becomes too much to bear. Basic self-care feels pointless. Why shower, eat well, or rest when nothing matters anyway? This withdrawal often reinforces the feeling of disconnection, creating a cycle that’s difficult to break.

Persistent Feeling of Defeat: A pervasive sense that no matter what you do, things will never improve or change.

This isn’t pessimism—it’s the result of having your efforts consistently undermined, your successes diminished, and your hopes repeatedly crushed. When every attempt to improve your situation has been sabotaged, giving up seems like the only logical response.

Small Triggers, Massive Waves

For survivors with Complex PTSD from narcissistic abuse, what appears to be a minor incident can trigger a catastrophic collapse of your will to live. The depth of this reaction often seems incomprehensible to those who haven’t experienced complex trauma.

When Trust Is Shattered Again

Consider this true story: A trauma survivor hired a dog sitter through a reputable company while away on vacation. Midway through the trip, they discovered through security cameras that the sitter was neglecting their beloved pet—not staying at the house as promised, leaving the dog alone for 17 hours, failing to provide food, and sending false updates about the dog’s care.

From several states away, they scrambled to find emergency care for their pet while documenting the neglect with timestamped video evidence. The vacation was ruined, but worse was coming. Despite irrefutable evidence and promises from the company, the sitter remained on the platform after being suspended for only one day, even posting public lies denying any wrongdoing and openly calling the survivor a liar.

For someone without trauma, this would be infuriating. For a complex trauma survivor, it was catastrophic. The combination of betrayed trust, gaslighting, injustice, powerlessness, and institutional failure to protect the vulnerable hit every trigger point from their abuse history. Being publicly called a liar—and watching that lie be allowed to stand without consequence—recreated the exact dynamic of their previous trauma. And doing everything in their power to pursue justice, only to have no influence, was soul shattering. For weeks afterward, they found themselves thinking, “I don’t want to be alive anymore.” The depth of despair was so severe they had to ask family not to leave them unattended.

To an outsider, this reaction might seem disproportionate. But trauma doesn’t operate on logic. When your psyche has been previously shattered, even the smallest betrayals can reopen those wounds completely.

The Invisibility of Triggers

Triggers can be unexpectedly small—a flash of painful memory, an unanswered message, a minor mistake at work. To others, these moments seem trivial, but to a trauma survivor, they can spiral into despair in an instant, reigniting feelings of shame, abandonment, or fear. The body reacts as if the past is happening all over again, no matter how much time has passed. For someone with CPTSD, these moments can instantly trigger:

• Emotional Flashbacks: Suddenly feeling the same helplessness, shame, or terror you experienced during the abuse
• Overwhelming Fatigue: A wave of soul level exhaustion that makes continuing to stay alive seem impossible
• Dissociation: Mentally “checking out” because reality becomes too painful
• Return to Hopelessness: All progress seems erased in an instant
• Sleep Seeking: The desperate wish to “go to sleep and never wake up”—not actively wanting to die, but wanting desperately for the pain to stop

What makes these triggers so devastating is that they often appear inconsequential to others. A friend’s constructive feedback becomes a crushing blow. A minor setback feels like definitive proof of your worthlessness. A happy memory brings guilt and confusion rather than joy.

The thoughts that follow aren’t dramatic plans for self-harm but quiet surrenders: “Being alive is too hard.” “I can’t do this anymore.” “I just want this to be over.”

This is why recovery isn’t linear. A survivor might be doing well for weeks or months, only to encounter a trigger that temporarily erases all sense of progress and returns them to that place of not wanting to continue living. And they often suffer in complete silence, because how do you explain to someone that a seemingly minor disappointment has made you lose your will to live?

Read the rest of this article in the first book of Ellen’s series “There’s A Word for That”: https://a.co/d/01GdqiwJ

Copyright Notice: This excerpt is from my book. All content is © 2025 Worldwide Groove Corporation. Unauthorized reproduction, distribution, or use of this material without permission is prohibited. Thank you for respecting my work. 😊

Photo Credit: Author – Additional Terms and disclaimers for images used in my posts on CPTSD Foundation.

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

In 1987, I walked into a job interview in Montreal and couldn’t say my own name.

I was twenty-two. Two days earlier, I’d been at a party with friends, cracking jokes, feeling like the world was mine. Now I was sitting across from a man who’d asked me the simplest question in the world, “Your name is?” and something was blocking the pathway from my brain to my mouth. My jaw locked. My throat clenched. I started sweating. I finally squeezed out my name, terrified, though I had no idea of what.

