Frequent EFs

[Kittylover]

I have episodes of intense fear, feeling little,and/or feeling bad or brokenseveral times a day  and I think these are emotional flashbacks.often I'll crave candy when I'm feeling bad which is something several people in the thread about what EFs feel like describe. If I think about/try to deal with my abuse it happens more. I've been having trouble falling asleep the past few days.Does anyone have tips for coping with these and/or making them less frequent.

[Convalescent]

I'm sorry, I'm going through the same thing, and I'm having a really hard time grounding myself. But, someone here tipped me about Pete Walker. who has posted an article about EF's (Haven't read it all, but at least the 5 first pages makes for a very educational and compassionate/understanding text), and how to deal with them. I've just ordered his first book

http://www.pete-walker.com/pdf/emotionalFlashbackManagement.pdf

Anyway, I just remembered some coping (I forget when I'm having a lot of EF's, which Pete Walker describes in the article btw). I have a teddy bear, from I was a little boy. It's one of the safe memories (or, not really memories connected to it, but I kind of associate it with good and safe things), so I sometimes keep it by me in bed, sometimes next to me in my couch, and sometimes I physically hug it. I also have a couple of people I can call. They are the only ones that feels safe (enough!) to really talk to when I'm there. It helps sometimes. And music. Soothing and comforting music. Anything that can get you too a... well, for me - a place away from self-loathing, self-hate, fear etc, into a warmer softer quiter place. A place where you can let go, heal, cry. A safe place. It's not easy though, it's hard as *. But as long as you can find it, one way or the other, you at least know that it's within reach. You just have to find your way to reach it.

And yeah, I also crave candy, btw.

[schrödinger's cat]

My flashbacks are milder than they used to be. They were really bad about a decade ago. So my coping strategies are relatively new, and they all relate to my milder flashbacks, and I'm still just starting to learn how to use them. So who knows how helpful this is. But here are the things I tried, mostly taken from others on this forum.

Recognizing flashbacks. Simply just telling myself that "this is an EF, it's not real now, it's just a window into the past" makes me feel a little better.

Treating it like a cramp or a head cold: it's bad right now, but it'll pass. Allowing myself to be a bit under the weather. Before I knew what emotional flashbacks are, I used to think they were a weakness, a character flaw, something I had to fight NO MATTER THE COST. So on top of the EF I also had the shock of "EEEP, what's wrong with me!!" and the stress of "I MUST OVERCOME THIS RIGHT NOWWW!!" So even just this little step of telling myself: "Eh, honey, it's an EF, we know the drill, it'll pass", like some kind of mental leg cramp - it just takes those additional layers of stress and shame away. Such a relief.

Talking to the scared, emotional, "little" part of myself as if it were a kid I'm calming down.

Reminding that part of all the things it's done right. That makes it feel less powerless. It's something I'm doing with my kids too when they're upset. When they were little, whenever they stumbled and started to cry in shock, I used to tell them: "How good that you managed to catch yourself with your right hand, you were really fast too", and there was always this pause where they looked startled, and then they took such comfort from this and started to tell me aaaaall about the nifty way they caught themselves. So I'm now doing this with my own Inner Child too.

Checking to see if I'm hungry.

Grounding techniques, like massaging my fingers - EFs make me live in my head too much and I lose touch with my physical reality. This also soothes my Inner Child: kids are often calmed down by seeing that you're doing something tangible for them, and they're soothed by touch. Someone else had a mini-mindfulness exercize that she does: she drinks a few sips of water as slowly and mindfully as she can. I forget who said that. It sounded like a good grounding technique, one you can use almost anywhere without attracting attention.

Investigating my EF as if it were something I'm writing about: what is it like, how does it feel, is there some feeling somewhere in my body, what exactly am I thinking, does it change over time, etc. That doesn't get me out of the EF, but it gets me to take a step back and see it as something I'm experiencing. During an EF, I usually feel that THIS is what the world is truly like, I'm finally seeing things clearly, this is the real truth. (Bleargh.)

If I'm up to it: asking myself "when in the past have I felt that way before?" - in other words: "where does this come from?"

Waiting. Outlasting the flashback. Sometimes that's the only thing I can do. "If you're going through *, keep going."

[Indigochild]

Hi guys...

Im new here and just wanted to ask two questions..
My question is....
Have you ever had emotional flashbacks around other people in a social situation you cant just walk out of?
Other people trigger me a lot and i find it very hard to carry on talking and being normal so i sort of seethe in anger and go into myself whilst trying to carry on an make it not look apparent.

My other question is...
whilst feeling awful whilst in an emotional flashback...how do you work out what from your past are causing your feelings now if you cant remember your past?

I dont gain anything productive from feeling so awful as i cant remember much from my past that it could relate to a lot of the time.

Thanks....