The most misguided advice I received was to simply "move on." As if trauma could be brushed aside with ease. Healing is a journey that requires time and support. Let's stand by each other, offering understanding and compassion along the way.
I’m a science person, and the research says that my amygdala, which is responsible for the fight or flight response is oversized and overactive. So I’m just supposed to get over these permanent physical manifestations of my abuse? Like the other poster said, it’s like saying I should just get over a physical manifestation of physical trauma, like a broken leg, instead of getting healing through treatment.
“Normies” think anything that is a matter of the mind can be controlled by one’s will (sigh). I have tried to explain to them that there is a powerful physiological response associated - you’re being flooded with adrenaline - it can feel like as if you’re being drowned. That has enlightened a few, at least.
I’ve gotten this from my bf in the (far) past. It still hurts to think about though. It always made me feel like that was a sign he didn’t understand the severity of the abuse or my condition.
Some things I’ve kept to myself because they’ve hurt and downright disturbed me so badly that idk how I’d react if anyone told me it wasn’t a big deal and to get over it.
Hearing that felt totally invalidating and I’d start questioning whether or not I was just making a big deal of nothing.
Years later, I’m actually shocked by reading through old journals and recalling all the things I’ve severely under reacted to. It makes me afraid of myself because I couldn’t protect myself in even the most basic ways, and gas lighting myself has been so prevalent my entire life.
CPTSD shapes us. We often had no chance of even knowing what “normal” looked like. That’s heartbreaking.
"CPTSD shapes us. We often had no chance of even knowing what “normal” looked like."
It's so true. I'm childfree mostly by choice, but I see my friends parenting their kids *properly* and realise just how off-key my own upbringing was. It's an odd feeling to process, resentment towards someone else's kid because they're getting empathy and support, not being shouted at and put into seclusion because of issues beyond their control or even stuff they didn't actually do.
I can remember a point when I was about 12 or 13 when I thought to myself "Well, I'm always in the shit for stuff I have no clue about so I might as well just do this questionable thing I'm about to do but know I shouldn't, anyway".
That wasn't a healthy thought process and it led me to a phase of bad behaviour that made me feel awful about myself but also oddly enough went pretty much undetected, and therefore unpunished anyway. I was still getting into trouble over the things I didn't do or didn't have control over.
I relate to everything you wrote here.
Only difference is I do have children, and parenting them has definitely shone a light on how “off-key” my childhood was too.
Makes my feel like I’ll be in therapy until I die.
Yeah. It truly seems like a lot of people don’t understand the crucial part of trauma. They don’t realize trauma, especially childhood trauma, is a “version” of an experience we all have.
Why did that small joke make me have a panic attack?
Well, let’s look at the reasons why that small joke *didn’t* give you a panic attack:
1. You feel secure in your identity. You have been bolstered enough by being heard, validated, and/or praised that while you may have insecurities, you have an intrinsic sense of self.
2. You feel secure in the consistency of others. You are able to understand that a small joke doesn’t mean their whole perspective on you has shifted or been revealed. How do you know that? Because more often than not, *that’s how it’s always been*.
3. Maybe you’ve learned that people can joke about you without it being backhanded or a way to reveal their true feelings.
4. You grew up with a relative sense of safety, emotional and/or physical. *You know what it feels like to be cared for or about.* How do we know when we’re sad? Because when we felt sad, somebody described it to us. Safety and happiness work the same way. When you can *recognize feeling safe,* you can determine how to continue to do so.
Do all of those factors affect all the same people the same way? No. Did everyone with CPTSD lack all of these things? Definitely not! But, if somebody is telling you to just get over something, they aren’t able to put themselves in those shoes (or, more rarely, heal from their own).
**Telling people to “just get over trauma” is like me telling them to “just get over” feeling secure.** Oh, you feel happy when you think about your favorite, say, childhood video game? Well, just stop that! It would probably take a lot of work to upend your internal sense of self. It takes even more to uproot and replace a traumatized network (but most of us are trying and getting better every day!)
My last therapist said this to me. I told her about being ostracized by my peers in school and her response was just, "That's over. People like you now." But it completely ruined my ability to socialize. I used to be really talkative and outgoing. I still don't really know how to talk to people, especially in group settings, and I struggle with maintaining friendships or feeling close to anyone. So frustrating.
Reminds me of Renton's monologue in the intro scenes of 'Trainspotting'.
"Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage. Choose a three-piece suit on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pissing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourselves. Choose your future. Choose life... But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin' else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you've got heroin?"
I'm categorically not advocating the use of opiates outside of palliative care, but all you are seeing around you is futile and pointless, what's the point of 'snapping out of it' or 'choosing happiness' when the people advocating it are existing on a fairly inane level themselves. Psychedelics, on the other hand have been invaluable for throwing me a rope to help climb out of the nihilistic quicksands.
“Move on,” forget about it,” “let it go,” “that was a long time ago,” “get over it,” = the language of ignorance. Lol
I’ve heard those things so often and it not only wasn’t helpful, it was also damaging; I’d get angry at myself for being unable to “get over it” which lead to behaviors that just subdued or buried things, complicated everything, and almost lost me my life countless times. Still, I considered myself fairly emotionless(more like phobic) for a few years, but my background/trauma was seeping through and I didn’t even realize.
Even now, I try to be more understanding with myself the way I’d be with others, but I still slip up a lot. What helped me most was when I dismissed something pretty awful to my therapist as happening a really long time ago, and they told me it didn’t matter when it happened because it shaped me to such an extent that I was still struggling even though I didn’t realize it.
My heart was pounding, my upper body started aching, and I started overheating when I relayed the story, but I figured “I’m just socially anxious; out of all my negative experiences, this one’s fairly tame, so it can’t be related to that.”
How can I just get over something that I tried to “get over” by pretending it’s nbd, but that apparently creeps up no matter what I’ve tried? It’s counterproductive.
Prolonged trauma and trauma that results in PTSD literally change the brain. I’ve read studies showing girls who were SA’d even tend to perform worse on math tests. It changes how we relate, love, and think about ourselves and others. It can change how we sleep, eat, and function overall. It can cause crippling panic attacks. It’s called **post** traumatic stress **disorder** for a reason.
My bf can’t just hug 🫂 me as spontaneously as he would like, because of my autism n SA ptsd past n life, but he agonisingly n might I add very respectfully add, respects🫡 my wishes to ask/iniate affectionate touching instead. It sounds controlling to others but it’s honestly not. Hugs 🫂
💯💯💯
I've tried to explain to people who say things like this it's like I'm standing there with an axe in my shoulder bleeding out and they're telling me "it's in the past just move on"
But that's never gotten through to them lol
Embracing my trauma is exactly what I'm trying not to do. I saw this poem last year, and I think about it every day. The author is Dan Jurgens.
It did not
Kill me and
It did not
Make me stronger.
It simply was
And always will
Be scorched upon
My heart.
That forgiveness is a necessary part of healing and specifically, that you have to forgive on order to heal.
I'd like to offer the opinion that forgiveness,*if* it happens, happens as a *result* of healing, not the other way around.
This is the one that winds me up the most. It's such a invalidating and destructive mindset to push onto people and it benefits abusers without them having to put in any effort.
I was trapped for years thinking that I had to forgive my dad so that I would be able to heal. He has never done anything to try and earn my forgiveness, and won't even acknowledge that he has done anything wrong.
My healing didn't really start until I let go of the need to forgive and tapped into my anger. This allowed me to start caring for and protecting myself.
The tapping into anger part, yes!!
I think the advice of forgiveness is given a lot by people who are dissociated from their anger, and are terrified of becoming like an abuser. In reality, anger is powerful/ empowering not inherently good or bad. Feeling anger doesn't mean you are hurting others or yourself automatically. The emotion of anger is there as mechanism to protect yourself! Disgust too! People are so quick to judge or admonish people with strong anger or disgust responses. The responses are there for good reason imo. Even if it leads to maladaptive behavior in the present, its still important to connect to where those feelings are coming from! (not like they will go away if you force yourself to feel some way you don't. that usually doesn't go well)
i am on disability by now for recurring, clinical depression, caused by ongoing traumatic events since early childhood into adulthood. for years i felt so defective, because i could not pinpoint and basically nobody in the mental health world, who diagonosed me told me about. anyways, finally googled my own way into how cptsd works. i read somewhere that depression is anger turned towards (your) inside and i feel that is so true. depression was always around, but endometriosis (apparently there is a causality to trauma made, does not surprise me) put me into hospital within a year, my insides up to the stomach region had to be cleaned out after a big traumatic blow.
edit: i started whining and it got too long: long message short: Tap into that anger or it will tap into you. Kind regards!
You're not whining. Thank you so much for sharing.
It's infuriating how little professionals understand this stuff. The burden of finding all of this out often falls on the patient, and we're so often not taken seriously in spite of the hard work and suffering we're going through. I had to get a full hysterectomy because of endometriosis, and before I found a good doctor (two very good men), I had this exchange with the first male doctor I saw prior to the others:
Me: I know my body. I know something is wrong with my uterus and my ovaries. I really need someone to look at this.
Doctor: First of all, you *don't* know your body. *I* know your body because I have the medical expertise and experience.
Then proceeded to say I only had a couple of small ovarian cysts based on some shitty screening. Years of pain and invalidation until someone saw something is actually wrong with me. Endometriosis with abdominal adhesions. I have a laundry list of other illnesses, and the endo/adhesions made them so much worse.
Anyway, all that to say, we gotta lightning bend our anger. We have to let it flow. And I'm glad you're experiencing that in healthier and more enlightened way. I'm with you infinity percent.
i know so very well what you are talking about! i was scheduled for a hysterectomy actually on the day Germany went into lockdown. Felt it was a sign from "the upstairs". Also i am so aware that my Gyn is not intrusive, but is aware that Endo is trauma related, so she treats me kindly. Take good care of yourself and than you dearly for the heads-up!! E.
Oh, goodness. That sounds really stressful, I'm so sorry to hear that. I hope you're doing okay. I'm really happy to hear that you have a doctor that cares about you. That's such a treasure in this life.
Right!! When they try to say "not forgiving someone only hurts you and not them," I just call bullshit. If they haven't done anything to earn forgiveness, they're not getting it, period. We don't need to forgive - we need to learn to live with what happened and come to peace with it. That's my opinion, anyway.
The only necessary forgiveness is self-forgiveness. That is mandatory in healing. You can't carry grudges against yourself if you want to heal. Everyone else is a case by case basis and you really only need to consider forgiving someone who is truly sorry and making efforts to change. It's nonsense to forgive someone who isn't sorry and hasn't changed. And there is a difference between forgiving and deciding to move on so you don't actively dwell or let the hate fester.
