Some days, the nightmares keep us awake all night and haunt us during the day for no apparent reason. It’s like having a perpetual shadow glued to your back, and it won’t leave you alone.

The days when you don’t understand the flashbacks are even worse. Fear sets in, and it makes you feel uneasy.

Have you ever felt that way?

Have you ever stood in a queue in the food market and started to tremble?

I have.

It wasn’t one of my finest moments. It was years ago, and I still remember it because of how I felt.

I had just been to therapy, and it had been a big session with a lot of triggering memories. I should have driven straight home, but I needed some essential items for the following day.

As I stood in that queue with people all around me, I noticed I was hot. My heart decided to run a marathon in my chest, and my body trembled, like a leaf in the wind. My hands were full of items so I couldn’t just leave. The room fell silent all around me, and I felt as if I was right back in my worst moment. I felt his hands around my neck, squeezing ever so gently…

NO — I screamed inside my head and squeezed my knuckles on my items without anyone seeing what I was doing. The loaf of bread came out a little worse for wear, but other than that, my groceries survived my hands. I breathed in and out slowly and focused my eyes on a poster advertising a brand of diapers. I must have read the slogan several times until my brain understood its meaning. I wiggled my toes in my sandals to feel the floor.

Another time, I was at one of my friends’ barbecues. Lots of adults talking, kids running around, music playing from a boom box. Everyone was enjoying themselves. One of the dads went to the kitchen to get a knife to cut some meat, and he walked across the yard towards the grill. Suddenly, my whole world slowed down. All the voices and music stopped, and I froze. All I could do was stare at that knife as it bobbed in a hand that was walking across the yard.

My flashback took me to a very different hand that was walking towards me with a menacing grin. My scream made everyone stop, and it catapulted me back into the present. Someone had turned off the boom box, and everyone stared at me. Our kids were frozen in place.

A familiar voice put his hand on my back, said my name, and where we were. My husband turned me around and held me. His firm body with the familiar smells made me realize where I was, and I was shaking.

After a few minutes, I found myself sitting in a chair with a glass of iced tea in my hand. The music was playing, the adults were talking again, and the kids carried on playing.

These flashbacks can happen anytime to a trauma survivor. It doesn’t matter where you are or who you are with.

Like the turtle, a trauma survivor has to survive the constant cold water showers (triggers) that threaten to consume us. The most important thing is that you have a strategy to cope with them as they happen because they will. There is nothing worse than not being prepared for an emotional onslaught.

My advice to all trauma survivors out there is this.

1. Have a coping strategy that works for you during the day. I have several that I draw on and use at work and wherever I end up during the day.
2. Grounding is a great technique that helps get you back to the present moment. Use your senses to ground you firmly back into the present.
3. Allow yourself to “bail out.” If the flashback isn’t going away, have an excuse ready to leave the room if you are with people.
4. Time — Always make sure that you are fully back in the present moment before you return to what you were doing. If you need a break, tell someone that you are popping out for a coffee break or something that you can easily manage.
5. Self-care — This is the big one. You have to look after yourself after a flashback. I know this doesn’t come easy for a survivor, but you have needs. If your body has reacted to a trauma memory, you will not be able to function for a while without some kind of care plan. A glass of water, a snack, a short walk around the office, or maybe close your eyes for five minutes to shake a building headache.

My name is Lizzy, and I’m a mom, teacher, author and mental health blogger. I write for those who don’t always feel that they have a voice. For more about me, my books and articles check out my website: www.elizabethwoodsauthor.com

Support my writing, and buy me a coffee.

https://ko-fi.com/elizabe69245484here

Photo by Amanda Phung on Unsplash

Elizabeth Woods

For more about me: https://www.elizabethwoodsauthor.com

Elizabeth Woods grew up in a world of brutal sex offenders, murderers, and inconceivably neglectful adults. Elizabeth is passionate about spreading awareness of what it is like to survive after trauma. She is the author of several books and has written her memoir, telling her childhood story: The Sex-Offender’s Daughter: A True Story of Survival Against All Odds, available on Amazon Kindle and paperback.

Elizabeth is also the author of “Living with Complex PTSD” and the Cedar’s Port Fiction series: “Saving Joshua”, “Protecting Sarah”, “Guarding Noah” and “Bringing Back Faith,” and “Restoring Hope,” available here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0BCBZQN7L/allbooks?ingress=0&visitId=7e223b5b-1a29-45f0-ad9d-e9c8fdb59e9c&ref_=ap_rdr&ccs_id=931f96e2-c220-4765-acc8-cc99bb95e8bd

www.elizabethwoodsauthor.com/

Many clinicians meet clients who arrive with ritual abuse claims, fractured timelines, no corroboration, and a history of moving from specialist to specialist in search of answers. Most are not fabricating. Many are not remembering with precision either. A common statement appears in these rooms: if the body reacts, it must have happened. It sounds compassionate. It is not. It shortcuts assessment, confuses physiology with fact, and turns treatment into a confirmation loop. The alliance becomes a mirror that reflects back whatever the client fears most, rather than a container that steadies and clarifies.

Consider a typical presentation from practice. A client recalled being left overnight in a freezing basement. The concrete floor, footsteps overhead, a cold doorknob out of reach. The scene held sensory weight and carried real fear. Later, family records showed the home had no basement. The conclusion is not that nothing happened. The conclusion is that the image may have fused borrowed fragments and emotional truths into a single picture the nervous system could organize around. The body reacted. The target of that reaction was misidentified. What needed work was not a fast-track diagnosis based on physiology, but a paced inquiry into what the body was trying to protect and what events might actually fit the pattern.

The nervous system encodes threat. Implicit memory lives in posture, breath, and gut. None of that provides coordinates. Somatic evidence flags significance. It does not settle attribution. Collapse those two and accuracy drops. In trauma care, accuracy is not a luxury. It is ethical triage. Misreading hyperarousal as proof of incest, or adopting a story that later fails against hospital logs or sibling testimony, harms clients and families and erodes trust in the field. The emotional pain remains real. The backstory can still have holes.

Memory science has been clear on this point for decades. Some dislike the mess that research exposed, but disliking a finding does not erase it. Suggestion is powerful. The therapeutic relationship amplifies that power because trust lowers a client’s defenses against influence. Recovered memories do occur. They can surface slowly and unevenly and later find support in records or witnesses. They do not usually arrive polished, and they never deserve to be declared true on the basis of shaking hands or a rolling stomach. The correct posture is steady attunement, careful pacing, and respect for a mind that can both shield and distort.

The larger problem is cultural. Many therapists fear that skepticism will be heard as betrayal. They worry about appearing to side with perpetrators. They default to affirmation in order to avoid conflict. Caution then gets mislabeled as minimization, and verification gets mislabeled as doubt. In that climate, it is tempting to protect one’s reputation rather than the client. That is not care. That is drift.

A responsible approach is plain and repeatable. Stabilize first. Map what the body does before, during, and after certain narratives. Separate sensation from story. Ask where the language came from and what other explanations could fit the same physiology. Invite corroboration where it is possible to do so without harm. Hold space for what cannot yet be known. Keep the alliance strong without making promises the facts cannot carry. Somatic validation and factual verification are not enemies. They are different tools used for different questions.

Good therapy does not hand people answers. It teaches people how to hold possibility without certainty, and how to test what can be tested while protecting what still needs time. If a client reports abuse, the report is taken seriously and treated with respect. The work then proceeds without rushing the story into a fixed shape. Memory is important. That is why it deserves clinical accountability rather than slogans or ideological immunity.

