Recent posts
#21
General Discussion / Re: Trauma and Depression
Last post by Teddy bear - January 21, 2026, 08:45:14 PMThanks for this thread. In my current state, I could mainly only look through it, but I'm feeling somewhat similar.
It's interesting—I had a genetic test done a few years ago, and according to the results, I have about a 30% risk of depression, with no other predispositions to mental illness.
This seems to make sense, as I remember having episodes of depression since I was 10 or 12 years old.
It's interesting—I had a genetic test done a few years ago, and according to the results, I have about a 30% risk of depression, with no other predispositions to mental illness.
This seems to make sense, as I remember having episodes of depression since I was 10 or 12 years old.
#22
Art / Re: Artist's impressions of wh...
Last post by Teddy bear - January 21, 2026, 08:18:07 PMHi, glad to find this thread. I've probably been dealing with mild depression and/or burnout recently.
These drawings are impressive. For me, they evoke something oppressive, dark, and gloomy, which really resonates with the not-so-bright mood I'm in right now.
I do find it a bit puzzling though—it seems like a lot of work. When I'm depressed, I can hardly do anything: low mood, no motivation, apathy... It's wonderful he was able to complete them with such passion and perseverance.
Anyway, I'm planning to talk to a new doctor soon about how I've been feeling.
These drawings are impressive. For me, they evoke something oppressive, dark, and gloomy, which really resonates with the not-so-bright mood I'm in right now.
I do find it a bit puzzling though—it seems like a lot of work. When I'm depressed, I can hardly do anything: low mood, no motivation, apathy... It's wonderful he was able to complete them with such passion and perseverance.
Anyway, I'm planning to talk to a new doctor soon about how I've been feeling.
#23
Recovery Journals / Re: Living As All of Me
Last post by Chart - January 21, 2026, 08:12:11 PMThat was powerful HannahOne, thank you.
#24
Recovery Journals / Re: Desert Flower's Recovery J...
Last post by Chart - January 21, 2026, 08:07:42 PM #25
Please Introduce Yourself Here / Re: Introduction
Last post by Erec - January 21, 2026, 07:51:05 PMThank you both, TheBigBlue and NarcKiddo. I really appreciate your support and for being there for me.
I would like to share more, but perhaps now isn't the best time. As I mentioned, it was a revelation, but not the kind that makes things simple—at least not immediately. I want to talk more about it, partly because what I've discovered about my biological issues—which likely amplified the negative effects of my trauma perfectly—might be helpful to others as well. However, I don't think I have the mental clarity yet to explain it in an organized way. I wouldn't even know which sections of the forum to post in. But I can tell you that neuroinflammation is a central aspect of my problems.
I hope to feel better soon and return here with more calm. Right now, I also realize I am too focused on my own situation to truly look out for others, and the people who write here deserve an attention and closeness that I probably cannot give today.
My heartfelt thanks to you both, see you soon.
I would like to share more, but perhaps now isn't the best time. As I mentioned, it was a revelation, but not the kind that makes things simple—at least not immediately. I want to talk more about it, partly because what I've discovered about my biological issues—which likely amplified the negative effects of my trauma perfectly—might be helpful to others as well. However, I don't think I have the mental clarity yet to explain it in an organized way. I wouldn't even know which sections of the forum to post in. But I can tell you that neuroinflammation is a central aspect of my problems.
I hope to feel better soon and return here with more calm. Right now, I also realize I am too focused on my own situation to truly look out for others, and the people who write here deserve an attention and closeness that I probably cannot give today.
My heartfelt thanks to you both, see you soon.
#26
Recovery Journals / Re: Living As All of Me
Last post by NarcKiddo - January 21, 2026, 06:06:24 PMQuote from: HannahOne on January 16, 2026, 01:20:40 AMThe book of my life was scribbled in before I got to even pick up a pencil.
Oh boy.That resonates so much I just want to cry. Actually, I am crying. In a healing way, so thank you.
