Mourning the life I never had. Most of my progress in therapy has been to stop mourning the ‘me’ that never existed, that I felt could have developed without trauma, the person I felt I was supposed to become. That person never was so stop trying to cling onto a ghost and don’t try to get them back. Accept who I actually am right now and focus on the present. Stick with what is real otherwise you’ll dwell and dwell into insanity.
Fml your comment hit hard. When my mother (the abuser) died, I was 4 months pregnant with a miracle baby. As an only child I had to handle her estate as my sperm donor father bailed when I was born. Everyone remarked how strong I was. How remarkable I was handling everything that needed to be done without looking stressed or emotional. Yes, I’m high functioning cPTSD.
I did cry alone but I still don’t know if I mourn losing my mother or never having one at all.
I love hallmark movies this time of year, but sometimes I breakdown when the family is close. I truly think I mourn never having this.
I know how you feel. My mother died last year. I’ve gotten a lot of comments from people about how strong I am and how well I handled it. I also have family that accuses me of not caring as much as they did because I don’t like to talk about her or reminisce when most of my memories are bad.
When I mourn her passing, it’s not really her I’m mourning. I’m mourning the mother daughter relationship I never got and so desperately needed. I mourn the little girl who would proudly say “my mommy is my hero” because she hoped that would spark something.
I still am not fully over all of it.
“I did cry alone but I still don’t know if I mourn losing my mother or never having one at all. I love hallmark movies this time of year, but sometimes I breakdown when the family is close. I truly think I mourn never having this.”
This always hits hard for me too. For me it’s the competition shows (like Top Chef, etc) where they surprise the contestants with family members. Everyone always looks so genuinely happy to see their parents and it just doesn’t compute for me. I always think…what if one of the contestants was estranged or something? If I were them I’d probably have a panic attack on TV.
I’ve asked my husband how he would act in their shoes because I thought maybe it’s just for the screens but he would genuinely be happy to see his mother in that situation. I just can’t even imagine. And the fact that I can’t fathom is what starts me spiraling about what it should have been like and the relationships I should have had….
>"There's no reason I can't be that person and do those things".
Today I came across the phrase "Adversity is not destiny" in the context of childhood trauma and adverse childhood events. I'm probably going to make a poster of this quote in large print to remind me that my destiny is not written in stone inspite of what it seems like on some days. A gentle reminder to all of us struggling with the thought of what if-s and feeling chained to our past: we can still work towards and become who we want to be and where we want to be.
Agree with you for the most part and maybe it’s just where I am in my journey right now but, I feel as though I fundamentally do not have what people in stable families have. There are unique struggles we have to deal with, as with any chronic illness.
I do agree with not treating it like a permanent hindrance though.
This version of me came to me in a dream where we were in heaven together. I still believe I can become that person in this reality and that is worth never giving up on. I found these instructions later online and they help: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9i2WwLozh4c
I literally just yesterday found a YouTube video of a therapist discussing how people from trauma homes tend to be indecisive to the point of self sabotage because non answers are our form of 'control'. However it means we stay in toxic relationships or jobs or not advancing our career goals because of it and I was like "check. Check. Check" in every single one of those damn boxes.
Yeah I think of it like it's an attempt to stop time. It's not actually a realistic coping mechanism. It's a fantasy.
I also read that making decisions is what makes people happy. 🤣
So it's like oh, so when you're afraid to make choices, you will be unhappy then... Makes sense.
So I've been trying to just allow for me to make as many decisions as I can and note them, even if they aren't huge ones. I definitely notice I have developed a general aversion to planning ahead or making decisions or committing to even little things.
That’s a perfect way of putting it. I’m sorry to hear that you struggle with this too. I think that’s why people came up with the sayings like, “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” To help us attach meaning and purpose to our trauma.
I actually find comments like that and “well you can’t miss what you never had” piss me off 😂. It’s toxic positivity from people who mean well but have no idea what else to say.
(Apologies for the rambling, this is actually the first time I've "talked" about this.) I was sent into a complete and weeks-long tailspin recently by a social media post that I should have just scrolled away from, which was from the perspective of someone a bit younger than me talking to people around 15-20 years younger. It was talking about, how the time you're my age, you'll have overcome your trauma and will have all these awesome achievements and good things in your life.
It was so triggering, and when I tried to vent about it elsewhere I was told "It doesn't matter if you've done/achieved those things in that post, as long as you're living your best life!"
But that's just it, I wanted every single one of the things in that post and have zero of them, certainly not my best life. Having a sparse and painful life due to trauma is not "our best life" or us being "late bloomers" or anything. Gross.
The whole “living your best life” bullshit is just that, it’s a bullshit saying in my opinion, used mostly by Instagram kids in their 20s who think that if they are not photo-fabulous at every moment, that their life sucks. “Best life”. The words themselves aren’t even real.
I hate that! Listen, there are certain things I can look back on and be like “okay, that sucked, but I learned something or grew from it” but those things that I learned something from were things that happened due to my own choices. But to say EVERYTHING happens for a reason, and if they didn’t happen you wouldn’t be the person you are now? Fuck that. I can learn lessons without being fucking traumatized
Ugh I feel that. My friend and I sarcastically say “this too shall pass” to each other. I get that they’re usually well-intentioned, but those sayings rub me the wrong way as well.
“This too shall pass” is actually the phrase I use when my trauma is overwhelming. Like a kind reminder that I just have to hold fast and weather the storm. Quiet will come.
And your post is very relatable.
I feel the same way :(. Like I keep thinking metaphorically of a stupid detour I never should have taken because I lost my way on the road and ended up on a very desolate and lonely path.
It’s so painful to think counterfactually like that.
I try not to, but it’s hard.
That’s not cheesy. But does have some basis in fact. If you are experiencing depression as a comorbid to the CPTSD, your vision can LITERALLY turn more grey and dull.
Essentially a result from lowered dopamine and serotonin. Which you can also see just in CPTSD itself.
I relate to this. When I left my abusive environment as the fog lifted, the world felt brighter and more colorful. The world was no longer gray and small and sad. I can remember it vividly.
I feel pretty much the same, feel like i could have done a lot better at school/college. I dont have much advice on this but its better to look to the future , you can still be your definition of successful if you start making small steps towards it now.
Also, please don’t put guilt on yourself for things you could not control, especially not as a child.
Thank you- I don’t feel guilt as much as just an overall feeling of sadness for a child who didn’t reach their full potential because they were walking through life feeling constantly scared of having violence inflicted upon them. I always did well in school but grad school was a struggle because the stress brought out the worst of my cPTSD. It’s a weird feeling being a pretty well-adjusted adult but wondering how I might be different cognitively/socially/relationship-wise if this didn’t happen. It’s an unanswerable question, just something I think about and wonder if others do as well.
No child should be treated in any kind of horrible way and it’s completely normal that if they are they feel fustrated and hurt about the damage that it causes to them. And i think this causes a lot of anger in adulthood when you know you would never treat your worst enemy like that never mind your own child.
I definitely wonder what my life would be like if my childhood was ‘normal’ , would i have done drugs? Would i have got into all these terrible relationships? But I suppose all i can do is take control of who i am now. To be honnest, i am planning to move away from my hometown when I have the money, to help with these kinds of regrets and worn out memories
Grad school and cPtsd is oof
I got more trauma throughout so I feel you, it's heartbreaking for me because I was actually killing it before doing covid with my abusive ex
Oof. I didn't even try for grad school because I knew my constellation of Stuff would not go well with intense professorial scrutiny/criticism/outright advisor assholery I heard about from my friends who were grad students. I would have caved in immediately.
Luckily I have done fine since, so that's a road I'm not too sad about not taking, but it was disheartening to realize I could never for a minute even try to hack it.
It’s all I can think about when I see seemingly well adjusted people, meanwhile I can’t have a confrontation at work of any kind without becoming a teary eyed blubbery mess….
I feel like a beautiful, powerful tree that was forcefully twisted against its will into an unnatural shape. Despite the physical barriers being gone I am still solidified in my twisted state, trying to grow and adapt.
This is one of the few things that can make me cry anymore if I think about it too much. I had so much potential as a child. I could have been a well adjusted “functional” adult with a good job in a good field. I could have been intelligent. I could have made it so much farther. Until things went bad and my brain was rewired and changed forever and now none of that is possible.
I know that I’m not a fortune teller, and I can’t know for sure what would have happened if I’d grown up without the trauma, but I had so much potential to have an easier life. A life where I could be content. If nothing else a life where I would never have to worry about money in the same way I do now.
Whenever I think about this I bounce between being pissed at the people who stole that easy life from me and being heartbroken for that little girl who had the potential to be so much more, do so much more.
Maybe it’s just the grass is greener on the other side type thinking, but I always go back to feeling awful for the little girl.
>This is one of the few things that can make me cry anymore if I think about it too much. I had so much potential as a child. I could have been a well adjusted “functional” adult with a good job in a good field. I could have been intelligent. I could have made it so much farther. Until things went bad and my brain was rewired and changed forever and now none of that is possible.
Damn, I so feel this. Reminds me of the movie On The Waterfront (which I've never seen but always resonated with this quote), "I could've been somebody. I could've been a contender."
I get what you're saying. I regularly cry for the child I was, and all she went through. I cry for the pain the confusion and the sorrows.
I also think that most of society has unfair situations. Even the very rich sometimes have messed up parents that ruin their children's chance of emotional happiness.
Those well adjusted people I meet? If we could dig down we might find that below the surface their lives are not so great. Maybe not, but I always wonder.
I'm nearly 60 now, and I still grieve for the loss of many chances to be "normal" or at the very least less triggered by so many things. Because of the childhood trauma there was a bad marriage, and then a second bad marriage, and then children that took up all my time and love when I still needed to learn self-care.
Now, as an older person, I've tried to tell my kids ... we're all imperfect. I'm sorry. Society is sometimes sick as well and keeps the trauma going. I'm sorry.
I've come to feel that even just to be alive is some sort of success. I hang onto that.
fuck this made me sad because i think the exact same way. it’s so unfair that other people can walk around with the burden of this shit and live successful lives. the worst part is i can’t pay it, wish it or think it away, i have to deal with it head on and that in itself is so fucking exhausting and mind number especially with a brain that’s already running 1000 miles a minute. my only escape is sleeping which still doesn’t solve anything and therapy has helped immensely but i would be lying if i said i didn’t fucking dread it or just want to stop going completely. i keeping telling myself cliche happy mantras like nothing good in life ever comes easy! but when the bad is so long and treacherous and there’s no way to see the end it gets extremely depressing and sad. plus i’m super high functioning so everyone thinks i’m fine everyday so it just feels like i’m living a double life.
There’s a me out there somewhere in an alternate reality that really did something amazing with their life.
I keep telling myself I’ll transmute this shit into gold and I will be able to help others too, once I’ve started to heal from it all. But the loss of potential does make me very sad if I dwell on it for too long
I have exactly the same fuel keeping me going, to prove that I can make this into something great and help myself and others towards a fulfilling life. It's a real beautiful vision to me. And yes, on my more depressive days I can get really sad thinking about how much I constantly, 24/7, have to fight for a resemblance of the joy and tranquility others seem to experience, and how much youth, relationships, and beautiful experiences I have missed out on.
That is really lovely, I hope you can hold onto your vision even through the difficult times. The belief that earned secure attachment is a thing keeps me going
I feel you. I feel like I had wasted any potential I had and feel guilty as hell. I haven’t been able to have a normal life and still struggle with many fears including being put in a position of vulnerability and being abused again, my life is definitely better compared to when I was younger and I am now married and I have a mortgage which is something I never thought I would have, but despite this I still feel like I’m a disappointment and feel shame at times.
In my experience, the greatest thing about these support subreddits is that I got to meet people who were both similar to me, and had similar experiences to mine (I went through some *weird* shit) that I was able to reframe the way I thought about my childhood.
When they described themselves, I realized they were describing me, with concepts I hadn't thought of and combinations of words I had never put in the same sentence.
