Have you checked out that EMDR option, @crewlucaa_? It really helped a friend of mine with PTSD. Me, I seem to have written much of the bad stuff out of my system. But then that's my speciality. I wish I could help. Sending both of you octopus hugs.
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Autism Forums
Callistemon
Callistemon
Well - my friend is in her early 40s and had childhood trauma. She's also a trauma specialist herself these days, so she thought it was a bit ironic that she was still dealing with stuff like this. But yeah, EMDR and TLC...for her. Plus she wrote a full-length autobiography detailing all this appalling stuff, so I guess that's helped her too...
maycontainthunder
Dog V4 muddy feet have recharged and are being sent to you Callistemon along with ear snuffles.
Callistemon
Awww, you two are so sweet. I'm very glad to have made your acquaintance through the marvels of modern technology, satellites in orbit etc. 
maycontainthunder
Yes, the marvels of modern technology Callistemon. Wait, why's it doing that? No, I don't want that program open... no don't delete that. Bad computer, very bad computer. 
L
Luca
I’ll definitely ask my psychiatrist about it then, if it wa able to help her all those years later!
I have mixed feelings about it because it sounds a bit scary.
I suppose I could try writing about it, but it’s pretty disgusting, especially because I was a child. My thread about trauma from sleepaway camp looks like a lighthearted joke in comparison.
I have mixed feelings about it because it sounds a bit scary.
I suppose I could try writing about it, but it’s pretty disgusting, especially because I was a child. My thread about trauma from sleepaway camp looks like a lighthearted joke in comparison.
Callistemon
Yeah, it seems you had much gorier trauma than I did. Mine was garden variety emotional neglect, physical violence towards me and between my parents, verbal abuse, emotional abuse etc. But my friend was sexually abused by her uncle between toddlerhood and age 10.
Callistemon
Plus emotional neglect, parentification, alcoholic violent dad, grinding poverty, etc etc. She's in the US and I've just asked her if there's any place you can contact, in an email to her. I'll let you know what she says.
Callistemon
One thing I found really helpful is to tell my own childhood trauma story in terms of a stylised fairytale. It's third person so you get to see it from the outside. Gore will bring up emotions when you write it down. But if you don't deal with these emotions in the daytime, they will come back to haunt you at night, was my experience.
L
Luca
I wouldn’t call that “garden variety,” that’s still horrible! 
and I’m very sad that it happened to you!
No one’s trauma is any less valid than anyone else’s, we all experience things differently too… my camping story may be a laugh for some people!
What I experienced as a child falls more into the “torture” and “involuntary captivity” categories on all fronts but that’s all I am comfortable saying about it.
and I’m very sad that it happened to you!No one’s trauma is any less valid than anyone else’s, we all experience things differently too… my camping story may be a laugh for some people!
What I experienced as a child falls more into the “torture” and “involuntary captivity” categories on all fronts but that’s all I am comfortable saying about it.
Aspychata
I woke up this morning with a PTSD dream of being set up at my last job. It happened right in front of me. Just lie and say l did something didn't do instead setting up people to lie. Really.
I refused to work with the clique. But l woke up upset.
I refused to work with the clique. But l woke up upset.
Callistemon
Big hugs to all of you. With extra octopus.
maycontainthunder
Dog V4 sends you all a mad moment similar to this; https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sMY7LCk0UxQ
Callistemon
The other thing I found helpful - that little girl I was had nobody to talk to about that stuff. So I went back and talked to her, like a sort of Harry Potter imaginative pensieve thing. Because somebody had to. Because that is the psyche that's throwing all that stuff at your subconscious. And when you are asleep your subconscious comes out and says hello.
Slim Jim
I figure only so much space in the synapses. Maybe like a hard drive, once it gets full up, you can overwrite some old memories with new ones.
Callistemon
Sadly that's not how it works, @Slim Jim. Traumatic memories involve the amygdala, because in evolutionary terms, living things are never supposed to forget anything life-threatening - it's a survival priority. So the really traumatic memories can be suppressed, but never erased (excepting death and brain damage).
Callistemon
So typically in PTSD, they or aspects of them get suppressed behind a "wall" for years as happened to me, and/or just consciously pushed to the side when we are awake, because who wants to think about that unpleasant stuff from ancient history. But the subconscious brings it back up when the conscious lets go in sleep, and then there's horrible flashback cinema.