I love your writing style. Healing wishes to you and Frank.
#27
Recovery Journals / Re: the next step
Last post by Papa Coco - January 21, 2026, 05:37:14 PMSan,
From one overwhelmed soul to another, Just know you're not alone. We're all pulling for each other.
From one overwhelmed soul to another,
Just know you're not alone. We're all pulling for each other. #28
Recovery Journals / Re: Papa Coco's Recovery Journ...
Last post by Papa Coco - January 21, 2026, 05:23:02 PMChart, Dolly, NarcKiddo, San,
I can't express enough how helpful your responses are right now.
Dolly, I have a slightly different take on why you feel the need to help. I feel like we're in this together, and we are wired to share help with each other, and I receive your suggestions as gifts, not as budding in. I've always loved that old quip that says how we have two hands; one for giving and one for receiving. When we use both equally, the healing energy of the Universe flows through us like conduits. That's why I'm grateful anytime anyone on the forum shares their thoughts for the purpose of helping. And I'm VERY interested in reading the book you're reading. What we often call scapegoating, or "Identified Patient", I sometimes call the "Gilligan Syndrome". Gilligan made mistakes that kept the 7 characters stuck on the island. Pretty soon, every time a mistake was made, every single person; all 7 characters, and all the millions of viewers watching that show, just knew to blame Gilligan. In my own life, whenever I'm with someone who treats me like I'm the problem, I start to become the problem. AND when I become the problem, they become surer to just blame me without even thinking first. It's a Confirmation Bias that's shared with both the victim and the accusers. If Gilligan were to somehow escape the island alone, the other 6 characters and the millions of interested viewers would all be suddenly thrown into chaos--lost without the only excuse they knew how to use. The loss would be catastrophic for a while as people were forced to find a new reason for their problems. --I'm probably going to buy the book you're reading. It sounds like it could really help me with my anger issues around FOO and church.
NarcKiddo, That sounds like we share an affliction for sure. In my own world, this credit card fiasco appears to be a karmic lesson meant to help me see something that's always been there, but my head has been in the dark with the guinea pig. I now recognize that my future tombstone could read "85 years of living in panic". I live my life like I'm drowning and flailing for a life ring to grab onto. And as that comes to light for me, I can also see that I've rushed into "cures" in a panic. When I'm in periods of calm, it's because I'm hiding my head in the little house. Then when I'm pulled out of the little house, back into the real world, I actually escalate the sense of chronic panic by panicking for a cure. What we're onto here is a need for deescalation. To calm panic, I need to not panic, but to calm down.
San, You brought up something I recently heard in one of Daniel Schmidt's amazingly peaceful YouTube videos on his website www.awakentheworld.com. He said that we need to stop DOING peace and start BEING peace. I'm like you and your D. I want instant results, and I can't focus long in meditation. I frantically run toward it, then frantically run from it. I find that, for me, using peaceful meditations found online or through meditation apps, helps me find a few moments of physical and spiritual peace that I hope to increase by repeating. Nueroplasticity is the act of repeating a new habit so often that it forges new patterns in the brain. I'm up to where, if I use the right app at the right time, I can feel peace for up to about 45 minutes now. And back to my comments with NarcKiddo, I feel like this credit card fiasco was a gift from Karma to help shine a spotlight on what the real problem is. I'm in a lifelong panic, and I'm using panic to try and calm panic.
I really like the idea that we don't need to DO peace, but we need to settle into the peace that we are. And if we can stop thinking about yesterday and tomorrow for just a few seconds a day, we can "be" peace for at least a few seconds. And with neuroplasticity in play, we can eventually stretch seconds into minutes, and maybe even one day turn minutes into hours.
