People online complain that their therapist/psychologist/psychiatrist will not use CPTSD as a diagnosis. According to their own manual of disorders DSM-5, it doesn’t exist, so for insurance purposes some other set of letters are used. My counselor wouldn’t even give me PTSD, until my work wanted to know exactly what I was living with. My…
My counselor asked me why didn’t I tell? At first I didn’t know, because I didn’t remember. To help me get in touch with my feelings he gave me a children’s coloring book about feelings to use. Color this page happy and what color is sad and so on then came the page “What would…
A friend posts excellent stuff on line for CPTSD. One of the topics that I struggle with is toxic shame. https://blogs.psychcentral.com/psychology-self/2019/01/toxic-chronic-shame/ Hard thing is when I do something wrong there is regular shame which is Jiminy Cricket reminding me what I need to do to correct my poor choices. If I hurt someone I feel…
I actually maintain 3 different blogs. My picture blog I’ve hardly touched in a year. I kept getting it more and more complicated until I found I couldn’t keep up with it any more. It started out 1 picture a day….then I made it more complicated. I have my We are One blog and it…
I grew up learning about fight or flight ad nauseam. I blew it off. I didn’t fight, I didn’t run. I figured it didn’t apply to me, which in a way it didn’t. I eventually learned about freeze. Then I read an article by Peter Walker outlining the 4 F’s: Fight, Flight, Freeze and Fawn. …
Dissociation from my emotions is a symptom of PTSD/CPTSD. I was numb. I didn’t feel pain but I didn’t feel happiness either. I was so completely detached from my feelings that I couldn’t tell you at any given moment what I felt. I knew I had feelings….sometimes I was happy and sometimes I felt bone…
In the media, online and gossip around me have some fairly messed up ideas about PTSD. PTSD/CPTSD is not rudeness, cruelty to others, or criminal behavior. Recently, I heard someone say that the reason a person was so rude was because they were mentally ill. WRONG. Missing social skills, yes. Lack of proper upbringing, yes. …
I am doing a bit of light Summer reading.…(please read that with intense sarcasm.) If talk of mass shootings is triggering for you…..please skip today’s post. They Call Me “Mr. De” is the book written by Frank DeAngelis, former principal of Columbine High School. This high school was one of the first mass shootings after…
One of the symptoms that blurs the lines between PTSD and TBI, traumatic brain injury, is sensory overload. My daughter shares different articles about TBI since that is her challenge. I recognize the symptoms as something I experience with PTSD/CPTSD. Here is the link to the Mighty: https://themighty.com/2016/02/people-explain-what-sensory-overload-feels-like/ I first discovered my intense dislike of…
The title of the article caught my attention right away, which it is supposed to do. 15 Things Only People With ‘Smiling Depression’ Understand I remember talking to my first counselor and complaining that my doctor told me I was depressed and didn’t know it. He smiled and gently asked, “Do you ever feel angry…