That was the beginning. Within days, my ability to hold a simple conversation was destroyed. People became a source of dread. My face would contort, my eyes would twitch, and every interaction was like trying to keep calm while a tarantula was crawling on me. It became impossible. The outgoing, confident guy I’d been my whole life appeared to be dead.

I saw psychiatrist after psychiatrist, but nobody could tell me what was wrong. They treated me for depression and anxiety, but nothing stuck, and nothing made sense for whatever had broken inside me. The condition I was living with didn’t even have a name yet. C-PTSD wouldn’t be a term until 1992, and the WHO didn’t officially recognize it until 2018. The doctors were working with an old map.

So like many others before and after me, I was on my own.

Into the Dark

Six years after my collapse, on a spring night in 1993, I grabbed my camera and tripod and walked out into the city. I had no plan. I was still in the grip of the trauma, and I needed to be somewhere alone, and the darkness of the night just helped me to disappear.

I ended up at the foot of an unlit alley in a rough part of town. I should have been afraid; it was a menacing spot, I was alone, carrying expensive gear in the middle of the night. But something strange happened. I walked in, and the deeper I went, the better I felt. The city’s noise dimmed, the darkness thickened around me like a blanket, and for the first time in years, I felt calm. It was a deep peace I had long forgotten.

In that dark alley, I didn’t have to perform for anyone. Nobody was there to see me struggle. The constant exhausting effort of pretending I was okay simply stopped. In a place that was already broken, I didn’t have to hide anymore.

I set up my camera, and a 25-year practice began.

A Ritual I Couldn’t Explain

I went back the next night. And the next. Over the following weeks and months, going out into dark, forgotten urban spaces with my camera became the only thing I wanted to do. I started seeking out the ugliest, most abandoned places I could find – alleys, ruins, crumbling corners. Something about matching my surroundings to what I felt inside brought relief.

It took me 20 more years to finally understand this was more than photography. I was performing a ritual.

Each shoot followed the same pattern. I would enter a dark, frightening space alone, stand in the darkness until my eyes adjusted, and I could see. I’d carefully compose the crumbling space in the camera, then I’d step into the scene with my lights, and over twenty to ninety minutes, I’d bring color and light to the wreckage, section by section. When I was done, I’d step back, close the shutter, and leave.

Enter the dark place. Stand in it until you can see. Decide how to frame the damage. Then bring light to the darkness, and find ways of making a frightening reality into something beautiful.

I was rehearsing my own recovery in physical space, over and over again, without knowing that’s what I was doing. The camera was recording evidence that the transformation was real. Each photograph was real proof that something shunned and forsaken could become beauty, that you could enter the wreckage and come out with something worth keeping.

The Paradox That Made It Work

One of the strangest things about those years is this: I was not afraid of what everyone else feared, and yet deadly afraid of what everyone else shrugged off as life. A brief conversation could trigger a tailspin that lasted weeks. But standing alone at 2 am in a place where gunshots had just rung out? I was perfectly calm.

It took me a long time to understand why. The danger in the alleys was external, concrete, something I could respond to. The danger that crippled me – social interaction, being seen, being asked to speak – was internal, invisible, and nothing I tried could touch it. In the alleys, my hypervigilance, the constant scanning, became an asset instead of a symptom. My broken wiring was, for once, perfectly suited to my environment.

I’d found the one context where my damage was useful. And without realizing it, I was using that context to slowly repair the damage.

What I Know Now

I did this for twenty-five years. Over 1,200 nights in more than thirty cities. The photographs were exhibited in galleries and museums, covered by the New York Times, PBS, NPR, and ABC. People responded to the images without knowing the story behind them, and that’s how I wanted it. I planned to take that story to my grave, until it became more important to me that the photos be fully understood.

Only while writing my book did I finally learn the name for what had happened to me in 1987. Only then did I begin to see the pattern – that I had accidentally invented a practice that addressed my specific injury with eerie precision. The repetition, the controlled exposure to fear, the physical engagement, the mindfulness in darkness, the transformation of something broken into something beautiful – it mapped onto things clinicians now describe as somatic regulation, graded exposure, and meaning-making. I had no framework and no clinical language. My body just knew what it needed, and it dragged me to the places where healing could happen.