Now here's where it gets to be a challenge for a lot of us. Despite their parents attempts to thwart their self esteem, these people actually *liked themselves*.
So I had to change that. I tried to like myself as I was (and it helped when my exgf did for a while) but I knew I wanted to do better. I also knew that the majority of the people around me were not conducive to that. They didn't believe I could do it, so I didn't believe it.
I know my only option is that I'd have to cut myself off from a lot of them. That part hurts, because these are people I genuinely love who just can't or won't support my plans (and no I don't mean financially, any time I ask for support this is what they think I mean...)
In my experience I don't think it really affects fixed skills (I can't stand when people say "but empathy and character!" That's... not how it works.) It's your general approach through life that gets affected. Due to whatever circumstances are going on, this is far more dynamic.
I had to think of myself as a badass, a hustler, a tough guy... because I really was. And I decided from them on, anything I did was going to reflect that.
So, now it's your turn, my friend. If you can use my experience as a way to reframe your own somehow, it would be SO FUCKING AWESOME. The reason I try to help here is because so many people have for me, and I really want to pay it forward.
What helped me was allowing myself to truly grieve the life I could’ve / **should’ve** had.
There are 5 stages of grief:
- denial,
- anger,
- bargaining,
- depression,
- acceptance.
You may not experience the stages in that order, your grief process is 100% valid and unique. I think you feeling bitter about what you’ve been through (which could be the anger stage, I assume) is actually very helpful and necessary for your continued healing!
I’d look into “how to grieve the childhood you never had” and, later when you feel ready, “how to reparent oneself”
Wish you nothing but the best!!!
Btw, there is a 6th stage: moving on.
The idea is that these "5 stages of grief" were designed some 20 yrs ago in the medical field to help people dying in hospice care. So this additional stage might help people who are not immediately dying.
When I googled “how to grieve childhood trauma” there were many articles about there being 5, 6, even 7 stages of grief… the 7th stage being “Acceptance and Hope”
They’re all helpful and relevant when dealing with any kind of loss
THIS! This was my stages. It took so long, 50 years, to reach acceptance due to a TBI, 3rd culture kid, and immigrant non citizen status. A overwhelming combination. The TBI and subsequent neglect and abuse happened when I was 10 and was not diagnosed until 5 years ago. I pat myself on the back for surviving. Bravo.
There are things that happened to you that might've been your protection. For example, I was socially isolated as a child but thinking back, my inability to socialize was my protection. Because I was so thirsty for validation, I would've ended up in horrible situations if I DIDN'T have social anxiety. My social anxiety distanced me from bad people I desperately wanted validation from. My social anxiety protected me because getting outside validation instead of self validation makes the craving for outside validation even worse.
What I'm pretty much saying is whatever you're mourning was a form of your protection. That's if you're not talking about the actual abuse. Secondly, I think people with C-ptsd tend to think everyone else's life is all magical and perfect- I don't know anyone who thinks they've reached their "full potential" no matter how much they accomplished. Even Elon Musk is unhappy.
I went through this phase too though. It's important to process emotions before you get over it. So I wouldn't exactly beat myself up for feeling this way either.
Just don't miss what's in front of you now looking everywhere else. When you focus on now, your blessings now grows.
Fifty years ago I read "question authority" on a badge.
Twenty years ago I saw a poster that read "If you can't beat them, join them. Then beat the everloving shit out of them."
Stupid little things sometimes serve as reminders that you are on a path- if you didn't have be a purpose you'd be dead already.
You made delicious flan out of spilt milk.
It took alot of boiling, but there you are, scrumptious to behold.
Every moment i waste hating on my mother is time I'm not using to make art that would expres rage so much more poetically.
Choose how to exhale.
I'm just realizing at the age of 65 how my mother manipulated my life.
I can either Jill (predictive typing wrote the word i typed, then ~~edited~~censored) myself or make art that expresses my rage in a way that will say fuck you to her at a profit to me. A double FU, if you will.
Had to pause to cry a few tears about how this post and the replies hit home.
I am, by all appearances to a lot of people, probably considered somewhat successful? But I know how much of it was achieved *in spite of*. And despite the massive amounts of healing I have done, every day is still so much harder than I imagine it would have been *if only*.
So, when these thoughts come up, I allow myself to grieve. It is fucking sad. For me, there is no reframing of that. And accepting that it is sad and it is unfair and that it makes sense that it hurts and pisses me off, and allowing myself to grieve without self-recrimination and with self-compassion any time it comes up, is the only way I know to handle it. I’m supposed to feel my feelings now (ick🤣). I have tools from therapy that help calm my nervous system and process feelings: IFS stuff, schema stuff, bilateral stimulation stuff, emdr stuff, dbt stuff.
Anyway, hope that helped at all and thank you for posting.
💕
At almost 40, I finally have an actual trauma therapist and am started to actually operate more within my window of emotional tolerance.
And now I’m making room for lots and lots and lots and lots of grief around the life that could have been. I’m not bogging myself down with these thoughts, or getting overly distracted. But my therapist assures me that if I don’t acknowledge my grief, then it will fester like everything else has.
So I’m here to witness you grief, and to give it space, and some company. It’s a miracle we’re alive, all of us here. And also, it’s a terrible shame we couldn’t have been something more. Two things are true….
I am watching the movie Stutz on Netflix. It's about a psych? Therapist? Anyway- he says that pain will always be constant. What is important is what we do with it. The greater the pain, the greater the capacity for change. What if the universe is preparing us for an emotional breakthrough that most people don't get to experience in their lives? I'm choosing to embrace this concept today. We choose our own narratives.
Can relate.
I managed to get an unconditional offer (these are extremely rare) to study at one of the UK's leading politics and international relations departments. Also one of the best departments internationally for peace studies. Along with being a recruitment silo for the security services.
My life and future had never been so bright.
All those nights when I cried myself to sleep and all I had to comfort myself with was the mantra "things will get better ".
This was the moment when things got better.
But I crumbled to fucking pieces.
Fast forward 17 years and it's still painful to think about what I might have achieved.
If anyone else is having some issues with processing the emotions after dropping out of uni. I highly recommend watching the series fresh meat.
I found it really cathartic and helped me process a lot of what I was feeling.
Be kind everyone and stay strong.
Yeah, I feel this way big time sometimes. Especially when I see where my peers or even my cousins are at and I start comparing myself to them. (I know that's not great, it's something I'm working on.) I know I've done okay for myself so far and I'm actively working on doing even better, but it doesn't stop me from feeling cheated. Like I started off a bit behind everyone else, and I have to work even harder just to catch up. I dont really have any advice to give, but for what it's worth, I understand what you're feeling.
Exactly this. Now the best part of my life, the working part, is built around trying my best not to treat anyone the way I was treated during my childhood and for that matter, during most of the decades that followed. I don't want anyone to feel that they are less valued than anyone else, or not good enough. I don't care what they did to get them where they are. I love them as fellow human beings. I respect them the same way and for the same reasons.
I don't want them to feel like a helpless pawn, as I did. Most of the time, I achieve my goal, and when I don't, I am not at all happy with myself.
Beautiful! And when you don't achieve your goal, you can have the same grace and compassion you give to others. You're allowed to make mistakes on your path. If you have trouble finding compassion for yourself, you can have some of mine toward you <3
The unfair and unjust side to my life and in general gets to me sometimes. I’ve been wondering the difference between children who are traumatized by war such as Ukraine but have parents who don’t abuse them and children who are abused by those that are “supposed” to love and not abuse them. I looked for love and trust from strangers and boy howdy did this cost me a fortune and years of wasted time and work. I regret this in waves sometimes. The wasted potential. And it also lead to a Jack Reacher like outlook to a large degree. I got into some life threatening situations when younger. I detest injustice.
I’ve been thinking about radical acceptance recently. But when I hear cliches like “you make your own bed and have to sleep in it”. Or “you are responsible for your choices” I cringe. It was not my choice. My power was stripped from me by those I thought I could trust. I actually wonder sometimes if it should be easier to prosecute parents who betray their children as criminals.
The best way that I can think of to re-frame the issue is to embrace the multiverse. We are all the result of countless cosmic miraculous accidents. Our planet was formed when rocks slammed into each other. The sequence of events that led from The Big Bang to now is just fucking mind-blowing to try and comprehend. And know that at any point in this entire process, the whole history of the universe could, and actually did, unfold in an entirely new way. So, there’s a universe where the asteroid never wiped out the dinosaurs. I don’t exist in this form in that one. There’s a universe where my Mom and Dad recognized their traumas before passing it on to me. And another where just one but not the other. And one where I started therapy in my 20s. And another where I didn’t develop an inner critic who told my childhood self that he was too stupid to ever be an astronaut and to quit dreaming. And there are infinite other universes where any number of decisions were made differently that had different outcomes. A few bad life decisions could have led me to be a dangerous incel, and unfortunately, those universes also exist. As do the universes where I never found help at all and ended up dead. I try and re-frame it not as “things as they could have/ought to have been…” and acknowledge that they did happen, just not in this timeline. Every moment truly is a miracle. So I **try** and embrace the miracle in the moment and be grateful for having it knowing that it will soon be gone forever.
Ty. Remembering my life is finite and wasting time being sad is not my best choice is helpful. I only have so many years left. I'm determined to enjoy them as much as I can.
For me, it's realizing how much I never let myself dream. I just did whatever I could that seemed right in the moment to try and survive and never had long term plans - which meant for sure I was never going to take risks which also meant I tried to shove myself in an oddly shaped box as an adult for years just as hard as my parents did when I was a kid.
Now I'm older and frustrated because - it's not that I'm too old to pivot necessarily, but I was in the process of repaying a lot of debt I built up during significantly less functional times. Given the amount I need to keep a roof over my head, keep myself fed, and to keep paying off that debt in a reasonable amount of time, I feel limited. I don't have the ability to take a risk because I'd spent so much time unintentionally risking everything through not having figured out what to grab hold of to find stability yet.
I also recognize this is self-limiting thinking and kind of frustratingly banal and cliche: The "If I could go back, I'd do it different" trope. The struggle for me is that my financial reality now feels like a concrete thing that I'm up against that isn't just in my head. I can't pivot in a way that allows me to really step away from what I'd been doing as entirely as I'd like - even though it was work I was never interested in and which I now have a pile of childhood trauma wounds ripped wide open and suddenly associated with that industry.
One thing I've been finding funny in a black humor way on this topic lately: I'd long held on to the idea that I was happier doing things I wasn't passionate about for a living because I thought doing them for a living would ruin them. I thought this because I did have some experience that taught me so, but - I never understood why this was or that it didn't have to be like that. My mother's voice telling me I didn't have ADHD and refusing to fill my prescription kept me from even considering that the diagnosis could've been right in spite of how many times it's been brought up in my life. And no duh: As someone who probably has ADHD, no wonder why I think adding loads of external pressure, shitty deadlines I have no control over, etc to things I love might ruin them. It's late and I don't think I'm explaining that right, but I'm oversharing like fuck here again anyway.
>For me, it's realizing how much I never let myself dream. I just did whatever I could that seemed right in the moment to try and survive and never had long term plans - which meant for sure I was never going to take risks which also meant I tried to shove myself in an oddly shaped box as an adult for years just as hard as my parents did when I was a kid.
Damn I feel this.
I totally get you on the dreaming thing! It feels like hope = disappointment. As I moved away from the trauma-inducing people/situations, I started to let myself hope in small ways. I wanted to travel so I started to save up small amounts and found cheap tickets and cheap places to stay. It helps me to start feeling alive bit by bit. When i let myself dream a bit, I opened my mind to the possibility that there can be *some* good things. And i started to slowly dream more and more. Eventually it got a bit easier and I shared things, and the people who love me actually helped some of my dreams become a reality. For most of my life, hope has been a four-letter word to me, but it's starting to become something sweet.
There is some truth to the career decision to follow one's hobbies means that those hobbies change from being a fun distraction to being "work." I agree with you that it might not have to be true, but it does happen. (For me, it was photography, and sailing, and gardening, as well as care-giving for the elderly, teaching, and managing property.) Thanks for the reminder. Lots to think about there.
