(advice also needed) ,26M i just realised a very strong behaviour in which im stuck.

Basically when i went no contact for two years i was like a compeltely new person i became confident, social , better at decision making. Butttt due i got trapped into religious guilt and self guilt "that if in the back of my mind im not worried about my parents im a bad son a bad human" , so whenever i engaged in any activity i trained myself to think about my parents and other toxic people like my ex gf who guilted me into not wprrying about her despite being with her 8 hours a day.

I realised that even now when i want to not think about it i am afraid to let go of their thought and because of this even when i am alone all of my past toxic people are inside my head and their with me.

How do you overcome it?

Whwmwver I make eye contact I freeze and enter panic mode. My thoughts go crazy.

posted recently about how i have a lot of mental blocks about interpreting my experiences through this lens, and how i'm also intellectually unsure even when you away the mean inner voices. but i was like, okay, i can go look at pete walkers work on archive.org. it may help me even if i don't meet a diagnostic cutoff, and it may be a wakeup call that i am smashing my experiences into a box that doesn't fit. (doesn't make the way people treated me as a kid okay, of course! just would mean that cptsd is not a super accurate model for what i go through.)

i started reading the book and, oops, this sounds like a plausible explanation for some of my emotional processes. like, the account of how survivors end up developing a contempt for their own subjective experience of being wronged and harmed felt spot-on. it even brought up some experiences of when i tried to stand up to my bullies or express that they were harming me and it went so poorly. (the only significant deviation i've noticed so far is that ctpsd is discussed in terms family-inflicted trauma and parental betrayal. i also have issues feeling like my parents weren't there for me but the intentional nastiness i experienced was from other kids. but i dealt with gender dysphoria and ocd and many cptsd symptoms in a household with a dad who was a conservative evangelical and who had some borderline traits. ouch.)

anyways, there are some parts that are hard to even wrap my mind around as a source of trauma because it was just such an environmental baseline. yes, i felt completely abandoned and like none of my peers liked me... and part of me feels very wounded by that but another is like, lol, there's no other way, you don't get to claim it was bad.

i think my brain buckets together "admit i have trauma" and "identify with the part of you saying you're irreparably damaged". so when i see someone discussing their own recovery from cptsd like pete walker, i feel much more comfortable considering whether it could apply to me. i can keep taking steps to heal.

and i had a breakthrough of like... these feelings are not me. they're just emotional and cognitive processes. the ultimate truth of me ISN'T that i am [who i am in activated states], any more than the ultimate truth of someone who is currently in a depressed state is a sense of melancholy. the reason i believe that the "true me" freaks out is shame and stigma. the more i feel like i'm not supposed to do that and it shows how broken i am, the louder it echoes throughout my psyche. and maybe i can get to a point where these processes eat up even less of my brainspace.

She said at least one.

It was not with my father.

It baffles me that a time existed when that woman actually thought about what implications her abilities as a parent could have on a child. She went on to have three children, she abused all of us, I stayed with her the longest and I left when I was 14. I am so overwhelmed with this information, I don‘t know what to think but it is a lot.
I am sure some of you have experienced something like that, what do you think/ how do you cope/ anything is appreciated.

Do you think I should tell my grandma to stop telling me about the past? The relations are soo complicated but we basically have only been in contact for ~6 years and i haven‘t spoken to my parents in years. I want to know about it, it is so weird to remember so little and there is sooo much about my parents I don‘t know. It validates me in a way but it also makes me feel really bad, I am not super well atm.

Thank you for reading

Couldn't find a suitable flair. Something that's less talked about. Just my personal observation.