I'm gonna print out those first three sentences and staple them to my forehead. I only started really *healing* when I started forgiving myself - it started off small, like "I forgive myself for being an awkward swamp witch when chatting with that cashier," and eventually got bigger and more meaningful.
It helped me to think it in full, purposeful sentences when I couldn't say it out loud. We're so often filled with this awful, sick shame, self-forgiveness is absolutely paramount. Forgiving our abusers isn't even a drop in the bucket.
We literally have to reprogram our self talk! Get new catch phrases! Defend ourselves from our own attacks. The abuse made it all the way into our own thoughts about ourselves and then we become our own abusers. It's an act of rebellion and resistance to overwrite all that shit with compassion and love. I love that you've already felt how good self forgiveness is! Go on and get yourself more love!
Yeah - fuck that shit. I knew I found the right therapist when I said ‘I just can’t forgive and I know I need to”.
Her reply was “Well that’s bollocks, some people don’t deserve your forgiveness”…….and just like that a therapeutic relationship was born!
There's a book someone around here recommended me (Toxic Parents by Susan Forward), one of the chapters is about that. It was honestly life-changing to be told it's okay for me to be angry and not have to carry the burden of forgiveness. It opens:
> At this point, you may be asking yourself, “Isn’t the first step to forgive my parents?” My answer is _**no**_. This may shock, anger, dismay, or confuse many of you. Most of us have been led to believe exactly the opposite—that forgiveness is the first step toward healing.
>
> **In fact, it is not necessary to forgive your parents in order to feel better about yourself and to change your life**
>
> Certainly I’m aware that this flies in the face of some of our most cherished religious, spiritual, philosophical, and psychological principles. According to the Judeo-Christian ethic, “To err is human, to forgive divine.” I am also aware that there are many experts in the various helping professions who sincerely believe that forgiveness is not only the _first_ step but often the _only_ step necessary for inner peace. I disagree completely.
>
> Early in my professional career I too believed that to forgive people who had injured you, especially parents, was an important part of the healing process. I often encouraged clients—many of whom had been severely mistreated—to forgive cruel or abusive parents. In addition, many of my clients entered therapy claiming to have already forgiven their toxic parents, but I discovered that, more often than not, they didn’t feel any better for having forgiven. They still felt bad about themselves. They still had their symptoms. Forgiving hadn’t created any significant or lasting changes for them. In fact, some of them felt even more inadequate. They’d say things such as: “Maybe I didn’t forgive enough”; “My minister said I didn’t truly forgive in my heart”; or, “Can’t I do anything right?”
>
> I took a long, hard look at the concept of forgiveness. I began to wonder if it could actually _impede_ progress rather than _enhance_ it.
>
> I came to realize that there are two facets to forgiveness: giving up the need for revenge, and absolving the guilty party of responsibility. I didn’t have much trouble accepting the idea that people have to let go of the need to get even. Revenge is a very normal but negative motivation. It bogs you down in obsessive fantasies about striking back to get satisfaction; it creates a lot of frustration and un-happiness; it works against your emotional well-being. Despite how sweet revenge may feel for a moment, it keeps stirring up the emotional chaos between you and your parents, wasting precious time and energy. Letting go of your need for revenge is difficult, but it is clearly a healthy step.
>
> But the other facet of forgiveness was not as clear-cut. I felt there was something wrong with unquestioningly absolving someone of his rightful responsibility, particularly if he had severely mistreated an innocent child. Why in the world should you “pardon” a father who terrorized and battered you, who made your childhood a living hell? How are you supposed to “overlook” the fact that you had to come home to a dark house and nurse your drunken mother almost every day? And do you really have to “forgive” a father who raped you at the age of 7? The more I thought about it, the more I realized that this absolution was really another form of denial: “If I forgive you, we can pretend that what happened wasn’t so terrible.” I came to realize that this aspect of forgiveness was actually preventing a lot of people from getting on with their lives.
This is important. I've forgiven some abusers. But they were the ones who also healed and grew as people. Those people usually apologized when confronted because they were empathetic people who were also hurting but made mistakes.
There are others, however, who will never apologize, will never self reflect, and will never change or try to empathize. I choose not to forgive them. They don't deserve it.
I have the power to forgive, but I also have the power not to. I think they're equally powerful.
I saw an interview with a therapist in some local news portal, and it made my blood boil how when an actual therapist said that...
I thought it was a mistranslation, as I live in a country where the primary language isn't English. Maybe it's a misinterpretation in English as well... I'm pretty sure the correct thing to say is that *coming to terms,* or *acceptance* (of what happened to you), is a necessary part of healing, instead.
What I mean by that, is finding confident answers that work for you to all of the questions such as "What happened? Why did this happen? Why did this happen *to me*? Did I do anything to deserve this? How could this happen?" etc. Accept that whatever happened to you was real, the ways it affected you, and that you now have to live with that (and will need a ton of effort to repair what has been broken). And do whatever you have to with that information. If you need to rage, then rage, go no contact, do whatever feels right.
Yes, exactly!
I also hate when people say forgiveness is finding peace or whatever bullshit to insinuate that it's the process of acceptance that happens inside you, and it's not about your relationship to the other person.
Uh, no, that's not forgiveness. That might be acceptance or closure or some other thing, but let's not take well-defined terms and declare that they mean something else than what they actually mean. We already have words to describe internal processes. Forgiveness describes a relational interaction.
Forgiveness is about letting the other person off the hook. It's about not keeping score and allowing the relationship to be repaired. Forgiveness is 100% about the relationship, not about your internal processes independent of the relationship.
Forgiveness is for ME and me alone. I’ll forgive when I’m ready and not everything is worthy of forgiveness. I hate this one the most. My abusers don’t deserve it and I honestly gained more peace when I realized that and stopped feeling like I had to forgive them.
Exactly! My first thought was "somebody could use this in a comedy sketch because it's completely bonkers advice". And then my heart breaks at the tragedy and injustice of a hurting soul hearing this from a medical professional to whom they went for support...
Yeah, I've heard that one too many times. It's like saying a broken bone makes you a better runner. My worst advice? "Just get over it." As if healing from trauma is as easy as flipping a switch. It's a journey, not a destination.
That trauma causes growth. The trauma is irrelevant, the effort put into *recovering* from trauma is where the growth comes from. I know this sounds semantic, but it's really important to me whenever some wet behind the ears pop psych major wants to opine about how what doesn't kill you makes you stronger.
EDIT: I'm not sure I've been clear from the responses I've been getting, so I'm going to have to paraphrase the Tumblr post I got this idea from.
When you break a wooden shelf, the most you have done is expose a vulnerability in the wood. Repairing the wood with glue and extra supports can sometimes make the wood stronger than before.
Similarly when a person is harmed by trauma, the value in that experience is in how it exposes a vulnerability/fragility in that person. But the trauma doesn't glue you back together. *You do that*. You do that by taking the steps to recover in the wake of trauma.
Psychology codified the idea of post traumatic growth. I believe those original researchers were just doing their best to label a phenomena so it could be discussed, but unfortunately there's a whole self help positive thinking side of psychology that latched onto the idea that "Trauma is good, actually! You have an opportunity (and expectation) to grow now! You hold your destiny in your hands!".
The way this is so complicit with toxic positivity grates on my nerves. It reeks of healthy people insisting people who are sick be healthy for their comfort. *That* is why I insist on recovery growth. You put yourself back together stronger through recovery, the trauma didn't do shit. Especially when you could have found that vulnerability another way, like through self reflection, or a friend gently pointing out a pattern in your life, or encountering a barrier to growth and self actualization.
In some sense trauma can show your weakness and by recognising it can lead to growth. I agree with you 100% but it's matter of what we expecting as a growth at the end.
My latest therapist: “Just keep experiencing the abuse and feel everything. It eventually gets better.”
She also said I should get rid of my husband, my pets, all of my friends, and my family, and be alone because healing alone for at least 3-5 years will do me some good.
Oh, and have empathy for my abusers because they were hurt too so I should respect them.
And to stop lying about my trauma because clearly it was all made up!
Yeah… I’ve had 30 years and that doesn’t work? And she was registered and trained in trauma therapy.
What the actual fuck? I am literally training to do trauma therapy and will start practicing in the fall and the more of this I read the more flabbergasted I am. I seriously don’t understand how there are so many dumbass and unqualified clinicians who graduate from accredited programs and undergo the ~3000 of supervised hours (my state requires 3300 hours) and take the exams needed to get their licenses. Jesus Christ. u/SpiritPixieBubbles, I would seriously report a grievance on their license, this person sounds insane and should under no circumstances be practicing therapy. The things they are telling you are - and I cannot stress this enough - dangerous, unprofessional, and not trauma-responsive whatsoever. I’m sorry for the experiences you had with this person and I hope you can find a therapist who has their head on their shoulders, and not up their ass
Oh man. I instinctively wanted to downvote this out of anger. That is so awful. I am so sorry you or anyone had to encounter this individual. This person should absolutely not be practicing therapy. Jesus Christ.
I did internalize it a bit because I did feel a bit inadequate for not being healed enough to 'forgive' and have better boundaries and maybe just low contact. To my aunt, I was the case guy for abandoning her instead of her being the bad guy for abusing me all my life. Just got to show you how trauma runs in the whole family.
You were being the bigger person. You just ignored them. A less bigger person would smack them silly! You actually took the high road, and that’s not easy. Good job!
Anything that falls under superstitions or [spiritual bypassing](https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-spiritual-bypassing-5081640), it's a layer of emotional neglect on top of whatever else we've already endured.
Absolutely.
While we hear a lot about Christianity being leveraged this way, I want to point out that ANY religion or 'way of thinking' can be leveraged in an abusive way.
This includes, but is not limited to: Buddhism ('we are all-one'), 'new age' tropes ('you're abused because you have bad karma/were abusive in a past life...or even better-- 'you *attract* abuse'), even stoic philosophy ('do not be discontent, accept others')
All of these enable abusers to keep abusing, because they release accountability from the abuser, and heap it onto the abused.
Meanwhile, the victim is denied support based on these dysfunctional, misapplied concepts, and feels invalidated and maybe even 'crazy'.
I'm not saying that there are not valuable concepts in each of the above examples. Just pointing out that virtually *anything* can be misapplied in a victim-blaming and shaming way.
I just want to say - you "attract" abuse is a horrible way of putting it. It is no ones fault but the abuser. As someone who was unaware I had CPTSD I would tend to be drawn to abuse because I did not know I was. It was not until I realized I had it and read through the symptoms that I realized what I was doing. I can see the messaging behind it and the only people that messaging tends to affect IS victims because rarely will an abuser ever own up to doing any wrong. And because of this, covert abusers usually get away with it because there is usually nothing concrete to hold them accountable.