Final thoughts

Somatic truth and factual truth are not the same category. Both matter. One guides immediate regulation and safety planning. The other guides attribution, repair, and justice. When clinicians keep those lanes clear, survivors get care that is humane, scientifically honest, and legally durable.

References

Scientific American. People Likely Aren’t as Susceptible to False Memories as Researchers Thought. 2025.
Murphy G, et al. False Memory Replication Dataset. University College Cork. 2023.
Loftus E. The “lost in the mall” technique. 1995.
Otgaar H, et al. The return of the repressed. Perspectives on Psychological Science. 2019.
McNally RJ. Remembering Trauma. Harvard University Press. 2003.
van der Kolk BA. The Body Keeps the Score. Viking. 2014.
Lynn SJ, Lilienfeld SO, Merckelbach H, et al. Dissociation and dissociative disorders. Clinical Psychology Review. 2014.

Cover Image: jonathan-borba-OhU7gVp0D7c-unsplash.jpg

Dr. Mozelle Martin

Dr. Mozelle Martin is a retired trauma therapist and former Clinical Director of a trauma center, with extensive experience in forensic psychology, criminology, and applied ethics. A survivor of childhood and young adulthood trauma, Dr. Martin has dedicated decades to understanding the psychological and ethical complexities of trauma, crime, and accountability. Her career began as a volunteer in a women’s domestic violence shelter, then as a SA hospital advocate, later becoming a Crisis Therapist working alongside law enforcement on the streets of Phoenix. She went on to earn an AS in Psychology, a BS in Forensic Psychology, an MA in Criminology, and a PhD in Applied Ethics, ultimately working extensively in forensic mental health—providing psychological assessments, intervention, and rehabilitative support with inmates and in the community. A published author and lifelong student of life, she continues to explore the relationship and crossovers of forensic science, mental health, and ethical accountability in both historical and modern contexts.

www.InkProfiler.com

Why the edge can feel unsafe

Humans did not evolve on memory foam in locked bedrooms. For most of our history, we slept on the ground, in caves, in huts with thin doors. Exposed limbs meant exposed entry points. Predators target extremities and the neck because access is easier. The nervous system solved that problem by favoring positions that protect the core: curl, cover, and tuck. That is not fear. It is pattern recognition preserved across generations. The amygdala still scans in the background during sleep, and it does not retire just because you purchased a better mattress.

Evolutionary memory that is still on duty

Even today, the brain runs a quiet night watch. On the first night in an unfamiliar place, sleep becomes asymmetric; one hemisphere remains more alert while the other rests. Laboratory work has demonstrated this first-night effect with imaging that shows a built-in vigilance system holding partial guard. That is biology, not superstition, and it helps explain why the edge of a bed in a new setting can feel like a cliff rather than a cushion.

Trauma history changes the map

Trauma shifts sleep from rest to strategy. People with childhood abuse, severe neglect, or control-based punishment often adopt positions that prioritize mobility, concealment, or both. Some sleep near the edge with one leg ready to move because escape has been coded as necessary. Others cannot tolerate uncovered limbs at all and cocoon under blankets even in warm rooms, not for comfort but for defense of the areas perpetrators once accessed. These choices are rarely conscious. They are solutions installed by experience and maintained by a threat-biased nervous system.

Posture, perception, and what the research suggests

Sleep posture correlates with emotional states in population studies and clinical reviews. Fetal-style sleepers more often report higher stress and adverse life events. Supine sleepers show a higher association with sleep paralysis in several samples. Side and edge positions vary; for some, the choice is airflow and spinal ease, for others, it is a safety cue learned a long time ago. None of this proves a single rule. It does support what clinicians observe: position is not random for many survivors.

Temperature, physiology, and learned associations

Feet are fast radiators. Specialized vessels in the hands and feet move heat quickly, so a foot outside the covers can lower body temperature and help with sleep onset. Biology does not operate in a vacuum, though. If cold feet were paired with fear, isolation, or punishment, the same sensation can function as a warning rather than a comfort. The body votes based on memory more than on textbook physiology.

Practical steps that respect biology

Start with observation rather than force. Notice how your body positions itself in the first moments of waking and the last moments before sleep. Those are honest windows. Make small experiments without pressure. If you want to test more exposure, begin with a toe or ankle rather than a full limb and see what the body permits. Do not copy someone else’s version of calm. One person sprawls because their system is quiet; another curls because their system is careful. Adjust the room before you try to adjust your biology. Lower the bed, soften the lighting, and set a temperature that signals safety. Some people settle with breathable sheets and a light-weight throw; others require no weight at all. There is no universal fix. The point is to give the nervous system current evidence that the environment is safe in the present day.

Final thoughts

Edge anxiety is not drama, and it is not immaturity. It is a living record of what kept people safe. If your legs lock tight or you pull the blanket over your head every night, that is not a flaw. It is survival programming that has not yet been given a stable reason to retire. Whether you sleep centered like a sandbag or hold the perimeter like a lookout, the pattern makes sense once the history is named. Your brain did not forget what life taught it, especially at night.

References

Tamaki M, Bang JW, Watanabe T, Sasaki Y. Night watch in one brain hemisphere during sleep associated with the first-night effect in humans. Current Biology. 2016;26(9):1190-1194.
Jalal B, Romanelli A, Hinton DE. Sleep paralysis in Italy: frequency, symptoms, and the role of cultural interpretation. Consciousness and Cognition. 2017;51:298-305.
Suni E, Chen W, Jungquist C, et al. Sleep position and mental health: a scoping review. Sleep Health. 2017;3(6):460-467.

Photo by Priscilla Du Preez 🇨🇦 on Unsplash

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.

Dr. Mozelle Martin

Dr. Mozelle Martin is a retired trauma therapist and former Clinical Director of a trauma center, with extensive experience in forensic psychology, criminology, and applied ethics. A survivor of childhood and young adulthood trauma, Dr. Martin has dedicated decades to understanding the psychological and ethical complexities of trauma, crime, and accountability. Her career began as a volunteer in a women’s domestic violence shelter, then as a SA hospital advocate, later becoming a Crisis Therapist working alongside law enforcement on the streets of Phoenix. She went on to earn an AS in Psychology, a BS in Forensic Psychology, an MA in Criminology, and a PhD in Applied Ethics, ultimately working extensively in forensic mental health—providing psychological assessments, intervention, and rehabilitative support with inmates and in the community. A published author and lifelong student of life, she continues to explore the relationship and crossovers of forensic science, mental health, and ethical accountability in both historical and modern contexts.

www.InkProfiler.com

It’s a powerhouse of possibility,  and it’s also a paradox. It keeps us alive. Helps us create. Love. Imagine. It’s where the best parts of us live–the cleverness, the humor, the wild creativity, the gut instincts, and the empathy.

But it’s also where the trauma lives.
Where the fear lives.
Where the ghosts of what we survived are still pacing the halls.

A Hypervigilant Command Center

If you live with CPTSD, then you know that it’s not just a brain. It’s a hypervigilant command center. Always alert. Always scanning. Always assuming the next bad thing is just around the corner–even when life is calm.

When you walk into a room, you don’t just enter. You calculate. You assess. You map out the exits, read every face, and listen for tone shifts. You don’t even realize you’re doing it; it’s automatic.
Learned from years of needing to be ready, just in case.

