recovery report. observations and conundrums

[jamesG.1]

Hi all.

Some of you may remember me from 2017-18 when I posted a fair bit. If so, hello, and hope you are all charging ahead with your recoveries.

Thought I'd share some observations and insights as well as update a few things while they are on my mind, I'm in the mood somewhat and as I'm about to go on holiday, it's a good time to offload as there are luggage restrictions and this stuff is heavy!

To summarise causes, my C-PTSD stems from 4 major life events hitting in the same time period and then dragging on for around 8 years before reaching a grim period of conclusion. Alcoholic partner, abusive narcissistic sibling, complex work and a sick and difficult parent, it wasn't the worst story, but it was relentless and the lack of power and the levels of responsibility eventually mangled me so bad that after I finally broke free, I began to see the symptoms and effects we all know and love.

Because I'd put myself into isolation to escape, I then found myself trying to create a new life in the teeth of an emotional storm and I made huge errors, or rather had no choice but to drift into mistakes that I was in no position to avoid. This probably is my biggest mental battle now, reconciling the money I lost and the other material losses caused during the period when the C-PTSD was raging.

As I recover, and I am definitely recovering now, there are odd new effects to balance. Firstly, the endless churning thoughts seem to finally be giving way to a new blankness. This is distinct from dissociation, it's more a sort of peacefulness akin to the silence after a loud concert. I think I've thought through the events leading to my illness and have drawn the only logical conclusions, namely that the people around me were at best negligent, at worst spiteful, malicious and breathtakingly selfish. I've looked at the story from every conceivable angle and questioned what I could or should have done and allowing for the fact that I'm human, was faced with ridiculous pressures and intractable personalities and that extreme stress removes your life's toolkits in an attritional daily grind, it's no surprise that my own actions were far from perfect. The difference is that I tried to be proportionate, fair and rational. I didn't lash out, bully or manipulate, even in self-defence, whereas the people around me, the people one should most depend on and trust, were outright cruel.

The emotion I've felt most is a form of bewilderment, and maybe that's C-PTSD in a nutshell. Being an illness induced by relationships it's deeply rooted in the contradiction between the rosy conditioning we are given about family, relationships and friendships and the shock of seeing how low some people, SOME people, are willing to sink to satisfy their needs. For me, the realisation that I could not only not count on these people for support, I actually had to hide my increasing trauma because it attracted attacks. I was, am, bewildered. There is nothing in my heart and soul that can align with such mindless spite and neglect. I'm a hugely empathic person, but no matter how I try, I cannot get in the mind of the people who hurt me.

For much of the last year, I've been facing a few of my demons head-on, partly by chance, partly by design. First off, as soon as I'd shaken my business, I began looking for a job and then, I started seeing someone.

The dating has been very complex. My last relationship was wrecked by alcohol and the impact of my mother's illness and my brother's incessant attacks. RElationships are a huge trigger, and my girlfriend has been pretty outstanding about giving me room to wrestle with busloads of demons as we've grown closer. My skin is wafer thin, and I am on constant alert for threats and control. I move in mid-August and that's going to be a whole new challenge, but I think you have to face this thing down and punch back or you shrink into your bandages and that just has to be avoided.

Likewise work, which is a major challenge aged 56. Given that I'm coming out of a period of niche self-employment, its also proving hard to find a solid long term job, and ageism is definitely a factor. Also, on the first job, a relapse and a manager with obvious narcissistic behaviour came into contact and it wasn't pretty. My concentration went to the wall and she was all over me. Not pretty at all. However, I had huge support from team members and for everything that stung, I also rebuilt confidence in other departments and came out ahead. The new job is more related to my freelance career and is better paid, but short-lived, so from here on, I have to weigh up income against stability.

My big issue is my creative projects. Right now I'm in a holding pattern as I wait for the work and domestic stuff to settle, an odd situation as I have fans for my books nagging me to produce book 3. But my head just isn't there. Like it or not, I have to accept that the mania I developed hanging on to my creative projects while all else went to bits, contributed to my illness. It became obsessive and drained my limited energy preventing me from regaining headspace and enough puff to sort out a job and get the basics in place. I think my head decided that the time has come for rest and that is what I'm seeing now. Rest.

It's an odd sensation. My head has been alive with old conversations, wild scenario planning and panic buttons for the best part of 4 years and then suddenly, it just stopped. This is very different to the dissociative blankness we all feel when things are just too much, this came on once I knew I was out of the woods with some of the bigger logistics and feeling the benefits of emotional support from a partner. But it's also annoying. Part of me just wants to throw myself at life like a hungry piranha, but it's a message I have to take very seriously.

A massive part of my recovery has been keeping an eye on the science and understanding of how brain structure and chemistry is vital for the understanding of this horrible disorder. The poor old brain is an amazing thing, but even a jewel like that can be fractured if the stresses are big enough. Stresses can be very varied, damaging the brain because they are short and sharp, or because they are small but incessant. We are all different, our fracture lines are as varied as our faces, and there is no rule on when and how trauma becomes a factor. But once it is there, it is there and that is that. After it arrives, life changes, rulebooks are torn up and all our certainties go to the wall.