I don't know if Karma is a spiritual thing or a deeply wired in sense of balance that, from our deepest subconscious, knows we want to find peace, so it creates learning lessons for us. Karma has been given a wrong reputation that it's about punishing bad behaviors. I don't see it that way. I personally believe Karma is a coach that I've hired to keep creating learning scenarios for me, to help me learn what I need to learn. It repeats lessons only when I'm still not getting it. Like my grandson's driving simulator. Every time he crashes it makes him take the same course again, and it repeats the course until he can master it. My Karma is a gift, either from some universal intelligence, or from my own deepest mind, (I don't really care where it comes from--if it works, it works) but I really, really believe I was attacked by thieves so that I would see how much panic lives within me all the time. I really thought I was in good shape until those thieves showed me how violated and unsafe I still do feel in life. I pray daily for peace, and this chaos is the cure that I have to go THROUGH rather than continue to ignore. This unrest is the answer to my prayers for peace. Thinking of it as a simulator helps me make sense of how I'm being given a chance to go through it finally. These thieves made me go through it one more time. Eventually, I'm going to be made able to accept the peace I keep hiding from now.
The peace is there. It's up to me to "BE" it. I don't even have to find it, I just have to settle into it.
I love you all, and those aren't just words,
PC
I can't express enough how helpful your responses are right now.
Dolly, I have a slightly different take on why you feel the need to help. I feel like we're in this together, and we are wired to share help with each other, and I receive your suggestions as gifts, not as budding in. I've always loved that old quip that says how we have two hands; one for giving and one for receiving. When we use both equally, the healing energy of the Universe flows through us like conduits. That's why I'm grateful anytime anyone on the forum shares their thoughts for the purpose of helping. And I'm VERY interested in reading the book you're reading. What we often call scapegoating, or "Identified Patient", I sometimes call the "Gilligan Syndrome". Gilligan made mistakes that kept the 7 characters stuck on the island. Pretty soon, every time a mistake was made, every single person; all 7 characters, and all the millions of viewers watching that show, just knew to blame Gilligan. In my own life, whenever I'm with someone who treats me like I'm the problem, I start to become the problem. AND when I become the problem, they become surer to just blame me without even thinking first. It's a Confirmation Bias that's shared with both the victim and the accusers. If Gilligan were to somehow escape the island alone, the other 6 characters and the millions of interested viewers would all be suddenly thrown into chaos--lost without the only excuse they knew how to use. The loss would be catastrophic for a while as people were forced to find a new reason for their problems. --I'm probably going to buy the book you're reading. It sounds like it could really help me with my anger issues around FOO and church.
NarcKiddo, That sounds like we share an affliction for sure. In my own world, this credit card fiasco appears to be a karmic lesson meant to help me see something that's always been there, but my head has been in the dark with the guinea pig. I now recognize that my future tombstone could read "85 years of living in panic". I live my life like I'm drowning and flailing for a life ring to grab onto. And as that comes to light for me, I can also see that I've rushed into "cures" in a panic. When I'm in periods of calm, it's because I'm hiding my head in the little house. Then when I'm pulled out of the little house, back into the real world, I actually escalate the sense of chronic panic by panicking for a cure. What we're onto here is a need for deescalation. To calm panic, I need to not panic, but to calm down.
San, You brought up something I recently heard in one of Daniel Schmidt's amazingly peaceful YouTube videos on his website www.awakentheworld.com. He said that we need to stop DOING peace and start BEING peace. I'm like you and your D. I want instant results, and I can't focus long in meditation. I frantically run toward it, then frantically run from it. I find that, for me, using peaceful meditations found online or through meditation apps, helps me find a few moments of physical and spiritual peace that I hope to increase by repeating. Nueroplasticity is the act of repeating a new habit so often that it forges new patterns in the brain. I'm up to where, if I use the right app at the right time, I can feel peace for up to about 45 minutes now. And back to my comments with NarcKiddo, I feel like this credit card fiasco was a gift from Karma to help shine a spotlight on what the real problem is. I'm in a lifelong panic, and I'm using panic to try and calm panic.