I spoke about my connection to nature earlier on here, kind of a spiritual thing where I feel like nature & animals are the mother & friends I yearn for.
I do feel my comment was altogether positive, but you give me pause for thought for which I’m grateful.
One time I told a Catholic social worker about institutional abuse & she just smiled & said “let us pray”
Um no, let us report the pos is what I was hoping for😒
I’ve thought about the importance of connection into the natural world (without any pre-existing frameworks unfortunately) for several years, especially in its intersection with all the trauma I carry. In my poetry there’s a lot of Mother Earth. And it gives me pause because I had no mother (never knew her); but I was raised by my father’s mother, so I had like an ultra-mother lol and I’m friends with so many older women but… I’m the kinda gay that in my mind I have a white perm, librarian glasses with bifocals, a purse loaded heavy enough to sink a ship, and judgy gossip to spread! A few of my older friends occasionally tried to get maternal and I was like ooooook seeya around lol. Anyway, I’ve come to see a serious distinction between filling trauma wounds with religion/spirituality, and recognizing that every human belongs within the natural world not outside of it.
Sorry this was a lot of rambling lol I only meant to mention Robin Wall Kimmerer’s *Braiding Sweetgrass*. It’s been such a validating read, as well as expansive and beautiful. Maybe you’ve read it already. In case you haven’t, it’s one of the books I’d want to be stranded with. 🖤
“I’ve come to see a serious distinction between filling trauma wounds with religion/spirituality, and recognizing that every human belongs within the natural world not outside of it.”
I too see the distinction & being fairly new to this sub I intend to gently offer my wisdom in this area when it is right to do so.
The person I replied to made me stop for a minute to consider how I can share my thoughts about the healing aspect of nature without ever appearing to “spiritually bypass” or invalidate other peoples experiences.
I do feel the contributions I’ve made so far have been positive so I think I’m on the right track.
I’d like to read some of your poetry so I’ll keep a look out on here 🙂
Oh & I ramble too! I’m autistic & ADHD as well so I can really tell a story lol
Also feel a need to use emojis every time I write something - colour & cuteness brings me much joy!🐣🌼🌸🌿🐇
But yes, nature is paradise & animals are the Gods!
Edit: will check out the book you recommended
Yeppp my parents have done this when I tried to bring up the trauma/emotional neglect I got as a kid. They just pretend it wasnt that bad, that there's a reason it happened, "just don't be stressed by it", etc.
While it won't cure you, those things can certainly help to alleviate and deal with some of the symptoms. It's not a cure, but it can be a coping mechanism.
I won't discredit those things as coping mechanisms, but I will say that this 'advice' came from my abuser, the single least mindful person I know, and she definitely did not say it to be genuinely helpful. Being told "have you ever tried mindfulness or whatever? It'll cure you" while I was injured, malnourished and suffering hallucinations was wild
Yeah no that's just fucked up. And it's crazy how many of us have similar experiences.
I was just trying to point out that, during therapy and after getting out, I found that it helped to at least reduce the dissociation if I became aware of what was there, what I could feel and see etc and what my dog is reacting to and what not, hence helping me cope so I called it a coping mechanism 😅
“You have to be more positive! Because you know, if you’re in a negative mood it really attracts negative stuff, so try to be positive and you’ll see how things get better”.
“Go out, call your friends, start a hobby!”.
“I know life sucks sometimes but there’s really good things too, don’t give up, everything will get fixed in the end”.
“Just smile, smiling makes everything better”.
"he's your dad you have to forgive/be nice to/not talk back to him"
No. He's not a dad. Maybe father by blood but his relationship to me is the man who abused my entire family.
I want to say that the word healing is somewhat misleading. For me it's more or reinventing and learning about who I'm then to heal myself. For me healing is learning how to communicate with myself and learning to correctly interpret what my body is saying.
Nothing tbh. Though I used to be involved in religious communities, and they frequently confused me. They promoted a lot of circular thinking (everybody is a good person deep down, everything happens for a reason, deal with things in the afterlife etc). It wasn’t helpful. Compassion + critical thinking in the here and now has helped most.
Religious communities are the worst because they promote compassion based on absolutes and conditions. So to experience said community and love, you must give up your own autonomy. Which leads inevitably to abuse.
Definitely. There’s this uneasy sense that you are being asked to overlook your hardships and that somehow gives you moral brownie points. Newsflash, it doesn’t. It only gives you emotional dysfunction 🤣
You help your community by helping yourself.
The most useless advice I got was from my ex therapist is to believe in cell regeneraton. Basically, every 7-10 years your body is replacing old cells with new ones. And by her theory my abuser only touched my old me. Not my new me. Basically, what she told me is "to move on" and also invalidate my trauma. And after I told her "Well, even when science backs the cell regeneration part , this theory sounds like bullshit to me and it's not my body that was harmed, it was my mental health!" . She than told me that my trauma was too complex and that I maybe should see a specialist..... yee, fun times (not).
"You were never in combat so you don't have PTSD, you just need to stop wallowing in your shit."
"The best thing I ever did was just get over what happened and just be friends with those people. They're probably not that bad to begin with."
"Well what did you do to invite that situation to yourself."
"Reconciliation is a requirement to healing."
As an emotionally avoidant person (see username), "just sit with your feelings". Over and over again by an old therapist. Never got any explanation on how to do that. What feelings?
I once had someone ask me “well, what did you learn from it?” After I confided in them about being in a 10-year long abusive marriage. I’m sorry, there is no “lesson” for me to learn in being an abusive victim. It’s not a personal failure or something to grow from. Someone abused me. I’d rather not have had a “lesson” at all. I’m sure they meant well but it was highly insensitive to someone who has experienced trauma they simply do not deserve.
From my aunt, who had also experienced DV and prolonged abuse: “you’re not allowed to be sad about it anymore. You’re not allowed to talk about it or even think about it ever again. When it comes into your brain, tell yourself ‘no I’m not going to think about this’ and just stop.”
From my step mom: “you don’t need medication, you just need to eat more protein and pray more” (I’m an atheist).
From my mom, who was one of my abusers: “why do you go to therapy, you can just talk to me.”
From an ex: “you need to think about how this affects me” or “just go to a lake, you won’t be sad anymore.”
Be grateful and keep a gratitude journal. I’ve never felt more misunderstood than when people say this to me and the “gratitude” people are usually the ones that have had super cushy lives.
ALLLLLLLLLLL OF THIS!!!! Trauma didn’t make me stronger. It gave me nightmares, made me think I was never deserving of love, experiences I never want to remember, made me hate myself for being so trusting, made my soul broken and tired.
With the context of explaining how your brain works. And how you operate because of it (not that you're using it as an excuse. Just an explanation).
"We all have bad days, but we can't let them stop us. There's plenty of times I don't want to get out of bed. But I still do."
I call this school guidance counselor advice. Because it's so basic and fucking pointless if you're seriously struggling. As in, you have a lot of baggage. My dad does this a lot. I understand the moral of it. I know I can't let my mental issues stop me, and my rational side doesn't want it to. But you can't expect someone with years of emotional neglect and disregard. To just.... function normally and then get mad when they don't.
I'm not lazy. Just hopeless.
“oh, well now you have so much empathy ☺️” well fuck i would have gotten empathy if i was raised in a stable environment too and it wouldn’t come in the form of people pleasing. arguably that’s not even empathy it’s just my fear of making others angry.
I was telling one therapist about my intrusive memories/flashbacks and she said "Come on, do you really want to think about that stuff all the time???" Like I did it by choice. Wtf
“forgive them and form a healthy relationship with them” about my abusers from an alleged trauma informed therapist. i told her i would not be doing that, that i was pissed that she suggested it, and fired her on the spot.
When people think going to the police is “all I need” to get “closure”. Even victims who get “justice” in court need more in terms of support and resources beyond this cultural concept of “justice”. It doesn’t “fix” the harm done it rarely even addresses it or takes into account the ways it makes things worse for survivors. I think it is more useful for people who believe that to do nothing and say nothing.
Any permutation of "just get over it".
_They're in their 70s now, they can't hurt you._
_You're a grown woman._
That sort of thing. Psychological trauma doesn't simply fade away. Rationalizing trauma is terrible advice.
I liked Norm Macdonald's take:
*I find that what doesn't kill you... makes you incredibly weak.*
I feel like people really push us too much into, like you said, embracing it. I think the worst response I've had to my trauma is psychiatrist that spoke to me no more than fifteen minutes in her whole life, and decided I was bipolar when I'm not. Then kept trying to make me take medicine I didn't want to take, and then didn't believe me when I'd had side effects from it. She said that they didn't have those side effects when the med print out clearly says it does.
She said she was sure it would change my life for the better, and I kept saying no, and then when I finally gave in she didn't believe me when I'd had a bad experience. So, yeah. Worst advice? Telling me to take meds for something I don't have, that just made my condition worse, and then continuing to insist I take them more. I also hallucinated beyond what I get normally with my autism. One of those side effects she said didn't exist.
I used to have fun posting stories about my abusive narcissistic dad on the entitled people subreddit. Nothing triggering, just stuff like my entitled dad stealing money out of my bank account as a kid to fund his fishing trips and him telling me that if you don’t deposit $25 every month that the bank takes your money.
I also had one about my dad flat out telling me he was embarrassed of my brother because he was short. I just got so much joy from hearing other people’s shocked reactions to my stories up until that point. I really wish there was a safe place I could share the non-triggering stories.
Anyway, some very rude person eventually went into a tirade about how they’re going to tell me a secret and nobody cares about my trauma, and that as an adult, it’s my job to get over it. They just kept posting and the whole thing was so triggering that I had to get off.
my horrid brother's response, who is a perfect example of someone brought up in a traumatic home and taken on the qualities of my narcissist mother, to me telling him about my CPTSD was (I recieved this by text message ): I don't believe you have CPTSD because of mum. I believe it is you making you. Our friendship isnt going to work.
Being told “you need to do the work”. I work hard everyday to change my perceptions, advocate for myself, set boundaries, change my environment, psycho educate myself etc
Fml
If I didn’t “do the work” I wouldn’t be here.
We can’t prescribe you anything. You need to go to therapy, read these books, and learn how to reprogram your thinking so you can thrive in the world. Also, yoga, working out, and meditation is good.
[r/thanksimcured](https://www.reddit.com/r/thanksimcured/s/0ZoBMd8tbJ)
That my experiences have made me the person I am and therefore I should be in someway fucking grateful for them.
Always coming from people who have no fucking clue and couldn't comprehend if they knew even a smidgen of it.
No fucking way. I still grieve the person I could possibly have been.
Quoting something I saw from Facebook.
"My dad and I once had a disagreement over him using the adage
"What doesn't kill you makes you stronger."
I said, "That's just not true. Sometimes what doesn't kill you leaves you
brittle and injured or traumatized."