Emotional Hijacking: When the Past Invades the Present

Then someone says something. Maybe it’s nothing–a joke, a pause, or a look that lingers a second too long. Boom, your body’s gone tight, your stomach drops, and your thoughts scatter.

Suddenly, you’re back in a memory you never meant to revisit.
Not fully reliving it, but emotionally hijacked by it.
The fear, the shame, the worthlessness.
All of it, flooding in as if it never left.

Ruminating in the Ruins

Your brain starts looping.
Was it me?
Did I mess up again?
Are they mad?
Am I too much? Not enough?
What did I do?

You start ruminating.
You replay the conversation.
You pick apart every word, every silence.
You fill in blanks with worst-case scenarios.

And you don’t even want to be doing it; it just happens.

You know it’s happening. You see it happening.
But knowing doesn’t stop it.

It’s as though your own inner monologue is unraveling you in real time.
And you’re powerless to stop the unraveling.

This Is What CPTSD Can Look Like

Not always flashbacks.
Sometimes, it’s a slow, invisible spiral that pulls you under with nothing dramatic on the surface.
Just a brain quietly trying to protect you… in all the wrong ways.

The Whispered Lies in the Dark

And sometimes, yeah, the thoughts get dark. Not always suicidal. But heavy. Bone-deep exhausted. The kind of dark where you lie in bed and feel like a failure for simply existing.
The kind where your brain whispers:

“You’ll never get better.”
“This is just who you are.”
“People only tolerate you.”
“You’re too much.”
“You’re alone in this.”

And if you’re tired or overwhelmed–or just raw that day–you believe it.

Even though you know it’s the trauma talking.
Even though you’ve done the therapy.
Even though you’ve read the books, taken the meds, and journaled your guts out.
You still believe the lie your brain is screaming at you.

The Hardest Fight: Your Own Mind

That’s what makes healing so hard.
You don’t just fight symptoms.
You fight your own mind.

And it’s not because you’re weak.
It’s because your brain adapted perfectly to survive what happened to you.
It just doesn’t know you’re safe now.
It doesn’t know the war ended years ago.

What I’m Holding Onto

But here’s the part I’m learning, what I try to hold onto when it all feels too much: This brain, this chaotic, overworked, trauma-stamped brain of mine… It’s still trying and still showing up and still learning.

It laughs.
It makes art.
It remembers weird 90s trivia.
It falls in love.
It gets back up, even when it swears it’s done.

It is, somehow, still mine, and still beautiful.
Not because it’s perfect.
But because it keeps going.

Tender. Tired. Trying.

Beautifully magnificent. And also:

Tender.
Tired.
Trying.

Maybe that’s the point. Healing doesn’t erase the trauma. It means we learn how to live with a brain that’s been through hell, and that we choose, every day, to love it anyway.

Photo by Camila Quintero Franco on Unsplash

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.

Jack Brody

Born and raised in Boston, Jack Brody has called New York City home for over 30 years. He’s a proud father to a teenage daughter, a survivor of childhood abuse, and someone who knows firsthand what it means to live with Complex PTSD.

Diagnosed six years ago, Jack has been on a deep healing journey, one marked by therapy, growth, hard truths, and unexpected resilience. As a men’s mental health advocate, he shares his story to remind others that they’re not broken, not alone, and never beyond hope.

Whether through his writing, podcast, or quiet conversations with fellow survivors, Jack’s mission is simple: to speak honestly about the hard stuff, and to show that healing out loud is not only possible, it’s powerful.

aboutthatjack.com/

At first, I tried to push them back in, trying to make them fit into the version of my life I had always known. But no matter how much I willed them away, they kept coming—not in full, cohesive scenes, but in flashes, in body sensations, in a deep, unshakable knowing that left me questioning everything.

And that’s when the real battle began.

The Shock of Remembering

Nothing prepares you for the moment your own mind turns against you. One day, you think you know yourself. The next, you are drowning in memories that do not feel like yours but somehow are.

It feels impossible. Unbelievable. Like something you might have read in a book but never expected to happen in your own life. And yet, there it is.

For me, the shock came with a mix of emotions I did not know how to handle. Grief for the childhood I thought I had. Rage that my brain had kept this from me. Terror that if this was true, then nothing in my life had ever been what I thought it was.

And then came the worst question of all: What if I’m making this up?

The “Am I Making This Up?” Spiral

If you have been here, you know the loop.

• Why now?
• Wouldn’t I have always remembered if it were real?
• What if I’m just looking for attention?
• What if I planted this idea in my own head somehow?

I wrestled with these thoughts constantly, dissecting every memory fragment, analyzing every feeling, desperate for proof that would make it undeniable. But that proof never came in the way I wanted.

Instead, my body became the evidence. The panic that gripped me in certain situations. The way I froze at a touch, I should have been able to tolerate. The overwhelming nausea, the shaking, the way my mind wanted to flee even when I was safe.

My body had always known, even when my mind did not.

But the doubts were relentless. There were moments when I was certain I had broken completely, that I was unraveling, that soon I would not be able to trust a single thought inside my own head. I had been sure of my past once. If that could change, then what else was not real?

When the World Feels Unreal

One of the hardest things about repressed memories resurfacing is how they shatter your sense of reality. Everything becomes uncertain: your past, your identity, your relationships. And if you are anything like me, you crave certainty. You want someone to confirm what you remember, to tell you it is real, to give you something solid to stand on.

But most of the time, that doesn’t happen.

I started second-guessing everything. I would stare at old photos of myself as a child, looking for signs in my own eyes. Did I look happy? Did I look scared? Could I have been hiding something even from myself?

And then there were the nightmares. The ones that left me gasping for breath, the ones where I woke up drenched in sweat, my body aching in ways I could not explain. My mind tried to tell me they were just dreams, but my body told a different story. The fear, the disgust, the panic. It was real.

I had to learn how to exist in the in-between, to trust myself even when I had doubts. To accept that my brain had done what it needed to do to protect me and that just because I didn’t remember for decades didn’t mean it wasn’t true.

The Despair of Not Knowing

No one talks enough about the despair. The way it can swallow you whole. When you start remembering pieces of something so unthinkable, its weight is unbearable.

I remember curling up in bed, unable to move, unable to function, my mind replaying the same thoughts on a loop.

“This isn’t real. This can’t be real.
But what if it is?
What if I’m losing my mind?
What if I’m just broken?“

Nothing shakes your sense of reality like waking up one day and realizing your past is no longer what you thought it was.

I would search my memories for signs, clues, anything that would either validate or disprove what I was starting to uncover. But memory does not work like that. It does not arrive neatly, in perfect order, with timestamps and witnesses. It drips in, slowly, sometimes violently, and often without warning.

And then came the darkest thoughts.

“What if I’m making this up because I want an excuse for my struggles?
What if I’m just broken beyond repair?“

I became convinced I was unraveling, that I would wake up one day completely lost inside my own head. The fear was not just about what had happened to me; it was about whether I could ever trust myself again.

The Darkness That Almost Swallowed Me

The grief was unbearable. It was not just about the memories. It was the loss of the life I thought I had. The childhood I had once cherished now felt like a dream I had woken up from too late.

And the worst part? There was no one to validate it for me. No way to prove or disprove what my brain was screaming at me.

There were days I couldn’t breathe under its weight. Days I wondered if I would ever feel normal again. Days I thought maybe it would be easier if I just disappeared.

This is the part people don’t talk about. The way the pain can feel so heavy that it drags you under. The way remembering doesn’t feel like healing at first. It feels like dying.