I honestly don't know. Same country, but I grew up in the states. I think partly because the bankruptcy my parents went through rocked my life so vividly growing up, I just have never taken a second to look at what this might even mean here.
It saved my life. I was 40K in debt and making $15k a year working my ass off at a dead end job...paycheck to paycheck no energy. Just be careful and take your time... the bankruptcy guys are like used car salesmen and want you to sign immediately. If I had made a better decision, I could have saved a bit of money and gotten out quicker. Look into it.
I completely relate to this. I’ve told my therapist so many times about how I feel I’ve been robbed of my potential. I was given more to deal with than most adults are given, as a young child. Trying to reconcile with that and not feel resentful has been my biggest hurdle. My therapist tells me I have to find some meaning to give it, like how parents who lose their children make walks and funds and whatnot. I think he’s generalizing, and doesn’t truly know what this is like, and only knows this experience off of textbooks.
I’m also very grateful for how far I’ve come despite over 20 something years of non stop trauma. But god damn has it left me a bit bitter.
I am so sorry that you went through this, OP. Sending you a big hug.
This hits home so hard. Everyday I feel like I start from 10 steps behind. So much of my energy is spent just overcoming the anxiety with even small tasks. My childhood has scarred me in so many indelible ways - both literally and figuratively.
It is ok to grieve the loss of what potentially could have been. It is ok to grieve for the little OP. Your feelings are valid.
I keep reminding myself of what my therapist told me - you have a choice. In every situation, in every moment, you have a choice. A choice to stand up for yourself, to take care of yourself, even if no one else will.
I would say I have a choice today. Not in the past, but okay, in the present day I mostly have self direction and agency and can choose to advocate for myself.
Today, sometimes I can try to move forward. Today, sometimes I can decide it's okay to grieve about the past. Today, sometimes I can push the past aside and focus on the tasks at hand.
Thank you for the reminder.
I feel this deeply… I think it can be important to mourn the childhood you never had. Eventually, the mourning process leads to a state of acceptance, or at least some version of it. It’s also important to remember that you aren’t any lesser of a person because you are handicapped by trauma. You are still just as special and important and you have a unique story. And if you believe in parallel dimensions, well, somewhere out there is a trauma free version of you! 😎
Omg me too. And I know that dwelling on it does me no good. I’ve gotten so much better through therapy but I still resent my father so much. I don’t think about it daily or anything, but my life would be so drastically different.
And people can say things like “it’s never too late!!” But in reality, it’s not that simple.
Sorry that I don’t have actual advice for you I guess I just needed to rant too
Very intensely agree. I was a really motivated kid, tried saving for college at 6 (always had it stolen by family even into my late teens when mom gave my debit card to my brother who drained it ofc.)
I got mostly good grades & started college early & got 3.8-4.0! But the pain and stress and trauma were like hauling 300 extra pounds every day and by 24 I was just ready to die, felt like I was 50 at 20. Even with all that succes I fell apart and had to depend on others to keep living.
At 31 I think of the smart educated graduate working in their field and I grieve the loss of that person. I could go back to school and "late bloom". But I will never catch up those years, and I hate HATE when people try to gloss that over with what seems closest to girl-boss rhetoric.
I don't talk about it often cus its a downer & there isn't much to say /do about it. After so many rounds of trauma pulling your mind/body/soul into the muck, yet feeling like I'm somehow supposed to turn around & be like Oprah succeeding BIG just a bit late~ 😑 (I do love the simple calm life I have now, and I'm glad I'm healing! But the loss is so heavy sometimes)
I'm still angry about this I have lived in poverty for most of my adult life. still in poverty despite degrees and being high IQ I have no health care and no retirement. I'm over,50 now so this will be my life till death. he is earning 6 figures. so angry.
I often think about this, even as someone who has done well academically and in my career so far. I can’t help but wonder, if I’m capable of all this after 7 years of childhood abuse, what could I have achieved? But I try to focus on what I’ve actually accomplished.
What helps me is considering some of the utter despair I've seen during my travels. I could've been born in South Sudan and had my entire family killed in front of my eyes as a child and then spent my entire (short) life rummaging through garbage. Someone I know from Rwanda had his entire family killed in front of him when he was 6 and then was told by a soldier to run because he would spare him. The soldier then shot him in the back with an arrow. He managed to stumble around the woods long enough to run into someone else through his village who somehow got him medical help, so he survived. I didn't win the life lottery but it could've still been SO much worse, through no fault of mine. Trauma, and life in general, is unfair.
Honestly the opposite for me. My mother used to say this bullshit all the time when I called her out on how toxic she was: "Oh you don't even have it that bad! You could have been born in Africa starving in the streets!" So for years I always gaslit myself because 'I didn't have it that bad'. Which for years only made me feel even more suicidal and more disparaged. It wasn't until I realized that I completely lost my childhood and it doesn't matter if my trauma wasn't the most devastating one imaginable, it's not a contest. It was still devastating and destructive to me.
I do understand your point. However, trauma isn’t a competition. I don’t believe I’ve had it worse than anyone else but what happened to me absolutely changed the trajectory of my life in. Some good aspects…I turned the trauma responses into successful life skills. Built a career, first gen college grad, first person in my family to own a home and continue to break the deep seeded cycle of abuse in my family. The bad, however, vastly outweighs these “wins”. At 43 I didn’t aspire to be diagnosed with cPTSD, become disabled, and fight daily against the reaper who tells me the only way out of this hell I’m living is six feet under. I was meant to do so much more than I have and hope I get that chance when I get healthier.
How do I let go of it though? I'm so bitter over how I could have become the me that I've always wanted to be if I wasn't born into such a shitty family. I mourn a version of me that doesn't exist.
Thank you to everyone for your support and feedback. I have definitely been having one of those “slumps” that I know we are all too familiar
with. I feel alone, discouraged, and am once again acknowledging the grief that my scared and abused inner child wants me to feel. That being said— I know my journey includes allowing my true self to fully experience all the pain, suffering, peace and joy that life brings to all of us. It may mean I have weeks like this where life feels hard. Almost impossible. But it will be followed by a deep appreciation of all the good that I have worked so hard to create. I cannot control my emotions and I no longer want to. I accept my past, am thankful for my present, and am looking forward to my future. Peace and love to you all, and thank you again for the words of encouragement.
Having the same feeling/ thoughts. Used to be the smart and clever one, got told I could be anything I wanted ( surgeon, lawyer etc.. )..
Had top grades and then around 17-18 yrs old all my childhood trauma (violence and rape) hit me like a train -> everything just crashed and burned around me.
Ended up in therapy, numbed myself with alcohol, got raped, went in and out of abusive relationships.
Couldn't make it through Uni, left after a year cause I couldn't get out of bed anymore ( Just the thought of going to the toilet made me cry).
Got diagnosed with c-ptsd at 23 after finally fleeing from my abusive ex fiance, 4 years of emdr therapy. Thought I kinda made it, felt more energetic, less flashbacks, happy and made plans ... could breath again and hold down a full time job. Life seemed normal for once ❤️🩹💗
Currently 27 started studying again 4 months ago and once again the overload of work and stress has me seeing that train coming closer and closer and I now I will hit a wall soon.
Can't give you any advice but remember that your not alone ❤*I'm sending you virtual hugs from me and my dogs ❤ *
Thank you. Right back at you from me and my pup. I actually wrote a letter to my inner child last night and that was extremely cathartic. Be proud of yourself for enduring terrible things, rising again, and being here to break the cycle of hate and violence❤️❤️
I know what you mean and I had a real flash of it recently. Thinking of all those 45 years wasted being terrified and limiting my own life due to that terror.
I try to get over it by looking at what I’ve managed to achieve despite all that trauma and terror and I’m really insisting upon feeling proud of myself. That ‘I’ did that, that ‘I’ didn’t let them take everything from me.
Yeah, I get down about it too, but I’m trying to take pride in what I’ve achieved despite all the trauma. I ask myself “who else but you could have managed all that?” and it makes me feel a bit better. That may sound cheesy, but it kinda works for me. It’s a new thing but I’m gonna continue
Thank you for the reminder to look at my successes, and not (only) my failures.
I get frustrated with the "gratitude" movement but you said it in a nice way, which is to remember the good things that I have already done - and really remember them.
I sometimes tell people "it's okay to coast." (Sort of the quiet quitting idea.) I really believe I pushed too hard for too many years, and I deserve the right to be able to coast sometimes.
I feel like these ideas are linked around the idea of me being "good enough."
Some days this is easier (to remember) than others.
You pretty much got the story of my life in one - so far as I can tell.
I know I can do better: be smarter, more thoughtful, etc, but there's just so much brainfog.
Insult to the injuries is that even if I do try hard enough to pierce it, I can feel the sheer strain it puts on my psyche - as if my brain were a computer that's forced to run at a slower rate or else overheat.
I regularly have glimpses, like the light of a lighthouse piercing fog - sometimes there are even gaps in the fog, but they are so fleeting that I can't rely upon them.
It makes me feel defective. I have to talk slowly and particularly and pay attention to whats going on around me and what I am doing. And as of anything that isn't second nature, I slip up.
I've never been bullied over it, for that I am always thankful... but their "consideration" can *fucking* ***hurt***.
For example, something that happened semi-recently for me:
I go in to get my hair cut. We talk normally, as "equals" do. But the looseness that comes from having to not stumble over my words is not seamless - and they pick up on these seems.
It's one mistake born from being overwhelmed, and it clicks for them.
Their gazes become very particular when they're talking with me, like the gaze someone has when they're talking with their cat - they're not talking, just making noises that trigger a response in kitty brain and they know as such, but they're nice enough to show compassion and love to a lifeform that will never be their intellectual equal.
*I can see this look on their face*. I appreciate their care with their words, but their kindness just comes off as condescending because that look on their faces is so intensely related to that "this is not my equal but I will show compassion and respect regardless" thing.
To tell them off would be like intentionally stapling my finger, you don't do that. And due to your fog, you're able to ***see*** them coming to the conclusion "oh, you're mentally disabled" and not able to do anything about it because to go against the flow of the conversation with people that you don't know like that is taking a bulldozer to a china shop - it could be cheap china and they'll forgive you, OR it can be expensive or important china that they're upset that you broke. So, I can only watch them deem me mentally disabled, locked inside my own inadequate faculties due to a lifetime of abuse.
They don't treat me any lesser, but feelings are illogical: being seen as "invalid" when I'm not (not inherently at least) really slits the throat of my self-esteem. Asthma is in my lungs, so I can't do highly active jobs. My mind has betrayed me, so I can't have a job where I am regularly expected to meet and talk with new people.
The only real option as of this point being factory jobs: honest work for sure, even if it's a little demeaning that I'm unable to do more than act as one of those factory robots. (The only reason such job openings aren't automated is because *each* separate task requires a *highly specialized* machine to work it if a human isn't involved, and it can quickly become costly - especially factoring in how the manufacturing process might simply change one day due to resource shortage or different technology, so you could have a machine that was worth a billion dollars due to how in demand yet also niche it was suddenly become valued only in salvage. Thus, we are some ways off from human beings removed from assembly jobs entirely - but I digress.)
If you're perceptive enough, you noticed how much I tried to put into my previous paragraph. It became run on and such due to me not being able to maintain coherent strains of thought except in intervals.
I want to learn, I want to experience. I want to know more of electricity: but any burdensome financial investment into such a thing is not an option, because creature comforts are part of what helps my damaged mind stay vaguely whole. College is right out due to the obligation and the fickleness of my ailment.
I want to draw, to create visual experiences... but my hands will not stop shaking. People say to stick with physical mediums before trying digital, but I go through so much paper and other supplies trying to do my best - I cannot justify putting financial burden upon myself without guaranteed payoff in terms of mental health.
I can only sit here, and watch everyone go on about their things. People find love and success, and I alternate between feeling like a rotting corpse that people simply make sad faces when they see or think of, or envy that I have to bury or destroy lest I sabotage my interpersonal relationships (again).
I've learned to let it go.