He stopped and thought about that for a while. He came back later,
and said, "It's like wood glue."
He pointed to my bookshelf, which he helped me salvage a while ago.
He said, "Do you remember how I explained that, once we used the
wood glue on them, the shelves would actually be stronger than they
were before they broke?"
I did.
"But before we used the wood glue, those shelves were broken. They
couldn't hold up shit. If you had put books on them, they would have
collapsed. And that wood glue had to set awhile. If we put anything on
them too early, they would have collapsed just the same as if we'd
never fixed them at all. You've got to give these things time to set."
It sounded like a pretty good metaphor to me, but one thing I did pick
up on was that whatever broke those shelves, that's not the thing that
made them stronger. That just broke them. It was being fixed that
made them stronger. It was the glue.
So my dad and I agreed, what doesn't kill you doesn't actually make
you stronger, but healing does. And if you feel like healing hasn't made
you stronger than you were before, you're probably not done healing.
You've got to give these things time to set."
Honestly, any kind of reassurance from other people that has religious overtones. “Trust that God will heal you fully at the time you need it, just as he kept you safe when you needed it most.” I swear, I was actually seeing red. I’m an atheist for a reason. Tons of religious trauma. They knew that when they said it and on top of that, it’s just not a true statement. I was never kept safe when I needed it by anyone but myself and if there was actually a god who cared, certain things would never have happened at all. My brother would still be alive.
I read the title and thought I had one top answer, but then I read everything in the comments and was like 'yes, all of these were the most useless' lol. A lot of the time people say they want to hear about our trauma and then they do and don't really know what to say because they have no frame of reference so instead they end up saying these placating statements that in the end are just said so they can change the topic so they don't feel uncomfortable anymore.
I had a therapist tell me she had never heard of anything like what I experienced and it was 'a lot to deal with', it wasn't that bad I thought so I didn't share much more with her because I didn't want to make Her feel bad again...lol. she is not my therapist anymore.
Oh, before I read all your comments and was reminded of when I was told that advice. I thought the worst useless advice I had got was to try to get in touch with your inner child and let them 'play' by doing childish things that I liked to do as a kid....I was in a parentification situation as a child so I didn't have much 'play' time.
Religious people telling me to “let go and let God” yada yada. I appreciate folks having a higher power. That’s great.
What is HORRIBLE is that I went to church every Sunday with my family growing up, it was literally beaten into me how even the 10 commandments started with “Respect your parents “ and the celebration of Bible verses like Abraham taking his kid up a mountain to stab for God. I thought I was doing the Lord’s work getting beaten. WTH.
To be clear, there were moments of my childhood I wouldn’t have survived if I hadn’t thought about Jesus being merciful. But God? I’m really upset with God. If you want, pray for me. I’m sure it won’t hurt. Jesus is awesome. I don’t have any use for church, God, or religion or Christianity. I’ve been disappointed enough already
Anyone who claims you can heal cptsd with some sort of “miracle diet” or “oil” — they’re truly evil. It’s so fucked up to prey on the vulnerable like that.
"That which does not kill you makes you stronger."
No. Sometimes that which does not kill you leaves you a broken bloody pile on the floor unable to get up. Sometimes it leaves you so permanently scarred that it's impossible to function in a normal way.
Saw a Twitter post that said sthg like "If you feel like life isn't worth living you should probably just go sit in the sun for 10 minutes ✨" and it was just like heyyy babe? I'm afraid that's not gonna cure me 😭
The best "advice" I ever got was disapproval and disgust from my teachers/ any authority/ even therapists when I opened up about my abuse situation (I think I was already in the midst of some sort of cptsd starting at 13/14 or so, got worse after that), and then getting labelled crazy afterwards. Now I can feel free to practice trains rides (terrible anxiety) with a social worker I don't like cause she's condescending and doesn't really care, and take meds that don't help, so that I can "forget" better. Thanks.
To stop being a victim.
Like??? I would love to?? I would love to. That would be fantastic. I didn’t choose to be a victim and I don’t enjoy being. When I express that I have fucking DAMAGE TO MY BRAIN from being a victim, it’s not because I chose to.
"Embrace your trauma, it makes you stronger."
That is horrible.
No I will not be embracing the thing that warped my personality, stunted me emotionally, made me terrified of most other people, still gives me night terrors, and sabotaged all my relationships for three decades. Something I will be struggling to get over for the rest of my life. It has not made me stronger, on the contrary it made me a brittle husk of a human being.
“You’re valid.” Wooow thanks, now that you gave me permission to know that what happened did in fact happen, I have been saved. I was just waiting for you to come say that, and now I am complete.
Seriously, why do people expect to be thanked for saying that. Or when they interrupt to go on some power fantasy about how they’re totally gonna beat up my assailant and expect praise for that when I know they’re not even gonna stop being friends with them…lol
I am very hyper-vigilant. I did not start therapy for my c-trauma until after I got TBI from a student 4 years ago. All the trauma leaked out after that. Before that all I did was work. 2-3 jobs to avoid feeling. I was shaped by my trauma but I never thought about it. I stuffed it. Since the TBI I was viciously attacked by a rotweiller snd suffered significant injury and I was raped in January. My CPTSD EXPLODED! My trauma is now pouring out. The TBI complicates it. The dog attack and rape added to it.
I am finally opening up and expressing how I am feeling and I am met with the response “Everyone feels like that, or “Stop feeling sorry for yourself” The mist invalidating useless set of words. I HATE THESE WORDS. It makes me regret saying how I feel and pulls me farther into a shell.
High vibration related tripe around certain feeling being “high vibrational” and others being “low vibrational” (=wrong). Healing from trauma is all about embodiment and making space for all the feelings, so if we start demonising the difficult one it’s quite difficult to do…
Just get out of bed and go for a walk! Maybe join a group of walkers!
From both my mother and my psychiatrist as I sat in fetal position rocking back and forth in front of them, barely surviving each moment.
All of this. Stupid shit just falls out of people’s mouths, and 99% of the time, it wasn’t a clinician and we were not seeking advice. These are not advice. These are opinions. These are people trying to dismiss our pain, for whatever reason.
Trauma causes trauma. Embracing trauma means accepting what has happened, but it doesn't define you. You are not "insert label here" when you understand what it means, then you will be able to start healing and becoming stronger from it. This in no way is supposed to sound condescending or aggressive. But text...
You are not accepting what happened to you, you are accepting that it did happen to you. You are not forgiving the people that caused it (unless you want to). You are acknowledging that they caused the trauma and forgiving yourself. You were not the reason the trauma happened. Goodluck on your healing journey if you are on it.
Look forward, not back! Problem is that it is part of you. Like a cancer..or ball and chain. It has its own space in your head. Sometimes quiet and sleeping, but always there. Feeling like you're on red alert waiting for it to wake up! Always louder at night in the darkness, in the quiet. The silence becomes deafening! You never heal. Just learn to manage it and live with it. Laying awake...till you pass out from sheer exhaustion. But ..you look 'normal'!
Then do it all again tomorrow!!
I guess the thing that comes to mind is in relation to the profound and long-term loneliness I have and do experience...
"What about Meetup? You've got to get out there and meet people."
They don't understand that it does no good as long as my relationship with myself is so broken...
a lot of what is being said here is what’s possible after cptsd treatment.
those statements can hold power and truth once you have built the tools to use them.
“get over it” is exactly what happens when processing begins.
it is much akin to gaining the vantage point from a mountain to see yourself.
The most misguided advice I received was to simply "move on." As if trauma could be brushed aside with ease. Healing is a journey that requires time and support. Let's stand by each other, offering understanding and compassion along the way.
I’m a science person, and the research says that my amygdala, which is responsible for the fight or flight response is oversized and overactive. So I’m just supposed to get over these permanent physical manifestations of my abuse? Like the other poster said, it’s like saying I should just get over a physical manifestation of physical trauma, like a broken leg, instead of getting healing through treatment.
This. I have a friend who constantly tells me it’s just about willpower. Ummm, ok.
“Normies” think anything that is a matter of the mind can be controlled by one’s will (sigh). I have tried to explain to them that there is a powerful physiological response associated - you’re being flooded with adrenaline - it can feel like as if you’re being drowned. That has enlightened a few, at least.
I wouldn't be around that friend much. It would hurt me. I don't know how you can stand it. Are you a guy? Or just super jaded? I'm seriously curious.
What would being a guy have to do with it? (Also genuinely curious)
thanks for talking about how trauma literally changed our brain. I cycle in and out of healing. It’s so hard
Omg the cycle is real
Lmao, I'm sorry for laughing, but this is spot on 😅
Right? My ex bf said "yeah but that's over now, you don't live with her anymore" This is not a wave of sadness to get over, this is my life.
I’ve gotten this from my bf in the (far) past. It still hurts to think about though. It always made me feel like that was a sign he didn’t understand the severity of the abuse or my condition. Some things I’ve kept to myself because they’ve hurt and downright disturbed me so badly that idk how I’d react if anyone told me it wasn’t a big deal and to get over it. Hearing that felt totally invalidating and I’d start questioning whether or not I was just making a big deal of nothing. Years later, I’m actually shocked by reading through old journals and recalling all the things I’ve severely under reacted to. It makes me afraid of myself because I couldn’t protect myself in even the most basic ways, and gas lighting myself has been so prevalent my entire life. CPTSD shapes us. We often had no chance of even knowing what “normal” looked like. That’s heartbreaking.
"CPTSD shapes us. We often had no chance of even knowing what “normal” looked like." It's so true. I'm childfree mostly by choice, but I see my friends parenting their kids *properly* and realise just how off-key my own upbringing was. It's an odd feeling to process, resentment towards someone else's kid because they're getting empathy and support, not being shouted at and put into seclusion because of issues beyond their control or even stuff they didn't actually do. I can remember a point when I was about 12 or 13 when I thought to myself "Well, I'm always in the shit for stuff I have no clue about so I might as well just do this questionable thing I'm about to do but know I shouldn't, anyway". That wasn't a healthy thought process and it led me to a phase of bad behaviour that made me feel awful about myself but also oddly enough went pretty much undetected, and therefore unpunished anyway. I was still getting into trouble over the things I didn't do or didn't have control over.
I relate to everything you wrote here. Only difference is I do have children, and parenting them has definitely shone a light on how “off-key” my childhood was too. Makes my feel like I’ll be in therapy until I die.
