cptsd foundation
Trauma-Informed Blog
Here you’ll find content that focuses on complex trauma research, as well as survivor stories & poetry, and featured articles from clinicians and thought leaders in the world of trauma recovery.
Do You Love to write?
If you have a passion for writing and want to reach a large audience with your research on complex trauma and mental health, or if you’re a survivor and want to share your story, we want to hear from you!
We are always on the lookout for guest bloggers, so click that button below to learn more about writing for CPTSD Foundation and how you can get started.
Things You Can Say to Your Child But Not Your Inner Child
Things You Can Tell Your Children But Not Your Inner ChildAs a parent of four stepchildren and two biological ones, I wasn’t thrilled to find out I had yet another child to parent. The thought made me want to run to the nearest hospital and get an emergency...
Three Things I Learned From My Anxiety the Hard Way!
This series of blogs will talk about my journey on anxiety, my learnings, and what helped me to soar.
The purpose of these articles is to motivate and support everyone going through the same and their family members.
This article will talk about my learnings of the condition.
The Long-Term Harmful Effects of Childhood Sexual Abuse.
This April we have been focused on childhood sexual abuse (CSA), a crime that can cause long-term harm even as the child grows into adulthood. 1in 4 women and 1 in 6 men alive in the United States today were molested sexually before the age of 18. This means there...
Why Pets Are Better Than People
CPTSD is caused by relationships with bad people, but how do we, as adults, separate the good from the bad. I’m at that point where I’m learning about myself and barely trust myself so the idea of trusting others is a bit too much. So, right now, the only new...
The Friend of Love
The Friend of Love My best friend is moving away. She’d been dropping hints for months, but I decided to retreat behind a wall of denial and hope for the best. The best was not to be. Ellen is moving, and there isn’t anything I can do about it. We had our share of...
An Odyssey to Self Forgiveness
It was a gray and wet winter day. Raindrops were running down the windows of my house and the leafless trees added to the bleakness. My dog, curled up like a croissant in his dog bed, was watching me with big questioning eyes as I slumped on the couch, wiping away...
Childhood Sexual Abuse During COVID-19
The COVID-19 pandemic has been brutal on us all. Rising depression and anxiety plague our world more than any time in recent history, and it is not only adults who are affected. Children have been home from school living with adults who are out of work, out of...
Orange Trees in the Desert, Fight or Flight and Emotional Regulation
The desert of the Southwestern United States has a strange, stark beauty all its own. Gorgeous sunsets, rock formations and deep canyons accented with spiky cactus resemble another world. If you grew up back east like I did, your previous experience with plant life...
The Wind – A Survivor Poem
The Wind always feels so free to me I wonder daily about life and its peculiarities, the sense of unfulfillment versus stability. The deep-seated longing but not knowing what it is or where it comes from. Is it a culmination of reality versus subconscious or...
The Stories We Tell Ourselves
First grade was the first time in my life I felt understood. I loved everything about school. The snacks, the smell of mimeographed worksheets, learning how to read and write, the playground, and most of all, I loved my teacher Mrs. King. She was the first adult I...

What is Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder?
“Complex PTSD comes in response to chronic traumatization over the course of months or, more often, years. This can include emotional, physical, and/or sexual abuses, domestic violence, living in a war zone, being held captive, human trafficking, and other organized rings of abuse, and more. While there are exceptional circumstances where adults develop C-PTSD, it is most often seen in those whose trauma occurred in childhood”.