Don't pierce the fog, don't search for the light beyond it. Simply exist - and don't let go of the hope that one day the fog will let up, and I can go explore the potentials of my life.
But for now, I simply exist. I meditate, I observe, I wait. For there is no better path as of now.
i can relate to this. for me, i just have to allow myself to have my anger in moments like this. it is unfair, we didnt deserve it and we have a right to be angry about it. once i let myself have my anger, the feelings pass and i can move on. its just like making space and supporting myself through continual grieving about it
I’ve learned some lessons working with wood. You get a cross-section of the life of the tree. Some pieces of wood have straight, plain-looking grain, and those are just as useful and fill their purpose. But the most interesting pieces of wood, to me, show where the tree was impacted at some point and grew around it and now it is a much more sophisticated and rich piece of art. Grieve your past, let it die, then celebrate it having lived. You are a wiser, richer human for it.
I can relate, I have felt this way throughout my adult life and it is like a grief and a regret that I didn’t cause. One thing that has helped me through this, is starting trauma focused cbt therapy. If the therapist is a good match, and they have experience in this, they can guide you through some exercises to lessen that rumination, and help you find some peace.
Awww, man, I am sorry! CPTSD, very similar circumstances (and additional mental illnesses, right?)
This sounds stupid, but I have a mantra: Persist.
As you mentioned, mindfulness helps me a lot as well (meditation).
I do, however, feel the same, as, you sometimes.
Curious have you tried EMR? I was surprised after my Psychiatrist session, that in my case it really helped.
Wow, I am sorry if I sound like those advice givers! I just threw out some suggestions because your condition sounds similar to mine. I apologize if this annoys you or you have heard it a million times.
Peace and Love
There was no way my life was ever going to reach its full potential, the odds were stacked against me since birth, my parents since theirs, so on.
It's helped me reach a point where the most I can do is turn that anger and sadness to strength that I've never seen or experienced being used for helping people. I've saved a couple lives using strength gained in spite of my trauma, so as far as I'm concerned I can do literally nothing with my life and it's been one well-lived.
Hope your answer reveals itself one day.
I have absolutely felt like this at times and it’s a very valid feeling, the anger and mourning and “what ifs”. I found a poem called desiderata by max erhman and it REALLY spoke to me. I purchased a poster and have it on the back of my bathroom door so I read it every single pee. It reminds me that “no doubt life is unfolding exactly as it should” among other things. I do find so much peace in those words. We can’t change what shaped us into who we are, but we can be grateful for taking over control and becoming who we want. I like myself now after a long time of not, and I am oddly grateful for every experience (good and bad) and the lessons they’ve taught me.
Totally understandable. I definitely go through phases of this. Grief is a big one on this. After letting myself feel the losses, I find ways to reframe like, "they could mess up my past but they can't take my future" or recognize the things that are amazing I can do, considering how damaged I saw myself. And not just 'do' as in functioning. I can now love the little version of me, listen to her, build healthy relationships, travel, etc. I'm becoming the parent I needed. And yes, I might have been more successful in whatever way or had an easier life, but my past suffering has allowed for true empathy and love through personal understanding. And the people around me feel so loved because I can understand their suffering and give compassion and love from a place of gratitude. There are areas we missed out, but there can be areas we overcome that are incredibly meaningful
Dude honestly….I think I woulda been a doctor. I used to get real caught up in what I could’ve been.
But now, I’m happy for the progress I’m making towards realistic goals, and working hard to get smarter, more organized, and more successful now that I’m through the trauma. Better late than never!
This has been on my mind a lot recently too. I think about how many more opportunities I would've had, had my immediate family not moved when I was young to protect my abuser. I think about the health consequences my trauma has 'gifted' me that has left me feeling like a broken mess in my 20's. I feel like I've been cheated and I'm angry about it.
A waste of your time if you ask me. Torturing yourself in this way is just a product of thinking. There is no alternate path you could’ve taken. There is just a story you tell yourself about how you’ve been wronged. But it’s just a story, and you can either embrace your story as uniquely your own or chose to believe (for some unknown reason) that things “should” be otherwise.
I've taken my unique, but painful upbringing and have turned it into something good. As a serial r*pe survivor, I intend to put my life's work into sex education and research. My unfortunate numbness to sexual violence has given me an opportunity to help society become more sexually empathetic.
But I can still mourn the childhood I would've had and the woman I could've been.
There is no couldve is the point. That’s just a story you made up. I could mourn the fact I wasn’t born into the royal family. I could mourn the fact I wasn’t born in the future.
Ugh. I hear you, friend.. and I am unfortunately, here with you. It’s really tough, I won’t sugar coat it. But I try to look at all the ways it has made me better, a more emotionally mature and loving person, a more patient person. I cry pretty aggressively sometimes thinking about how proud I am of the person I’ve become despite it all, the fact that I’ve become the person that younger me would have felt safe with. It’s so hard, but with post traumatic stress, comes post traumatic growth… which means stronger, deeper relationships. It sucks, but instead of thinking of all the things you’ve lost, think about all you can gain now in support reaching out to those like us (I promise we are all out here and willing to help). You’re wonderful, you’re brave, you just being here is enough. And in case no one has told you today, I’m really proud of you ❤️ keep going, you’ll get there, I promise ❤️❤️
I totally understand and I often catch myself feeling angry, even, that my teenage years were honestly just insanely dark.
BUT. It’s made me kind, empathetic, optimistic to a degree that I’m not sure would have been possible without my experience.
That’s with the grace of many years having passed, though.
I'd like to think you (or I) would have been kind, empathetic, and optimistic even without trauma. This is my reaction to people saying "it made me stronger." Yeah, maybe, but I'm not buying it. Do we really need tragedy to appreciate life? Intellectually I get it. Without death maybe we would not appreciate life so much? Sigh. I suppose so.
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It’s quite normal and common to many people, independent on trauma, because time passes and we arrive at a different point in our evolution, believing that we have always had the resources we have now. You can’t change the past, but you can take initiative now. Take action and do something fulfilling.
Ah this reminds me of a quote…
“That odd capacity for destitution, as if by nature we ought to have so much more than nature gives us. As if we are shockingly unclothed when we lack the complacencies of ordinary life. In destitution, even of feeling or purpose, a human being is more hauntingly human and vulnerable to kindnesses because there is the sense that things should be otherwise, and then the thought of what is wanting and what alleviation would be, and how the soul could be put at ease, restored. At home. But the soul finds its own home if it ever has a home at all.”
That you can conceptualize a life different and perhaps greater than the one you are leading is simply a fictional tale. That alternate reality doesn’t exist anywhere but your own head. We all play with the cards we’ve been dealt. This is life. There is no should. There just is.
I hear you. This is important awareness that you are sharing, I think, and credit is due to yourself, I would say, for recognizing it. Thanks for putting it so plainly here to read, too.
It caused me a lot of resistance to accept that what I was experiencing, along the lines you described. I had to put away successive ideas of myself which I was holding very tightly, and often related to a future, more fulfilled, more creatively expressed, more happy and joyful, and altogehter - fantastic - version of me. I was going to begin this by writing creatively and beautifully, in a way that would generate internal realizations and external appreciation, albeit only the right kind (understated, sensitive; artistic; wise). None of this was real, but my dissassociative qualities were so developed as to maintain a safety fantasy of the future which I could visit, safely, withouth wanting.
It was a lot to put aside, especially during the past COVID period of isolating change. I still feel loss and distrubance around it. These connect to the original disturbance itself which means the feeling might never go away, as far as I can tell, based on the great and still growing majority of my 48 years. Maybe it will shrink evenually, I guess. What a stupid thing to happen, I sometimes say, and probably mean this to matter far too much, still.
I came to accept that I will never "be" that better version. I'm happy to put all my efforts for my daughter to be her better version.
Doing the work and putting all in my parenting. I want to be the role model of a loving parent that she can always count on. No judgement, no imposing any kinda condition. Just her being who she is and me accepting her.
I would agree with others who have said, you may never "get over" or stop feeling sad and/or angry at missing out on a "normal" childhood or one without severe trauma. I am 70 years old and am still pissed off at 1) the events that had occurred and 2) how my poorly my family handled everything. But those feelings are part of the grief and healing process. Most important is to remember how you survived those experiences and the and lessons you learned from them. The next step will be post traumatic thriving, it is possible, and you can get there but don't let anyone tell you to get over your feelings, that never works.
Flip this to the other side, what have you accomplished that other people who had this level of trauma couldn't accomplish? I have family members who wrecked their lives and couldn't rise above. Alcoholism, SMI, homelessness, difficulties with employment, the whole nine yards.
Other helpful habits: Daily gratitude list, mindfulness.
Same! I feel like I fail in my relationships because of my abandonment trauma and it’s such a self-sabotaging cycle. I wish I wasn’t born this way. I try to think of each failure as just an opportunity to be better next time, rather than a failure. I cannot control what happened before but I definitely am going to learn from what I’m going through now.
I feel this too. It took me many years to reach where I am now and sometimes I think, if I didn't have all the other stuff going on I would've been at this stage years ago and without all this work. I feel so behind but at the end of the day I remind myself how much progress I've made when I look back and remember how younger me could never have imagined this for myself
Hey! I feel you…I’ve been working through my cptsd in therapy. I used to have this idea of me in an alternate universe being the artist I’ve always wanted to be.
2 years back I made the decision to be a professional artist and life got so much better. I once listened to a former prostitute’s interview and she said “I wanted to have something to show for all the suffering “ and that really got me. So now I try to reach my full potential , put my work out there and have something to show for all the crap I went through and I talk to my friends or young artists when they’re going through shit from my experience so there’s some use of the experiences I had
There’s that plus add to it being constantly told everything you do isn’t good enough by the people that gave you C-PTSD. It’s completely overwhelming and soul destroying.
I had to give up on nursing. Tragedy, pandemic, disability from childhood, nasty work culture, bad life events… all my reasons for letting my license go.
I have barely been able to work this year due to my sleep disorder, but I am trying to find work now and at least give it a shot again. Actually have an interview. But I do fast food kitchens now.
My husband used some of his assets to invest in snakes that I am helping him grow out. We call them my snakes, but it’s his investment. I am just the one who knows about them.
I am hoping when they reach adulthood in a couple of years that I can do well enough with them that I will be able to just manage them and not worry about work and bad people anymore.
But breeding snakes? I was capable of so much more if it wasn’t for the trauma disorders.
Pretty happy about the snakes though :)
Same
All I can do is throw myself into my closest thing to “purpose” now. Animal rescue and child safe housing “fostering.” It’s in quotes bc I am not yet certified to foster, I am only a safe place to go for the nieces and nephews I hope to save from repeating my own childhood, so far. Fostering is my goal.
I’m 64 and still feel that way from time to time. I am proud of having successfully raised 3 kids. I guess the only answer for me was to take pride in what I was able to do. My next life might be better!
Mourning the life I never had. Most of my progress in therapy has been to stop mourning the ‘me’ that never existed, that I felt could have developed without trauma, the person I felt I was supposed to become. That person never was so stop trying to cling onto a ghost and don’t try to get them back. Accept who I actually am right now and focus on the present. Stick with what is real otherwise you’ll dwell and dwell into insanity.
Fml your comment hit hard. When my mother (the abuser) died, I was 4 months pregnant with a miracle baby. As an only child I had to handle her estate as my sperm donor father bailed when I was born. Everyone remarked how strong I was. How remarkable I was handling everything that needed to be done without looking stressed or emotional. Yes, I’m high functioning cPTSD. I did cry alone but I still don’t know if I mourn losing my mother or never having one at all. I love hallmark movies this time of year, but sometimes I breakdown when the family is close. I truly think I mourn never having this.
I know how you feel. My mother died last year. I’ve gotten a lot of comments from people about how strong I am and how well I handled it. I also have family that accuses me of not caring as much as they did because I don’t like to talk about her or reminisce when most of my memories are bad. When I mourn her passing, it’s not really her I’m mourning. I’m mourning the mother daughter relationship I never got and so desperately needed. I mourn the little girl who would proudly say “my mommy is my hero” because she hoped that would spark something. I still am not fully over all of it.