I’m not a therapist. I can’t tell anyone what their body needs, and I certainly don’t recommend the risks I took, which seemed to be calibrated to my specific injury. But I can say this: if you’ve found something that calms you and you don’t know why, pay attention. If you’ve built a ritual that doesn’t make sense to the people around you but keeps you upright, don’t dismiss it. Your body may be solving a problem your mind hasn’t caught up to yet.

I spent twenty-five years not understanding what had happened to me, or what to do about it. But my body knew, and kept telling me.

Photo Credit: User Supplied from their Book: Alley’s & Ruins.

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

I’m surprised I wasn’t born wearing a tiny pair of boxing gloves. That would have been appropriate, given the kind of life I would be leading as a kid.

For people like me who grew up with complex trauma, our nervous systems helped us survive through trauma responses. Way back in the early 20th century, an old guy named Walter Bradford Cannon coined the ‘fight or flight’ responses in his 1915 book titled Bodily Changes in Pain, Hunger, Fear, and Rage. This work is grounded in physiology, though, the way the body responds–not psychology or trauma theory.

“Freeze” was added later by trauma researchers, and Complex PTSD expert Pete Walker added “fawn” in his 2013 book Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving. Fight, flight, and freeze are biologically ancient reactions in animals and humans, while fawning is innately human, rooted in relational trauma. When people “fawn” as a trauma response, their nervous system is helping them survive in a socially unequal power struggle. Generally, those who fawn in a situation will attempt to appease or please their abuser as a response to abuse.

I was not made to fawn. That doesn’t make me any better than someone who fawns, or freezes, or flees; this is just how I am made, deep within the biology of my cells. Because of this, I have a hard time understanding that response because I have witnessed chronically abused children, first-hand, and I just wanted to scream, “STAND UP FOR YOURSELF FOR CRYING OUT LOUD!” Or, “why are you letting her manipulate you like that? You see this is about control, right?”

Perhaps I had to be a fighter in order to thrive after the traumas I experienced as a child and young adult, I don’t know for certain. I am working on being more understanding and accepting that not everyone is made the way I am, and that for some people, standing up for themselves could feel like a death sentence.

I hated watching these children being raised by an emotionally abusive mother, and then their brother was added as an abuser, as well. It was heart-wrenching to see how their response was to fawn. The times they did try to fight, before puberty, their mother put them in their place very quickly; she threatened to kill herself, and they were terrified of her. Even though they’re young adults now, they are still drinking the Kool-Aid, and I mourn the kind of lives they could have had if they didn’t grow up that way.

My life might have been easier if I just fawned over my mother’s demands, her insults, her constant criticisms, and her blatant and excessive coddling of my brother–who was only 15 months younger than I was.

If I fawned instead of fought, I probably wouldn’t have been institutionalized in a mental hospital on my 13th birthday because she just couldn’t handle me. I probably wouldn’t have been constantly grounded for nonsense, including taking away my ability to get to work.

The truth is, I fought her constantly with logic, with reason, with common sense. But emotional abusers are anything but logical and reasonable, especially emotional abusers with personality disorders like borderline, narcissistic personality disorder, and bipolar disorder. I was fighting a battle that I would never win as a minor–but I fought anyway.

By the time I left for college (which I did 100% on my own, without support), I was battle-scarred and seeping from so many wounds–but no one could see them. I was exhausted from the fight, which had gone on for eight years straight. Distance helped immensely and because I was not connected to my abuser in any way, especially emotionally, removing myself nearly completely helped me feel just a little bit closer to normal.

We fighters are very misunderstood because our survival strategy violates social expectations about how pain, fear, vulnerability, and self-advocacy are “supposed” to look. The other trauma responses retreat, appease, or disappear, but we fighters move toward the threat, and that makes people uncomfortable–especially the abusers. However, some abusers, like mine, used it to their advantage.

A fight trauma response looks like a raised voice, firm boundaries, anger, confrontation, or refusal to back down. On the outside looking in, these appear deliberate, like the person fighting is choosing conflict. In reality, this fight response is automatic nervous system mobilization. Our body detects danger, so it prepares to push back in order to survive. In my personal situation, my abuser used it as evidence that I was “difficult,” “impossible,” and “defiant”.

