Today’s other post is C is for Challenging – over on Kaiberie.com.
Challenging and CPTSD go hand in hand. And in my case, my CPTSD isn’t the ‘standard’ kind anyway. I hate to say it, but CPTSD is a bit difficult at the best of times – so I’ll try and explain what I can.
The C in CPTSD is for complex. It’s caused by ‘prolonged trauma’. In people like me, that have had it since I was a teen, it’s caused (in my case at least) by bullying. There are other causes, like prolonged abuse or neglect. I had a good family, and they cared for me, but I was bullied the whole time I was in school – right through from primary to college. And while I understand and accept that people did what they did because they had problems too – that we were kids, so it wasn’t (really) their fault, and that bullying, while I was at school was considered ‘character forming’, it wasn’t. Not in the way that I think many people meant back then.
Being what I am made me, in many senses, who I am, so it’s not all bad. But I’ve often compared it to being badly tempered. I look just fine on the surface, but the temper – the fire that was used to form what I am – was wrong, and therefore under the surface…well, you get the metaphor.
I talked about it a few years ago in ‘the Fear’, but I didn’t really come to the conclusion that I had to actually let it go and accept there was no changing it until a few years ago.
CPTSD is most commonly treated by talking therapy. Meditation. Mindfulness (more on that later in the month). All of which I know how to do.
But I always talk about CPTSD to make it clear that not all of us were abused by our families. Because a lot of people hear CPTSD and jump to conclusions about why I am the way I am.
I wrote about it a little more on Kaiberie.com last year and on Bi-Polarbears