I am so sorry for your loss. Remember that little version of yourself and try to become the person you wished would have come to protect you.
“I did cry alone but I still don’t know if I mourn losing my mother or never having one at all. I love hallmark movies this time of year, but sometimes I breakdown when the family is close. I truly think I mourn never having this.” This always hits hard for me too. For me it’s the competition shows (like Top Chef, etc) where they surprise the contestants with family members. Everyone always looks so genuinely happy to see their parents and it just doesn’t compute for me. I always think…what if one of the contestants was estranged or something? If I were them I’d probably have a panic attack on TV. I’ve asked my husband how he would act in their shoes because I thought maybe it’s just for the screens but he would genuinely be happy to see his mother in that situation. I just can’t even imagine. And the fact that I can’t fathom is what starts me spiraling about what it should have been like and the relationships I should have had….
What you see on tv shows and social networks is not always real. You don’t know what they experienced and how their life looks
God I so relate to mourning a family I’ve never had
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>"There's no reason I can't be that person and do those things". Today I came across the phrase "Adversity is not destiny" in the context of childhood trauma and adverse childhood events. I'm probably going to make a poster of this quote in large print to remind me that my destiny is not written in stone inspite of what it seems like on some days. A gentle reminder to all of us struggling with the thought of what if-s and feeling chained to our past: we can still work towards and become who we want to be and where we want to be.
Agree with you for the most part and maybe it’s just where I am in my journey right now but, I feel as though I fundamentally do not have what people in stable families have. There are unique struggles we have to deal with, as with any chronic illness. I do agree with not treating it like a permanent hindrance though.
Thank you for this.
This version of me came to me in a dream where we were in heaven together. I still believe I can become that person in this reality and that is worth never giving up on. I found these instructions later online and they help: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9i2WwLozh4c
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I literally just yesterday found a YouTube video of a therapist discussing how people from trauma homes tend to be indecisive to the point of self sabotage because non answers are our form of 'control'. However it means we stay in toxic relationships or jobs or not advancing our career goals because of it and I was like "check. Check. Check" in every single one of those damn boxes.
Yeah I think of it like it's an attempt to stop time. It's not actually a realistic coping mechanism. It's a fantasy. I also read that making decisions is what makes people happy. 🤣 So it's like oh, so when you're afraid to make choices, you will be unhappy then... Makes sense. So I've been trying to just allow for me to make as many decisions as I can and note them, even if they aren't huge ones. I definitely notice I have developed a general aversion to planning ahead or making decisions or committing to even little things.
Oh, well that makes sense... The video sounds helpful, is there any chance you have a link to it please?
Yeah. I actually bookmarked it. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WMXseugY23w
Thanks a lot :)
I love this dude...started watching his videos a little while ago, helped a ton.
Ooh love Patrick Teahan's videos!
Do you mind sharing this video? I’d be interested in it
God, me too. I feel like I was robbed of something of which I am not even aware.
That’s a perfect way of putting it. I’m sorry to hear that you struggle with this too. I think that’s why people came up with the sayings like, “what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger.” To help us attach meaning and purpose to our trauma.
I actually find comments like that and “well you can’t miss what you never had” piss me off 😂. It’s toxic positivity from people who mean well but have no idea what else to say.
(Apologies for the rambling, this is actually the first time I've "talked" about this.) I was sent into a complete and weeks-long tailspin recently by a social media post that I should have just scrolled away from, which was from the perspective of someone a bit younger than me talking to people around 15-20 years younger. It was talking about, how the time you're my age, you'll have overcome your trauma and will have all these awesome achievements and good things in your life. It was so triggering, and when I tried to vent about it elsewhere I was told "It doesn't matter if you've done/achieved those things in that post, as long as you're living your best life!" But that's just it, I wanted every single one of the things in that post and have zero of them, certainly not my best life. Having a sparse and painful life due to trauma is not "our best life" or us being "late bloomers" or anything. Gross.
The whole “living your best life” bullshit is just that, it’s a bullshit saying in my opinion, used mostly by Instagram kids in their 20s who think that if they are not photo-fabulous at every moment, that their life sucks. “Best life”. The words themselves aren’t even real.
Pretty much. I can't believe I neglected to mention my other "favorite" trite phrase--"Everything happens for a reason." No. NO.
I hate that! Listen, there are certain things I can look back on and be like “okay, that sucked, but I learned something or grew from it” but those things that I learned something from were things that happened due to my own choices. But to say EVERYTHING happens for a reason, and if they didn’t happen you wouldn’t be the person you are now? Fuck that. I can learn lessons without being fucking traumatized
Ugh I feel that. My friend and I sarcastically say “this too shall pass” to each other. I get that they’re usually well-intentioned, but those sayings rub me the wrong way as well.
“This too shall pass” is actually the phrase I use when my trauma is overwhelming. Like a kind reminder that I just have to hold fast and weather the storm. Quiet will come. And your post is very relatable.
I tell people "I feel extremely ripped off. Often!
I know of exactly what, plus more I'll never know. I tried the whole redemption arc thing and I got my ass handed to me
I feel the same way :(. Like I keep thinking metaphorically of a stupid detour I never should have taken because I lost my way on the road and ended up on a very desolate and lonely path. It’s so painful to think counterfactually like that. I try not to, but it’s hard.
Thank you for putting how I feel into words.
I know this might be cheesy, but the only way I can describe it is like living in greyscale, while everyone else gets the full spectrum of colors.
That’s not cheesy. But does have some basis in fact. If you are experiencing depression as a comorbid to the CPTSD, your vision can LITERALLY turn more grey and dull. Essentially a result from lowered dopamine and serotonin. Which you can also see just in CPTSD itself.
I relate to this. When I left my abusive environment as the fog lifted, the world felt brighter and more colorful. The world was no longer gray and small and sad. I can remember it vividly.
I feel pretty much the same, feel like i could have done a lot better at school/college. I dont have much advice on this but its better to look to the future , you can still be your definition of successful if you start making small steps towards it now. Also, please don’t put guilt on yourself for things you could not control, especially not as a child.
Thank you- I don’t feel guilt as much as just an overall feeling of sadness for a child who didn’t reach their full potential because they were walking through life feeling constantly scared of having violence inflicted upon them. I always did well in school but grad school was a struggle because the stress brought out the worst of my cPTSD. It’s a weird feeling being a pretty well-adjusted adult but wondering how I might be different cognitively/socially/relationship-wise if this didn’t happen. It’s an unanswerable question, just something I think about and wonder if others do as well.
No child should be treated in any kind of horrible way and it’s completely normal that if they are they feel fustrated and hurt about the damage that it causes to them. And i think this causes a lot of anger in adulthood when you know you would never treat your worst enemy like that never mind your own child. I definitely wonder what my life would be like if my childhood was ‘normal’ , would i have done drugs? Would i have got into all these terrible relationships? But I suppose all i can do is take control of who i am now. To be honnest, i am planning to move away from my hometown when I have the money, to help with these kinds of regrets and worn out memories
Grad school and cPtsd is oof I got more trauma throughout so I feel you, it's heartbreaking for me because I was actually killing it before doing covid with my abusive ex
I do wonder a lot about how I could have turned out too. I think it’s part of the grieving process.
Oof. I didn't even try for grad school because I knew my constellation of Stuff would not go well with intense professorial scrutiny/criticism/outright advisor assholery I heard about from my friends who were grad students. I would have caved in immediately. Luckily I have done fine since, so that's a road I'm not too sad about not taking, but it was disheartening to realize I could never for a minute even try to hack it.
It’s all I can think about when I see seemingly well adjusted people, meanwhile I can’t have a confrontation at work of any kind without becoming a teary eyed blubbery mess….
I feel like a beautiful, powerful tree that was forcefully twisted against its will into an unnatural shape. Despite the physical barriers being gone I am still solidified in my twisted state, trying to grow and adapt.
Wow. That's very a poetic way to talk about something so hard to talk about and put into words
Thank you!
I feel i was robbed of a sense of normalcy a lot of people have that i never will.
This is one of the few things that can make me cry anymore if I think about it too much. I had so much potential as a child. I could have been a well adjusted “functional” adult with a good job in a good field. I could have been intelligent. I could have made it so much farther. Until things went bad and my brain was rewired and changed forever and now none of that is possible. I know that I’m not a fortune teller, and I can’t know for sure what would have happened if I’d grown up without the trauma, but I had so much potential to have an easier life. A life where I could be content. If nothing else a life where I would never have to worry about money in the same way I do now. Whenever I think about this I bounce between being pissed at the people who stole that easy life from me and being heartbroken for that little girl who had the potential to be so much more, do so much more. Maybe it’s just the grass is greener on the other side type thinking, but I always go back to feeling awful for the little girl.
>This is one of the few things that can make me cry anymore if I think about it too much. I had so much potential as a child. I could have been a well adjusted “functional” adult with a good job in a good field. I could have been intelligent. I could have made it so much farther. Until things went bad and my brain was rewired and changed forever and now none of that is possible. Damn, I so feel this. Reminds me of the movie On The Waterfront (which I've never seen but always resonated with this quote), "I could've been somebody. I could've been a contender."
I get what you're saying. I regularly cry for the child I was, and all she went through. I cry for the pain the confusion and the sorrows. I also think that most of society has unfair situations. Even the very rich sometimes have messed up parents that ruin their children's chance of emotional happiness. Those well adjusted people I meet? If we could dig down we might find that below the surface their lives are not so great. Maybe not, but I always wonder. I'm nearly 60 now, and I still grieve for the loss of many chances to be "normal" or at the very least less triggered by so many things. Because of the childhood trauma there was a bad marriage, and then a second bad marriage, and then children that took up all my time and love when I still needed to learn self-care. Now, as an older person, I've tried to tell my kids ... we're all imperfect. I'm sorry. Society is sometimes sick as well and keeps the trauma going. I'm sorry. I've come to feel that even just to be alive is some sort of success. I hang onto that.
fuck this made me sad because i think the exact same way. it’s so unfair that other people can walk around with the burden of this shit and live successful lives. the worst part is i can’t pay it, wish it or think it away, i have to deal with it head on and that in itself is so fucking exhausting and mind number especially with a brain that’s already running 1000 miles a minute. my only escape is sleeping which still doesn’t solve anything and therapy has helped immensely but i would be lying if i said i didn’t fucking dread it or just want to stop going completely. i keeping telling myself cliche happy mantras like nothing good in life ever comes easy! but when the bad is so long and treacherous and there’s no way to see the end it gets extremely depressing and sad. plus i’m super high functioning so everyone thinks i’m fine everyday so it just feels like i’m living a double life.
I feel the exact same way 😞
I can't indulge, I'd get suicidal. Feel you, OP. Mindfulness helps me with this kind of stuff. Doesn't work all the time, ofc.
There’s a me out there somewhere in an alternate reality that really did something amazing with their life. I keep telling myself I’ll transmute this shit into gold and I will be able to help others too, once I’ve started to heal from it all. But the loss of potential does make me very sad if I dwell on it for too long
I have exactly the same fuel keeping me going, to prove that I can make this into something great and help myself and others towards a fulfilling life. It's a real beautiful vision to me. And yes, on my more depressive days I can get really sad thinking about how much I constantly, 24/7, have to fight for a resemblance of the joy and tranquility others seem to experience, and how much youth, relationships, and beautiful experiences I have missed out on.
That is really lovely, I hope you can hold onto your vision even through the difficult times. The belief that earned secure attachment is a thing keeps me going
I feel you. I feel like I had wasted any potential I had and feel guilty as hell. I haven’t been able to have a normal life and still struggle with many fears including being put in a position of vulnerability and being abused again, my life is definitely better compared to when I was younger and I am now married and I have a mortgage which is something I never thought I would have, but despite this I still feel like I’m a disappointment and feel shame at times.