People assume, “that person could control it if they wanted to”, or “they just seem to enjoy conflict” because responses look active rather than passive. We humans are much more comfortable recognizing trauma when it looks like collapse compared to when it looks like resistance.

Anger is one of the least tolerated emotions, especially when it’s expressed by women, children, and marginalized people. When trauma shows up as anger, it gets moralized instead of medicalized. Rather than asking, “What threat taught you to respond in this manner?” people ask:

Why are you so aggressive?

Why can’t you calm down?

What’s wrong with you?

This fight response is misread as a character flaw instead of a complex learned survival skill.

Fighters disrupt people’s comfort and their need for control–especially emotional abusers. Freeze and fawn responses make the other person feel needed, calm, unchallenged, and in charge, whereas fight responses do the exact opposite. Fighters will question authority and push back against unfairness; they refuse to emotionally disappear when mistreated, and will make tension visible and uncomfortable for those in the room.

Systems like families, workplaces, and relationships that rely on silence and compliance are threatened by those who have a fight response. It’s easier to label the fighter as the problem than to examine the environment that required the fight response to begin with.

As much as it pains me to admit this, fight is related to fear and is rarely recognized as such. As humans, we are taught that fear looks like crying, avoidance, withdrawal, and panic, but for fighters, fear looks like increased energy, argument, defensiveness, and readiness, along with a “bring-it-on” attitude. Because fear is hidden inside these other, more aggressive emotions, it’s missed and replaced with incorrect assumptions about hostility and ego. In truth, fight is fear with momentum.

Many fighters grew up where fight was the only protection they had in emotionally abusive, chaotic, or unsafe environments because freeze wasn’t safe–it meant they would be the target. Fawn didn’t work–their needs weren’t respected, nor were their efforts to be nice/good/useful recognized. Flight wasn’t possible because they couldn’t leave and had nowhere to go. So, fight was the only way to maintain dignity, boundaries, or a sense of self.

I want to share a brief story.

When I was 11 years old, my father was out of the house because his heroin habit took over his life. One bitterly cold night, there was a knock at the door. Usually, my mother was working, but she was home that night. My father came to the door asking for food and a blanket. He pawned his leather jacket and was homeless.

I heard his plea and got up from watching my TV program to make him some Campbell’s Chicken Noodle soup, spread some butter on white bread, and take my blanket off my bed, which was gifted to me by my neighbor, Mary. I carefully took these through the living room and was blocked by my mother, who threatened me, belittled me, and cursed me, but I fought back with everything I had to get to the door and give my father food and warmth.

Writing this still fills me with difficult emotions. The trauma of that night is woven into the fibers of who I am. She would not keep me from helping my father without a fight, and, in the end, he had the soup, and I let him keep the blanket.

Culturally, we seem to prefer trauma survivors who are quiet, forgiving, insightful without being threatening, and resilient–but in soft, palatable ways. Fighters complicate the story because we’re not always gentle; we may hold on to anger longer; we may not rush to forgive (or may not forgive at all); we may insist things were wrong and, at least at first, demand retribution if not at least some form of acknowledgment of the wrongdoing done to us. All of this makes us fighters hard to celebrate and easier to dismiss.

If you’re a fighter, I stand in solidarity with you. Fighters are misunderstood because our trauma response looks like aggression instead of fear, choice instead of instinctual reflex, and defiance instead of personal protection. This makes it so much easier to blame us than to recognize the threats we had to deal with every day, and how we learned to survive them.

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

Resources

Cole, P. M., Martin, S. E., & Dennis, T. A. (2004). Emotion regulation as a scientific construct. Child Development, 75(2), 317–333. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-8624.2004.00675.x (article)

Marshburn, C. K., Cochran, K. J., Flynn, E., & Levine, L. J. (2020). Workplace anger costs women irrespective of race. Frontiers in Psychology, 11, 579884. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2020.579884 (article)

Perry, Bruce. (2021). What Happened to You? (book)

Riggs, S. A. (2010). Childhood emotional abuse and the attachment system across the life cycle: What theory and research tell us. Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma, 19(1), 5–51. https://doi.org/10.1080/10926770903475968 (article)

Walker, Pete. (2013). Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving (book)

Xu, M. (2025). Reconsider the anger of marginalized communities. Journal of Marital and Family Therapy, 51(2), e70018. https://doi.org/10.1111/jmft.70018 (article)

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

It is not because you are incapable.
It is not because you are hypersensitive or hypo sensitive.