Grounding Through the Chaos

If you are in this place, if your world feels like it is cracking open, and you do not know how to hold the pieces, I want you to know you are not alone. And you are not broken.

Here are some things that helped me (and might help you, too):

• Validate your emotions, even when you doubt your memories. Your feelings are real, no matter what.
• Find safe people to talk to. Whether it is a therapist, a coach, a support group, or trusted friends, do not do this alone.
• Ground yourself in the present. When the past tries to pull you under, remind yourself that you are here, now. Feet on the floor. Breathe in your lungs. Safe.
• Give yourself permission to not have all the answers. Healing is not about proving what happened. It is about reclaiming yourself.

You Are Still You

When the past cracks open, it can feel like you are losing yourself. But you are not. You are still you. Maybe even more than you have ever been.

I won’t pretend this journey is easy. It is disorienting, painful, and sometimes feels impossible. But you are not alone. You do not have to have every answer to start healing.

Your story matters. Your pain is real. And you deserve to heal, whether the world ever sees your truth or not.

You Are Not Crazy. You Are Remembering.

If you are here, in the middle of the storm, feeling like you might not make it out, I need you to hear this.

You are not broken. You are not making this up. You are not crazy.

Your brain protected you the best way it knew how. And now, it is giving you back what you are ready to hold.

You do not have to remember everything to heal. You do not have to prove anything to be worthy of support.

Your pain is real. And you are not alone.

Hold on, friend, even when it feels impossible. Hold on.

Because the other side of this? It’s worth it. And so are you.

Photo by Vincent Burkhead on Unsplash

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.

Danica Alison

Danica Alison is an optimist, deep thinker, and out-of-the-box adventurer who finds meaning in life’s chaos. She’s a writer, a healing advocate, and someone who believes healing is a journey best traveled with curiosity, humor, and a little bit of rebellious joy.
A lifelong lover of stories, both lived and told. She is passionate about exploring the messy, beautiful process of being human. Whether she’s writing, learning, or connecting with others, she brings a mix of warmth, honesty, and a refusal to fit into neat little boxes.

www.DanicaAlison.com

They walk like us, they talk like us, and they may even have pristine reputations in their communities. However, nothing can prepare a victim for the way her life will change once a psychological abuser “picks” her.

A psychological abuser’s goal is to utilize mental tantalization to break a victim’s psyche down over time, make her appear crazy, and isolate her from mutual connections without leaving a trail of evidence. After you’re discarded from a relationship with one of these personalities, the abuser will spit seething venom at you, disempowering you and removing your humanity and self-worth. They don’t care who you were before, during, or after your relationship with them, as they utilize hot and cold behavior to make you question your reality. You’re not a human being; you’re a commodity to be exploited in their game of life. To these personalities, everything is your fault. No matter how many nice things you do for them, nothing is good enough. No matter who you are, what you say, or what you do, your existence enrages them. If you look them in the eyes, there’s nothing there — almost as if they have no conscience. Even being given the “death glare” or “sociopathic stare” by one of these people is enough to transfer that intense hatred of you into yourself and make your body shake. Their sadism lurks behind a facade of innocence.

Who is the Psychological Abuser? 

Psychological abusers are emotional toddlers in adult bodies. The abuse doesn’t have to happen in a romantic or familial relationship, as is most commonly discussed. Abuse can occur in any type of relationship or environment—schools, workplaces, churches, or any communities where humans gather. Abusers have plenty of experience — they typically have multiple victims. While psychological abuse can be so crafty that the victim might even question if she is really a victim, they know exactly what they do to you, and they enjoy it. But the words “abuser” and “bully” are the last words they would use to describe themselves. They don’t think they are doing anything wrong.

While it isn’t possible for victims to diagnose these types of people, just be aware that they have serious pathological issues consisting of narcissistic, sociopathic, and psychopathic tendencies. I don’t typically subscribe to using the word “normal” to describe human behavior because of the history of the word being used to ostracize people who do not conform to groupthink. However, I’m fine with using the word “normal” to describe healthy people in relation to these abusive personalities. Psychological abusers live in an entirely different reality than normal people do.

Who Do Abusers Target? 

Abusers target people who have something they do not or cannot have themselves. Since nothing is ever good enough for them, they envy those who are content with themselves. They typically target empaths — people who have an innate joy and genuine gratitude for life, see every human being as worthy of love and tend to see the good in others. Their animosity toward empaths comes from a place of not being able to fathom how another person can have that much joy regardless of life circumstances. 

Abusers can work alone or in groups. Typically, they eventually rope “flying monkeys” into their games — minions who either overtly or covertly help the abuser perpetrate the abuse. Often, these flying monkeys do not even know the victim personally. Since the abuse is so insidious, even these flying monkeys might not understand the full extent of the torment inflicted on the victim. If these supporting actors could see the full extent of the abuse, they may stop being pawns in the abuser’s destructive game. Unfortunately, most of these flying monkeys don’t want to understand the harm they’re complicit in, but they want to be part of the group and win the abuser’s praise, and they get their own power trip satisfied in the process.

For reference, The term “flying monkey” comes from The Wizard of Oz. The Wicked Witch of the West puts them under her spell.

The Average Person Does Not Understand Psychological Abuse

Psychological abuse can be an amorphous force, very difficult for an outsider to detect. Abusers often charm other people close to their victims, so these people have no reason to believe that the abuser is doing anything wrong to them. Outsiders may even ask, “What did they even do to you?”

It’s sneaky. As the victim, I couldn’t even fully put it into words myself. This is precisely why abusers utilize psychological abuse as their weapon of choice. They are crafty enough to know that if they did it in any other way, they would “get caught” by outsiders. The victim may be told that she’s “overthinking it” or that it’s “just how she’s perceiving it.” The power dynamics, manipulation, hot and cold behavior, gaslighting, and mind games form a Stockholm Syndrome-style trauma bond, which makes the victim believe: “Maybe they’ll eventually give me closure.” The victim may come across as “unable to move on” from the relationship when, in reality, she is wrestling with that trauma bond as she tries to fathom what is being done to her after the discard and seek a resolution to the tension. 

The mind games taunt the victim with a false hope for closure and an ending to the sick games, but that closure never comes. If victims question what’s going on, perpetrators use tactics like gaslighting and denial to pretend like nothing is happening and boomerang the blame back onto the true victim, further making her question her own reality. They may even try to convince others, and even themselves, that they are the victims. Don’t be fooled. They are not victims.

Abusers want their victims to spend their time wondering what they did wrong, but the only thing they did “wrong” was threaten their inflated ego by simply existing in their vicinity. Their tactics come from a need to control their environment and manipulate the people around them so that their world is centered around the one and only thing that matters: themselves. 

Some Mental Health Professionals Misunderstand Psychological Abuse

During my years in the mental health system, I tried bringing up some of these situations to the clinicians I saw, believing that they would be able to help me understand the painful symptoms I was experiencing in my body as a result. What I learned, though, was that many medical professionals don’t understand this type of abuse and will even go as far as to blame and retraumatize the victim further. 

After these gut-wrenching experiences with professionals I opened my heart to, I took active steps to seek out experts trained to handle victims of psychological abuse. The professional I started working with was so helpful, and she was open about being a survivor herself. 