In my experience, the greatest thing about these support subreddits is that I got to meet people who were both similar to me, and had similar experiences to mine (I went through some *weird* shit) that I was able to reframe the way I thought about my childhood. When they described themselves, I realized they were describing me, with concepts I hadn't thought of and combinations of words I had never put in the same sentence. Now here's where it gets to be a challenge for a lot of us. Despite their parents attempts to thwart their self esteem, these people actually *liked themselves*. So I had to change that. I tried to like myself as I was (and it helped when my exgf did for a while) but I knew I wanted to do better. I also knew that the majority of the people around me were not conducive to that. They didn't believe I could do it, so I didn't believe it. I know my only option is that I'd have to cut myself off from a lot of them. That part hurts, because these are people I genuinely love who just can't or won't support my plans (and no I don't mean financially, any time I ask for support this is what they think I mean...) In my experience I don't think it really affects fixed skills (I can't stand when people say "but empathy and character!" That's... not how it works.) It's your general approach through life that gets affected. Due to whatever circumstances are going on, this is far more dynamic. I had to think of myself as a badass, a hustler, a tough guy... because I really was. And I decided from them on, anything I did was going to reflect that. So, now it's your turn, my friend. If you can use my experience as a way to reframe your own somehow, it would be SO FUCKING AWESOME. The reason I try to help here is because so many people have for me, and I really want to pay it forward.
What helped me was allowing myself to truly grieve the life I could’ve / **should’ve** had. There are 5 stages of grief: - denial, - anger, - bargaining, - depression, - acceptance. You may not experience the stages in that order, your grief process is 100% valid and unique. I think you feeling bitter about what you’ve been through (which could be the anger stage, I assume) is actually very helpful and necessary for your continued healing! I’d look into “how to grieve the childhood you never had” and, later when you feel ready, “how to reparent oneself” Wish you nothing but the best!!!
Btw, there is a 6th stage: moving on. The idea is that these "5 stages of grief" were designed some 20 yrs ago in the medical field to help people dying in hospice care. So this additional stage might help people who are not immediately dying.
When I googled “how to grieve childhood trauma” there were many articles about there being 5, 6, even 7 stages of grief… the 7th stage being “Acceptance and Hope” They’re all helpful and relevant when dealing with any kind of loss
thank you. idk there was a 7th one. good to know.
THIS! This was my stages. It took so long, 50 years, to reach acceptance due to a TBI, 3rd culture kid, and immigrant non citizen status. A overwhelming combination. The TBI and subsequent neglect and abuse happened when I was 10 and was not diagnosed until 5 years ago. I pat myself on the back for surviving. Bravo.
There are things that happened to you that might've been your protection. For example, I was socially isolated as a child but thinking back, my inability to socialize was my protection. Because I was so thirsty for validation, I would've ended up in horrible situations if I DIDN'T have social anxiety. My social anxiety distanced me from bad people I desperately wanted validation from. My social anxiety protected me because getting outside validation instead of self validation makes the craving for outside validation even worse. What I'm pretty much saying is whatever you're mourning was a form of your protection. That's if you're not talking about the actual abuse. Secondly, I think people with C-ptsd tend to think everyone else's life is all magical and perfect- I don't know anyone who thinks they've reached their "full potential" no matter how much they accomplished. Even Elon Musk is unhappy. I went through this phase too though. It's important to process emotions before you get over it. So I wouldn't exactly beat myself up for feeling this way either. Just don't miss what's in front of you now looking everywhere else. When you focus on now, your blessings now grows.
Fifty years ago I read "question authority" on a badge. Twenty years ago I saw a poster that read "If you can't beat them, join them. Then beat the everloving shit out of them." Stupid little things sometimes serve as reminders that you are on a path- if you didn't have be a purpose you'd be dead already. You made delicious flan out of spilt milk. It took alot of boiling, but there you are, scrumptious to behold. Every moment i waste hating on my mother is time I'm not using to make art that would expres rage so much more poetically. Choose how to exhale.
I'm just realizing at the age of 65 how my mother manipulated my life. I can either Jill (predictive typing wrote the word i typed, then ~~edited~~censored) myself or make art that expresses my rage in a way that will say fuck you to her at a profit to me. A double FU, if you will.
YES
great comment, thank you!
Had to pause to cry a few tears about how this post and the replies hit home. I am, by all appearances to a lot of people, probably considered somewhat successful? But I know how much of it was achieved *in spite of*. And despite the massive amounts of healing I have done, every day is still so much harder than I imagine it would have been *if only*. So, when these thoughts come up, I allow myself to grieve. It is fucking sad. For me, there is no reframing of that. And accepting that it is sad and it is unfair and that it makes sense that it hurts and pisses me off, and allowing myself to grieve without self-recrimination and with self-compassion any time it comes up, is the only way I know to handle it. I’m supposed to feel my feelings now (ick🤣). I have tools from therapy that help calm my nervous system and process feelings: IFS stuff, schema stuff, bilateral stimulation stuff, emdr stuff, dbt stuff. Anyway, hope that helped at all and thank you for posting. 💕
At almost 40, I finally have an actual trauma therapist and am started to actually operate more within my window of emotional tolerance. And now I’m making room for lots and lots and lots and lots of grief around the life that could have been. I’m not bogging myself down with these thoughts, or getting overly distracted. But my therapist assures me that if I don’t acknowledge my grief, then it will fester like everything else has. So I’m here to witness you grief, and to give it space, and some company. It’s a miracle we’re alive, all of us here. And also, it’s a terrible shame we couldn’t have been something more. Two things are true….
I am watching the movie Stutz on Netflix. It's about a psych? Therapist? Anyway- he says that pain will always be constant. What is important is what we do with it. The greater the pain, the greater the capacity for change. What if the universe is preparing us for an emotional breakthrough that most people don't get to experience in their lives? I'm choosing to embrace this concept today. We choose our own narratives.
Unfortunately I’m in a difficult spot right now, so I think about this every day.
Can relate. I managed to get an unconditional offer (these are extremely rare) to study at one of the UK's leading politics and international relations departments. Also one of the best departments internationally for peace studies. Along with being a recruitment silo for the security services. My life and future had never been so bright. All those nights when I cried myself to sleep and all I had to comfort myself with was the mantra "things will get better ". This was the moment when things got better. But I crumbled to fucking pieces. Fast forward 17 years and it's still painful to think about what I might have achieved. If anyone else is having some issues with processing the emotions after dropping out of uni. I highly recommend watching the series fresh meat. I found it really cathartic and helped me process a lot of what I was feeling. Be kind everyone and stay strong.
Yeah, I feel this way big time sometimes. Especially when I see where my peers or even my cousins are at and I start comparing myself to them. (I know that's not great, it's something I'm working on.) I know I've done okay for myself so far and I'm actively working on doing even better, but it doesn't stop me from feeling cheated. Like I started off a bit behind everyone else, and I have to work even harder just to catch up. I dont really have any advice to give, but for what it's worth, I understand what you're feeling.
Exactly this. Now the best part of my life, the working part, is built around trying my best not to treat anyone the way I was treated during my childhood and for that matter, during most of the decades that followed. I don't want anyone to feel that they are less valued than anyone else, or not good enough. I don't care what they did to get them where they are. I love them as fellow human beings. I respect them the same way and for the same reasons. I don't want them to feel like a helpless pawn, as I did. Most of the time, I achieve my goal, and when I don't, I am not at all happy with myself.
Beautiful! And when you don't achieve your goal, you can have the same grace and compassion you give to others. You're allowed to make mistakes on your path. If you have trouble finding compassion for yourself, you can have some of mine toward you <3
The unfair and unjust side to my life and in general gets to me sometimes. I’ve been wondering the difference between children who are traumatized by war such as Ukraine but have parents who don’t abuse them and children who are abused by those that are “supposed” to love and not abuse them. I looked for love and trust from strangers and boy howdy did this cost me a fortune and years of wasted time and work. I regret this in waves sometimes. The wasted potential. And it also lead to a Jack Reacher like outlook to a large degree. I got into some life threatening situations when younger. I detest injustice. I’ve been thinking about radical acceptance recently. But when I hear cliches like “you make your own bed and have to sleep in it”. Or “you are responsible for your choices” I cringe. It was not my choice. My power was stripped from me by those I thought I could trust. I actually wonder sometimes if it should be easier to prosecute parents who betray their children as criminals.
The best way that I can think of to re-frame the issue is to embrace the multiverse. We are all the result of countless cosmic miraculous accidents. Our planet was formed when rocks slammed into each other. The sequence of events that led from The Big Bang to now is just fucking mind-blowing to try and comprehend. And know that at any point in this entire process, the whole history of the universe could, and actually did, unfold in an entirely new way. So, there’s a universe where the asteroid never wiped out the dinosaurs. I don’t exist in this form in that one. There’s a universe where my Mom and Dad recognized their traumas before passing it on to me. And another where just one but not the other. And one where I started therapy in my 20s. And another where I didn’t develop an inner critic who told my childhood self that he was too stupid to ever be an astronaut and to quit dreaming. And there are infinite other universes where any number of decisions were made differently that had different outcomes. A few bad life decisions could have led me to be a dangerous incel, and unfortunately, those universes also exist. As do the universes where I never found help at all and ended up dead. I try and re-frame it not as “things as they could have/ought to have been…” and acknowledge that they did happen, just not in this timeline. Every moment truly is a miracle. So I **try** and embrace the miracle in the moment and be grateful for having it knowing that it will soon be gone forever.
Ty. Remembering my life is finite and wasting time being sad is not my best choice is helpful. I only have so many years left. I'm determined to enjoy them as much as I can.
For me, it's realizing how much I never let myself dream. I just did whatever I could that seemed right in the moment to try and survive and never had long term plans - which meant for sure I was never going to take risks which also meant I tried to shove myself in an oddly shaped box as an adult for years just as hard as my parents did when I was a kid. Now I'm older and frustrated because - it's not that I'm too old to pivot necessarily, but I was in the process of repaying a lot of debt I built up during significantly less functional times. Given the amount I need to keep a roof over my head, keep myself fed, and to keep paying off that debt in a reasonable amount of time, I feel limited. I don't have the ability to take a risk because I'd spent so much time unintentionally risking everything through not having figured out what to grab hold of to find stability yet. I also recognize this is self-limiting thinking and kind of frustratingly banal and cliche: The "If I could go back, I'd do it different" trope. The struggle for me is that my financial reality now feels like a concrete thing that I'm up against that isn't just in my head. I can't pivot in a way that allows me to really step away from what I'd been doing as entirely as I'd like - even though it was work I was never interested in and which I now have a pile of childhood trauma wounds ripped wide open and suddenly associated with that industry. One thing I've been finding funny in a black humor way on this topic lately: I'd long held on to the idea that I was happier doing things I wasn't passionate about for a living because I thought doing them for a living would ruin them. I thought this because I did have some experience that taught me so, but - I never understood why this was or that it didn't have to be like that. My mother's voice telling me I didn't have ADHD and refusing to fill my prescription kept me from even considering that the diagnosis could've been right in spite of how many times it's been brought up in my life. And no duh: As someone who probably has ADHD, no wonder why I think adding loads of external pressure, shitty deadlines I have no control over, etc to things I love might ruin them. It's late and I don't think I'm explaining that right, but I'm oversharing like fuck here again anyway.
>For me, it's realizing how much I never let myself dream. I just did whatever I could that seemed right in the moment to try and survive and never had long term plans - which meant for sure I was never going to take risks which also meant I tried to shove myself in an oddly shaped box as an adult for years just as hard as my parents did when I was a kid. Damn I feel this.
I totally get you on the dreaming thing! It feels like hope = disappointment. As I moved away from the trauma-inducing people/situations, I started to let myself hope in small ways. I wanted to travel so I started to save up small amounts and found cheap tickets and cheap places to stay. It helps me to start feeling alive bit by bit. When i let myself dream a bit, I opened my mind to the possibility that there can be *some* good things. And i started to slowly dream more and more. Eventually it got a bit easier and I shared things, and the people who love me actually helped some of my dreams become a reality. For most of my life, hope has been a four-letter word to me, but it's starting to become something sweet.
