Folks have got to understand that they probably aren't messed up by some Secret Big Trauma that they just can't remember; but rather by a million tiny microtraumas that they do mostly remember but don't even register as traumatic because nobody actually understood that these things would cause trauma, much less stack on each other over the years.
Whether you're carrying one big rock or a big ol' bucket of sand, it's going to weigh on you just as much.
This is why psychologists have started taking more of an interest in CPTSD in the last 10-15 years. What most people know as PTSD is a response to a single, intensely traumatic event (or even a series of events). However, CPTSD (chronic post-traumatic stress disorder) is caused by living for years in a situation where your nervous system cannot catch a break. Even if nothing huge ever happened to you, you always had to be on guard for a thousand little things that could and did happen.
After years and years of this, your nervous system gets "stuck" in an activated threat response. It never really lets you rest, and if this started when you were a kid, you may not develop a lot of neural pathways that you should have, because your brain was too focused on keeping you safe to bother with little things like "genuine human connection" and "interpersonal attachment."
No lie, Complex PTSD/CPTSD is HUGE.
If you are disabled, if you are queer, if you are chronically ill, if you are the survivor of a toxic but not abusive relationship, if you grew up or lived under the threat of harm but no "actual" harm (or "very little" harm) was done, you may have CPTSD that isn't getting caught because CPTSD looks different from PTSD.
At the risk of falling into a trivialization trap, a lot of things you may not perceive as traumatic actually are. I was embarrassed for a long time in both group and individual therapy to say anything in my childhood was traumatic, because I was sitting with people who had suffered horrible physical or sexual abuse. But here are some things that are, in fact, traumatic and - when they occur over a long period - can set you on a course of maladaptive coping for decades if not addressed:
Being told or shown that your emotions are not valid, that you have no safe place to express them
Parents or caregivers oversharing graphic trauma from their past with you
Threats of physical violence, even if not carried out
Being told or shown that affection or approval is contingent on competency or academic success
Prejudice from inside OR outside the family (homophobia, racism, body shame)
Mocking or dismissal of things that are meaningful to you
If you constantly feel unworthy, afraid, ashamed, or even flat and emotionless, it's worth exploring why. And, because you've been so consistently undermined and minimized, you may feel like a fraud for being upset or functioning poorly. You're not a fraud; it's years of conditioning telling you "I should be able to handle this" or "lots of people are worse off than I am so I shouldn't complain." Your conditioned brain is lying to you; you won't be able to open yourself to the joy of trusting relationships with others OR do meaningful things to help those who are worse off until you do the work to melt the block of ice surrounding you. All my love to you, friends.
Pete Walker is a therapist that's been on the cutting edge of this for many years, and he has a website here with plenty of free resources. (Just straight PDFs of parts of his books!)
Also, his books are not that expensive, well-written, and truly helped me process a lot of my trauma. I did a ton of it alone because I couldn't find a therapist for years, and those books (complex ptsd: from surviving to thriving & the tao of fully feeling) really changed the trajectory of my life.
He talks about grieving, about changing our internal dialogue to one that's positive instead of negative, talks about SEVERAL trauma typologies, and more.
As someone who has been diagnosed with the big trauma PTSD but most of their problems were coming from the little stuff that was CONSTANT and made me run on 2000% all day every day, this guy is a lifesaver. I'm so different from how I was before, especially with the help of some in-person therapy. Finding the right person makes all the difference, truly.
You can pick up his books on the website, but if you're looking for resources on this and you have the space and support to be able to do some of your own work (please don't do it completely alone unless you must) check out the sidebar over at pete-walker.com. He made this incredible resource that not everyone knows about and I try to share it where this comes up.
Thank you for informing people about this.
Reblogging for the additional info and resources, and to emphasize that the C does indeed stand for "complex," not "chronic." (Understandable that people would get mixed up, though.)