More often than not, the greatest obstacle to feeling freely is this: a nervous system that has been living in prolonged stress, and a brain that has adapted to conserve energy in response to that stress.

When the body perceives an ongoing threat—whether from life events, emotional pain, or chronic pressure—it shifts into survival mode. The nervous system prioritizes protection over connection, and the brain begins to operate from an energy-conservation model. This means it becomes less interested in exploration, openness, and emotional processing, and more focused on efficiency, prediction, and staying safe.

Brain scientist Delia McCabe speaks to this beautifully: when we understand how the brain functions, we can begin to create the internal conditions that allow us to feel safe enough to feel. Without that sense of safety, the brain will always default to protection.

And protection, while essential in moments of real danger, can become limiting when it turns into a long-term state.

In trauma-related stress, the body produces elevated levels of stress hormones like adrenaline and cortisol. These are powerful chemicals designed to help us respond quickly to a threat. But over time, they come at a cost. The production and recycling of these stress hormones require significant nutritional resources—vitamins, minerals, and amino acids that the body also needs for other essential functions.

One of those functions is the production of serotonin, a neurotransmitter deeply involved in mood regulation, emotional stability, and a general sense of well-being. Another is acetylcholine, which plays a key role in learning, memory, focus, and the processing and integration of new information.

When the body is under prolonged stress, resources are diverted toward survival. This can gradually lead to nutrient depletion, leaving fewer building blocks to support balanced mood, clear thinking, and emotional regulation. The result is not just psychological—it is physiological.

You may feel more reactive, more anxious, more depleted.
You may find it harder to focus, remember, and process.
You may feel emotionally flooded one moment and numb the next.

This is not a personal failure.
It is a system under strain.

At the center of this system is the limbic system—the emotional brain. This includes structures such as the amygdala, which scans for threats, and the hippocampus, which helps process memory and context. When stress is chronic, the amygdala becomes more sensitive, more reactive, more likely to interpret neutral situations as threatening. At the same time, the systems that help regulate and contextualize emotion can become less effective.

This is why emotions can feel so intense, so sudden, and sometimes so disorganizing.

They are not just emotions.
They are survival signals amplified by a system that has been on high alert for too long.

And yet, within this understanding lies something deeply hopeful.

Because when we begin to support the nervous system and the brain in the ways they actually need, the experience of emotion begins to change.

We can start by creating conditions of safety.

Not by forcing ourselves to feel everything at once, but by gently teaching the system that feeling does not equal danger.

This can be as simple—and as profound—as:

• Slowing the breath to signal calm to the nervous system
• Grounding through the body by feeling the feet or the support beneath you
• Softening the muscles, especially around the face, jaw, and chest
• Orienting to your environment to remind the brain you are here, now, and safe

These small acts, that can be so quickly overlooked, can and do begin to regulate the limbic system when practiced with nervous system awareness in mind. They reduce the body based intensity of the stress response and allow the brain to shift out of pure survival mode.

As this happens, something begins to open.

Emotions, which once felt overwhelming or fragmenting, start to feel more fluid.

There is a beautiful truth about emotions that many people never get to experience fully:

When emotions are felt fully, without judgment, the often-frozen, stored stress associated with them begins to mobilize. Knowing how to orient this release of energy is equally important.

With the practice of titration and pendulation, we learn to fear emotions less and less. They arrive, their expression is felt, and they pass—like birds free to fly and land again.

It is when they are resisted, suppressed, or feared that they tend to linger, intensify, or fragment our inner world, often times causing inflammation due to the stress of storing them.

Feeling safe enough to witness your own emotional landscape—without immediately trying to fix, judge, or escape it—is one of the most precious and empowering skills you can develop.

When we can create and share that space, something shifts. You are no longer at the mercy of your emotions.
You are in a relationship with them. And from that relationship, regulation, integration, and healing become possible.

Over time, as the nervous system learns that it can feel without being overwhelmed, and the brain receives signals of safety while it approaches what is stressful to feel, the entire system begins to reorganize and create new predictions.

Energy becomes more available.
Mood stabilizes.
Clarity returns.
The body feels less like a battleground and more like a place you can inhabit.

And perhaps most importantly, you begin to rediscover something that may have felt lost for a long time:

The freedom to feel.

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

Who listens to children? Who hears them and acts on the truth in a helpful way? Who chooses to walk away?

