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Since CPTSD is caused from an injury or injuries, it is possible for the brain to be healed. What that will look like for each person will vary.

Lots of exciting discoveries are being made in the field of neuroplasticity.

Like you, tho, I wonder what that means for me. My exposure to trauma began before I was verbal. I guess for me, when I think of healing, I think of restoration or getting back to what I was meant to be, or as close as possible.

I've already experienced some healing and I do feel better. I am seeing a gestalt therapist and, while it doesn't address the injuries to my brain itself, it is helping me with all the confusing emotions.

You may be interested in reading "The Body Keeps The Score". The author goes into the why's and how's of traumatic injury as well as different successful therapies. Hope this helps.

Thank you for the book recommendation! I've ordered the "Complex PTSD" book that I saw in the recommendations assoon as I found this website, but I'll order this one too. Which one would you recommend to read first?

And thank you for talking about neuroplasticity. I'll look it up. Hopefully it's something that can make me believe that someone with cPTSD can actually heal. I have very little hope left at this point.

Sara, this is almost a philosophycal question, to be or not to be. Finding meaning and purpose while suffering from PTSD is hard. When, in my life, everything spiralled down, the only way up for me was making art, through painting and using mixed media I found new meaning. This question you ask still pops into my head every once and a while. Disturbing? Yes. Insurmountable? No.

For me it's all about acceptance.

Take care

Lingurine

Thank you Lingurine,

This is what I think I'm struggling with. I cannot accept it. Sometimes when I talk about what happenned I actually physically feel lsick and need to run to the toilet to vomit.

The older I get the more framework I have to look back and unravel the gaslighting (My father throughout the years had me convinced it was my fault that he abused and tortured me. When I was very little it was easy. When I got a bit older he went as far as to pulling up literature about bi-polar disorder, showing it to me and saying that was the reason he had to "discipline me". First of all, what he took for a bipolar cycle is me being very, very depressed after he'd attack me for a period of time and then trying to get back to normal life with school activities and friends to just be humiliated and beaten up again when he had a bad day. Secondly, even if a child is bipolar, it doesn't give the caregiver the right to abuse them! *!)

I think now that I'm in a safe place (with my lovely boyfriend and a generally peaceful life) more of the memories/physical panick come up. And the more I see how crazy and cruel that childhood was. I can't forgive it, really. As an adult person I would never put myself around a person like this and I would never knowingly leave a child in a custody of someone like that. But as a child it wasn't my choice to make.

I tried in my teens to do a lot of affirmations and sort of make myself forgive him. I really tried with all my heart. But because the damage was done, living my life I come across triggers that bring the pain, the panick and the nightmares back again and again.

My psychopathic father lives a comfortable life without any remorse and he never went to jail for what he did (I was not brave enough to go to the police, and my mother wanted to keep the dirt in the family and keep the outer appearances perfect).

I do not accept that that person avoided all the consequences and is doing just fine while I am in a prison of PTSD.

Have you ever read or heard about an adult who had gotten cured of CPTSD?

When I read of PTSD that vets got after a tour in a warzone I often come across the "he wasn't himself afterwards".

But what exactly is "myself" if I had gotten CPTSD in through my childhood, through things that happenned ibn my formative years? My personality is a huge scar. There is no happy and healthy "myself" to get back to, because it never had a chance to develop.

I've been through a lot of therapy and sometimes it helped for a while, sometimes it made me worse (dismissive therapists).

If my life is going to be this continuous struggle that eventually spirals back to pain every time, what kind of quality life is it? Is it even worth it?

hi aurora,

i'm here from your other post where you said you weren't sure if this was abuse.

i read your post and all of it was abuse.

all of it.

i wanted to write more but at this moment i can't because i'm crying. i will try to write more in a couple of days.

i just want to wish you strength.

Hi,

I'm 27 now and still suffering from the echos of things that happenned as I was growing up. I am safe now, I live in a small cosy flat with a loving boyfriend and a red cat.

I've been physically, emotionally and verbally abused and tortured by my father who I suspect has some distinctive psychopathic personality traits. Some things I remember very vaguely or not at all, probably due to the physical head trauma or just my subconscious trying to block it out. The things I do remember make my blood run cold. I remember my father enjoying doing what he did. His eyes, usually dead and emotionless "fish eyes", filled with sadistic joy in those moments.

I've been diagnosed with PTSD and I see my symptoms in that, but I think it doesn't take into account the effect traumatic experiences have on a child's forming brain. For example a journalist in a hot spot can be captured and tortured and develop PTSD from it. But that is a grown person with already formed personality, sense of self worth and some mental shield against stress, all these things will help him in coping with the trauma later on. But imagine it is a child whose tortured. And not for a week or day, but many, many years.

I can't concentrate or deal with stress, I forget things like where I left my keys, what day of the week it is, what my plans were, the chapter of a book I just read. When I'm  anxious or once again spiraling down into depression, I even find it hard to gather my thoughts and form sentences. I have nightmares still and wake up feeling like I've been beaten up or hit by a car. I take antidepressants of course, but still I have days when I want to take my own life just not to feel anything and instead of it I still sometimes resort to self harm (like cutting my hands, hitting or pinching myself, poking my palm with a pointy object). These are the things I used to do as a child, now I try to do therapy(not right now, between therapists) and follow a healthy lifestyle, but they still happen. I have trouble socially and get panic attacks and very, very painful anxiety and sense of dread.

Lately I've been thinking a lot about taking my life just because the symptoms are so painful and I don't see how I can go on living like that, on days like these I don't know what to do with myself. I know the symptoms will most likely always be with me in some form of another. But of course I can't do it right now because I have a loving boyfriend and I would never want to hurt him. If I hadn't had him, I'm pretty sure I would've done it by now.

I'm just here looking for some support I think.