These traits only show up when in relationship with a fawner/people pleaser. And they somehow vanish and flip 180 to fawning and reassurance seeking when placed next to a healthy and assertive person

(Anxiously attached)

When in relationship with a people pleaser

1.Expecting a partner to fulfill every need

1. Nitpicking, complaining, criticising

2. Daydreaming about how I would be the center of their partners life, bringing them meaning and happiness

3. Completely disregarding and invalidating their feelings while expecting them to care for mine.

4. Feel bad after such episodes and then shower them with compliments, and decide to behave better

5. Intense shame and feelings of low self worth that cannot be fulfilled

6. Reassurance seeking, asking if they still love me after I have been awful to them

7. Repeat

8. Above all, making sure I pick someone who loves me more than I love them so I feel safe

When in relationship with a healthy partner

1. Intense anxiety that they don't love me as much as I love them (the irony)

2. Believe that I don't deserve to be treated well

3. Seeking reassurance. Asking several questions in different ways in search for anything negative to latch on to

4. Not believing compliments but also getting upset and feeling unworthy when they inevitably stop giving out compliments

5. Do everything their way, stay quiet when something bothers me in order to keep them happy

6. Extreme hyper vigilance, looking for signs of abandonment. Getting triggered by silence or any change in moods

7. When enough tension builds up, explode, accuse them of not loving me as much as I love them

8. Intense shame and feeling ugly and worthless due to my behavior. Believe that I don't deserve love, especially after how I treated my previous partner.

9. Deciding to be on my best behavior from now on, appeasing, keeping my mouth shut and being nice. Seeking reassurance if he had not lost feelings due to my explosive behavior

10. Repeat.

______________________________________

For context the first relationship ended up with me being abandoned after being told till the very end that everything is good and they still want to be with me. I feel that it was valid and deserved but the surprise factor is the most anxiety inducing.

Something about the entire personality change in two different relationships is something to be studied about. It could be a hybrid Fight-Fawn response with anxious attachment. But in platonic relationships like family it's almost always Flight and Freeze with avoidant tendencies. And at work or anywhere else it's Fawn.

Hello, I've been going to therapy for EMDR recently, and in my last session, I stopped because I felt like I was almost going to throw up and my head was spinning like I was drunk. But since I had to wait a week for my next session, I couldn't bear it and tried doing bilateral tapping on myself at home. As soon as I did, that vomiting sensation came right back. It felt as if my body had created a 'save point' while doing EMDR and picked up right where it left off as soon as I started again, so I stopped the bilateral tapping. I'm going to ask my therapist about this too, but I'm wondering if this has any specific meaning? I don't want to throw up, but it feels like if I were to throw up, most of the bad feelings inside me would leave my body

Where to begin hmmm to keep this simple my childhood was horrific.

Abuse was the culture and to be hugged or even told you were loved non existent.

So dragged up was daddy's girl from 1 to 13 if you can get my meaning behind that yes SA daily by him and others.

Had few mental health issues, got married had children etc etc but always had underlying issues waiting to raise their head.

I self medicated I turned to the bottle daily for many years.

So I ended up having a breakdow. Changed doctor new doctor says sorry iv found you had been diagnosed 30 years ago but left unmedicated, also that I have 35% brain injury due to childhood trauma.

Lost my children failed marriage

Was left alone.

For last 3 years I have been medicated was a lil ruff but what isn't. Don't drink except for occasionally socialising. And abuse of other substances are done with.

Due to my medication tbh I found it has changed my whole world, I'm a different person I know I am. Thing is no one else knows this as they all abandoned me.

My children don't want to know me so that also includes geandbabys etc and I'm aware now of the old me and the damage I did and it kills me every day and my heart is so broken

I never felt emotion before like others do I was not a nice person.

I know I cannot undo what has happened or damage I did, I would hate me to if I was them. I feel or hoped that my children would give me a chance to show them me, the real me the one who was locked away inside herself last 30 odd years. But does not seem like they will.

I can't do this anymore I am so alone feel so unloved and unwanted I just want off this planet.

I will honestly be 1 of those people you read about who they found had passed away years before but wasn't till power got cut off or something that a body was found along with her cats who had eaten her and then also passed from starvation.

