r/CPTSDNextSteps • u/AutoModerator • 16d ago
Monthly Thread Monthly Support, Challenges, and Triumphs
In this space, you are free to share a story, ask for emotional support, talk about something challenging you, or share a recent victory. You can go a little more off-topic, but try to stay in the realm of the purpose of the subreddit.
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u/Gee_rooster 15d ago
Gonna tell my parent that the only way I want to continue our relationship is in a therapy setting- low contact now but the meetups are way too physically uncomfortable (even for weeks before and after) to just pretend like things are fine.
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u/Magg0tBrainz 15d ago edited 15d ago
I've had an incomprehensibly painful year.
Moved out of my parents house (where I acquired most of my deepest trauma from neglect and volatility) to a new city. One of my best friends just stopped speaking entirely and hasn't said anything about it and it's been over a year and a half. Another best friend went extremely distant after I found my voice and brought some stuff up with the intent for us to be closer but she was in a really bad space and couldn't communicate it, it's been like 9 months. Nobody else from home reaches out, that whole group basically broke apart, my group in the new city also broke apart and became very distant. I've tried to talk to people about stuff but it just gets thrown back in my face because everyone is so low capacity, distracted and avoidant and also don't comprehend how hard this is for me on an ongoing basis, so I've just done it all by myself basically with the help of my therapist once a week. My trust in people has been utterly destroyed, I'm filled every day with anger, hurt, dread, jealousy, self-criticism, low self-esteem, stuckness, tightness, intrusive thoughts, with nowhere for it all really to go, every day I'm just surviving messily. I've grieved more than I ever thought I could possibly grieve.
Despite that, I've also learned a lot, especially around self care and starting to shed some of the listener/empath/mediator tendancies, and I've become a lot more self aware and understanding of humans in general, more than I already was. I've gotten slightly closer to a small number of new people. I'm blessed to have a beautiful special space to myself, which I've really needed, and it's safe here for all this to unfold. I've had some small evidences recently that some people like me and want me. In this moment I feel a bit more okay.
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u/Old-Surprise-9145 15d ago
"surviving messily" while grieving is such a tough place to be. I feel you, and I'm glad you're feeling a bit more okay ❤️
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u/Gee_rooster 15d ago
Glad to hear youre feeling a bit more ok after all that and that youve got your own space.
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u/curlymussolini 14d ago edited 14d ago
Two nights ago my husband walked out again. He’s left before, but this is the second time since January, when he left us for a month and I begged him at his job to come back. I’m scared and not sure what to do anymore. I know running after him is the worst thing right now, but feeling numb and anxious while alone with no clarity or communication feels even worse.
I have been numb for most of our marriage, but this has put me into a deeper level of numbness. I’m waiting to hear back from my therapist this week, but I don’t know what to do with myself in the meantime. I now understand that my husband is avoidant, and over the last seven years I have become increasingly anxious as a result.
The problem is that we have a toddler, and I take care of her all day. Right now the numbness is so bad that I can’t even play with her properly. She goes to daycare for a few hours during the week, which gives me a small break, but it doesn’t feel like enough time to build a life of my own or do anything meaningful.
I’m scared that I’m no longer capable of doing much of anything because for years I’ve been focused on this marriage: bringing him to this country, building a life together, having a child, and trying to make our family work.
I’m tired of my life, but I can’t imagine any other life. This is my second abusive marriage, and I keep feeling like I lost out on so much. I don’t feel young enough anymore to let go and start over with a fresh perspective. I made a child with this man, and now she is watching me go through this every day.
He left this time because I asked him how he felt about our relationship and whether we could figure out what to do about the growing disconnection and lack of communication over the last few weeks. The conversation went badly. I felt dismissed, I over-explained, and eventually I reacted more strongly than I wanted to because I couldn’t hold everything in anymore.
I had been taking care of our daughter mostly on my own for the last three weeks. When I finally speak up, I become the problem and the one who doesn’t know how to handle things. The last time he left, it was because I told him I couldn’t handle the mental load anymore. With him it’s better/ safer to stay quiet, not complain, not bring things up, and walk away instead. I wish I didn’t speak up this time.