Having felt victimized by other mental health professionals when I first met with her, I still wasn’t sure if what I had endured was abuse or if I was truly a victim. I had a list of all the things I had experienced as a result of what I had been through, many of which the medical system had previously written off as “all in my head,” giving me outlandish diagnoses. I also “confessed” all my reactions to the abuse along the lines of fight, flight, freeze, and fawn reactions. Some of those trauma responses were made out of dissociation. I felt so guilty for these reactions, and I felt like this professional needed to know how “awful” I was for making my abusers uncomfortable with my attempts to reconcile the tension. In my case, I was not a victim of just one psychological abuser. I was a victim of more than one perpetrator, and they banded together to target me, feeding off each other. 

After going through my laundry list of symptoms and reactions with this professional, I put my notebook down and looked up at her with eyes full of tears. I waited for her to tell me that I was a horrible person and that I had done everything wrong. I waited for her to laugh at me. I waited for her to tell me I was crazy. I waited for her to tell me that perhaps I was the abuser myself. And I waited for her to kick me out of her office since I was probably too much to deal with. 

She paused for a while and looked me in the eyes, saying, “You did nothing wrong. And it’s not just in your head. Everything you’ve shared tells me that you were targeted by psychological abusers.” 

Getting that validation was incredible for me. As a survivor herself and an expert researcher on the subject, nothing phased her—she had heard it all. She reassured me that everything I was experiencing was perfectly normal. I felt so seen, validated, and heard for the first time in so long. It often takes someone who has survived the same thing to truly understand where a victim is coming from, and I finally received that validation from someone who understood. As I looked into the eyes of another survivor who had been in my exact shoes, even though she was a trained professional much older, both of our eyes teared up, and we shared a humbling moment of our hearts touching one another. My work with her was transformative in understanding the reality of what I had been through and overcoming my self-guilt. 

Many Do Not Understand It, But Psychological Abuse is Insidious

Psychological abuse is real, and it is insidious. There are times when flashbacks and emotions still come up for me, but I implement grounding and nervous system regulation tools to remind myself that I am safe.

Survivors, while you may feel incredibly isolated in healing from this despicable form of hidden abuse, know that there is a community of C-PTSD survivors who have been or are in your shoes. We are all healing together. From one survivor to another, you are so strong, and I believe that you can overcome it.  

Photo by Lil Artsy on Pexels

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.

Natalie Rose

My name is Natalie, and I am a survivor of about 13 years of absolute psychological torture from Complex PTSD symptoms. For the longest time, I thought I was inherently sick and broken beyond repair. I spent over a decade running around in circles in the medical system trying to figure out what was “wrong” with me and how to “fix” it.

♡ What is Complex PTSD? ♡

Complex PTSD symptoms come from severe, prolonged, and numerous incidents of trauma, typically of a relational nature. Symptoms can come from any type of trauma, though, and the trauma doesn’t necessarily have to stem from childhood — adults can develop CPTSD as well. Trauma can damage the brain and shrink the hippocampus, causing many of the symptoms of CPTSD. I decided to go public with my story to be a voice for the voiceless. There are too many survivors being told CPTSD is a lifelong sentence, and they are not being given the tools they need to overcome their symptoms.

♡ My Story ♡

I endured multiple types of traumas starting at around age thirteen, including numerous situations of both individual and large-group interpersonal cruelty. Some of these situations forced me to switch environments. My body couldn’t fathom what was happening, and my nervous system shut down. I saw danger everywhere, operated in a panicked survival mode, and lived in fear, anxiety, and isolation. I did my best to appear “normal” on the outside, keep a smile on my face, and control what was happening on the inside, distracting myself with extreme workaholism and doing nice things for others. I took active steps to keep branching out in confidence again, but these traumas kept piling onto each other and overlapping. I wasn’t ready to give up yet, though, because I knew my family and friends would be distraught if I did. The most difficult and heartbreaking part of my story is that the two communities I set out to seek healing in—religion and the medical system itself—caused further trauma when some religious leaders, congregation members, and medical professionals chose to take advantage of my vulnerability for their own motives. In most of these situations, I didn’t even realize I was a victim until outsiders pointed it out for me and that my vulnerability made me a target of malicious people. Each future situation of being targeted was just salt on the wound of the original incident.

♡ My Struggles to Find Answers ♡

What I went through all those years was so severe, and my symptoms and physical body reactions as a result were so excruciating that I went as far as to see a neurologist, concerned that my symptoms were the result of some sort of nervous system disorder. However, he returned with no paperwork in his hands to inform me that there was nothing wrong with me but that I was simply completely traumatized, and my body reacted accordingly. I finally realized that my symptoms were not the result of an inherent mental or physical illness and began to take a trauma-based approach to my healing after many years of believing that I was “sick” for the rest of my life. My true progress began when I finally rejected the lies that were told to me that I would have to manage my symptoms for the rest of my life and made the decision to believe that I was fully capable of healing from my excruciating pain.

♡ Finding My Own Healing ♡

I am excited to share tips for natural, somatic, and holistic healing that have helped me overcome things like dissociation, flashbacks, sleep challenges, anxiety, hypervigilance, and more. I began to pursue unique methods of healing after many years of not seeing much progress through westernized care, and this was the catalyst for fast-tracking my healing. I aim to help survivors overcome their feelings of self-guilt, blame, and humiliation and help them realize that their bodies had normal reactions to abnormal situations.

I’m so glad I didn’t give up when my pain felt unbearable. I know what I’ve survived. I know the work I’ve put in to overcome it. I am finally living a life of consistent peace and contentment, and I am sharing my story from the other side. I hope to encourage other survivors that there was never anything wrong with them to begin with and that they are capable of living healthy, happy, and fulfilled lives. I aim to live my life in love of both others and myself, understanding that everyone has a story of their own. I am grateful to the CPTSD Foundation for giving me an opportunity to share my story.

♡ Personal Blog ♡

To learn more about my healing journey, please visit my personal blog, “Little Cabin Life,” at:
littlecabinlife.com

If you haven’t noticed, that is a lot of work and can be extremely exhausting. Additionally, there is deeper work in therapy to process the trauma activated by the trigger. All that emotional work can leave you feeling like you’ve been hit by a bus…at least, that is how I experience it. It’s like a therapy hangover.

In this healing journey, there are intense seasons of growth and also seasons of rest. Many trauma survivors, including myself, are most uncomfortable with the season of rest.

There may be many reasons for that. Some may feel like they will lose momentum if they pause. Some are uncomfortable with the quiet because it was a sign of impending danger during their trauma. Some may not think they deserve a break or haven’t worked hard enough. The reason codes are endless.

During my healing journey, I worked through several of those reason codes and learned an important lesson…healing requires rest and self-care. This is not a sprint, but rather, it is an ultra-marathon. We need to pace ourselves and tend to our “sore” spots; otherwise, our health will fall apart, and we will not be able to move forward.

In the wake of a flashback, self-care is essential to help you regain a sense of safety and well-being. No amount of self-criticism, blaming, or shaming will help you regain that sense of safety and well-being you long for.

Through trial and error, I discovered that the effectiveness of self-care practices correlates to the age you were triggered back to in the flashback. In my case, I was triggered back to the womb, so the things that made my younger parts feel comforted were rocking in a glider, listening to lullabies, taking a slow, meditative walk, and a spiritual visualization of having that little part climb up into Jesus’ lap for comfort.

