Complex PTSD

[JoJoMax]

I was recently diagnosed with Complex PTSD. Of course the "complex" part isn't recognized in the DSM, so my paperwork says chronic ptsd instead. As soon as I started reading up on complex ptsd I had an AHA moment! My life made sense! I had no idea that I have been triggered so much and have actually been suffering from flashbacks. I always thought of ptsd as something that soldiers suffer from and end up in a corner terrified and thinking they hear bullets. I didn't think that it was something I could possibly have.
I would love to talk to others that have complex ptsd. It seems daunting that I can ever get over an entire childhood and large portion of my adult life of abuse and abandonment.

[Fargin]

Thanks for drawing my attention to the subject.

I've often compared some of my "shame flashbacks" to PTSD. I'd be out and about and I'll suddenly get reminded by something that brought me so much shame, I bring my hands to me face. If it happens around other people, I'll attempt to disguise it as rubbing my eyebrows or chin, but what I'm actually doing, is covering my face in shame, over something that happened maybe 30 years ago. Then I get anxious, worrying how people would treat me, if they knew what triggered me.

Through talk therapy, I've been able to place my childhood in the "not okay" category. This doesn't mean, I'm not still affected by the shame, mistrust and anxiety, but I've become much better at accepting my current situation as a result of feral parenting and childish survival mechanisms. And because we're talking survival, I also accept, that these mechanisms are deeply ingrained. If you burn yourself on a hot stove again and again, you can't just unlearn that lesson. Me, I'm trying to unlearn, that I'm not a bad person/son/brothe and avoiding even minor conflicts by self-annihilation isn't the best way to cope with people and adult life. But if we're talking the foundation of my personality, I might have to rebuild everything it brick by brick, so I try to accept that it's a massive task, maybe my life's work.

[Glock therapy]

Hi,
I only recently learned about the concept of Complex PTSD/Developmental Trauma and I’ve really had an aha moment too. I'm amazed at how well it explains my experience. I’d heard people who’d been badly abused or who’d otherwise had horrible childhood experiences describe a fundamental unease, instability in different areas, and internal conflicts and chaos that I strongly related to. But I always took trauma to involving at least one off-the-charts horrific experience of the sort that exceeded anything I've ever had happen to me. And I always wondered—what’s my problem? My parents had issues and there was some emotional abuse, but like a lot of people I never thought that the stuff that went on was "bad" enough to offer any explanation of why my life has been such a mess.

One particular Youtube video that really clicked for is by a guy named Laurence Heller. His talk, which is an explanation of his particular approach to treating developmental trauma, does a really good job of explaining how trauma occurs, I thought. Perhaps it's really basic stuff, but his explanation, including the interplay and accumulation of different stuff really blew me away.
Here's the link if you want to check it out: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPhasHMSyas
I think everyone on this board should check it or something similar out, because--and especially because of a lot of the surveys Paul reads--I think a lot of us with "mental illnesses" have unrecognized trauma.

I felt somewhat exhilarated by this aha moment of learning about the broader concept of trauma and how much of my experience it encompasses. But, like you, the flip side to this is "This is so complex, developed over such a long period of time, and so fundamental to me. How the fuck am I ever going to begin to change this?" It's like I have to become a fluent in a foreign language or become a performance-level violinist or some other skill that is just too complex to learn as a middle aged person. I feel validated, but discouraged at the same time. Am considering trying to work with someone who is trained in NARM (Heller's approach) or Somatic Experiencing or some such body-centered approach that focuses on trauma. I work with a psychoanalytically oriented shrink with whom I've started doing a bit of EMDR, but it doesn't feel like we're getting anywhere.

Anyways... related to what you wrote but am kind of new to the whole approach. Am at a point right now, too, where I'm finding it very difficult to do anything and as self-defeating as it is, I may not really do anything about it right now.

[Fargin]

Thanks a bunch for that youtube link GT.

Informative and brutal.