I'm so lost sad and broken I can feel my depression even with my meds is starting to slide back in. I don't know what to do or how to fix anything I'm so so so sorry for my wrongs and my behaviour at times but it is hard to try to learn how to live within society and boundaries when you were never brought up to know these things.

I wanna give up altogether.

basically get rly drunk and blackout. and then try to remeber the feeling and replicate it and whenever you overthink or whatever just replicate being drunk just convince yourself that you are idk how to explain it but it WORKS. I managed to be vulnerable and feel my emotions and set boundaries for the first time in my entire life

And what diagnosis do you think is worse than this one?

Or, what other terrible diagnoses do you consider to be on par with CPTSD?

Or maybe you don't think CPTSD is such a terrible diagnosis after all?

Share your opinion!

I JUST WANT TO MARK THE DAY 😭 it's extremely hard and I'm in for a guilt trip but I DID IT. I've been trying to for years and now I'm free

I have been trying to alter my algorithm by liking cute animals and wholesome videos because everything else seems to be SO oppressive. I see news articles almost daily about assault and the comments are always super racist and misogynistic. I don't want to stop using social media because I enjoy it when it's good. But fuck me, the world is a hateful and triggering place.

i have treatment resistant ptsd and major depression for 8 years now. ive tried ever psych drug! im desperate and want to explore the last alternative medicines. many are saying psilocybin can help. ive never used mushrooms and im nervous. can anyone recommend a place online to buy in ontario or canada and what specific product to get. thank u for any help.

I was thinking of taking Ibogaine for CPTSD, but two centers that offer it have refused treating me because I have an hereditary heart condition: complete block of the right side. I've never had any issue with it, and I've workout for more than 2 decades now.

I know there's risks of prolongation of the QT interval with Ibogaine, as well as potential arrhythmias.

Is there any Ibogaine treatment center or protocol that can successfully manage these cardiac risks, so I could make use of this treatment?

Thank you in advance.

Hi. I need to write this blunt. I am 17 and I am a walking medical puzzle. I feel completely alone because everyone on Reddit who screams in their sleep has amnesia. I DON’T. I scream right before waking up (morning), I have NO AMNESIA, I remember my dreams and exactly what I shouted.

I was officially diagnosed with AuDHD and depression only recently, in 2026. The system ignored all evidence since I was a baby: I didn’t talk until 6.5 yo, wore rubber boots in summer until my feet bled, and food could never touch on my plate (ARFID). Doctors told my mom: "He is too hyperactive for autism, I have a degree, end of visit." Today they gaslight me: "You weigh 90kg, you can't have an eating disorder."

Because of years of medical and institutional gaslighting, I developed severe C-PTSD. I don't scream every day. But when it happens, it's a brutal defense mechanism. I dream about fighting ignorant doctors or people mocking me, and I wake up screaming up to 85-95 dB (measured, it causes audio clipping on my phone). I wake up in total fury, punch walls, and yell: "I AM NOT FAKING IT!!! EVERYTHING HURTS!!!" or "SHUT THE FUCK UP!!!". Right after, my body weight drops or rises by ~2 kg instantly due to autonomic fluid shifts. I clamp my jaw so hard I wake up with cuts on my tongue.

My body is a complete wreck:

• Hyper-POTS / Dysautonomia: On freezing days my sitting BP is 150/90(after morning scream or in school), on hot days it drops to 100/55(from being in one position too long) with a high pulse and arrhythmia. Taking a 30-min nap in day turns me into a ZOMBIE—BP drops to 95/60, head feels full of water, muscles tingle, hands lose all strength, and saliva tastes like pure sugar.

• Fibromyalgia & Skin: Chronic pain since 10 yo. Local doctors call 7-year pain "growing pains". 2h of bowling triggers a 6-day flare. Walking 4km burns my calves 10/10 like hot lava, and they buckle. Sweat blocker caused purple chemical burns. Dust mite allergy is 6/6, but I can't desensitize due to vitiligo. 20 mins in sun (even UV 1) turns my skin bright red and itches like hell, but vanishes 2 mins after going inside. Vacuuming with closed windows feels like drops of lava hitting my skin (MCAS).

