Are you ever truly happy?

[saylor]

I've been slogging through a nearly unbearable, seemingly never-ending bout of anhedonia. It's gotten to where I feel I can't bring myself to do much of anything. Even things I used to find reasonably pleasurable don't appeal whatsoever. I don't know how I'd motivate to do anything if I were still working. Geez

Anyway, it has got me to thinking, I'm not sure that I've ever been truly happy. I know I've felt bits of joy and excitement here and there, but those seem to be much more the exception than the rule. And I never seem to look forward to anything anymore. I have a tendency to dump all the "bad" in my life on the CPTSD. I assume that anything that's off with me must be due to that. But maybe I'm wrong... ?

Does anyone want to chime in? I'm just curious, how often do you feel truly happy?

I am running out of steam, feeling like this. It's amazing what a toll daily lack of happiness can take on one. It gets to where there's no point to anything at all. Why struggle, why effort? That's how it feels, anyway

[Snookiebookie2]

Truly happy? Not very often.

My life is lots of ups and downs.   More downs, than ups to be fair. 

I think if most people analyse their lives, they'd probably say the same. But I do think we've been unfortunate that we've been through a ton of of * (of different varieties) that has given us CPTSD.  And I genuinely think that means we have probably had more downs than most people have. And also that generally speaking that theres been less positive experiences in our lives too.

It's no wonder that you are experiencing the things you are. And I'm sorry to hear it, so I'm sending you a warm and friendly hug.

It's hard when you're going through a tough cycle to see how your ever going to feel different.   Not much advice I can give.  Maybe remember other times that you felt like this and how life just changed.

The current covid19 crisis is affecting us all. I'm finding it difficult to believe that my life and routine will return to 'normal'.  To use a word you did, its a long 'slog'.  Then I remembered being at home for my first 17 years with my dad and his domestic violence and mental abuse. It was all I had known.   I thought it would never end.  But it did. And covid19 will. And I am sure that your mood and feelings will too.

I s'pose this is my clumsy way of saying  'this too will pass', and trying to give you some hope. But at the same time I totally get what the lack of daily happiness can do to your spirit and motivation.   Lack of positives is just as painful as negative experiences.

 

[woodsgnome]

Happiness? Only when I remember who I am, except I can only do that by casting aside the mountain of bad vibes that always seem to lurk in the background. Now I wonder how I ever survived to find myself out of obvious danger, but where 'true' happiness seems always meant for the other person, never me; always out of reach.

Well, okay. Maybe I haven't had the giddy dance it all away sort of happiness ... I think I've been afraid of it, actually. The patterns left from long-term abuse -- as a child and adult -- ebb and flow, but I did find ways to survive that fed my soul nonetheless.  If any of that construes happiness, I at least had that taste of it.

Most of these happy spins surprised me, one way or another. The major surprise was just realizing I had the capacity to do some things I'd never thought might happen. I know I often held back , even sabotaged myself when it just seemed too hard to believe in me.

I still find that hard, but in between there's at least been hints of more contentment, if not outright happiness -- I'm still too wary of that. I mean, am I allowed to really be happy? When will the other shoe drop? What will happen to me if I risk it? The happy part? Maybe it only comes when I question the validity of those claims.

I'm still a work in progress. There's still clouds on the horizon, but peaks of blue sky emerge once in a while, too. It may seem odd, but just that gives me a smidgeon of something akin to a surprise called happiness.

[saylor]

Truly happy? Not very often.

My life is lots of ups and downs.   More downs, than ups to be fair. 

...

It's no wonder that you are experiencing the things you are. And I'm sorry to hear it, so I'm sending you a warm and friendly hug.

...

Lack of positives is just as painful as negative experiences.

 

Thank you for the hug, Snookie. It helps.

I'm sorry that you experience more downs than ups, too. I think you're right that lack of positives can be as bad as presence of negatives. It has taken me a long time to figure that out. I finally managed to get to a place in life where a lot of the old negatives (abuse, massive amounts of stress, etc.) are gone, and yet I find that I'd still rather not exist than feel the way I do every day—it's been very eye-opening, since I thought I'd be so much more at peace with life now, but I'm not.... I would really like to be able to experience some genuine, lasting happiness and see if that makes life feel worth living and worth all the effort that it takes to keep going.

I'm not ashamed for wanting to be happy

Now I wonder how I ever survived to find myself out of obvious danger, but where 'true' happiness seems always meant for the other person, never me; always out of reach.

Well, okay. Maybe I haven't had the giddy dance it all away sort of happiness ... I think I've been afraid of it, actually.

...

I'm still too wary of that. I mean, am I allowed to really be happy? When will the other shoe drop? What will happen to me if I risk it? The happy part? Maybe it only comes when I question the validity of those claims.

I'm still a work in progress.

Woodsgnome, I also feel sometimes like happiness is for others, not me (and then the cynic says, they're probably just faking it, heheh...) but seriously, maybe I'm sabotaging myself by unconsciously assuming there's no hope for me. Or like you say, "waiting for the other shoe to drop"... I know I do that a lot. It's like I can never fully trust that stuff's going well and things are ok and it's safe to be happy. I probably need to do more thought work around that

[Stillost]

This is something I've thought a lot about! When have I been happy? It seems so fleeting. I tend to be afraid of it. The thoughts are;

When I'm excited or happy about something I want to talk about it. My voice gets louder and I talk faster. I'm told to be quieter, talk softly, slow down. All the excitement is gone

I'm happy, having fun. I don't want to stop, it's so rare with other people. So I don't regulate, just keep going until inevitably something triggers me. Boom!

I'm happy. I'm not paying attention. I forget to be aware. I forget that I need to be careful how I speak. What I say, who's listening. The silence afterwards

I'm working now on peace instead of happiness. Acceptance of the good and trying not to look for the bad. Not listening to the voice of pain. Accepting the gift of sunshine