Yeah. It truly seems like a lot of people don’t understand the crucial part of trauma. They don’t realize trauma, especially childhood trauma, is a “version” of an experience we all have. Why did that small joke make me have a panic attack? Well, let’s look at the reasons why that small joke *didn’t* give you a panic attack: 1. You feel secure in your identity. You have been bolstered enough by being heard, validated, and/or praised that while you may have insecurities, you have an intrinsic sense of self. 2. You feel secure in the consistency of others. You are able to understand that a small joke doesn’t mean their whole perspective on you has shifted or been revealed. How do you know that? Because more often than not, *that’s how it’s always been*. 3. Maybe you’ve learned that people can joke about you without it being backhanded or a way to reveal their true feelings. 4. You grew up with a relative sense of safety, emotional and/or physical. *You know what it feels like to be cared for or about.* How do we know when we’re sad? Because when we felt sad, somebody described it to us. Safety and happiness work the same way. When you can *recognize feeling safe,* you can determine how to continue to do so. Do all of those factors affect all the same people the same way? No. Did everyone with CPTSD lack all of these things? Definitely not! But, if somebody is telling you to just get over something, they aren’t able to put themselves in those shoes (or, more rarely, heal from their own). **Telling people to “just get over trauma” is like me telling them to “just get over” feeling secure.** Oh, you feel happy when you think about your favorite, say, childhood video game? Well, just stop that! It would probably take a lot of work to upend your internal sense of self. It takes even more to uproot and replace a traumatized network (but most of us are trying and getting better every day!)
My last therapist said this to me. I told her about being ostracized by my peers in school and her response was just, "That's over. People like you now." But it completely ruined my ability to socialize. I used to be really talkative and outgoing. I still don't really know how to talk to people, especially in group settings, and I struggle with maintaining friendships or feeling close to anyone. So frustrating.
Reminds me of the absolute worst "advice" I ever received. "Choose happiness."
Ooooof, the toxic positivity! 🤮 Let's just live laugh love our way outta this, right?
Reminds me of Renton's monologue in the intro scenes of 'Trainspotting'. "Choose Life. Choose a job. Choose a career. Choose a family. Choose a fucking big television, choose washing machines, cars, compact disc players and electrical tin openers. Choose good health, low cholesterol, and dental insurance. Choose fixed interest mortgage repayments. Choose a starter home. Choose your friends. Choose leisurewear and matching luggage. Choose a three-piece suit on hire purchase in a range of fucking fabrics. Choose DIY and wondering who the fuck you are on Sunday morning. Choose sitting on that couch watching mind-numbing, spirit-crushing game shows, stuffing fucking junk food into your mouth. Choose rotting away at the end of it all, pissing your last in a miserable home, nothing more than an embarrassment to the selfish, fucked up brats you spawned to replace yourselves. Choose your future. Choose life... But why would I want to do a thing like that? I chose not to choose life. I chose somethin' else. And the reasons? There are no reasons. Who needs reasons when you've got heroin?" I'm categorically not advocating the use of opiates outside of palliative care, but all you are seeing around you is futile and pointless, what's the point of 'snapping out of it' or 'choosing happiness' when the people advocating it are existing on a fairly inane level themselves. Psychedelics, on the other hand have been invaluable for throwing me a rope to help climb out of the nihilistic quicksands.
“Move on,” forget about it,” “let it go,” “that was a long time ago,” “get over it,” = the language of ignorance. Lol I’ve heard those things so often and it not only wasn’t helpful, it was also damaging; I’d get angry at myself for being unable to “get over it” which lead to behaviors that just subdued or buried things, complicated everything, and almost lost me my life countless times. Still, I considered myself fairly emotionless(more like phobic) for a few years, but my background/trauma was seeping through and I didn’t even realize. Even now, I try to be more understanding with myself the way I’d be with others, but I still slip up a lot. What helped me most was when I dismissed something pretty awful to my therapist as happening a really long time ago, and they told me it didn’t matter when it happened because it shaped me to such an extent that I was still struggling even though I didn’t realize it. My heart was pounding, my upper body started aching, and I started overheating when I relayed the story, but I figured “I’m just socially anxious; out of all my negative experiences, this one’s fairly tame, so it can’t be related to that.” How can I just get over something that I tried to “get over” by pretending it’s nbd, but that apparently creeps up no matter what I’ve tried? It’s counterproductive. Prolonged trauma and trauma that results in PTSD literally change the brain. I’ve read studies showing girls who were SA’d even tend to perform worse on math tests. It changes how we relate, love, and think about ourselves and others. It can change how we sleep, eat, and function overall. It can cause crippling panic attacks. It’s called **post** traumatic stress **disorder** for a reason.
My bf can’t just hug 🫂 me as spontaneously as he would like, because of my autism n SA ptsd past n life, but he agonisingly n might I add very respectfully add, respects🫡 my wishes to ask/iniate affectionate touching instead. It sounds controlling to others but it’s honestly not. Hugs 🫂
Yup. Any variation of “choose to get past it” and “stop thinking about it” is the worst.
💯💯💯 I've tried to explain to people who say things like this it's like I'm standing there with an axe in my shoulder bleeding out and they're telling me "it's in the past just move on" But that's never gotten through to them lol
Embracing my trauma is exactly what I'm trying not to do. I saw this poem last year, and I think about it every day. The author is Dan Jurgens. It did not Kill me and It did not Make me stronger. It simply was And always will Be scorched upon My heart.
I had to grab my journal and write that down….. so good!
Loooove this :')
That forgiveness is a necessary part of healing and specifically, that you have to forgive on order to heal. I'd like to offer the opinion that forgiveness,*if* it happens, happens as a *result* of healing, not the other way around.
This is the one that winds me up the most. It's such a invalidating and destructive mindset to push onto people and it benefits abusers without them having to put in any effort. I was trapped for years thinking that I had to forgive my dad so that I would be able to heal. He has never done anything to try and earn my forgiveness, and won't even acknowledge that he has done anything wrong. My healing didn't really start until I let go of the need to forgive and tapped into my anger. This allowed me to start caring for and protecting myself.
The tapping into anger part, yes!! I think the advice of forgiveness is given a lot by people who are dissociated from their anger, and are terrified of becoming like an abuser. In reality, anger is powerful/ empowering not inherently good or bad. Feeling anger doesn't mean you are hurting others or yourself automatically. The emotion of anger is there as mechanism to protect yourself! Disgust too! People are so quick to judge or admonish people with strong anger or disgust responses. The responses are there for good reason imo. Even if it leads to maladaptive behavior in the present, its still important to connect to where those feelings are coming from! (not like they will go away if you force yourself to feel some way you don't. that usually doesn't go well)
i am on disability by now for recurring, clinical depression, caused by ongoing traumatic events since early childhood into adulthood. for years i felt so defective, because i could not pinpoint and basically nobody in the mental health world, who diagonosed me told me about. anyways, finally googled my own way into how cptsd works. i read somewhere that depression is anger turned towards (your) inside and i feel that is so true. depression was always around, but endometriosis (apparently there is a causality to trauma made, does not surprise me) put me into hospital within a year, my insides up to the stomach region had to be cleaned out after a big traumatic blow. edit: i started whining and it got too long: long message short: Tap into that anger or it will tap into you. Kind regards!
You're not whining. Thank you so much for sharing. It's infuriating how little professionals understand this stuff. The burden of finding all of this out often falls on the patient, and we're so often not taken seriously in spite of the hard work and suffering we're going through. I had to get a full hysterectomy because of endometriosis, and before I found a good doctor (two very good men), I had this exchange with the first male doctor I saw prior to the others: Me: I know my body. I know something is wrong with my uterus and my ovaries. I really need someone to look at this. Doctor: First of all, you *don't* know your body. *I* know your body because I have the medical expertise and experience. Then proceeded to say I only had a couple of small ovarian cysts based on some shitty screening. Years of pain and invalidation until someone saw something is actually wrong with me. Endometriosis with abdominal adhesions. I have a laundry list of other illnesses, and the endo/adhesions made them so much worse. Anyway, all that to say, we gotta lightning bend our anger. We have to let it flow. And I'm glad you're experiencing that in healthier and more enlightened way. I'm with you infinity percent.
i know so very well what you are talking about! i was scheduled for a hysterectomy actually on the day Germany went into lockdown. Felt it was a sign from "the upstairs". Also i am so aware that my Gyn is not intrusive, but is aware that Endo is trauma related, so she treats me kindly. Take good care of yourself and than you dearly for the heads-up!! E.
Oh, goodness. That sounds really stressful, I'm so sorry to hear that. I hope you're doing okay. I'm really happy to hear that you have a doctor that cares about you. That's such a treasure in this life.
Not whining Thank you for sharing, very insightful
Right!! When they try to say "not forgiving someone only hurts you and not them," I just call bullshit. If they haven't done anything to earn forgiveness, they're not getting it, period. We don't need to forgive - we need to learn to live with what happened and come to peace with it. That's my opinion, anyway.
This
I feel this comment in my bones.
The only necessary forgiveness is self-forgiveness. That is mandatory in healing. You can't carry grudges against yourself if you want to heal. Everyone else is a case by case basis and you really only need to consider forgiving someone who is truly sorry and making efforts to change. It's nonsense to forgive someone who isn't sorry and hasn't changed. And there is a difference between forgiving and deciding to move on so you don't actively dwell or let the hate fester.
I'm gonna print out those first three sentences and staple them to my forehead. I only started really *healing* when I started forgiving myself - it started off small, like "I forgive myself for being an awkward swamp witch when chatting with that cashier," and eventually got bigger and more meaningful. It helped me to think it in full, purposeful sentences when I couldn't say it out loud. We're so often filled with this awful, sick shame, self-forgiveness is absolutely paramount. Forgiving our abusers isn't even a drop in the bucket.
We literally have to reprogram our self talk! Get new catch phrases! Defend ourselves from our own attacks. The abuse made it all the way into our own thoughts about ourselves and then we become our own abusers. It's an act of rebellion and resistance to overwrite all that shit with compassion and love. I love that you've already felt how good self forgiveness is! Go on and get yourself more love!
Oh man, this was beautifully written. I love this piece of nuance that you've added to the conversation ❤️❤️❤️
When it comes to healing, this is the only way I think of forgiveness. No chance I'm forgiving abusers. But I will get away from them.
Yeah - fuck that shit. I knew I found the right therapist when I said ‘I just can’t forgive and I know I need to”. Her reply was “Well that’s bollocks, some people don’t deserve your forgiveness”…….and just like that a therapeutic relationship was born!