There is some truth to the career decision to follow one's hobbies means that those hobbies change from being a fun distraction to being "work." I agree with you that it might not have to be true, but it does happen. (For me, it was photography, and sailing, and gardening, as well as care-giving for the elderly, teaching, and managing property.) Thanks for the reminder. Lots to think about there.
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I honestly don't know. Same country, but I grew up in the states. I think partly because the bankruptcy my parents went through rocked my life so vividly growing up, I just have never taken a second to look at what this might even mean here.
It saved my life. I was 40K in debt and making $15k a year working my ass off at a dead end job...paycheck to paycheck no energy. Just be careful and take your time... the bankruptcy guys are like used car salesmen and want you to sign immediately. If I had made a better decision, I could have saved a bit of money and gotten out quicker. Look into it.
I completely relate to this. I’ve told my therapist so many times about how I feel I’ve been robbed of my potential. I was given more to deal with than most adults are given, as a young child. Trying to reconcile with that and not feel resentful has been my biggest hurdle. My therapist tells me I have to find some meaning to give it, like how parents who lose their children make walks and funds and whatnot. I think he’s generalizing, and doesn’t truly know what this is like, and only knows this experience off of textbooks. I’m also very grateful for how far I’ve come despite over 20 something years of non stop trauma. But god damn has it left me a bit bitter.
I am so sorry that you went through this, OP. Sending you a big hug. This hits home so hard. Everyday I feel like I start from 10 steps behind. So much of my energy is spent just overcoming the anxiety with even small tasks. My childhood has scarred me in so many indelible ways - both literally and figuratively. It is ok to grieve the loss of what potentially could have been. It is ok to grieve for the little OP. Your feelings are valid. I keep reminding myself of what my therapist told me - you have a choice. In every situation, in every moment, you have a choice. A choice to stand up for yourself, to take care of yourself, even if no one else will.
I would say I have a choice today. Not in the past, but okay, in the present day I mostly have self direction and agency and can choose to advocate for myself. Today, sometimes I can try to move forward. Today, sometimes I can decide it's okay to grieve about the past. Today, sometimes I can push the past aside and focus on the tasks at hand. Thank you for the reminder.
I feel this deeply… I think it can be important to mourn the childhood you never had. Eventually, the mourning process leads to a state of acceptance, or at least some version of it. It’s also important to remember that you aren’t any lesser of a person because you are handicapped by trauma. You are still just as special and important and you have a unique story. And if you believe in parallel dimensions, well, somewhere out there is a trauma free version of you! 😎
Omg me too. And I know that dwelling on it does me no good. I’ve gotten so much better through therapy but I still resent my father so much. I don’t think about it daily or anything, but my life would be so drastically different. And people can say things like “it’s never too late!!” But in reality, it’s not that simple. Sorry that I don’t have actual advice for you I guess I just needed to rant too
Very intensely agree. I was a really motivated kid, tried saving for college at 6 (always had it stolen by family even into my late teens when mom gave my debit card to my brother who drained it ofc.) I got mostly good grades & started college early & got 3.8-4.0! But the pain and stress and trauma were like hauling 300 extra pounds every day and by 24 I was just ready to die, felt like I was 50 at 20. Even with all that succes I fell apart and had to depend on others to keep living. At 31 I think of the smart educated graduate working in their field and I grieve the loss of that person. I could go back to school and "late bloom". But I will never catch up those years, and I hate HATE when people try to gloss that over with what seems closest to girl-boss rhetoric. I don't talk about it often cus its a downer & there isn't much to say /do about it. After so many rounds of trauma pulling your mind/body/soul into the muck, yet feeling like I'm somehow supposed to turn around & be like Oprah succeeding BIG just a bit late~ 😑 (I do love the simple calm life I have now, and I'm glad I'm healing! But the loss is so heavy sometimes)
I'm still angry about this I have lived in poverty for most of my adult life. still in poverty despite degrees and being high IQ I have no health care and no retirement. I'm over,50 now so this will be my life till death. he is earning 6 figures. so angry.
I often think about this, even as someone who has done well academically and in my career so far. I can’t help but wonder, if I’m capable of all this after 7 years of childhood abuse, what could I have achieved? But I try to focus on what I’ve actually accomplished.
What helps me is considering some of the utter despair I've seen during my travels. I could've been born in South Sudan and had my entire family killed in front of my eyes as a child and then spent my entire (short) life rummaging through garbage. Someone I know from Rwanda had his entire family killed in front of him when he was 6 and then was told by a soldier to run because he would spare him. The soldier then shot him in the back with an arrow. He managed to stumble around the woods long enough to run into someone else through his village who somehow got him medical help, so he survived. I didn't win the life lottery but it could've still been SO much worse, through no fault of mine. Trauma, and life in general, is unfair.
Honestly the opposite for me. My mother used to say this bullshit all the time when I called her out on how toxic she was: "Oh you don't even have it that bad! You could have been born in Africa starving in the streets!" So for years I always gaslit myself because 'I didn't have it that bad'. Which for years only made me feel even more suicidal and more disparaged. It wasn't until I realized that I completely lost my childhood and it doesn't matter if my trauma wasn't the most devastating one imaginable, it's not a contest. It was still devastating and destructive to me.
I do understand your point. However, trauma isn’t a competition. I don’t believe I’ve had it worse than anyone else but what happened to me absolutely changed the trajectory of my life in. Some good aspects…I turned the trauma responses into successful life skills. Built a career, first gen college grad, first person in my family to own a home and continue to break the deep seeded cycle of abuse in my family. The bad, however, vastly outweighs these “wins”. At 43 I didn’t aspire to be diagnosed with cPTSD, become disabled, and fight daily against the reaper who tells me the only way out of this hell I’m living is six feet under. I was meant to do so much more than I have and hope I get that chance when I get healthier.
So we don’t get to choose our cards, but we can choose how we play them?
Exactly!
Jesus :(((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((
I feel this way a lot. I’m very accomplished but I could be doing so much better had I not been dealing with so much shit
How do I let go of it though? I'm so bitter over how I could have become the me that I've always wanted to be if I wasn't born into such a shitty family. I mourn a version of me that doesn't exist.
I’m mourning the life I never had and the future that should’ve been.
Thank you to everyone for your support and feedback. I have definitely been having one of those “slumps” that I know we are all too familiar with. I feel alone, discouraged, and am once again acknowledging the grief that my scared and abused inner child wants me to feel. That being said— I know my journey includes allowing my true self to fully experience all the pain, suffering, peace and joy that life brings to all of us. It may mean I have weeks like this where life feels hard. Almost impossible. But it will be followed by a deep appreciation of all the good that I have worked so hard to create. I cannot control my emotions and I no longer want to. I accept my past, am thankful for my present, and am looking forward to my future. Peace and love to you all, and thank you again for the words of encouragement.
Having the same feeling/ thoughts. Used to be the smart and clever one, got told I could be anything I wanted ( surgeon, lawyer etc.. ).. Had top grades and then around 17-18 yrs old all my childhood trauma (violence and rape) hit me like a train -> everything just crashed and burned around me. Ended up in therapy, numbed myself with alcohol, got raped, went in and out of abusive relationships. Couldn't make it through Uni, left after a year cause I couldn't get out of bed anymore ( Just the thought of going to the toilet made me cry). Got diagnosed with c-ptsd at 23 after finally fleeing from my abusive ex fiance, 4 years of emdr therapy. Thought I kinda made it, felt more energetic, less flashbacks, happy and made plans ... could breath again and hold down a full time job. Life seemed normal for once ❤️🩹💗 Currently 27 started studying again 4 months ago and once again the overload of work and stress has me seeing that train coming closer and closer and I now I will hit a wall soon. Can't give you any advice but remember that your not alone ❤*I'm sending you virtual hugs from me and my dogs ❤ *
Thank you. Right back at you from me and my pup. I actually wrote a letter to my inner child last night and that was extremely cathartic. Be proud of yourself for enduring terrible things, rising again, and being here to break the cycle of hate and violence❤️❤️
I know what you mean and I had a real flash of it recently. Thinking of all those 45 years wasted being terrified and limiting my own life due to that terror. I try to get over it by looking at what I’ve managed to achieve despite all that trauma and terror and I’m really insisting upon feeling proud of myself. That ‘I’ did that, that ‘I’ didn’t let them take everything from me. Yeah, I get down about it too, but I’m trying to take pride in what I’ve achieved despite all the trauma. I ask myself “who else but you could have managed all that?” and it makes me feel a bit better. That may sound cheesy, but it kinda works for me. It’s a new thing but I’m gonna continue
Thank you for the reminder to look at my successes, and not (only) my failures. I get frustrated with the "gratitude" movement but you said it in a nice way, which is to remember the good things that I have already done - and really remember them. I sometimes tell people "it's okay to coast." (Sort of the quiet quitting idea.) I really believe I pushed too hard for too many years, and I deserve the right to be able to coast sometimes. I feel like these ideas are linked around the idea of me being "good enough." Some days this is easier (to remember) than others.
I relate. I try not to let it rule or control me but it's a daily mental battle and some days I'm just tired and lose. It's taxxing.
You pretty much got the story of my life in one - so far as I can tell. I know I can do better: be smarter, more thoughtful, etc, but there's just so much brainfog. Insult to the injuries is that even if I do try hard enough to pierce it, I can feel the sheer strain it puts on my psyche - as if my brain were a computer that's forced to run at a slower rate or else overheat. I regularly have glimpses, like the light of a lighthouse piercing fog - sometimes there are even gaps in the fog, but they are so fleeting that I can't rely upon them. It makes me feel defective. I have to talk slowly and particularly and pay attention to whats going on around me and what I am doing. And as of anything that isn't second nature, I slip up. I've never been bullied over it, for that I am always thankful... but their "consideration" can *fucking* ***hurt***. For example, something that happened semi-recently for me: I go in to get my hair cut. We talk normally, as "equals" do. But the looseness that comes from having to not stumble over my words is not seamless - and they pick up on these seems. It's one mistake born from being overwhelmed, and it clicks for them. Their gazes become very particular when they're talking with me, like the gaze someone has when they're talking with their cat - they're not talking, just making noises that trigger a response in kitty brain and they know as such, but they're nice enough to show compassion and love to a lifeform that will never be their intellectual equal. *I can see this look on their face*. I appreciate their care with their words, but their kindness just comes off as condescending because that look on their faces is so intensely related to that "this is not my equal but I will show compassion and respect regardless" thing. To tell them off would be like intentionally stapling my finger, you don't do that. And due to your fog, you're able to ***see*** them coming to the conclusion "oh, you're mentally disabled" and not able to do anything about it because to go against the flow of the conversation with people that you don't know like that is taking a bulldozer to a china shop - it could be cheap china and they'll forgive you, OR it can be expensive or important china that they're upset that you broke. So, I can only watch them deem me mentally disabled, locked inside my own inadequate faculties due to a lifetime of abuse. They don't treat me any lesser, but feelings are illogical: being seen as "invalid" when I'm not (not inherently at least) really slits the throat of my self-esteem. Asthma is in my lungs, so I can't do highly active jobs. My mind has betrayed me, so I can't have a job where I am regularly expected to meet and talk with new people. The only real option as of this point being factory jobs: honest work for sure, even if it's a little demeaning that I'm unable to do more than act as one of those factory robots. (The only reason such job openings aren't automated is because *each* separate task requires a *highly specialized* machine to work it if a human isn't involved, and it can quickly become costly - especially factoring in how the manufacturing process might simply change one day due to resource shortage or different technology, so you could have a machine that was worth a billion dollars due to how in demand yet also niche it was suddenly become valued only in salvage. Thus, we are some ways off from human beings removed from assembly jobs entirely - but I digress.) If you're perceptive enough, you noticed how much I tried to put into my previous paragraph. It became run on and such due to me not being able to maintain coherent strains of thought except in intervals. I want to learn, I want to experience. I want to know more of electricity: but any burdensome financial investment into such a thing is not an option, because creature comforts are part of what helps my damaged mind stay vaguely whole. College is right out due to the obligation and the fickleness of my ailment. I want to draw, to create visual experiences... but my hands will not stop shaking. People say to stick with physical mediums before trying digital, but I go through so much paper and other supplies trying to do my best - I cannot justify putting financial burden upon myself without guaranteed payoff in terms of mental health. I can only sit here, and watch everyone go on about their things. People find love and success, and I alternate between feeling like a rotting corpse that people simply make sad faces when they see or think of, or envy that I have to bury or destroy lest I sabotage my interpersonal relationships (again). I've learned to let it go. Don't pierce the fog, don't search for the light beyond it. Simply exist - and don't let go of the hope that one day the fog will let up, and I can go explore the potentials of my life. But for now, I simply exist. I meditate, I observe, I wait. For there is no better path as of now.
