Rainagain,
I agree with Radical this is a complicated question, and there's probably no 'right' answer. There are so many different types of therapy, client, situations and people.
You got me thinking. Not sure this will help, but just in case it makes sense to anyone else (you and me included):
I think it might depend on whether you're in danger now, or processing the consequences of danger that's already passed.
I totally agree with you therapy has its limits, especially with circumstances. Talking about an existential danger that's out there, objectively in your life, just talking isn't enough. It's partial at best. If you're in danger now and you can neither run or fight, you may have cptsd in the making because the cause of the trauma keeps hurting you. Circumstances keep hurting you.
Once circumstances are changed but the trauma is left behind... then therapy can do a world of good, I think, working on one's inner world and what that hurt left behind.
I relate very much to what you say, especially re. my physical health. People keep confusing circumstances with interpretation of circumstances, in my experience. It's so prevalent I've stopped trying to share anything. Often people want to believe suffering is a bad mood, abuse is a fight, violence is a disagreement, helplessness is pessimism, unhappiness is weakness, 'etc...

But you were in danger. The danger that caused your cptsd wasn't in your head. You didn't just feel you were in danger, you were in actual danger. It was real and it went on.
It may be a bit like treating an ER patient with a broken leg by putting a band aid on the external bruise but sending them home with the broken leg untreated. Possibly?
Also, therapy isn't meant to stop your body from reacting normally and appropriately to its surroundings. Ptsd and Cptsd are appropriate reactions to extremely dangerous circumstances.
All the books I've read about trauma leave me believing protection from that danger, safety, and protection from helplessness are crucial. Well, but all that's in an ideal world but we don't live there, we live in the messy world of things that are out of our control and pain that we often can't avoid.