The truth is, not many adults act when they should, and the cost to abused children is too much. They are ignored by those who have the power to help, and they carry on being abused.

I was the child who was ignored despite my pleas for help. I wasn’t just ignored by my bio-family, but teachers and doctors too.

All child abuse survivors have felt this betrayal by those who hurt them and failed to take care of their basic needs. They don’t need further betrayal from those who could help — yet, they are.

That deep betrayal lives in me and in all other child abuse survivors.

Survivors’ experiences are different, but there is one thing that we all feel, and that is loneliness.

Abuse and trauma within a family almost always comes with deep-seated betrayal of trust, neglect, abandonment, and lies.

Survivors feel alone in the world, and that burden is like a choking desolation.

Nobody wants us, and no one around us knows or wants to know what is happening, even if we tell or act it out. ( I tried) That truth is crushing for a young child.

Imagine never having a loving parent tucking you in at night when you might be scared of the dark.

An abused child is deeply traumatized by the dark and agonizes about it every day because when that darkness arrives, so does the pain.

The Importance of Role-Models

Children growing up need role models to help them make sense of the world. Role models give children an idol, someone to count on and guide them through life’s ups and downs.

A child growing up in a loving family will learn to love and treat others.

If a child has never had a positive role model, they will grow up to be at a disadvantage in many developmental milestones, especially social skills.

If your parents never hugged you, how can you know what a hug feels like?

If your parents never talked to you, how can you develop speech patterns and convey meaning in language?

An abused child misses out on so much.

Teachers are great role models and open up a world of education and experiences that these children cannot get from home. School trips are fun, and classrooms come alive in color and models during those early Pre-K to elementary years.

Where else can you be better submerged in a community aside from an elementary school?

Kids are great role models and can show their peers what to do. We learn a lot from one another.

I realized that I could have more freedom when I disappeared.

The media and TV have an abundance of role models as well. We are immersed in the internet and social media culture, and everything trickles down to our kids.

Not all children are lucky to have access to the internet and media at home, but they will get exposure in school.

Music and videos are playing in malls, on billboards, and in advertisements all around us. We cannot help knowing what is happening because information is everywhere in the suburban world.

I realized that I could have more freedom when I disappeared from my bio-family.

As soon as I could get away, I would be out on the streets looking for role models who might want me. At that time, I was completely vulnerable. I met a lot of different people on the streets, but I was smart too and learned to watch my six and not trust adults.

I never found a magic family that wanted to adopt me. Instead, I got taken back to my house every single time I stayed out too long.

As an adolescent from an abusive home, I was the perfect target for drug dealers. I had already seen what drugs and alcohol did to people and wanted no part of that life.

Many adolescent abuse survivors turn to drugs and alcohol to fit in and get an escape from reality.

I preferred to stay hungry rather than break the law. I needed to get away permanently from my bio-family, not be thrown into jail.

Seeking comfort in strangers

I chose my role models based on the person I saw myself becoming one day.

I saw how the young lady always smiled at her customers at the food market, and how it affected her sales.

Grumpy Gus selling potatoes in monosyllabic grunts never attracted customers to linger and talk.

These people helped me decide who I wanted to be. I took notice of people and picked the attributes that I liked.

Those role models helped me put together my identity because I refused to be like the people who hurt me.

The need for role models doesn’t stop in childhood. It follows you throughout life.

You want to be around family during the holidays. I spent them alone.

You want your family at your wedding and college graduation. (I had none, and I felt it)

When you find out you are expecting a baby, it’s scary and brings up tons of stuff. You want to ask your parents about it. (I couldn’t)

There are many moments in life when you want your family to stand behind you. A survivor simply doesn’t have that bond with family, and it hurts. 

This article has given you an insight into what it is like to grow up as an abused child. The importance of role models follows survivors into adulthood and beyond.

Most of the time, survivors need hope and love. Hope that not everyone in this world is a monster, and that we are worthy of being loved.

This is the world we need to show kids. A world that is wonderful and exciting. A world where everyone matters because we do. We matter, and we all have a voice.

Nobody should be ignored and alone. 

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

If you like reading my posts, then please follow me.

For more about me: www.elizabethwoodsauthor.com

Support your fellow writer:

https://ko-fi.com/elizabe69245484

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

My name is Elizabeth, and I’m a survivor of child abuse and horrific trauma. Healing from trauma is not a quick fix, and recognizing that it will take time is part of the struggle.