You may have different self-care routines that help you recover a sense of safety, but if you don’t, here are ten tips for practicing self-care after a flashback:

1. Find a Safe Space: If possible, move to a quiet, safe, and comfortable space where you can regain your composure and feel secure.
2. Self-Care Routine: After the immediate distress has subsided, return to your self-care routine, which may include exercise, relaxation techniques, and other activities that promote emotional and physical well-being.
3. Self-Compassion: Be gentle and compassionate with yourself. Remind yourself that what you experienced was a memory or a flashback and not a current threat. Use positive and reassuring self-talk.
4. Stay Hydrated: Sip on water or herbal tea to help soothe your nervous system and provide comfort.
5. Comfort Objects: Use comforting objects, such as a soft blanket, stuffed animal, or a cherished item, to offer emotional support and comfort.
6. Connect with Your Senses: Engage your senses to help anchor you in the present moment. Listen to soothing music, touch comforting objects, or use calming scents like lavender or chamomile.
7. Reach Out for Support: If you have a support system, reach out to a trusted friend or family member who understands your situation. Sharing your experience with someone you trust can be comforting.
8. Reflect and Journal: Reflect on your experience and journal your thoughts and feelings to help process the event. Writing can provide clarity and a sense of release.
9. Positive Visualization: Visualize a serene and safe place in your mind. Imagine yourself in this peaceful setting and focus on the sensory details, like the colors, sounds, and scents, to help create a sense of calm.
10. Progress Over Perfection: Understand that reclaiming serenity is a process, and it’s okay to have moments of discomfort or emotional distress. Celebrate the progress you make and acknowledge that healing is an ongoing journey.

Remember that self-care is a highly individualized process, and what works best for you may differ from what works for someone else. It’s important to create a self-care routine that meets your unique needs and preferences.

I would love to hear what self-care routines work best for you.

As always, you do not have to walk this journey alone. Contact me to schedule your free discovery call.

Trigger Tracker Template —(FREE Resource) helps you keep track of the triggers in your workplace and plan the coping strategies you will use to get through the experience.

Get on the waiting list for The Resilient Career Academy™. You won’t want to miss it.

If you want to stay informed on the programs, tools, and training I offer, sign up for my mailing list.

You can also visit my website for more information on courses and other freebies I offer at: https://www.cyndibennettconsulting.com.

Photo by Maddi Bazzocco on Unsplash

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.

Cyndi Bennett

Believer. Leader. Learner. Advocate. Writer. Speaker. Coach. Mentor. Triathlete. Encourager. Survivor.
 
Most of all, I am a fellow traveler on the rocky road called, Trauma Recovery. My mission is to minimize the effects of trauma for survivors in the workplace.

I was used to putting on a smile in public and controlling what was going on inside of me to the point where I got many comments from people in my life that they would never have guessed the level of suffering I was experiencing due to how well I concealed it. There were many times I lashed out at people, but almost everyone has had those instances at some point in their life. In general, it was a daily ritual of mine to power through school and work, which were great distractions for me, with a smile on my face, offering those around me the kindness that I wasn’t able to give myself, and I would return home to begin my rituals of self-torture and punishment.  

That night, I was trying to think of ways to calm myself down. I wanted to understand better what I was so angry about. I thought maybe I was getting super angry because I hated all the people who hurt me and hadn’t forgiven them yet. I had been searching for practical ways to forgive for so long because I couldn’t seem to figure it out. I read books, listened to podcasts,  and analyzed scriptures. I started questioning if I had ever had hatred for another human being in my heart and, if so, who? 

But when I finally got my answer, I hated one human being

I even got out a pen and paper and started trying to write down the names of all the people I hated. I sat there dumbfounded. There has to be at least one, I kept thinking as I shook my pen, trying to figure out who it was. I couldn’t think of anyone. I never once hated another human being and repeatedly worked to forgive and see the goodness in those who hurt me, even when they hurt me deeply.  

But when I finally got my answer, I hated one human being. And I hated her with a fiery, burning passion hotter than the heat of the bright, burning sun. 

It was me. I hated her. I hated my own guts. 

In fact, I hated my own name. I hated even thinking about it. Anytime someone called my name, even if it was a family member or friend trying to get my attention, it would spark flashbacks, and my body would jolt.

I very reluctantly started writing my own name with shaking hands and got through the first three letters, “Nat,” which is a nickname that many people in my life call me, before the tears started viciously flowing. I really did hate every fiber of my being, and I punished myself in ways that were too personal to mention. 

I Wasn’t Born Hating Myself

I wasn’t born hating myself. Society taught me to hate myself. The control systems of the world taught me to hate myself. Other people taught me to hate myself. I taught myself to hate myself. But unfortunately, no matter what was done to me, it was me who had become my biggest abuser. 

I couldn’t see the goodness in myself or forgive myself like I could with others. I couldn’t see what other people saw in me. I was punishing myself for things that weren’t even my fault to begin with. And over time, I hated my own guts more and more.  

Living in a “Never Good Enough” Society

Almost from the moment we are born, we are constantly shown signs of why we are not good enough. The indoctrination starts just about as soon as we exit the womb. We are fed marketing campaigns to tell us that we need these shoes, that makeup, this car. We are put in school programs that stifle our creativity as we try to make perfect grades and hit the requirements of what is asked of us to prepare us to follow rules and conform. Western society convinces us that we need labels, gimmicks, and symbols of status and prestige. We’re told that all these things will make us happy. But no matter what I obtained, they didn’t truly fulfill me. I was trapped in a cycle of needing the “next best thing” to keep up with constantly changing trends. 

Eventually, no matter what I obtained for myself, I was still in so much pain. I was willing to trade in all my material possessions and live in a cardboard box if it meant having freedom in my mind and body. I no longer cared about what I knew wouldn’t bring me fulfillment. I truly just wanted peace and contentment. It took much undoing and untraining for my brain to realize that I never needed all the gimmicks I thought I needed to be worthy or “good enough.” I can still be successful in my own way, and it doesn’t require labels. For me, my greatest success has been working my butt off to heal from the pain in my body that was in survival mode for the majority of my formative years. Nothing else mattered to me once I experienced true freedom, and the temporary things that I once thought would bring me fulfillment became last year’s news once I started being genuinely content (you can’t take your stuff with you when you die!). Of course, it is important to take care of ourselves and have enough to live comfortably. But I no longer felt the need to be a superstar in the corporate world, even though that was a goal of mine at one point. As a teenager who was passionate about computer science, I once dreamed of becoming a Chief Information Officer of a big tech company. But my life has changed so much, and my trauma made me reevaluate what was really important to me so that being a leader in the corporate world is actually the last thing I want. I’m currently working a simple job that works for me, pays my bills, and gives me enough to save and experience fun things with my family and friends when I’m not working. I spend the rest of my time on my healing journey and pursuing my personal passions that I don’t want or need to monetize. I don’t feel the need to run my version of the rat race. In fact, today, I am quite a minimalist and am content with my possessions, my finances, my home, and the simplicity of my life of newfound freedom. I truly do feel free. I also believe that, since I am in my mid-twenties, this doesn’t mean that once I take some time to relax and enjoy a simple life, I can’t go back to being ambitious in other ways but on my own time. Then, I will be able to conquer those things with peace and freedom rather than with constant anxiety. 

True Contentment Comes From Within

True contentment was always within me. I never needed anything else. Once I became content with myself, I made the decision to do the things that make me happy and not worry about chasing after the next best thing. For me, my greatest possessions are my moments of genuine contentment and freedom. Loving myself has allowed me the opportunity to love others much more than I was capable of before. 

