The Slow Rebuild - A reminder to myself after another year of reliving the trauma

Though I don’t really post on social media anymore (I’ve been just a quiet observer this last almost 8 years) I do occasionally post from time to time. If/when I do it’s usually in relation to my journey to recover stabilize rebuild myself again post CPTSD diagnosis. This time I posted as part of a trend, where I included that it was the first time in over a decade I was going through what I call my “trigger season” (Thanksgiving day to New Years eve) without the constant flashbacks, perpetual frozen state mentally, and fighting the urge to go catatonic physically.

I didn’t think I was healed, however I thought that after trying to work on how much my CPTSD impacts me I was finally making noticeable progress. . .

BOY WAS I WRONG.

For a small grain of context: Since I was 17 years old (when the origin events occurred) I’ve been working on rebuilding myself mentally from what I thought was only two events that were a large part of my trauma. The explosive end of my parents incredibly toxic and well honestly abusive marriage, and the car accident that almost killed myself and my older brother.

Now I still can’t drive - hence the I’m not healed phrasing. . . but for the most part I was otherwise rather asymptomatic of what I would normally experience. No nightmares. . . no auditory or bodily flashbacks of the events. . . hell I was even able to focus on keeping my room clean and my school work. So I was at least a bit better than where I was in the previous years. A win is a win, right?

Not necessarily. A not often discussed symptom of those who suffer with CPTSD is dissociative amnesia or what we would previously call repressed memories. And since it’s usual tactics weren’t working, I guess my trauma brain decided that it wanted to have a new challenger enter the ring and made me remember, and relive a previously “forgotten” locked away memory, that occurred in the same year as the other two . . . right in between them actually. And honestly. . . I don’t know how or where to go from here.

Once again the blocks have been knocked down, and I must rebuild. Again. Process and reprocess. Again. Have to re-explain to those around me where my brain has gone. Again. And I’m exhausted.

But remembering that I will never be placed in that position again, that I don’t surround myself with people like that anymore, that my home and my space is safe. . . it can and will be the balm that takes the edge off of the pain for me for now. At least while the blisters and scars are healing again.

Just remember:

You are no longer the person you were when that event happened.

You have the ability to say that you will not allow others to place you in that position again, and mean it.

And it’s okay to hold your comfort item a little extra right now.

Now. Go drink some water (because I know you haven’t). Eat something nourishing and tasty, because both is possible. And blast your music as loud as you possibly can so you can make a little bit of space between you and it for a moment.