“I want to feel better” We say to ourselves.

But some days just don’t go our way, and no matter what life throws at us, we hit the red lights at every intersection.

Other days, we flow through life like a river rushing towards a giant waterfall, as we plunge right to where we want to be. No matter what kind of day, week, or month you are having, it’s important to recognize that you cannot go through life as easily on your own.

Human beings are social creatures, and we often feel better when receiving support from a strong network around us. For most people, it’s our families that hold us together like “glue”.

How many times have you heard your friends talking about their families?

Every day, am I right?

I think it’s nice to hear people share their family stories, but it also makes me jealous.

I’ve got nothing to say when people ask me about my family. I tell them they’re all dead, but it’s not true.

I’ve never had a strong family behind me that I could turn to when I hit all the red lights. I’ve never had a strong role model in my life to help me when I needed it.

Life is harder when the going gets tough for survivors of child abuse and trauma.

I’ve heard the old saying that “It takes a village to raise a child” many times. I agree with that statement, but I think it doesn’t stop when you grow up.

An adult still needs a strong social network of support through all of life’s successes and downfalls.

Imagine if you have to go through a tricky surgery and you need to leave your young kids with someone you trust. Most people choose family.

I never could trust my own family with my own safety, so how could I trust them with my children?

When you get married, you want the world to come to the wedding. I walked down the aisle with “my half” of the room empty. Someone saw a lone tear escape down my cheek, and a big shuffle started with people moving across to my side. It was a nice gesture that made me feel welcomed into my husband’s family.

When you graduate from college, you want people to come and see you achieve a milestone in your life.

I’ve never had that support, and the loss feels like a vacuum in my life, leaving an empty void.

Sharing special moments must be incredible with family around you. I wish I knew how it felt.

It’s much harder to succeed in achieving your goals all alone, but if you get help and support along the way, it’s easier.

Part of healing from abuse is being willing to accept help from others.

This is something most trauma survivors struggle with because part of the damage is that we don’t “trust anyone to be there for us”, without it coming with a price tag, or a ramification of some sort.

It’s even more difficult to recognize that we need help and to ask for it.

I know I’m not good at asking for help, but I also know that I’m one of those people who will bend over backward for anyone who needs my help.

Isn’t that weird?

I’ve been told that accepting help and offering help to others are two different things. As a trauma survivor, I recognize hurt so much quicker than someone who has not lived through trauma. I see the pain from just a look, and I get “that feeling.” It can be overwhelming at times.

Reaching out

When life isn’t going so well, it is important to reach out to people you trust, like friends and, of course, family, if you have them.

Reaching out to friends and family not only feels good, but it also helps you to regulate your feelings.

I don’t know how often I have crossed the street to my friend’s house and sat in her kitchen with a coffee, watching her do laundry while our kids run around our feet. I mean, who does that? Well, my friends and I do it all the time. Just being in someone else’s house can help if you are having a bad day.

Make sure to choose the people you turn to who’s got your back. You will find out very quickly if someone is not trustworthy, and it’s not a nice feeling to be betrayed by someone close. It can take a while to get back up on your feet again.

Sometimes you think you know the person, only to find out they never had your best interests at heart.

If it doesn’t feel right, then it probably isn’t. Listen to that inner voice of yours.

There are those times when you need more help than just sitting in someone’s kitchen or having a catch-up coffee with a friend.

Tell that person you need their undivided attention to listen to you vent or to understand that you have a problem and need their advice. For these conversations, only privacy can help.

Let someone else take care of the kids for an hour and go somewhere private. Sometimes, these conversations are so difficult that you might just need a shoulder to cry on. Boy, have I been there plenty of times.

Whatever you need at that moment is the right thing to do.

I have come a long way in my healing journey by opening up to trusting people about my past. I feel better after sharing my hurt and pain with people.

I wrote a memoir of my childhood Amazon.com: The Sex-Offender’s Daughter: A True Story of Survival Against All Odds eBook: Woods, Elizabeth: Kindle Store and published it for the world to see.

I wrote the book to help other survivors know that it is okay to be allowed to have a life after abuse, and to fully live it. I also wrote it for therapists and other professionals who work with trauma survivors, so that they can understand what survivors carry before they get help.