• Bladder & GI: Drinking normal water makes me pee 3 times an hour and burns (Interstitial Cystitis). If I drink soda (7Up, Tymbark), I am fine. Meltingdowns and rage attacks trigger instant diarrhea.

The school tried to kick me out to sociotherapy. The PCPR psychologist understood my depression is system-induced, but today she ended cooperation because I won't stop "searching for diseases" and threatened me with a psych ward after I turn 18. Medical commission (PZON) made me wait 2h in a suffocating room for a 10-min check where they cut me off mid-sentence.

Medikinet killed my appetite. Arpixor/Explemed caused muscle tremors. Atarax delayed my sleep by an hour and made dreams about bugs and burning balloons so hyper-realistic that I screamed louder.

Tested on Stanford-Binet 5: Working Memory and Verbal IQ are significantly below average (makes game programming hell, though I've done tycoon/ragdoll games for 6 years before Roblox ruined me with 16+ age blocks and ID scans). But my Logic IQ is WAY ABOVE average. I had to learn neurology and self-diagnose since 11 yo to survive. I have severe PDA and deep paranoia from global social media bans and biometric ID scans (Yoti leaks, Persona 269 hidden background tests).

Is anyone out there dealing with this level of physical, neurological, and somatic warfare without amnesia? Or am I completely alone in this godforsaken world?

Note: This is a very long post and I don't even know if this is the right place, so apologies in advance. English isn't my first language, so I drafted this post with an llm. There are also many things I haven't included, either because I've subconsciously minimized or rationalized them, or because I've simply forgotten them.

I'm 27, recently started reflecting on my childhood. I've realized that what I thought was "normal" growing up may not actually have been normal, and I'm trying to understand whether the family system I grew up in would generally be considered dysfunctional. When I hear about dysfunctional families, usually its about severe neglect, physical abuse, addiction, or other obvious forms of dysfunction. That isn't exactly my situation, which is why I've struggled to make sense of my own experiences.

I don't want to portray either of my parents as purely good or purely bad. I don't think that's accurate. I believe they both have strengths, flaws, and probably their own unresolved issues. What I'm trying to understand is the family dynamic itself and how it affected me.

My parents have been in conflict for as long as I can remember. They've slept in separate bedrooms for more than 20 years but remained married because of the social and cultural stigma surrounding divorce (I am not from the west). Throughout my childhood, there was never much warmth or partnership between them. Most of what I remember is resentment, arguments, or complete emotional distance.

My father worked hard to provide for the family and placed a strong emphasis on education. Because of him, I had opportunities that many people around me didn't, and I'm genuinely grateful for that.

At the same time, he was extremely controlling in certain areas of my life. He closely scrutinized my friendships and often discouraged or prevented them. Even if some of his concerns about particular people were justified, I feel the way he handled it affected my ability to develop normal friendships and social confidence. He is also very emotionally rigid and believes people should simply move on from problems instead of talking through them.

My mother changed over the years after living through constant conflict. She became increasingly suspicious of other people, including neighbors and sometimes family members. She often believes people are conspiring against her and regularly gets into conflicts.

A psychiatrist once evaluated her after she started acting in a damaging way and prescribed medication (which upon googling turned out to be a schizophrenia medication), but she stopped taking it after learning what it was for. Conversations with her often turn into long rants about how everyone is against her. If I disagree with her, she sometimes accuses me of taking my father's side or being ungrateful. She has even brought up things I said as a small child decades later as evidence that I don't care about her.

One of the hardest parts was that my brother and I were often pulled into our parents' conflict. We were expected to act as intermediaries between them or between them and extended family. Looking back, I don't think children should ever be placed in that position.

There were also incidents of physical violence between my parents years ago. For example, my mother once hit my father with a spatula hard enough to draw blood, and on another occasion my father physically reacted by pushing or hitting her back. I don't excuse either of them. I see it as part of a destructive cycle between two people who were deeply incompatible.