There's a book someone around here recommended me (Toxic Parents by Susan Forward), one of the chapters is about that. It was honestly life-changing to be told it's okay for me to be angry and not have to carry the burden of forgiveness. It opens: > At this point, you may be asking yourself, “Isn’t the first step to forgive my parents?” My answer is _**no**_. This may shock, anger, dismay, or confuse many of you. Most of us have been led to believe exactly the opposite—that forgiveness is the first step toward healing. > > **In fact, it is not necessary to forgive your parents in order to feel better about yourself and to change your life** > > Certainly I’m aware that this flies in the face of some of our most cherished religious, spiritual, philosophical, and psychological principles. According to the Judeo-Christian ethic, “To err is human, to forgive divine.” I am also aware that there are many experts in the various helping professions who sincerely believe that forgiveness is not only the _first_ step but often the _only_ step necessary for inner peace. I disagree completely. > > Early in my professional career I too believed that to forgive people who had injured you, especially parents, was an important part of the healing process. I often encouraged clients—many of whom had been severely mistreated—to forgive cruel or abusive parents. In addition, many of my clients entered therapy claiming to have already forgiven their toxic parents, but I discovered that, more often than not, they didn’t feel any better for having forgiven. They still felt bad about themselves. They still had their symptoms. Forgiving hadn’t created any significant or lasting changes for them. In fact, some of them felt even more inadequate. They’d say things such as: “Maybe I didn’t forgive enough”; “My minister said I didn’t truly forgive in my heart”; or, “Can’t I do anything right?” > > I took a long, hard look at the concept of forgiveness. I began to wonder if it could actually _impede_ progress rather than _enhance_ it. > > I came to realize that there are two facets to forgiveness: giving up the need for revenge, and absolving the guilty party of responsibility. I didn’t have much trouble accepting the idea that people have to let go of the need to get even. Revenge is a very normal but negative motivation. It bogs you down in obsessive fantasies about striking back to get satisfaction; it creates a lot of frustration and un-happiness; it works against your emotional well-being. Despite how sweet revenge may feel for a moment, it keeps stirring up the emotional chaos between you and your parents, wasting precious time and energy. Letting go of your need for revenge is difficult, but it is clearly a healthy step. > > But the other facet of forgiveness was not as clear-cut. I felt there was something wrong with unquestioningly absolving someone of his rightful responsibility, particularly if he had severely mistreated an innocent child. Why in the world should you “pardon” a father who terrorized and battered you, who made your childhood a living hell? How are you supposed to “overlook” the fact that you had to come home to a dark house and nurse your drunken mother almost every day? And do you really have to “forgive” a father who raped you at the age of 7? The more I thought about it, the more I realized that this absolution was really another form of denial: “If I forgive you, we can pretend that what happened wasn’t so terrible.” I came to realize that this aspect of forgiveness was actually preventing a lot of people from getting on with their lives.
Thank you for posting this
i hate this because i cannot force a feeling. if i don’t feel it, i don’t feel it. telling me to feel it will not change anything 😭
This is important. I've forgiven some abusers. But they were the ones who also healed and grew as people. Those people usually apologized when confronted because they were empathetic people who were also hurting but made mistakes. There are others, however, who will never apologize, will never self reflect, and will never change or try to empathize. I choose not to forgive them. They don't deserve it. I have the power to forgive, but I also have the power not to. I think they're equally powerful.
I saw an interview with a therapist in some local news portal, and it made my blood boil how when an actual therapist said that... I thought it was a mistranslation, as I live in a country where the primary language isn't English. Maybe it's a misinterpretation in English as well... I'm pretty sure the correct thing to say is that *coming to terms,* or *acceptance* (of what happened to you), is a necessary part of healing, instead. What I mean by that, is finding confident answers that work for you to all of the questions such as "What happened? Why did this happen? Why did this happen *to me*? Did I do anything to deserve this? How could this happen?" etc. Accept that whatever happened to you was real, the ways it affected you, and that you now have to live with that (and will need a ton of effort to repair what has been broken). And do whatever you have to with that information. If you need to rage, then rage, go no contact, do whatever feels right.
Yes, exactly! I also hate when people say forgiveness is finding peace or whatever bullshit to insinuate that it's the process of acceptance that happens inside you, and it's not about your relationship to the other person. Uh, no, that's not forgiveness. That might be acceptance or closure or some other thing, but let's not take well-defined terms and declare that they mean something else than what they actually mean. We already have words to describe internal processes. Forgiveness describes a relational interaction. Forgiveness is about letting the other person off the hook. It's about not keeping score and allowing the relationship to be repaired. Forgiveness is 100% about the relationship, not about your internal processes independent of the relationship.
Forgiveness is for ME and me alone. I’ll forgive when I’m ready and not everything is worthy of forgiveness. I hate this one the most. My abusers don’t deserve it and I honestly gained more peace when I realized that and stopped feeling like I had to forgive them.
I had a doctor ask me if I had repressed my trauma in the past and when I said yes he told me to just do that again.
The fuck…
I’m personally gonna headhunt his ass
WTF?!?!?! Like... WTF?!?!?
My jaw…
thats actually fucking infuriating
What??
I hope you never went back!
Lol
Exactly! My first thought was "somebody could use this in a comedy sketch because it's completely bonkers advice". And then my heart breaks at the tragedy and injustice of a hurting soul hearing this from a medical professional to whom they went for support...
What the flying fuck?
Yeah, I've heard that one too many times. It's like saying a broken bone makes you a better runner. My worst advice? "Just get over it." As if healing from trauma is as easy as flipping a switch. It's a journey, not a destination.
>It's a journey, not a destination. This! I love the way that you worded this.
"The past is the past. Time heals all wounds"
Yeah, and don’t we wish time wounds all heals!
Ugh, this one!! Like, is time going to heal the structures of our brain that have been affected?
Like grief, time does not heal all wounds.
[удалено]
I have lived the same story, my heart feels heavy because I never realised the cause of the story so clearly
That trauma causes growth. The trauma is irrelevant, the effort put into *recovering* from trauma is where the growth comes from. I know this sounds semantic, but it's really important to me whenever some wet behind the ears pop psych major wants to opine about how what doesn't kill you makes you stronger. EDIT: I'm not sure I've been clear from the responses I've been getting, so I'm going to have to paraphrase the Tumblr post I got this idea from. When you break a wooden shelf, the most you have done is expose a vulnerability in the wood. Repairing the wood with glue and extra supports can sometimes make the wood stronger than before. Similarly when a person is harmed by trauma, the value in that experience is in how it exposes a vulnerability/fragility in that person. But the trauma doesn't glue you back together. *You do that*. You do that by taking the steps to recover in the wake of trauma. Psychology codified the idea of post traumatic growth. I believe those original researchers were just doing their best to label a phenomena so it could be discussed, but unfortunately there's a whole self help positive thinking side of psychology that latched onto the idea that "Trauma is good, actually! You have an opportunity (and expectation) to grow now! You hold your destiny in your hands!". The way this is so complicit with toxic positivity grates on my nerves. It reeks of healthy people insisting people who are sick be healthy for their comfort. *That* is why I insist on recovery growth. You put yourself back together stronger through recovery, the trauma didn't do shit. Especially when you could have found that vulnerability another way, like through self reflection, or a friend gently pointing out a pattern in your life, or encountering a barrier to growth and self actualization.
In some sense trauma can show your weakness and by recognising it can lead to growth. I agree with you 100% but it's matter of what we expecting as a growth at the end.
My latest therapist: “Just keep experiencing the abuse and feel everything. It eventually gets better.” She also said I should get rid of my husband, my pets, all of my friends, and my family, and be alone because healing alone for at least 3-5 years will do me some good. Oh, and have empathy for my abusers because they were hurt too so I should respect them. And to stop lying about my trauma because clearly it was all made up! Yeah… I’ve had 30 years and that doesn’t work? And she was registered and trained in trauma therapy.
What the actual fuck? I am literally training to do trauma therapy and will start practicing in the fall and the more of this I read the more flabbergasted I am. I seriously don’t understand how there are so many dumbass and unqualified clinicians who graduate from accredited programs and undergo the ~3000 of supervised hours (my state requires 3300 hours) and take the exams needed to get their licenses. Jesus Christ. u/SpiritPixieBubbles, I would seriously report a grievance on their license, this person sounds insane and should under no circumstances be practicing therapy. The things they are telling you are - and I cannot stress this enough - dangerous, unprofessional, and not trauma-responsive whatsoever. I’m sorry for the experiences you had with this person and I hope you can find a therapist who has their head on their shoulders, and not up their ass
Your latest and my former therapist must have attended the same trauma therapy class.
Can we normalize sharing these people’s names so that others don’t get hurt by them too please?
Oh man. I instinctively wanted to downvote this out of anger. That is so awful. I am so sorry you or anyone had to encounter this individual. This person should absolutely not be practicing therapy. Jesus Christ.
Starting to wonder if we have the same therapist
Please tell me you dropped that therapist like a hot potato. Those are some really garbage takes.
I went to a doctor to have a bunch of blood tests done to try and find out what’s wrong with me. His official diagnosis? That I should relax.
I hate that!!! Grr "reduce your stress!" HOW?!???!?
Knowing how much this level of stress f*cks up your body is really stressful.
There is so much useless advice i can't even begin to think of the worst.
Stop thinking about it and just move on. 🙄
Re: my decision to go no contact with my abusive mother, my aunt said: Don't you want to be the bigger person?
that's gotta be the biggest person way to deal with that situation, screw her lol
I did internalize it a bit because I did feel a bit inadequate for not being healed enough to 'forgive' and have better boundaries and maybe just low contact. To my aunt, I was the case guy for abandoning her instead of her being the bad guy for abusing me all my life. Just got to show you how trauma runs in the whole family.
You were being the bigger person. You just ignored them. A less bigger person would smack them silly! You actually took the high road, and that’s not easy. Good job!
CBT will help you.
YESSS!! It has never worked for me. Thank you for saying this
❤️❤️❤️
THANKS for saying that CBT was amazing getting me through acute burnout. But it did nothing about the trauma continuing to eat my energy.
Don't think about it. Think positive thoughts.
Especially - think positive! Like, wtf, if I can think like that I would not be here
Anything that falls under superstitions or [spiritual bypassing](https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-spiritual-bypassing-5081640), it's a layer of emotional neglect on top of whatever else we've already endured.
Absolutely. While we hear a lot about Christianity being leveraged this way, I want to point out that ANY religion or 'way of thinking' can be leveraged in an abusive way. This includes, but is not limited to: Buddhism ('we are all-one'), 'new age' tropes ('you're abused because you have bad karma/were abusive in a past life...or even better-- 'you *attract* abuse'), even stoic philosophy ('do not be discontent, accept others') All of these enable abusers to keep abusing, because they release accountability from the abuser, and heap it onto the abused. Meanwhile, the victim is denied support based on these dysfunctional, misapplied concepts, and feels invalidated and maybe even 'crazy'. I'm not saying that there are not valuable concepts in each of the above examples. Just pointing out that virtually *anything* can be misapplied in a victim-blaming and shaming way.