When I listened to it, I couldn't help feeling sorry for the patient group and sorry for myself. Compassion might be a more constructive word, but sorry or pity is probably most accurate for me. No one wants pity, but it's a change from contempt. By listening to Laurance Heller, I have to respect how severe the injury and how automated my problematic survival instinct might be.

If I accept that this is "so complex, long time developed and so fundamental," it becomes impossible for me to be my usual cruel and mean to myself.

[Glock therapy]

Hi Fargin,
Glad you liked the video--I think it's really good, tho' judging from comments section that sentiment is not unanimous among viewers (a given on Youtube, I guess). I think "informative and brutal" sums up the presentation really well--it's both understated and earth-shaking. (It seems like it's part of an info session being given to people who are considering taking training in his approach). One of the things that I like about him is that he readily recognizes his place within a broad legacy and readily gives credit to others' work. One thing that's not clear from the video nor from the other stuff I've watched/read--what's the therapy like? I don't have a sense for that yet, but will continue my investigation. Bessel van der Kolk and Peter Levine are a couple of other folks whose material has really resonated.

gt

[melalerve]

Interesting topic JJM, interesting video GT!

I think this is the group for me. I can relate to what you guys are describing so much. "Some stuff happened", but I was always sure that my problems in life couldn't actually have much to do with my (probably NPD) parents' acrimonious divorce, the way I was subjected to sexually transgressive behavior from my mom (barging into the bathroom etc), the constant emotional abuse or how I was constantly blamed for "disturbing the peace" (verbatim quote) in the family.

I did sense certain patterns of behavior, like how I would reject nurturing people and instead become "friends" and "partners" with people with whom I could form ultimately abusive relationships. But it wasn't until fairly recently that I came to realize this all is connected, and that the "low-level" of abuse wasn't all that low-level compared to what the majority of other people experiences in their childhood and youth.

Anyway, my modest contribution to this thread is this: Recently, I stumbled upon a Wikipedia article about Self-defeating personality disorder. Then I searched some more, and came across this short-ish Youtube lecture and also a text titled Masochistic Personality Disorder: A Diagnosis Under Consideration.

Unfortunately, much like Complex PTSD, Self-defeating (or masochistic) personality disorder isn't recognized in the DSM. "SDPD" was proposed in the appendix of DSM-3 but then dropped and never picked up in the later editions. I'm convinced these are closely linked or related, if not much the same. I'd be really interested to hear you guys' opinion about this. Do the criteria for "SDPD" (included in the Wikipedia article) sound as familiar to you as they do to me? Or am I way off-base and in your opinion(s) these are not actually similar?

[Glock therapy]

Hey Mel,
Thanks for the material you suggested and the thoughtful stuff you write. So the people who proposed Self Defeating Personality Disorder for the DSM weren't able to get it into the manual? There's a decent joke in there somewhere, but I can't quite locate it...

Hey, I think that the connection you draw makes a lot of sense. From what I know, the folks who endorse a trauma-focused view of "mental illness" see personality disorders as the long-term outgrowths of what were once adaptive reactions to trauma. I'm blurring all the stuff I've watched/read recently but I'm pretty sure Heller--and many others too--talks directly about how much-stigmatized disorders as BPD and even psychoses are not pathological at all, and should not be considered deficits, but rather are survival strategies that have long, long outlived their usefulness, becoming hindrances.

Recent guest Cassie Snieder talked about how any tiny bit of reasonable self-care, such as seeing a doctor was responded to with a "You too good for us" message from her family. One can imagine how such messages might induce a talented child to tell themselves "I'm not college material", "I'm not attractive" in order to end up staying close to home and family. Makes sense for a 4 year old to hunker down, but not a 24 year old. A hypothetical example, perhaps, of the sort of adaptive behavior that might also be the seed of what could become self-defeating personality disorder?

