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Thanks for the replies. I feel the same, that I need to be clear with my frightened young parts that they are protected by adult me, who is always here for them.

I recently found something that has helped a bit when I have an EF, and I wanted to share it here in case it might help anyone else.

I think I've often found when I have an EF and parts of my mind that feel I'm in danger take over, that when I try reassuring them that I'm safe, they seem to feel that's not enough. From childhood experience, safety has been a temporary thing that could change at any moment to extreme danger, so for traumatised parts of me, being safe now is no guarantee that they'll be safe in a moment's time.

A few weeks ago, I bought anti-virus software and set it up on my phone. By chance, it flashes up a message: "You are protected" whenever I activate my phone. The frightened young parts of my mind seem to find this a stronger, more proactive message to hear than when I tell them "You're safe". I think it can help remind them that I am an adult now and I have boundaries and am able to look after them in a way they weren't looked after when I was little.

I happen to look at my phone a lot of times through the day, so repeatedly seeing the message flash up seems to reinforce  it.

Thank you Kizzie, NarcKiddo and Chart for the welcomes and for pointing me in the right direction for finding out about EFs. It's good to understand the acronyms and it has been really helpful to see the list of EF symptoms that Schrodingers Cat compiled from forum members. This explains a lot about what I've been experiencing on and off over the years, including what's been going on the last couple of weeks, which has been what gave me the nudge to try joining the forum. 

Thank you so much for the replies, so full of compassion, understanding and encouragement. It means a lot, and there are already feelings of having found comfort and connection here.

I feel very unused to opening up to people online - on the odd occasions (outside of therapy sessions) that I've opened up before, it's been in person where there can be a lot of talking and a lot of communication without words, but with smiles, tears, silences and hugs. Hopefully I'll get used to condensing things into a few short paragraphs soon!

It feels like it might take a bit of time to get used to the forum set-up too. Is there somewhere where the main abbreviations are spelled out? I've worked out some but not others, like EF.

Pangur, Papa Coco and SenseOrgan, I'd like to reply properly to each of you individually and I've found a dm option. I hope that's ok - please let me know if that goes against the etiquette for forums.

Hi,

It's hard to think where to start. There's been quite a jumble of thoughts and feelings leading up to this, as I imagine everyone who's introduced themselves here can relate to.

Childhood is probably a sensible place to start. So, I grew up in a household with a violent father. As far as I'm aware, he was never violent with me in that way but he was with my mother, brothers and sister, and there was a constant sense of terror that at any moment his anger might erupt and someone I cared about deeply might get beaten up, and I was powerless to stop him. My mother in particular suffered hugely and part of her response was something that I've seen in the OOTS guidelines we're only supposed to refer to in a particular forum, so perhaps I can just say for now that it left me with an extreme fear of being abandoned forever and left with a monster.

For most of my life, I've been left with what felt like a background sense of dread, and a very anxious, perfectionist, people-pleasing, conflict-avoiding type of personality. I sort of accepted it as something I was just randomly stuck with until one time at work when I'd been very upset for a long time about being in a situation where I felt more was being asked of me than I could do. As a result, I imagined I was worthless and something terrible would happen to me and/or people around me. A colleague recommended her therapist and, 7 years on, I'm still in therapy sessions and it's been such a roller coaster.

So much fear has come up and massive emotional dysregulation in response to things that I know my adult self would be able to handle, but which trigger young parts of me. Flashbacks and getting triggered by things around me, with impacts that can stop me from feeling based in the present and being able to function for everyday tasks, lasting hours, days or weeks. Yearning to be hugged, held and to feel safe felt like an addiction always pulling on my mind but most days, with no one around who I could ask for this.

The therapy has helped a lot so that (most days) I'm at last able to feel that I have self-worth and that I'm safe now, and I'm able to have some boundaries, all of which has been life-changing. Over the last few years of therapy though, other, more deeply buried stuff has been starting to come up, and a whole new struggle.

Part of me had wondered, since my father went to prison for a while about 12 years ago for possession of huge amounts of child pornography covering all levels of severity, whether he'd done anything to me and, although I have no specific, full memories of this, I've been having really horrible flashbacks, sometimes in nightmares, sometimes in therapy sessions and sometimes in everyday life situations, where my whole body suddenly reacts as if I'm a child being sexually abused right now. There are overwhelming feelings of panic, of things being done to me and not being able to get away, and sometimes this is followed by dissociation and shutting down, feeling like I'm leaving my body and the room.

This kind of thing has happened a couple of times over the last week, leaving me feeling so exhausted and scared of what's in my head, and with my brain not able to function for even simple work tasks or decisions. I've ended up taking sick leave and spending time in bed with a hot water bottle to try to feel safe.

With dad's violence, part of what made it so frightening was that it seemed out of the blue and uncontrolled, but with the other abuse it was pre-meditated and there are fragmented memories of his sense of enjoyment, so it all feels so much darker and more messed up.

I keep reminding myself that my father's abuse and my mother's lack of protection do not mean I'm a bad person, and that the fact that I'm still so damaged by it all four decades later does not mean I'm weak. I keep telling myself that it's the stuff that happened to me and around me that was bad, and that all of the impacts on me back then and since then are entirely natural, and even though I have phases of being stuck in bed hiding from the world, I'm actually strong to be facing all of this and sticking with the therapy. I know it's a positive sign of how far I've come, that more and more disturbing, deeply buried stuff is coming up now - a sign that my psyche (apparently, although it doesn't feel that way) is ready to deal with it.

It's so hard though. I've read a few other posts on here and totally agree that feeling a lack of connection is such a huge part of it. As a child, I learned early on that I couldn't talk about what was going on. Now, a lot of of me does want to talk about it, bring it into the open, and not feel ashamed. But my therapist has advised it might not be appropriate to be honest with my boss when I'm off sick and that it's likely to be better for me if I don't say I have cPTSD. With other people around me, other than a few very close friends, it feels like too big a gulf, when people ask 'How are you doing?', between answering the expected 'Good thanks' and the truth, when at times the truth is more like 'I've just gone through an experience of feeling like I'm a very young child being sexually abused by my dad right now, I'm terrified, and need to cry a lot and be held'.

I've not yet been able to face or accept a lot of the buried stuff inside me, and I know I have a long, bumpy road ahead of me, but I'm really glad to have found this group about half a year ago and to have taken the plunge today by accepting that this is a group where I belong.

To anyone who's read this - thank you, and I wish you well in your journey.