The notion that loving ourselves and taking care of ourselves is narcissistic or selfish is pretty foolish to me. The fear of being labeled narcissistic, arrogant, cocky, selfish, or a braggart was what kept me in my self-loathing for so long. I was terrified to appear too confident in myself because I knew that I had made some people uncomfortable before. I had many moments of confidence and personal success, and when I received pushback from others who were not happy for me but instead angered by my joy, I began to question if I was acting arrogant for feeling proud of myself. However, this is not logical. We are absolutely allowed to feel proud of ourselves when we reach personal milestones. I also believe it is possible to find a healthy balance between confidence and humility without being arrogant. The easiest thing for an outsider to do—if they feel upset about, jealous of, or threatened by someone’s genuine contentment and confidence—is to label them negatively to make themselves feel better about their own self-loathing and their fears of embracing their own self-confidence for fear of the same pushback they give to others. 

I had to get over my fear of loving myself as well as the fear of what others would think about that. Loving myself and taking care of myself is not selfish. It is a requirement to survive. It is a requirement to maintain a job. It is a requirement to make a difference in the lives of others. It is a requirement if I desire to be a wife and mom in the future because I cannot take care of other people if I cannot take care of myself.  

We Must Love Ourselves as Much as We Love Others

For the longest time, I had so much love to give everyone except for myself. It got to a point where I was overcompensating by giving to others because I thought my worth came from what other people thought of me. My giving nature drove me crazy, especially when it got to the point that it was at the expense of my own well-being, and I could not take care of myself. I had to take active steps to start genuinely loving myself before I set back out to love others even more than I did before. During my healing process, I finally started to see bits and pieces of the deep love that the other people in my life always had for me. Loving myself has made loving others so much easier.

I always wanted to help others by sharing my story. But first, the process had to start with me. Once I put in the work and overcame my own challenges, I felt ready to share my story with the world. 

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.

Natalie Rose

My name is Natalie, and I am a survivor of about 13 years of absolute psychological torture from Complex PTSD symptoms. For the longest time, I thought I was inherently sick and broken beyond repair. I spent over a decade running around in circles in the medical system trying to figure out what was “wrong” with me and how to “fix” it.

♡ What is Complex PTSD? ♡

Complex PTSD symptoms come from severe, prolonged, and numerous incidents of trauma, typically of a relational nature. Symptoms can come from any type of trauma, though, and the trauma doesn’t necessarily have to stem from childhood — adults can develop CPTSD as well. Trauma can damage the brain and shrink the hippocampus, causing many of the symptoms of CPTSD. I decided to go public with my story to be a voice for the voiceless. There are too many survivors being told CPTSD is a lifelong sentence, and they are not being given the tools they need to overcome their symptoms.

♡ My Story ♡

I endured multiple types of traumas starting at around age thirteen, including numerous situations of both individual and large-group interpersonal cruelty. Some of these situations forced me to switch environments. My body couldn’t fathom what was happening, and my nervous system shut down. I saw danger everywhere, operated in a panicked survival mode, and lived in fear, anxiety, and isolation. I did my best to appear “normal” on the outside, keep a smile on my face, and control what was happening on the inside, distracting myself with extreme workaholism and doing nice things for others. I took active steps to keep branching out in confidence again, but these traumas kept piling onto each other and overlapping. I wasn’t ready to give up yet, though, because I knew my family and friends would be distraught if I did. The most difficult and heartbreaking part of my story is that the two communities I set out to seek healing in—religion and the medical system itself—caused further trauma when some religious leaders, congregation members, and medical professionals chose to take advantage of my vulnerability for their own motives. In most of these situations, I didn’t even realize I was a victim until outsiders pointed it out for me and that my vulnerability made me a target of malicious people. Each future situation of being targeted was just salt on the wound of the original incident.

♡ My Struggles to Find Answers ♡

What I went through all those years was so severe, and my symptoms and physical body reactions as a result were so excruciating that I went as far as to see a neurologist, concerned that my symptoms were the result of some sort of nervous system disorder. However, he returned with no paperwork in his hands to inform me that there was nothing wrong with me but that I was simply completely traumatized, and my body reacted accordingly. I finally realized that my symptoms were not the result of an inherent mental or physical illness and began to take a trauma-based approach to my healing after many years of believing that I was “sick” for the rest of my life. My true progress began when I finally rejected the lies that were told to me that I would have to manage my symptoms for the rest of my life and made the decision to believe that I was fully capable of healing from my excruciating pain.

♡ Finding My Own Healing ♡

I am excited to share tips for natural, somatic, and holistic healing that have helped me overcome things like dissociation, flashbacks, sleep challenges, anxiety, hypervigilance, and more. I began to pursue unique methods of healing after many years of not seeing much progress through westernized care, and this was the catalyst for fast-tracking my healing. I aim to help survivors overcome their feelings of self-guilt, blame, and humiliation and help them realize that their bodies had normal reactions to abnormal situations.

I’m so glad I didn’t give up when my pain felt unbearable. I know what I’ve survived. I know the work I’ve put in to overcome it. I am finally living a life of consistent peace and contentment, and I am sharing my story from the other side. I hope to encourage other survivors that there was never anything wrong with them to begin with and that they are capable of living healthy, happy, and fulfilled lives. I aim to live my life in love of both others and myself, understanding that everyone has a story of their own. I am grateful to the CPTSD Foundation for giving me an opportunity to share my story.

♡ Personal Blog ♡

To learn more about my healing journey, please visit my personal blog, “Little Cabin Life,” at:
littlecabinlife.com

How did you survive your childhood and move on? Where did your life take you? Where are you now? How are you doing?

These are questions we have all been asked, and some are not as easy to answer as others. My childhood will be similar to anyone else’s out there who suffered abuse and trauma from the people closest to us. We are all unique in how we cope with our situations and how we break away from them and move on. I can only really speak from my own experiences of abuse and trauma. I have also lived in this world for several decades, and I can honestly say that I am a very different woman now than who I was as an abused child. Life changes us as our bodies mature, and our brains are always learning new things as we are propelled through life. Our unique experiences shape us into the person we are and how we interpret situations. Everyone is different. It is great to be different from others because the world would be boring if we were all the same. It is our differences that should be celebrated, not ridiculed.

In this article, I want to explore how we, as survivors of abuse, deal with sadness, which is essentially another part of the grieving process after having lived through trauma.. Life continues despite our experiences. It happens all the time whether we want it to or not. We cannot turn off the clock just because we have a bad night of flashbacks. We still have to get on with our lives, but it is not always easy when you are living with complex PTSD. A nightmare can really mess up your day, and your organized schedule can easily spiral out of control when those emotions get in our way. As adults, we still have to go to work and get on with our daily chores, but what if you are too sad, and your need to just sit down or spend time in bed is greater than whatever else that schedule is telling you to do? Has this happened to you?

I often suffer from nightmares from my childhood and traumatic events that have happened to me since then. Most of the time, I can regulate myself back into the present and shrug off those memories, and move on with my day. Those flashbacks don’t hurt me as much as they once did. Don’t get me wrong, I still have periods when I get overwhelmingly sad from triggers and my emotions upset my day. I can also react badly to situations that I cannot control when I have already had an emotional day. While I know this to be true, those closest to me know who I am and how I react. Normal life stressors can be hard to manage for anyone, not just survivors, but we do tend to take things a lot harder than others. It is because we have already lived through too much. I am lucky because I now have a husband sleeping right next to me and young kids in the rooms next to ours. I am surrounded by family, and I take great comfort in having them around me. They help me and guide me when I am not feeling like myself. I also have a network of friends who I can turn to when I need them. It wasn’t always like this. I was once struggling as a teen with horrific nightmares that scared the living daylights out of me on most days. I would wake up screaming and terrified, covered in sweat and not knowing where I was. It used to take me hours, sometimes days, to get my emotions back in control. I also had very few friends because I had chosen to leave everyone I knew behind and start over. Being alone and sad is the worst feeling. I needed help because I seemed to be stuck in perpetual sadness.