One of the things that I'm having a little trouble with in all of this is the definition of trauma. I think we need to be able to accept that early learning can be the genesis of lots of different problems. Somehow though, it seems that such early experiences can only be taken seriously if we label them "traumatic" and have neurological evidence for changes in the brain. And maybe it makes sense to discuss things in terms of their effects most of all, but if we expand the definition of trauma to any adverse experience, we've lost an important sense of the word. I'm not trying to diminish everyone's experience, including my own, but I feel uncomfortable with the word trauma. Not because I feel it taints me but because it may diminish appreciation of the magnitude of experience of people who've suffered particularly profound abuse. On the other hand, lots of what I've been reading lately discusses how neglect and inconsistency on a caregiver's part can have worse consequences later in life than more "active" abuse. I'm not really able to articulate it so well, but I think things are a bit unclear around all of this in part because of language issues, and a new understanding of the impact of early experience. It may be a function of age--I'm 50 and decades ago, when I would have first learned the word it was not attached to but the most overt and horrific experiences.

Anyway, thanks for the good discussion around this. Sorry if my ability to get back is delayed at times.

-gt

[melalerve]

One of the things that I'm having a little trouble with in all of this is the definition of trauma.

Yes, I fully agree with what you wrote. Another aspect that gets easily overlooked when using the term "trauma", either in an overly specific or in an overly broad way, is that the same type and severity of experience (whether single event or longterm repetitive experience) may lead to trauma (or what's called impaired development or "maladaptive" behavior) in one person, but not in someone else who is more resilient for a variety of potential reasons, while a third person may display maladaptive behavorial patterns for a while but e.g. seek help earlier and respond well to treatment and other "learning chances" (e.g. relationships etc).

It's probably difficult to construct universal terms for the spectrum of experiences with traumatic potential and for the class of effects these experiences can cause, especially a term which emphasizes both the quantitivity of the severity of abuse as well as potential qualitative differences in the effects of the abuse.

Then again, as any visit to a self-help group will reveal, there's a wide spectrum of severity for any type of individual problems. So if we're discussing qualitative differences between "serious trauma" and "been through some shit", I'd say it largely depends on what the person her-/himself is feeling and thinking and doing (i.e. how they are actually coping), as well as what others who hear their story and/or watch them live their lives are feeling and thinking.

[Fargin]

I've been postponing replying to this topic for a good while too. I actually think the subject scared me a bit. I used to prepare myself before leaving my house, by imagine getting punched straight in the face or in bed at night, visualize getting handcuffed hands and feet and squeezed down in the leg space between the front and back seat of a police car, which somehow would help me relax and fall asleep.

Trauma, like depression, when thrown around becomes trivialized. I also think many of us, "the patient group," have trivialized our traumas, by labeling it as "some shit happened long time ago, but that clearly isn't connected to why my current life is falling apart."

For me, befriending a the more serious vocabulary, trauma, abuse, neglect and survival, has helped me a lot. By understanding the severity, it makes more sense to me, why it continues to affect my life decades later and it also makes sense to me, why it's so difficult to change. It's also a daunting task, however I feel, I've got a more realistic understanding for the size of the problem.

I think our survival mechanisms has to trivialize our own traumas or depress/suppress it, so we can attempt to cope, but even if we remove it from our consciousness, it might still be operating on an autonomous and automated level, just like breathing. So trivializing or denial is just like pressing the snooze button on your alarm clock. You might lower you state of alarm a bit, but it's set to go off at any second.

[melalerve]

"some shit happened long time ago, but that clearly isn't connected to why my current life is falling apart."

It's easy to fall into that thought trap if family & friends keep telling you to "let it go", "let bygones be bygones", "don't live in the past" etc.

even if we remove it from our consciousness, it might still be operating on an autonomous and automated level, just like breathing

Have you ever tried meditation? I've only recently stopped dismissing it as some kind of "esoteric nonsense" and started learning more about it. It's quite fascinating what kind of stuff comes up when one drops all those little defense mechanism and distractions.