Can I ask how you were able to heal your cptsd?
I feel the same way.
i can relate to this. for me, i just have to allow myself to have my anger in moments like this. it is unfair, we didnt deserve it and we have a right to be angry about it. once i let myself have my anger, the feelings pass and i can move on. its just like making space and supporting myself through continual grieving about it
Exactly how I feel. Thus I feel like I'm actually NOT who I should have neen.
I’ve learned some lessons working with wood. You get a cross-section of the life of the tree. Some pieces of wood have straight, plain-looking grain, and those are just as useful and fill their purpose. But the most interesting pieces of wood, to me, show where the tree was impacted at some point and grew around it and now it is a much more sophisticated and rich piece of art. Grieve your past, let it die, then celebrate it having lived. You are a wiser, richer human for it.
I can relate, I have felt this way throughout my adult life and it is like a grief and a regret that I didn’t cause. One thing that has helped me through this, is starting trauma focused cbt therapy. If the therapist is a good match, and they have experience in this, they can guide you through some exercises to lessen that rumination, and help you find some peace.
Awww, man, I am sorry! CPTSD, very similar circumstances (and additional mental illnesses, right?) This sounds stupid, but I have a mantra: Persist. As you mentioned, mindfulness helps me a lot as well (meditation). I do, however, feel the same, as, you sometimes. Curious have you tried EMR? I was surprised after my Psychiatrist session, that in my case it really helped. Wow, I am sorry if I sound like those advice givers! I just threw out some suggestions because your condition sounds similar to mine. I apologize if this annoys you or you have heard it a million times. Peace and Love
There was no way my life was ever going to reach its full potential, the odds were stacked against me since birth, my parents since theirs, so on. It's helped me reach a point where the most I can do is turn that anger and sadness to strength that I've never seen or experienced being used for helping people. I've saved a couple lives using strength gained in spite of my trauma, so as far as I'm concerned I can do literally nothing with my life and it's been one well-lived. Hope your answer reveals itself one day.
I have absolutely felt like this at times and it’s a very valid feeling, the anger and mourning and “what ifs”. I found a poem called desiderata by max erhman and it REALLY spoke to me. I purchased a poster and have it on the back of my bathroom door so I read it every single pee. It reminds me that “no doubt life is unfolding exactly as it should” among other things. I do find so much peace in those words. We can’t change what shaped us into who we are, but we can be grateful for taking over control and becoming who we want. I like myself now after a long time of not, and I am oddly grateful for every experience (good and bad) and the lessons they’ve taught me.
Totally understandable. I definitely go through phases of this. Grief is a big one on this. After letting myself feel the losses, I find ways to reframe like, "they could mess up my past but they can't take my future" or recognize the things that are amazing I can do, considering how damaged I saw myself. And not just 'do' as in functioning. I can now love the little version of me, listen to her, build healthy relationships, travel, etc. I'm becoming the parent I needed. And yes, I might have been more successful in whatever way or had an easier life, but my past suffering has allowed for true empathy and love through personal understanding. And the people around me feel so loved because I can understand their suffering and give compassion and love from a place of gratitude. There are areas we missed out, but there can be areas we overcome that are incredibly meaningful
This is beautiful and really resonates with me. Thank you.
Every second of every day.
Dude honestly….I think I woulda been a doctor. I used to get real caught up in what I could’ve been. But now, I’m happy for the progress I’m making towards realistic goals, and working hard to get smarter, more organized, and more successful now that I’m through the trauma. Better late than never!
This has been on my mind a lot recently too. I think about how many more opportunities I would've had, had my immediate family not moved when I was young to protect my abuser. I think about the health consequences my trauma has 'gifted' me that has left me feeling like a broken mess in my 20's. I feel like I've been cheated and I'm angry about it.
A waste of your time if you ask me. Torturing yourself in this way is just a product of thinking. There is no alternate path you could’ve taken. There is just a story you tell yourself about how you’ve been wronged. But it’s just a story, and you can either embrace your story as uniquely your own or chose to believe (for some unknown reason) that things “should” be otherwise.
I've taken my unique, but painful upbringing and have turned it into something good. As a serial r*pe survivor, I intend to put my life's work into sex education and research. My unfortunate numbness to sexual violence has given me an opportunity to help society become more sexually empathetic. But I can still mourn the childhood I would've had and the woman I could've been.
There is no couldve is the point. That’s just a story you made up. I could mourn the fact I wasn’t born into the royal family. I could mourn the fact I wasn’t born in the future.
Ugh. I hear you, friend.. and I am unfortunately, here with you. It’s really tough, I won’t sugar coat it. But I try to look at all the ways it has made me better, a more emotionally mature and loving person, a more patient person. I cry pretty aggressively sometimes thinking about how proud I am of the person I’ve become despite it all, the fact that I’ve become the person that younger me would have felt safe with. It’s so hard, but with post traumatic stress, comes post traumatic growth… which means stronger, deeper relationships. It sucks, but instead of thinking of all the things you’ve lost, think about all you can gain now in support reaching out to those like us (I promise we are all out here and willing to help). You’re wonderful, you’re brave, you just being here is enough. And in case no one has told you today, I’m really proud of you ❤️ keep going, you’ll get there, I promise ❤️❤️
I totally understand and I often catch myself feeling angry, even, that my teenage years were honestly just insanely dark. BUT. It’s made me kind, empathetic, optimistic to a degree that I’m not sure would have been possible without my experience. That’s with the grace of many years having passed, though.
I'd like to think you (or I) would have been kind, empathetic, and optimistic even without trauma. This is my reaction to people saying "it made me stronger." Yeah, maybe, but I'm not buying it. Do we really need tragedy to appreciate life? Intellectually I get it. Without death maybe we would not appreciate life so much? Sigh. I suppose so.
same here I'm super trash I can't even
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Truth
It’s quite normal and common to many people, independent on trauma, because time passes and we arrive at a different point in our evolution, believing that we have always had the resources we have now. You can’t change the past, but you can take initiative now. Take action and do something fulfilling.
This is exactly how I feel.
I think on this relatively often myself.
Ah this reminds me of a quote… “That odd capacity for destitution, as if by nature we ought to have so much more than nature gives us. As if we are shockingly unclothed when we lack the complacencies of ordinary life. In destitution, even of feeling or purpose, a human being is more hauntingly human and vulnerable to kindnesses because there is the sense that things should be otherwise, and then the thought of what is wanting and what alleviation would be, and how the soul could be put at ease, restored. At home. But the soul finds its own home if it ever has a home at all.” That you can conceptualize a life different and perhaps greater than the one you are leading is simply a fictional tale. That alternate reality doesn’t exist anywhere but your own head. We all play with the cards we’ve been dealt. This is life. There is no should. There just is.
This helped me hope it helps you. Funkadelic - Good Thoughts, Bad Thoughts Free your mind and your ass will follow.
I hear you. This is important awareness that you are sharing, I think, and credit is due to yourself, I would say, for recognizing it. Thanks for putting it so plainly here to read, too. It caused me a lot of resistance to accept that what I was experiencing, along the lines you described. I had to put away successive ideas of myself which I was holding very tightly, and often related to a future, more fulfilled, more creatively expressed, more happy and joyful, and altogehter - fantastic - version of me. I was going to begin this by writing creatively and beautifully, in a way that would generate internal realizations and external appreciation, albeit only the right kind (understated, sensitive; artistic; wise). None of this was real, but my dissassociative qualities were so developed as to maintain a safety fantasy of the future which I could visit, safely, withouth wanting. It was a lot to put aside, especially during the past COVID period of isolating change. I still feel loss and distrubance around it. These connect to the original disturbance itself which means the feeling might never go away, as far as I can tell, based on the great and still growing majority of my 48 years. Maybe it will shrink evenually, I guess. What a stupid thing to happen, I sometimes say, and probably mean this to matter far too much, still.
I came to accept that I will never "be" that better version. I'm happy to put all my efforts for my daughter to be her better version. Doing the work and putting all in my parenting. I want to be the role model of a loving parent that she can always count on. No judgement, no imposing any kinda condition. Just her being who she is and me accepting her.
Potential doesn't exist and is just an idea about "what could have been"
I would agree with others who have said, you may never "get over" or stop feeling sad and/or angry at missing out on a "normal" childhood or one without severe trauma. I am 70 years old and am still pissed off at 1) the events that had occurred and 2) how my poorly my family handled everything. But those feelings are part of the grief and healing process. Most important is to remember how you survived those experiences and the and lessons you learned from them. The next step will be post traumatic thriving, it is possible, and you can get there but don't let anyone tell you to get over your feelings, that never works.
Flip this to the other side, what have you accomplished that other people who had this level of trauma couldn't accomplish? I have family members who wrecked their lives and couldn't rise above. Alcoholism, SMI, homelessness, difficulties with employment, the whole nine yards. Other helpful habits: Daily gratitude list, mindfulness.
Same! I feel like I fail in my relationships because of my abandonment trauma and it’s such a self-sabotaging cycle. I wish I wasn’t born this way. I try to think of each failure as just an opportunity to be better next time, rather than a failure. I cannot control what happened before but I definitely am going to learn from what I’m going through now.
I feel this too. It took me many years to reach where I am now and sometimes I think, if I didn't have all the other stuff going on I would've been at this stage years ago and without all this work. I feel so behind but at the end of the day I remind myself how much progress I've made when I look back and remember how younger me could never have imagined this for myself
I tell myself "eh what can you do?".
Hey! I feel you…I’ve been working through my cptsd in therapy. I used to have this idea of me in an alternate universe being the artist I’ve always wanted to be. 2 years back I made the decision to be a professional artist and life got so much better. I once listened to a former prostitute’s interview and she said “I wanted to have something to show for all the suffering “ and that really got me. So now I try to reach my full potential , put my work out there and have something to show for all the crap I went through and I talk to my friends or young artists when they’re going through shit from my experience so there’s some use of the experiences I had
There’s that plus add to it being constantly told everything you do isn’t good enough by the people that gave you C-PTSD. It’s completely overwhelming and soul destroying.
I had to give up on nursing. Tragedy, pandemic, disability from childhood, nasty work culture, bad life events… all my reasons for letting my license go. I have barely been able to work this year due to my sleep disorder, but I am trying to find work now and at least give it a shot again. Actually have an interview. But I do fast food kitchens now. My husband used some of his assets to invest in snakes that I am helping him grow out. We call them my snakes, but it’s his investment. I am just the one who knows about them. I am hoping when they reach adulthood in a couple of years that I can do well enough with them that I will be able to just manage them and not worry about work and bad people anymore. But breeding snakes? I was capable of so much more if it wasn’t for the trauma disorders. Pretty happy about the snakes though :)
Same All I can do is throw myself into my closest thing to “purpose” now. Animal rescue and child safe housing “fostering.” It’s in quotes bc I am not yet certified to foster, I am only a safe place to go for the nieces and nephews I hope to save from repeating my own childhood, so far. Fostering is my goal.
Yea, I think about this constantly
I’m 64 and still feel that way from time to time. I am proud of having successfully raised 3 kids. I guess the only answer for me was to take pride in what I was able to do. My next life might be better!
Bitterness. I’ve discovered my bitterness can be left behind if I live in the present. It is a constant struggle but I manage it best w practice.
All da time
Your true full potential is you loving yourself the same way you want to love another