Who do you turn to when you are feeling sad?

Feeling sad is part of who we are as survivors of trauma and abuse. We were, after all, deeply hurt in the most profound way. We were physically violated and exploited by adults who were supposed to look after us but ended up doing the exact opposite. That fundamental betrayal will leave a mark, and each mark adds up to something more than our brains made us “forget.” The physical bruises and pain vanished with time, but those emotional scars stuck with us like invisible glue. We forget what happened to us until a time when our brains can handle the hurt and get “triggered.” We then flashed back to somewhere we never wanted to revisit, but our brains made us go there again. There it is — BAM! — your very own 3D movie starring yourself in the worst possible moment of your life. Your brain makes you watch yourself in that tortured moment and feel that pain again. You hear the voices as if they were right there, even though these events happened decades ago. It hurts, and the pain is acute and severe, just like it happened. It is no wonder that when you come out of that flashback, you feel overwhelmingly sad. You grieve for that young life who had no option but to take that pain and that burden to keep the abuse secret. Some survivors are triggered many times during the day and into the night. It can be exhausting to live like this. Feeling sadness is part of the grief process that we go through in our healing journeys. Those feelings have to come out. If you need to have a good cry, then do. Just know that you don’t need to go at it alone. Most survivors seek help and support. We eventually end up drawing strength from others as well as ourselves. It takes time to heal.

Have you ever felt overwhelmingly sad? Perhaps you had a nightmare, or you got triggered by something small, and you just couldn’t stop crying? How did you get through it?

Life has to carry on, no matter if we want to be present in it or not. Being sad is not an excuse to stop living. In fact, it is a great reason to carry on living. I know that the first thing that comes to mind when we are sad is to stop. We feel ashamed of our sadness, and we stop. We stopped whatever it was we were doing, and we often went and hid somewhere and tried to stem those stupid tears. Does this resonate with any of you? Have you ever cried in the staff restrooms at work? Or maybe you have gone out in the parking lot and sat in your car and sobbed your heart out? I have done this many times, and I can tell you that going at it alone is not the right way. When we feel sad, we want to hide ourselves away from everyone and let our emotions out in private. Why do we, as survivors, do that? Why are we so reticent to ask for help? Well, the answer is simple: it is because we are trauma survivors, and we don’t trust anyone. We might say we do, but in reality, we don’t. The reason for this is that we were hurt as children in the most fundamental way, and we don’t trust that the same hurt will not happen again. We protect ourselves by not trusting and opening up.

Our grief becomes very personal and visceral. It is always there. We sometimes don’t know how to get help and support

When I was a child, the only thing that I could talk to was my teddy bear. I carried him with me wherever I went until I was too old for a teddy bear, and my pillow had to suffice as my emotional crutch. I also used to carry a small key chain in the shape of a dolphin in my pocket. It was something that would ground me to the present moment when I was feeling sad. The shape of it calmed me as I touched it and pushed me back to the present moment. Children who have been abused do not trust adults, and when we grow up to be adults, we often turn inward to hide our emotions and sadness. Our grief becomes very personal and visceral. It is always there. We sometimes don’t know how to get help and support.

When we grow up, we come to learn that we need people in order to survive, and there are many situations where we need others to succeed. One of them is teamwork to achieve something at work or in a sport. It is the same thing with our emotional health. We are social creatures, and when we work with others, we are stronger than we are on our own. It takes a lot of bravery to reach out to someone and say; “Hey, I need help.” It is almost incomprehensible to reach out to others when our brains tell us not to trust anyone. Our past experiences of that deep betrayal will always be a constant reminder that the world is untrustworthy. Yet, we must try.

I was a lost eighteen-year-old once when I flew hundreds of miles to get away from my abusive background. I never turned back, but it was not easy to start a new life. Nothing that is worth living for is going to be easy. We have to fight for ourselves, and, as survivors, we have to do this a lot more than those who grow up in a loving home. We don’t have the love and support of family behind us that can propel us out into the air with a parachute to soften our landing into adulthood. We are launched like projectile cannonballs into the air, and we often land hard as adulthood comes as a huge shock. We were never taught the life skills that a loving mom and dad would give their child before leaving home. We are often abandoned financially and left to fight for our own survival. Everything is a surprise when we first start out by ourselves when we have to be on guard and on high alert for people who wish to exploit and harm our innocent souls. Being eighteen and alone in the world was one of the hardest years I have lived, but I was stubborn and determined that I survived my childhood for a reason. I cried buckets during those first years as life kicked me over and over while I learned what it was like to be an adult. I had many disappointments and was in worse situations than I can count, but I got through it. I learned a lot about reading people and noticed the signs of those who wished to use me for their own agendas rather than my best interests. I started making fewer mistakes and relished in my small successes. Even though I was sad and coping with constant nightmares, I learned a lot about myself in those early years. I learned that I had hope that my life would be good one day, and I turned my talents and strengths to my advantage. I took classes at night school and got into college. It was tough to work during the day and study at night, but those years were so worth it because they opened up new doors for me. Even though I was hurting and deeply sad about my past, I watched the people around me and decided to trust some of the people I worked with. That trust paid off, and I got so much in return that it helped me along the way.

If you are feeling overwhelmingly sad, please reach out because there is help out there. Trust yourself to make the right decision because if you have been abused, you get a sense of people very quickly. Trust it and go with what feels right. You do matter, and it does get easier to live with Complex PTSD. If you choose to open up to a friend and talk about what is hurting you, most friends will listen.  Your friendship may or may not last, but at least you have tried. I chose to open up to my first real boyfriend about what I had been through, and he understood me in a much better way. Our relationship didn’t last, but it wasn’t because of my past. Time tore us apart as our lives got pulled in different directions. You will find this to be true, as will people who come and go in your life.

There are many survivors out there, and there is support all over the world. There is support online, too, that acts as a good gateway to real face-to-face help.

My name is Elizabeth, and I am a survivor.

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Elizabeth Woods

For more about me: https://www.elizabethwoodsauthor.com

Elizabeth Woods grew up in a world of brutal sex offenders, murderers, and inconceivably neglectful adults. Elizabeth is passionate about spreading awareness of what it is like to survive after trauma. She is the author of several books and has written her memoir, telling her childhood story: The Sex-Offender’s Daughter: A True Story of Survival Against All Odds, available on Amazon Kindle and paperback.

Elizabeth is also the author of “Living with Complex PTSD” and the Cedar’s Port Fiction series: “Saving Joshua”, “Protecting Sarah”, “Guarding Noah” and “Bringing Back Faith,” and “Restoring Hope,” available here: https://www.amazon.com/stores/author/B0BCBZQN7L/allbooks?ingress=0&visitId=7e223b5b-1a29-45f0-ad9d-e9c8fdb59e9c&ref_=ap_rdr&ccs_id=931f96e2-c220-4765-acc8-cc99bb95e8bd

www.elizabethwoodsauthor.com/