I really like the idea that we don't need to DO peace, but we need to settle into the peace that we are. And if we can stop thinking about yesterday and tomorrow for just a few seconds a day, we can "be" peace for at least a few seconds. And with neuroplasticity in play, we can eventually stretch seconds into minutes, and maybe even one day turn minutes into hours.
I don't know if Karma is a spiritual thing or a deeply wired in sense of balance that, from our deepest subconscious, knows we want to find peace, so it creates learning lessons for us. Karma has been given a wrong reputation that it's about punishing bad behaviors. I don't see it that way. I personally believe Karma is a coach that I've hired to keep creating learning scenarios for me, to help me learn what I need to learn. It repeats lessons only when I'm still not getting it. Like my grandson's driving simulator. Every time he crashes it makes him take the same course again, and it repeats the course until he can master it. My Karma is a gift, either from some universal intelligence, or from my own deepest mind, (I don't really care where it comes from--if it works, it works) but I really, really believe I was attacked by thieves so that I would see how much panic lives within me all the time. I really thought I was in good shape until those thieves showed me how violated and unsafe I still do feel in life. I pray daily for peace, and this chaos is the cure that I have to go THROUGH rather than continue to ignore. This unrest is the answer to my prayers for peace. Thinking of it as a simulator helps me make sense of how I'm being given a chance to go through it finally. These thieves made me go through it one more time. Eventually, I'm going to be made able to accept the peace I keep hiding from now.
The peace is there. It's up to me to "BE" it. I don't even have to find it, I just have to settle into it.
I love you all, and those aren't just words,
PC
#29
Recovery Journals / Re: Dalloway´s Recovery Journa...
Last post by HannahOne - January 21, 2026, 04:55:02 PMDalloway, congratulations on writing a brilliant work! I'm so happy for you that you are able to articulate the importance of social work in the modern world. you must have worked hard and put a lot of thought into your paper.
It makes sense that you would feel imposter syndrome, like there must be a mistake. It's painful to feel the joy or take in that you did well, because it contrasts with your childhood where you couldn't feel that joy or feel that you did well. You bravely felt your emotions and confronted them directly. Congratulations on that too.
I relate to trying to understand. My mind wants to understand my parents, as if by understanding I can mentally undo what was done and fix it. But no amount of explanation will undo. We can only go forward, bringing the broken pieces with us and letting them see where we are now: in your case, you wrote a paper, the professor liked it. As those pieces see the you of today, they can begin to believe the past is over, and feel safer to feel the joy that is within you and know that your paper, and you, are brilliant, shining even in the dark.
It makes sense that you would feel imposter syndrome, like there must be a mistake. It's painful to feel the joy or take in that you did well, because it contrasts with your childhood where you couldn't feel that joy or feel that you did well. You bravely felt your emotions and confronted them directly. Congratulations on that too.
I relate to trying to understand. My mind wants to understand my parents, as if by understanding I can mentally undo what was done and fix it. But no amount of explanation will undo. We can only go forward, bringing the broken pieces with us and letting them see where we are now: in your case, you wrote a paper, the professor liked it. As those pieces see the you of today, they can begin to believe the past is over, and feel safer to feel the joy that is within you and know that your paper, and you, are brilliant, shining even in the dark.
#30
Recovery Journals / Re: Living As All of Me
Last post by HannahOne - January 21, 2026, 04:47:16 PMOne of the effects of CPTSD is an altered sense of self.
For much of my life I was the one to whom nothing bad had happened. I was one who got out. One who succeeded.
That's who I thought I was. But that's not how I felt. I didn't feel like I'd gotten out. I didn't feel like nothing bad had happened. I didn't feel like a success. Those feelings were kept away as much as possible, exorcised with exercise and worked out through work.