You are not alone in the world. Use the people around you who make you feel better and let them know what your struggles are. The people who love you will want to know, and help you thrive.

Trust your instincts about people. They are usually right.

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

If you like reading my posts, then please follow me.

For more about me: www.elizabethwoodsauthor.com

Support your fellow writer:

https://ko-fi.com/elizabe69245484

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

De-escalation respects physiology before it attempts logic. Stress moves through a brief sequence: something triggers, the mind assigns meaning, the autonomic system shifts, and behavior follows. That appraisal window is the only real chance to change course.

• If you offer a concrete option the person can use, arousal softens.
• If you judge the emotion and demand composure, arousal climbs.

Kitchens, clinics, classrooms, and squad rooms follow the same pattern because biology does not bend to titles.

Tone policing is often sold as coaching. In practice, it rewards packaging over truth and asks the person with less power to present pain in a way that comforts the person with more power. That may calm a meeting for ten minutes and poison the relationship for ten months. Survivors learn to edit for safety. They stop reporting until the situation reaches a clinic, a courtroom, or a crisis team.

There is a clean difference between soothing and silencing. Soothing reduces demand on the nervous system by changing something real in the environment. Silencing insists on compliance while everything else stays the same.

• Children feel the difference before they can explain it.
• Adults who have lived through coercion feel it at the first word.
• Employees hear it when performance talks are about tone more than work.

Language that works is short, specific, and time-bound. It pairs a behavior with an escape from the moment.

In homes where trauma sits in the air, “calm down” usually appears when fear spikes.

• A parent wants quiet.
• A partner wants the argument to end before someone leaves.

Softer words are not enough. Clean asks, are.

If you need quiet, say, “I need quiet for fifteen minutes.” If you need space, say, “I am stepping out and will return at 7:30.” If you need a boundary, state it once, repeat it once, then hold it. Direct requests reduce humiliation and stop the chain of second fights that ride behind the first.

Care practices should target the body as much as the story. A survivor will not settle because someone says “relax.” They settle when doors stay unlocked, plans are kept, and consequences match behavior. That rhythm lowers limbic alarm and shortens recovery time. Pair that with simple regulation skills: slow nasal breathing, brief movement, water, light, and a shift to a quieter space. Skills beat speeches.

Clinicians and peer supporters can improve outcomes with three habits.

1. Speak to function more than labels. “When meetings go past six, your body moves into defense, and you stop hearing offers.”
2. Give one action at a time and wait. Brains under stress need more time to process than any of us want to admit.
3. Protect dignity while you set limits. People can accept boundaries when they do not feel shamed in front of others.

For survivors, here is a field kit you can use without permission from anyone.

• Decide on two sentences you will say when your own arousal spikes.
• Write them down and practice them cold.
• Schedule your hardest conversations earlier in the day, not after your energy drops.
• Anchor every argument to one decision and one time box.
• If you are facing someone who uses tone as a weapon, switch to written communication, where you can slow the cadence and keep a record.
• Protect your body with routine sleep, food, movement, and light. Restoration is not a reward for good behavior. It is fuel for better judgment.

The line between safety and control runs through language and follow-through. “Calm down” tries to take control without adding safety. Replace it with behavior that actually lowers load and words that do not humiliate. Rooms get safer when people feel steady enough to think, and lives get more livable when promises are realistic enough to be kept.

References:
Barrett, L. F. (2017). How emotions are made: The secret life of the brain. Houghton Mifflin Harcourt.
Edmondson, A. C. (2019). The fearless organization: Creating psychological safety in the workplace for learning, innovation, and growth. John Wiley & Sons.
Gottman, J. M. (1994). What predicts divorce? The relationship between marital processes and marital outcomes. Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Herman, J. L. (2015). Trauma and recovery: The aftermath of violence—from domestic abuse to political terror (Rev. ed.). Basic Books.
Linehan, M. M. (2014). DBT skills training manual (2nd ed.). The Guilford Press.
National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health. (2002). The changing organization of work and the safety and health of working people (DHHS [NIOSH] Publication No. 2002-116). U.S. Department of Health and Human Services.
Porges, S. W. (2011). The polyvagal theory: Neurophysiological foundations of emotions, attachment, communication, and self-regulation. W. W. Norton & Company.
van der Kolk, B. A. (2014). The body keeps the score: Brain, mind, and body in the healing of trauma. Viking.

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