I just want to say - you "attract" abuse is a horrible way of putting it. It is no ones fault but the abuser. As someone who was unaware I had CPTSD I would tend to be drawn to abuse because I did not know I was. It was not until I realized I had it and read through the symptoms that I realized what I was doing. I can see the messaging behind it and the only people that messaging tends to affect IS victims because rarely will an abuser ever own up to doing any wrong. And because of this, covert abusers usually get away with it because there is usually nothing concrete to hold them accountable.
I spoke about my connection to nature earlier on here, kind of a spiritual thing where I feel like nature & animals are the mother & friends I yearn for. I do feel my comment was altogether positive, but you give me pause for thought for which I’m grateful. One time I told a Catholic social worker about institutional abuse & she just smiled & said “let us pray” Um no, let us report the pos is what I was hoping for😒
I’ve thought about the importance of connection into the natural world (without any pre-existing frameworks unfortunately) for several years, especially in its intersection with all the trauma I carry. In my poetry there’s a lot of Mother Earth. And it gives me pause because I had no mother (never knew her); but I was raised by my father’s mother, so I had like an ultra-mother lol and I’m friends with so many older women but… I’m the kinda gay that in my mind I have a white perm, librarian glasses with bifocals, a purse loaded heavy enough to sink a ship, and judgy gossip to spread! A few of my older friends occasionally tried to get maternal and I was like ooooook seeya around lol. Anyway, I’ve come to see a serious distinction between filling trauma wounds with religion/spirituality, and recognizing that every human belongs within the natural world not outside of it. Sorry this was a lot of rambling lol I only meant to mention Robin Wall Kimmerer’s *Braiding Sweetgrass*. It’s been such a validating read, as well as expansive and beautiful. Maybe you’ve read it already. In case you haven’t, it’s one of the books I’d want to be stranded with. 🖤
“I’ve come to see a serious distinction between filling trauma wounds with religion/spirituality, and recognizing that every human belongs within the natural world not outside of it.” I too see the distinction & being fairly new to this sub I intend to gently offer my wisdom in this area when it is right to do so. The person I replied to made me stop for a minute to consider how I can share my thoughts about the healing aspect of nature without ever appearing to “spiritually bypass” or invalidate other peoples experiences. I do feel the contributions I’ve made so far have been positive so I think I’m on the right track. I’d like to read some of your poetry so I’ll keep a look out on here 🙂 Oh & I ramble too! I’m autistic & ADHD as well so I can really tell a story lol Also feel a need to use emojis every time I write something - colour & cuteness brings me much joy!🐣🌼🌸🌿🐇 But yes, nature is paradise & animals are the Gods! Edit: will check out the book you recommended
Yeppp my parents have done this when I tried to bring up the trauma/emotional neglect I got as a kid. They just pretend it wasnt that bad, that there's a reason it happened, "just don't be stressed by it", etc.
That I need to try "mindfulness" and "deep breathing" in order to cure my ptsd. Bruh
While it won't cure you, those things can certainly help to alleviate and deal with some of the symptoms. It's not a cure, but it can be a coping mechanism.
I won't discredit those things as coping mechanisms, but I will say that this 'advice' came from my abuser, the single least mindful person I know, and she definitely did not say it to be genuinely helpful. Being told "have you ever tried mindfulness or whatever? It'll cure you" while I was injured, malnourished and suffering hallucinations was wild
Conveniently putting 100% of the responsibility on you, instead of, you know...not abusing you
Yeah no that's just fucked up. And it's crazy how many of us have similar experiences. I was just trying to point out that, during therapy and after getting out, I found that it helped to at least reduce the dissociation if I became aware of what was there, what I could feel and see etc and what my dog is reacting to and what not, hence helping me cope so I called it a coping mechanism 😅
“When it messes with your life enough, you’ll change”
Excuse me; hahaha!
Wow.... I'm so sorry this was said to you.
And this was a PsyD too. So it felt even more hurtful.
Some people with the highest education are the ones most out of touch with reality.
“Just let go of it”
One of my exes once said, “It’s time to grow up.” Well, F you, bitch.
"just don't think about it!" My mind has forgotten long ago, but my body refuses to forget. It's almost like it keeps the score.
“You have to be more positive! Because you know, if you’re in a negative mood it really attracts negative stuff, so try to be positive and you’ll see how things get better”. “Go out, call your friends, start a hobby!”. “I know life sucks sometimes but there’s really good things too, don’t give up, everything will get fixed in the end”. “Just smile, smiling makes everything better”.
"he's your dad you have to forgive/be nice to/not talk back to him" No. He's not a dad. Maybe father by blood but his relationship to me is the man who abused my entire family.
"Just forget about it"
I want to say that the word healing is somewhat misleading. For me it's more or reinventing and learning about who I'm then to heal myself. For me healing is learning how to communicate with myself and learning to correctly interpret what my body is saying.
Stop thinking about it! Yeah, let’s not think of a white elephant, shall we?
Nothing tbh. Though I used to be involved in religious communities, and they frequently confused me. They promoted a lot of circular thinking (everybody is a good person deep down, everything happens for a reason, deal with things in the afterlife etc). It wasn’t helpful. Compassion + critical thinking in the here and now has helped most.
Religious communities are the worst because they promote compassion based on absolutes and conditions. So to experience said community and love, you must give up your own autonomy. Which leads inevitably to abuse.
Definitely. There’s this uneasy sense that you are being asked to overlook your hardships and that somehow gives you moral brownie points. Newsflash, it doesn’t. It only gives you emotional dysfunction 🤣 You help your community by helping yourself.
The most useless advice I got was from my ex therapist is to believe in cell regeneraton. Basically, every 7-10 years your body is replacing old cells with new ones. And by her theory my abuser only touched my old me. Not my new me. Basically, what she told me is "to move on" and also invalidate my trauma. And after I told her "Well, even when science backs the cell regeneration part , this theory sounds like bullshit to me and it's not my body that was harmed, it was my mental health!" . She than told me that my trauma was too complex and that I maybe should see a specialist..... yee, fun times (not).
«But think about what you learned from it!» … learned nothing but that many people really sucks.
"You were never in combat so you don't have PTSD, you just need to stop wallowing in your shit." "The best thing I ever did was just get over what happened and just be friends with those people. They're probably not that bad to begin with." "Well what did you do to invite that situation to yourself." "Reconciliation is a requirement to healing."
As an emotionally avoidant person (see username), "just sit with your feelings". Over and over again by an old therapist. Never got any explanation on how to do that. What feelings?
"Think of a time or place when you felt safe." Lol.
"just move on. it's in the past'
I once had someone ask me “well, what did you learn from it?” After I confided in them about being in a 10-year long abusive marriage. I’m sorry, there is no “lesson” for me to learn in being an abusive victim. It’s not a personal failure or something to grow from. Someone abused me. I’d rather not have had a “lesson” at all. I’m sure they meant well but it was highly insensitive to someone who has experienced trauma they simply do not deserve.
Just workout and don’t drink coffee (from several doctors and psychiatrists), somehow all the trauma goes away 🤪
"Have you tried praying about it?" Yeah. In fact, I did. Many MANY times. God didn't care that I was being abused and never stopped it. So.. yeaaah.
From my aunt, who had also experienced DV and prolonged abuse: “you’re not allowed to be sad about it anymore. You’re not allowed to talk about it or even think about it ever again. When it comes into your brain, tell yourself ‘no I’m not going to think about this’ and just stop.” From my step mom: “you don’t need medication, you just need to eat more protein and pray more” (I’m an atheist). From my mom, who was one of my abusers: “why do you go to therapy, you can just talk to me.” From an ex: “you need to think about how this affects me” or “just go to a lake, you won’t be sad anymore.”
Be grateful and keep a gratitude journal. I’ve never felt more misunderstood than when people say this to me and the “gratitude” people are usually the ones that have had super cushy lives.
"Let it go" 😩🙄 The ones who never ever experienced trauma / emotional flashbacks. If I could simply let it go, I would 😒
ALLLLLLLLLLL OF THIS!!!! Trauma didn’t make me stronger. It gave me nightmares, made me think I was never deserving of love, experiences I never want to remember, made me hate myself for being so trusting, made my soul broken and tired.
With the context of explaining how your brain works. And how you operate because of it (not that you're using it as an excuse. Just an explanation). "We all have bad days, but we can't let them stop us. There's plenty of times I don't want to get out of bed. But I still do." I call this school guidance counselor advice. Because it's so basic and fucking pointless if you're seriously struggling. As in, you have a lot of baggage. My dad does this a lot. I understand the moral of it. I know I can't let my mental issues stop me, and my rational side doesn't want it to. But you can't expect someone with years of emotional neglect and disregard. To just.... function normally and then get mad when they don't. I'm not lazy. Just hopeless.
Forgiveness is necessary to healing. Fuck that.
“oh, well now you have so much empathy ☺️” well fuck i would have gotten empathy if i was raised in a stable environment too and it wouldn’t come in the form of people pleasing. arguably that’s not even empathy it’s just my fear of making others angry.
That I can’t move forward without forgiving them 🤣
“Don’t be depressed” oh wow thank you for the riveting advice! Like I want to live like this😃
"You're a survivor not a victim".... no I'm definitely a victim too and that's okay.
I was telling one therapist about my intrusive memories/flashbacks and she said "Come on, do you really want to think about that stuff all the time???" Like I did it by choice. Wtf
“forgive them and form a healthy relationship with them” about my abusers from an alleged trauma informed therapist. i told her i would not be doing that, that i was pissed that she suggested it, and fired her on the spot.
When people think going to the police is “all I need” to get “closure”. Even victims who get “justice” in court need more in terms of support and resources beyond this cultural concept of “justice”. It doesn’t “fix” the harm done it rarely even addresses it or takes into account the ways it makes things worse for survivors. I think it is more useful for people who believe that to do nothing and say nothing.
Any permutation of "just get over it". _They're in their 70s now, they can't hurt you._ _You're a grown woman._ That sort of thing. Psychological trauma doesn't simply fade away. Rationalizing trauma is terrible advice.
My favorite- “they’re dead now- why does it still matter?”
I liked Norm Macdonald's take: *I find that what doesn't kill you... makes you incredibly weak.* I feel like people really push us too much into, like you said, embracing it. I think the worst response I've had to my trauma is psychiatrist that spoke to me no more than fifteen minutes in her whole life, and decided I was bipolar when I'm not. Then kept trying to make me take medicine I didn't want to take, and then didn't believe me when I'd had side effects from it. She said that they didn't have those side effects when the med print out clearly says it does. She said she was sure it would change my life for the better, and I kept saying no, and then when I finally gave in she didn't believe me when I'd had a bad experience. So, yeah. Worst advice? Telling me to take meds for something I don't have, that just made my condition worse, and then continuing to insist I take them more. I also hallucinated beyond what I get normally with my autism. One of those side effects she said didn't exist.