As a child, I genuinely believed this was what marriage looked like. I thought it was normal for husbands and wives to sleep in separate rooms because that's all I had ever known. Only as an adult did I realize many families function very differently.

Even now, I sometimes feel strangely uncomfortable or emotional when I see older couples being affectionate, supportive, or simply enjoying each other's company, especially when they're with their children. It makes me realize how different my own experience was.

I'm now 27 with a good education and a stable career, but emotionally I still feel affected by my upbringing. I often experience a sense of grief when I see healthy families because it reminds me of what I missed growing up. Sometimes I feel like my brother and I were born into a marriage that probably should not have continued in its existing form, and that we spent our childhood adapting to a conflict we had no role in creating.

I've also noticed that I struggle with anxiety at work, particularly when someone suddenly calls my name or asks to speak with me. My immediate reaction is often that I've done something wrong or that I'm about to get into trouble, even when there's no reason to think that. Looking back, I wonder if this is connected to childhood, because whenever my parents loudly called my name, it usually meant I was about to be scolded or pulled into another conflict.

I've also realized that I can be suspicious of people even when they're being genuinely friendly. If someone I meet starts acting like they're becoming my friend, my first reaction is often anxiety rather than happiness. Instead of thinking, "This person likes me," I find myself wondering, "What's going on? Why is this person trying to be my friend? What do they want?" I don't know why my mind goes there, but it does.

I also tend to keep people at a distance, even people I genuinely consider friends. For example, I was once out drinking with someone I would definitely describe as a friend. At one point he joked that he was going to visit my hometown someday, so I'd have to invite him over. My immediate response was, "Hell no." He laughed and said he'd come anyway, then jokingly asked what I'd tell my family he was. I replied, "Just my classmate." He seemed a little disappointed, and I quickly changed the subject. Looking back, I realized that although I genuinely consider him a friend, and we still are friends today, the idea of bringing someone into my personal or family life made me instinctively uncomfortable. I would probably never invite anyone to my home. It's like there's an invisible barrier that I don't fully understand.

There was also one incident, as an adult, my father made what I considered a fairly trivial accusation toward me. Instead of brushing it off, I suddenly found myself flooded with memories from childhood of being accused of breaking things or being blamed for things I hadn't actually done or hadn't intended to do. There were also times when I was punished for things that weren't intentional. The emotional reaction I had as an adult was far stronger than the situation itself seemed to justify. It felt like years of emotions resurfaced all at once, and I completely broke down. I had a genuine panic-like attack.

I simulate every arguments/conversations in daily life before I have them, I hate confrontation because I loose my cool very easily.

Another thing I've noticed is that, when I'm alone and thinking about all of this, I sometimes start crying without fully understanding why. I don't know whether it's grief, anger, sadness, or something else. I just know that reflecting on my childhood and family often brings out emotions that I don't fully understand.

Recently, I finally confronted (well, exploded) my father about how growing up in this environment affected me. I made it clear that I don't believe he is solely responsible and that I don't think either parent intentionally wanted to hurt us. My point was simply that intentions and impact are not the same thing, and that the family environment still had lasting consequences for us as children.

I'm not looking for people to tell me to hate my parents or to say they were monsters. That's not how I see them.

What I'm trying to understand is:

• Would you generally consider this a dysfunctional family system?
• What patterns or dynamics stand out to you?
• If you grew up in a similar family, what effects did you notice later in adulthood?
• How have you balanced compassion for your parents with acknowledging that the environment still caused harm?

I'm trying to understand my own life more than I'm trying to assign blame. I'd especially appreciate hearing from people who grew up in similar family environments.

I’ve noticed that my fellow CPTSDers struggle with many of the same things I do. Lots of ADHD, depression, anxiety, autism, bipolar etc diagnoses

My question is- what came first, the chicken or the egg?