So my sense of self varied day to day and hour to hour. Was I a victim or a survivor? Did I get out, or was I repeating the same patterns? Was this enough success? Was this far enough away? Who was I beyond what happened to me? Who was I when I was living as if nothing had happened to me? I didn't want to have been abused. I didn't want that to be my story. But living as if I was someone else was leaving me disconnected from myself and everyone around me.
As I have been living more as All of Me, I'm coming face to face with the things I've denied about myself. In the past, I saw my silence as acquiescence. My acquiescence as failure. My failure as weakness. All of it as a lack, lack of self. But when I look at my life in context of what was happening at the time, I see that in the silence, acquiescence, failure, and weakness, I was there. Silence was my most potent word. Avoidance was my direct action. Acquiescence was the best chance to fight another day. If I hold Frank down by his back legs, which I would never do, he'll struggle for a few seconds and then go limp. I saw him do it at the farm when he was pulled from his hutch. It's his best chance. I get it. I never grasp him. I always wait for him to hop to me.
It's tempting to look at my life outside of the context of abuse and judge myself. If I were a rabbit who had never been grabbed and pinned, well, I'd be a different rabbit. It's only in context of what I went through that what I did and who I became makes sense. And all of that is all of me.
I am not what happened to me. But what happened to me is part of me. I am not CPTSD. But CPTSD is part of me. I am not the limited choices I made, choices to be silent, avoid, acquiesce. But all of those choices are part of me. And I'm not what I did when I had no choice. But that too is part of me.
As I take ownership of All of Me, I have so many more choices than I had in the past. Choices about how close people get, or when to say goodbye. Choices about how much information to give when, to whom. I can change my mind, go back and decide to be more open, or go back and shut the door harder. My sense of self is based less on the past and how I feel I failed, or on the future of who I might be if I succeed, and more on the present of what I'm choosing. What I'm wearing today. The words I want to say.
For much of my life I was the one to whom nothing bad had happened. I was one who got out. One who succeeded.
That's who I thought I was. But that's not how I felt. I didn't feel like I'd gotten out. I didn't feel like nothing bad had happened. I didn't feel like a success. Those feelings were kept away as much as possible, exorcised with exercise and worked out through work.
So my sense of self varied day to day and hour to hour. Was I a victim or a survivor? Did I get out, or was I repeating the same patterns? Was this enough success? Was this far enough away? Who was I beyond what happened to me? Who was I when I was living as if nothing had happened to me? I didn't want to have been abused. I didn't want that to be my story. But living as if I was someone else was leaving me disconnected from myself and everyone around me.
As I have been living more as All of Me, I'm coming face to face with the things I've denied about myself. In the past, I saw my silence as acquiescence. My acquiescence as failure. My failure as weakness. All of it as a lack, lack of self. But when I look at my life in context of what was happening at the time, I see that in the silence, acquiescence, failure, and weakness, I was there. Silence was my most potent word. Avoidance was my direct action. Acquiescence was the best chance to fight another day. If I hold Frank down by his back legs, which I would never do, he'll struggle for a few seconds and then go limp. I saw him do it at the farm when he was pulled from his hutch. It's his best chance. I get it. I never grasp him. I always wait for him to hop to me.
It's tempting to look at my life outside of the context of abuse and judge myself. If I were a rabbit who had never been grabbed and pinned, well, I'd be a different rabbit. It's only in context of what I went through that what I did and who I became makes sense. And all of that is all of me.
I am not what happened to me. But what happened to me is part of me. I am not CPTSD. But CPTSD is part of me. I am not the limited choices I made, choices to be silent, avoid, acquiesce. But all of those choices are part of me. And I'm not what I did when I had no choice. But that too is part of me.
As I take ownership of All of Me, I have so many more choices than I had in the past. Choices about how close people get, or when to say goodbye. Choices about how much information to give when, to whom. I can change my mind, go back and decide to be more open, or go back and shut the door harder. My sense of self is based less on the past and how I feel I failed, or on the future of who I might be if I succeed, and more on the present of what I'm choosing. What I'm wearing today. The words I want to say.