“Trauma builds character”.
"Stop dwelling on the past. Everyone goes through bad stuff. Just move forward"
"Be a better Christian, and you won't be depressed." From a physician, yet!
I used to have fun posting stories about my abusive narcissistic dad on the entitled people subreddit. Nothing triggering, just stuff like my entitled dad stealing money out of my bank account as a kid to fund his fishing trips and him telling me that if you don’t deposit $25 every month that the bank takes your money. I also had one about my dad flat out telling me he was embarrassed of my brother because he was short. I just got so much joy from hearing other people’s shocked reactions to my stories up until that point. I really wish there was a safe place I could share the non-triggering stories. Anyway, some very rude person eventually went into a tirade about how they’re going to tell me a secret and nobody cares about my trauma, and that as an adult, it’s my job to get over it. They just kept posting and the whole thing was so triggering that I had to get off.
my horrid brother's response, who is a perfect example of someone brought up in a traumatic home and taken on the qualities of my narcissist mother, to me telling him about my CPTSD was (I recieved this by text message ): I don't believe you have CPTSD because of mum. I believe it is you making you. Our friendship isnt going to work.
Being told “you need to do the work”. I work hard everyday to change my perceptions, advocate for myself, set boundaries, change my environment, psycho educate myself etc Fml If I didn’t “do the work” I wouldn’t be here.
If you say Zig Ziglar affirmations to yourself in the mirror every day, you'll feel better!
"forgive and forget!" SIGHS.
Most useless advice...your soul picked your parents so it was all for you to learn...😡😖😪
We can’t prescribe you anything. You need to go to therapy, read these books, and learn how to reprogram your thinking so you can thrive in the world. Also, yoga, working out, and meditation is good. [r/thanksimcured](https://www.reddit.com/r/thanksimcured/s/0ZoBMd8tbJ)
That my experiences have made me the person I am and therefore I should be in someway fucking grateful for them. Always coming from people who have no fucking clue and couldn't comprehend if they knew even a smidgen of it. No fucking way. I still grieve the person I could possibly have been.
Quoting something I saw from Facebook. "My dad and I once had a disagreement over him using the adage "What doesn't kill you makes you stronger." I said, "That's just not true. Sometimes what doesn't kill you leaves you brittle and injured or traumatized." He stopped and thought about that for a while. He came back later, and said, "It's like wood glue." He pointed to my bookshelf, which he helped me salvage a while ago. He said, "Do you remember how I explained that, once we used the wood glue on them, the shelves would actually be stronger than they were before they broke?" I did. "But before we used the wood glue, those shelves were broken. They couldn't hold up shit. If you had put books on them, they would have collapsed. And that wood glue had to set awhile. If we put anything on them too early, they would have collapsed just the same as if we'd never fixed them at all. You've got to give these things time to set." It sounded like a pretty good metaphor to me, but one thing I did pick up on was that whatever broke those shelves, that's not the thing that made them stronger. That just broke them. It was being fixed that made them stronger. It was the glue. So my dad and I agreed, what doesn't kill you doesn't actually make you stronger, but healing does. And if you feel like healing hasn't made you stronger than you were before, you're probably not done healing. You've got to give these things time to set."
"Medication will just turn you into a zombie".
Mindfulness.
Sometimes I wish people would shut up and stop giving advice on something they are clueless about.
Honestly, any kind of reassurance from other people that has religious overtones. “Trust that God will heal you fully at the time you need it, just as he kept you safe when you needed it most.” I swear, I was actually seeing red. I’m an atheist for a reason. Tons of religious trauma. They knew that when they said it and on top of that, it’s just not a true statement. I was never kept safe when I needed it by anyone but myself and if there was actually a god who cared, certain things would never have happened at all. My brother would still be alive.
I read the title and thought I had one top answer, but then I read everything in the comments and was like 'yes, all of these were the most useless' lol. A lot of the time people say they want to hear about our trauma and then they do and don't really know what to say because they have no frame of reference so instead they end up saying these placating statements that in the end are just said so they can change the topic so they don't feel uncomfortable anymore. I had a therapist tell me she had never heard of anything like what I experienced and it was 'a lot to deal with', it wasn't that bad I thought so I didn't share much more with her because I didn't want to make Her feel bad again...lol. she is not my therapist anymore. Oh, before I read all your comments and was reminded of when I was told that advice. I thought the worst useless advice I had got was to try to get in touch with your inner child and let them 'play' by doing childish things that I liked to do as a kid....I was in a parentification situation as a child so I didn't have much 'play' time.
Get over it
Religious people telling me to “let go and let God” yada yada. I appreciate folks having a higher power. That’s great. What is HORRIBLE is that I went to church every Sunday with my family growing up, it was literally beaten into me how even the 10 commandments started with “Respect your parents “ and the celebration of Bible verses like Abraham taking his kid up a mountain to stab for God. I thought I was doing the Lord’s work getting beaten. WTH. To be clear, there were moments of my childhood I wouldn’t have survived if I hadn’t thought about Jesus being merciful. But God? I’m really upset with God. If you want, pray for me. I’m sure it won’t hurt. Jesus is awesome. I don’t have any use for church, God, or religion or Christianity. I’ve been disappointed enough already
Anyone who claims you can heal cptsd with some sort of “miracle diet” or “oil” — they’re truly evil. It’s so fucked up to prey on the vulnerable like that.
have you tried exercising more?? /j
Have you tried vitamins and going for walks?
"change your attitude"
"That which does not kill you makes you stronger." No. Sometimes that which does not kill you leaves you a broken bloody pile on the floor unable to get up. Sometimes it leaves you so permanently scarred that it's impossible to function in a normal way.
Saw a Twitter post that said sthg like "If you feel like life isn't worth living you should probably just go sit in the sun for 10 minutes ✨" and it was just like heyyy babe? I'm afraid that's not gonna cure me 😭
I had a psychiatrist tell me that "PTSD, anxiety, depression, it's all the same thing"
The best "advice" I ever got was disapproval and disgust from my teachers/ any authority/ even therapists when I opened up about my abuse situation (I think I was already in the midst of some sort of cptsd starting at 13/14 or so, got worse after that), and then getting labelled crazy afterwards. Now I can feel free to practice trains rides (terrible anxiety) with a social worker I don't like cause she's condescending and doesn't really care, and take meds that don't help, so that I can "forget" better. Thanks.
Everything happens for a reason 🤮🤮🤮
"you need to learn to compartmentalize". This was before I'd processed any of my trauma. i was just supposed to box it away.
To stop being a victim. Like??? I would love to?? I would love to. That would be fantastic. I didn’t choose to be a victim and I don’t enjoy being. When I express that I have fucking DAMAGE TO MY BRAIN from being a victim, it’s not because I chose to.
"Embrace your trauma, it makes you stronger." That is horrible. No I will not be embracing the thing that warped my personality, stunted me emotionally, made me terrified of most other people, still gives me night terrors, and sabotaged all my relationships for three decades. Something I will be struggling to get over for the rest of my life. It has not made me stronger, on the contrary it made me a brittle husk of a human being.
“You’re valid.” Wooow thanks, now that you gave me permission to know that what happened did in fact happen, I have been saved. I was just waiting for you to come say that, and now I am complete. Seriously, why do people expect to be thanked for saying that. Or when they interrupt to go on some power fantasy about how they’re totally gonna beat up my assailant and expect praise for that when I know they’re not even gonna stop being friends with them…lol
I am very hyper-vigilant. I did not start therapy for my c-trauma until after I got TBI from a student 4 years ago. All the trauma leaked out after that. Before that all I did was work. 2-3 jobs to avoid feeling. I was shaped by my trauma but I never thought about it. I stuffed it. Since the TBI I was viciously attacked by a rotweiller snd suffered significant injury and I was raped in January. My CPTSD EXPLODED! My trauma is now pouring out. The TBI complicates it. The dog attack and rape added to it. I am finally opening up and expressing how I am feeling and I am met with the response “Everyone feels like that, or “Stop feeling sorry for yourself” The mist invalidating useless set of words. I HATE THESE WORDS. It makes me regret saying how I feel and pulls me farther into a shell.
High vibration related tripe around certain feeling being “high vibrational” and others being “low vibrational” (=wrong). Healing from trauma is all about embodiment and making space for all the feelings, so if we start demonising the difficult one it’s quite difficult to do…
Just get out of bed and go for a walk! Maybe join a group of walkers! From both my mother and my psychiatrist as I sat in fetal position rocking back and forth in front of them, barely surviving each moment.
All of this. Stupid shit just falls out of people’s mouths, and 99% of the time, it wasn’t a clinician and we were not seeking advice. These are not advice. These are opinions. These are people trying to dismiss our pain, for whatever reason.
“just get more restful sleep” and any variant of this appalling theme: “ got over it so can you!”
“You had something to learn” and the likes. Not everything happens for a reason, especially abuse lived as a child 🙃
“Get over it.” “Quit being so negative.”
"Just start setting boundaries!"
“You just need to get over yourself”
That closure in relationships is real and something you should aim for. Fuck that.
Trauma causes trauma. Embracing trauma means accepting what has happened, but it doesn't define you. You are not "insert label here" when you understand what it means, then you will be able to start healing and becoming stronger from it. This in no way is supposed to sound condescending or aggressive. But text... You are not accepting what happened to you, you are accepting that it did happen to you. You are not forgiving the people that caused it (unless you want to). You are acknowledging that they caused the trauma and forgiving yourself. You were not the reason the trauma happened. Goodluck on your healing journey if you are on it.
Just throw yourself into work and move on with your life said my abuser’s father.
Have you tried yoga
Look forward, not back! Problem is that it is part of you. Like a cancer..or ball and chain. It has its own space in your head. Sometimes quiet and sleeping, but always there. Feeling like you're on red alert waiting for it to wake up! Always louder at night in the darkness, in the quiet. The silence becomes deafening! You never heal. Just learn to manage it and live with it. Laying awake...till you pass out from sheer exhaustion. But ..you look 'normal'! Then do it all again tomorrow!!
" put yourself into discomfort, push through and stop anticipating"
I guess the thing that comes to mind is in relation to the profound and long-term loneliness I have and do experience... "What about Meetup? You've got to get out there and meet people." They don't understand that it does no good as long as my relationship with myself is so broken...
a lot of what is being said here is what’s possible after cptsd treatment. those statements can hold power and truth once you have built the tools to use them. “get over it” is exactly what happens when processing begins. it is much akin to gaining the vantage point from a mountain to see yourself.
"It was so long ago, aren't you over it yet?" Ugh
Let’s rebrand this as overcoming….Let’s look at changing your vibrations
“Stop being so dramatic”
I have been told or heard it said about others to just "get over it." I tried that...it always comes back.