Much of this, however, is chemical and physical in nature. It's very hard to see this objectively when the storm is raging at the window, but it's true... we feel so much of this thing because of chemicals. The brain is a mix of chemical and electrical impulses and a complex array of organs grouped into a central blob of grey matter. It wasn't designed to operate beyond certain tolerances and when it's bathed in too much stress hormone, ie cortisol and adrenalin, it begins to change. The reasoning brain begins to lose its power as the primitive stress areas go into overdrive. It's a physical injury. Despite what those around you will no doubt feel empowered to claim, it is not a decision or an attitude you have elected to have. Nope, you cannot simply override C-PTSD and trauma of the mind, anymore than you can talk yourself out of a gunshot wound.

Recovery then, is all about giving the brain time and space to recover its balance. Find out everything you can and objectify the condition as much as you can. Try and separate the cause from the effect in the same way you might with a physical injury, taking away the blame shame and guilt that as a matter of priority, because these feelings are by-products, a lens through which you are being forced to see yourself and the outside world.

This thing feels so HUGE. It dominates the landscape of our experience and seems so permanent, but it is an illusion. The limbic system in our brains has been severly shocked and it needs reassurance before it can calm down. To do that it needs heaps of positive reinforcement. Start that process now, gathering all the positives now, matter how small and frail they may be and begin ejecting anything and everything that aggravates. There is no timetable, no schedule to match. Take your time but don't let it drift. Persist.

Don't expect overnight successes, that is not the nature of the thing. I think I've only had a few occasions where I've been caught by surprise by sudden epiphanies. Change is glacial, recovery moves at a speed akin to coastal erosion. But that's fine, annoying I grant you, but its the way the brain works. It takes a lifetime to grow and you can't expect so much negativity to fall away just like that. The brain wants to know it isn't at war anymore, it is down to us to make sure that it gets the message, keeping up a stream of reassurances until the chemistry returns to normal.

In terms of boosting recovery, I'd say that taking anti-depressants were a mistake. They increased dissociation when I most needed a clear head and the withdrawal was one of the worst experiences of my life. What has proven useful was Propranolol, a beta blocker with some good evidence for PTSD management. I use it on a case by case basis, only resorting to it if I can feel a major panic attack in the offing. In those cases, taking it early on makes all the difference.

My feeling generally is that knowledge is power, so read up, watch youtube vids on the brain and generally go all science on the thing. Don't back off work and relationships but accept that a period with bumps in the road is ok, mistakes are a fantastic education and you need to be kind to yourself. If you love and lose, so be it. If you have a crap job thing, well then you've gained experience of how to approach it better the next time. This is a serious disorder. I've been very close to the edge multiple times as I'm sure many of the rest of you have been. We can't make light of it, nor should we, but don't attribute too much power to the thing, it controls perception, not reality.

Untangling one from the other is the road to recovery.

Wishing you all the best and power in your recovery. It's your life peeps. Don't let anyone or anything else make you lose sight of that.

x

[Blueberry]

Hi and welcome back! I'll be glad to read your post in detail later. 

[Tee]

Thank you James!
That was a lot of info. But give me hope that one day I might get there.

[SharpAndBlunt]

Thanks James, reading that I recognised a lot, and the bit about perception v reality is something I'm having to concentrate on right now. Your post was inspiring, thank you.

[Kizzie]

So much in your post I relate to and to some extent have difficulty articulating so thanks for making the effort to come back and share about your journey James!  It's one thing I love about having peeps, someone is always able to capture in words those vague, intangible bits and pieces of CPTSD that are huge but float around in our psyche and heart until we can name them. 

[Rainagain]

Thank you for posting James,

I often wonder what has happened to people who stop posting, so glad you are still working through things and seem to be moving forward, heartening to hear.

Your post made me think about our brains, the structure reflects function, advanced cognition from the frontal lobes literally added on to more primitive sub structures.

I've not thought of it that way before, not realised how trauma and threat speaks to the primitive hindbrain directly as that is partly why it evolved, the forebrain gets derailed by trauma via the hindbrain which takes control when activated.

Jordan Peterson explains that having a plan calms the hindbrain, it doesn't need to be a good plan, any plan can deactivate the hindbrain as it isn't very sophisticated.

In turn maybe this explains the intrusive thoughts/ruminating, it is the forebrain trying to think us out of our distress back to some level of proper control.

I've been going through this process for a good few years now and I'm no longer in such acute distress, some control has been regained over the hindbrain.

Forebrain led recovery, that seems to be how it works, the hindbrain cant be reasoned with, just calmed and soothed to allow the proper order and function to be established.

I'm not surprised you dont feel able to write at the moment, that is pure forebrain stuff, the hindbrain would just get in the way, marmosets dont write poetry.

[Three Roses]

James!  So good to "see" you again!

[a_bunny]

Thank you for sharing this. And kudos to you for all your hard work, and the wisdom and knowledge you've earned through your recovery process.