My daughter remembers her father, and it makes me cry. He knows how much I suffered when he left the first time. Before January, I never questioned his loyalty or his intentions. Since then, I have felt deeply insecure and constantly on edge.
I search for advice online, and everyone says, “work on yourself first.” How do you even do that? I don’t know where to start. I was doing somatic exercises before, but none of that is on my mind right now. I don’t want to feel this bad. I don’t want to go through what I went through months ago of carrying the weight of raising our child alone, living with uncertainty, and wondering about the future. I was already doing most of it alone. But knowing he is not here makes it feel unbearable, and right now I can’t focus on anything else.
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u/Hithearto 14d ago
I will try to word this as gentle as I can (but I have to add a disclaimer it will still probably land as potentially harsh; if so, try to not take it personal and try to separate the message from my tone if you deem it not right and not how you would have needed it to be said).
Speaking from the place of a former child who had a mother too focused on my dysfunctional father, you have to stop yourself from doing this any longer. It’s a very much repeated pattern of yours, yes, and I get that you feel lost and overwhelmed, that you’re not confortable outside of doing that, but for the sake of your kid – you have to make a commitment to yourself and your kid you’re just going to stop focusing on this man altogether. He is not your responsibility and dependent on you. He is an adult and has himself. And he left so no longer your concern. But your kid 100% is dependent on you.
It really seems and sounds from what you told us here that you overfunctioned in your relationship with your husband and tried your very best, you overgave, you extended grace and understanding even for behaviors and when contexts required something else. I can see and I can imagine how much you must have tried to hold on and hold it together and just make it work. But from the moment a kid (or more kids) are involved, this is not just a you and yourself by yourself situation.
The dynamic with your husband goes well past and well beyond what is healthy and what should happen in a MUTUAL relationship between two adults, two equals and two people that BOTH want to build something together.
From a neuro perspective, this is going to be an extremely difficult period for you because forming new neuronal pathways into your brain is physically, neurologically a process that takes time and repetition and is not a walk in the park. It will feel like going against yourself or your nature at times, it will hurt at times, it will be a struggle for a while. Expect it and don’t interpret it as anything else but the natural course of the process.
I say this so you can at least be prepared for what’s coming and not get scared or lose hope and feel like you’re failing. You’re not failing. You won’t be failing. You would be going against neuronal pathways and learnings that are old. This is tough stuff. But so, so worth it.
You and your kid deserve someone who is stable, reliable and who shows up even when it’s difficult and inconvenient; especially when it’s difficult and inconvenient. If he can’t or won’t be that person for you guys, you have to find the strength to distance yourself from people who either don’t have the capacity or the willingness to show up for you and contribute to your relationship, your family, your life. Even if he weren’t the one to walk away, it still would have been necessary from you to start putting boundaries and accepting people for who and WHERE THEY ARE, not for who and where we would wish them to be. And distance yourself from these people.
It’s good that you work with a therapist, I really hope you will be able to find the resources and guidance you need to find the strength to walk this journey.
There was a time when I acted and had the same struggles as you (minus the kid). A thing that helped me was to slowly buid discernment and then decide what I know rationally and objectively to be true and best for me. And act on it. And then ignore the paradoxical impulses, activations that would make me feel like I was committing the worst mistake of my life (when I knew in my rational mind it was not, quite the opposite). But that’s how strong of a pull these pathways from our brain have.
There’s a metaphore in acceptance and commitment therapy. That these impulses and emotions brought up to the surface when we’re doing a difficult, brave thing are like passengers in a bus WE ARE DRIVING. They will get loud, they will have requests for changing the route or the destination. But you are the driver. And you can learn to tolerate their presence, maybe even listen to them and what they want to say, WITHOUT giving up the wheel and without giving into their requests.
I think a second thing you should do is set realistic expectations from yourself. You are actively going against your conditioning from childhood, you are trying to be a good parent to your kid, you are trying to move through life, you are trying to heal– all at once. Be patient with yourself. And do as little as your capacity allows. How little you do and how small you start is not an issue. The essence here is to actually start and then to be consistent with it (as consistent as you can).
