Most people progress towards a goal with an expectation to keep moving forward.  PTSD means set backs.  Like driving an old jalopy you never know when a tire will blow, a part will fall off, or a water hose will spring a leak.  I wonder what’s wrong with me that I can not keep moving forward.  I am discouraged.  I spent 10 years in counseling with 2 different counselors, both moved away to another state.  I thought I could go on my own then this summer, another set back.  I am frustrated.  I met with a counselor for 2 sessions and quickly recognized she had no idea how to work with me.  I asked specifically if she had experience with PTSD.  She assured me she did.  2 sessions told me she didn’t.  I ponder.  Am I being unreasonable on purpose?  Is my frustration coming out as resentment towards this counselor?  Then I remind myself that I set up some logical criteria that would give me a clue about the relationship.  I accept that my story is not easy.  Listening to myself I recognize that it sounds like something Stephen King would write.  Only Stephen King’s stories have to be believable.  My story is so bizarre, there are many that can’t except my truth.  They doubt that any person could be so deliberately cruel.  My abuser’s pleasure was my pain.  He relished hurting me.  Took me a while to accept my own reality.  2 sessions is a short time to expect someone to accept my story unless they have experience with other PTSD survivors.  PTSD does not mean I am weak.  PTSD means I survived unbearable shit.  No other word for it.  It stunk.  I was hurt.  Repeatedly.  Accepting my story is hard for me.  However, I learned that as long as I reject what happened, it binds me to my past.  A weird paradox, denial actually binds me to my past.  PTSD gives me a working point.  Part of PTSD is set backs.  An unknown trigger or a trigger that I thought desensitized suddenly blows up in my face.  My default reactions is dissociation, binge eating, and isolation.  I accept that I had a set back this summer.  PTSD means I have set backs.  Doesn’t mean that I will stay back.  Doesn’t mean I will give up.  Doesn’t mean that PTSD defines me.  It means I have the steps to start moving again if I first accept that triggers happen.  Doesn’t mean I am weak or bad, it means I endured so much and there is still healing to do.

Scrambled pieces