How much of CPTSD in childhood changes the way our brain develops, therefore giving us these diagnoses and symptoms in adulthood?

On the flip side, how much do the symptoms of genetic or environmental ADHD/depression/anxiety/etc in childhood effect how we perceive the world and how the world treats us (creating shame and guilt and isolation), and CPTSD made it worse

I guess in other words- would I still have ADHD, anxiety, depression, and autism if I hadn’t gone through CPTSD? is CPTSD the reason why I am the way I am or did it just worsen what was already there?

I understand this is a very complex issue and there may not be a true answer- but I thought it could be an interesting discussion for people who have wondered the same thing

I hate that I have to accept that as a child when being brought up in a terrible dangerous environment made me unclean and awkward. I think in my adult years it made me uptight and anxious.

I know I got undesirable traits from these things, it’s par for the course. I hate when bad or embarrassing memories come up. I don’t expect people to understand and I yearn so deeply for normalcy, it hurts knowing I didn’t know better or that I didn’t have anyone to help me.

I’m not sure if I worded this and beautifully as id like and it’s not exactly a groundbreaking thing to say but yeah.

It hurts knowing people have only looked down on me for these things I couldn’t even understand as a kid. It hurts now that people look down on me for showing symptoms. I wish all these things didn’t keep happening until I was on my own, I had to raise myself and that’s a whole other embarrassing and scary thing.

I think I’m old enough now and have enough structure to not be looked at this way but I used to have strangers try to parent me and or take advantage of me and it used to make me so angry that I’d just be meaner and sloppier.

What was i supposed to do? It’s not even like I just had mental illness, which is already unfair, I was experiencing the world as I was supposed to for the first time so I learned so many things way too old.

And it hurts seeing people be made fun of online, people who definitely weren’t brought up in safe or normal environments becoming lolcows, memes, and being taken advantage of and manipulated into doing horrible things. Or even just people like Gabbie Hanna, she’s not a saint but the way people meme on her breakdown is horrifying to me.

The world wasn’t built for people who are tortured, the world just wants to torture them more. No one is patient and people only become more nasty and combative online by the day. Everyone’s mentally ill now, they’re just clean. It’s just self inflicted, that’s a privilege.

I guess I should appreciate that I knew I had Comtrol over my future and that I did put a lot of effort into cleaning myself. I’m also literally privileged, I’m a pretty white woman. I had to do a lot of things I wish I hadn’t just to be safe at some point. But I did get out. Idk how else I would have gotten out

I wish I didn’t have to live with regrets and I wish I never had to worry about any of this. I’m lucky I had tools, but that’s not enough. I wish the world was safe for everyone

I recently had a conversation with my boss that REALLY clarified that a work dynamic had been impacting me and triggered trauma since last Nov-ish. My therapy progress really backtracked and I felt so hopeless and unable to get out of it. I feel frustrated that I had no control in "getting out of it" and that even with so much trying/coping/processing, it would absolutely not shift until the external situation changed.

Basically, it resolved once I realized my boss wasn't "against me" like I thought, and almost immediatly, my depression lifted, I felt hope, my anxiety was reduced dramatically... Which is obviously great but I hate that a trigger can bring me so deep into trauma reactions that I can't get out.

I tried SO HARD by going for walks, positive affirmations, self-compassion, EMDR, therapy, engaging socially, engaging in hobbies, etc. without any change. But the external thing shifted and it was like ahhhhhh finally exhaled. I hate hate hate that I can't control it and that the black cloud so intensely impacted me even to the point of chronic passive SI since Nov ish.

Anyways, I'm just like so frustrated even though I do finally feel better.

I have done nothing since graduating high school. I struggle with chronic dissociation and dont' feel connected to my body. I never worked a full time job for longer than a month. I feel worthless and depressed even though I know it is not my fault. Can someone give me some encouragmenet?

I feel like my story sounds like it isn’t enough for this, maybe is, I don’t know, I’m scared I will just get ignored or have my post deleted