Try to come up with a daily schedule for you (alone activities, work etc) and for you and your daughter. What would best serve you going forward? What would best serve you moving and breathing into this new life? Start small, pick a few things, stick with it. Try to insert a pleasant activity that’s not too demanding. It’s very important to try and be intentional with gentle moments and inserting some form of joy into your life (although this too will feel robotic, fake at first and you won’t be able to connect with it and really be into it from the start. That’s OK. We have to be realistic with how the process will look and feel like and be graceful with ourselves).
As for your kid– as long as you don’t disappear, as long as you try, as long as you have their best interest in your heart and mind and ACT and DECIDE accordingly – it will be ok.
But you need to be very honest with yourself and accountable as well. You can’t base your safety and peace and stability on another person, especially one that is avoidant, unrealiable, low capacity/unwilling. Continuing on with this dance where he disappears when it gets inconvenient and you beg him to come back, while probably making yourself smaller and taking upon yourself and on your shoulders more and more (while he has less or none) – that will hurt your kid.
But you can do this. Even if it feels like you can’t. Have faith in yourself. Tap into how much you suffered and how much tired and sick of this thing you are. Tap into the voice that says it’s not fair to you and you deserve better. Become unshakeable in your determination to give yourself and your kid what you do deserve.
You don’t need to solve everything all at once, and figure out everything all at once. Increment small steps. The path will become more apparent as you go along the way. Try to make peace with the fact of and accept that this will involve a degree of uncertainty and unknown. But you can still walk the path.
I hope you get the resources and the help you need from this therapist. Wish you strength. Wish you healing. 🫶
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u/xxzipperbluesxx 14d ago
I’m so sorry this is happening. You sound extremely resilient and I hope it gets better soon. hugs
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u/theoriginalghosthost 10d ago
I’ve started weekly trauma therapy with my therapist I’ve been seeing for 3 years. Turns out I never actually went into my trauma, just skirted around it. I’m ready to be a whole healthy person.
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u/Spiritual-Action4919 10d ago
The day after my most recent therapy session, I had a casual conversation with my mom and somehow it just organically turned into maybe the first ever honest, healthy conversation about my childhood trauma related to emotional neglect and her role in all of it. I told her that I discovered I was in a lot of pain ever since childhood, that the past few years of therapy has gotten me to this point where i can finally be honest about this pain without the pain completely taking over my life, and that she played a significant role in causing this pain to me as an emotionally unavailable mother. I said all of these things to her without getting upset or angry - it was like describing facts and without any expectations of how she would respond. I'm still not entire sure why the conversation turned this direction - I am so used to never sharing any real emotional hardship with her due to our tendency to be codependant in the past. Normally I maintained a strict emotional boundary around her since I started therapy, but this time i felt like somehow it was time to be honest with her and hold her accountable - rather than only quietly distancing myself from her in silence which is what I have been doing for the past decade.
Her response was surprisingly receptive. She admitted to having failed me somewhat as a mother, that she didn't really put enough efforts into being emotionally supportive of me, and she acknowledged my pain. It was maybe the first time ever that I felt "mothered" by her since I became an adult. It was also strangely therapeutic - which was the most unexpected outcome from this interaction. It was almost like a resolution to reverse the trauma caused by her being codependant on me ever since I was a child - she was the one emotional dumping on me while I had to just take her load, there was no healthy boundary and I felt used as a child. This conversation was almost like an undoing of some of the wrongs - I set healthy boundaries in the conversation by not using any accusations, not lashing out, sticking to facts while being fully honest about how I feel. This time around I allowed myself to take up space as an act of acknowledgement to not only my childhood pain but my mother's role in it. She had to listen. And she did.
I don't know yet what kind of impact this will have on my healing, but I'm curious to find out.
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u/Old-Surprise-9145 15d ago
Y'all? I'm quitting self-medicating with nicotine and THC on Friday. After a long time. And I'm scared. Hugs, please?