I’m also starting to consciously process emotional traumas that were less physical like physical and sexual abuse.
And I get flashes of things pretty much everyday...
I haven’t been writing down every time I have a panic attack but, it’s been an average of anywhere from 1-5 times a week I would say.
I’ve also started reflecting more and understanding neglect and other dysfunctions in the dynamic of my childhood environment growing up and how it’s affected me.
It’s like these unsaid buried secrets that no one can really know or guess, but affect you at an intrinsic level without you knowledge possibly on a daily basis. Your relationships, the way you think and feel about yourself and the world, etc.
Also, a great deal of my panic attacks - although not all of them by any means, are surrounding specifically food trauma. So I would love to resolve the blacked out trauma I have from when I was ten that unleashed a life long struggle of an OCD like eating disorder that was labeled in the 90’s as Orthorexia Nervosa (https://fakeboitherottengirl.tumblr.com/post/189780666326/tilthat-til-of-an-eating-disorder-first-coined) also later associated as Eating Disorder Not Otherwise Specified. Unfortunately EDNOS was entirely removed from the DSM and my diagnsosis, ON, is not in the DSM either. So the course of treatment for me is unknown, and when I’ve mentioned it to therapists- it seems to be put on the back burner because they don’t know what to do about it.
I don’t either. I’ve gotten better since the age of 10 where I had to be force fed and was ending up hospitalized from heart failure essentially. It’s not that extreme anymore but, I still have lots of panic attacks and anxiety and discomfort surrounding food that makes my life dysfunctional and unmanageable at times.
it sounds like such a first world problem and I suppose I’m just used to it at this point, like oh yep- having another panic attack about food great... and I just deal with it however I can. But it’s yeah, I’ve lived in this apartment for an entire year and I’ve only attempted to stock my fridge and cabinets twice. Because even though I just bought the food, for some reason I just can’t eat it... blah blah blah. Lots of stuff like that but it all ends in me just not eating or not eating properly.
Anyways, I should probably do a little more ACA and Trauma and the 12 steps. Also been trying to read more about stuff along those lines.
https://study-na.tumblr.com/post/160543707197/putting-these-up-for-anyone-who-needs-them-today
Healing myself essentially... lol. The more knowledge you have about your issues the better.
Yoire not always going to have good days and that’s ok. It’s ok to fall apart and it’s normal with the circumstances. Sometimes you just have to get through it.
Other times you’re doing well.
but yeah uh,.. processing, studying. Talking, writing. Groups. It’s all part of it.
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For Christmas my dad got me a lint roller. This made me feel like he really didn’t care about me. And I realized that a large deal of my struggle with worthlessness and feelings of meaningless is engrained in me from my dad and how he has treated me and talked to me my entire life essentially, and just the incredibly unhealthy dynamic going on there... it’s a mess.
I don’t know if my mom played a part in that per day, when I was young there was a bit of neglect but, I was so used to it I just, it was normal to me as a child you know.
But looking back on it, it really wasn’t right. It wasn’t until other people had to directly inform me or I was shown blatant examples by other families, that I realized the way things were at home for me were no where close to normal.
And so I’m uncovering that a bit and connecting the dots... even though it was painful, it was a good thing my dad gave me that lint roller because it rolled back and resurfaced a ton of memories of emotional neglect j had forgotten.
I was always uncomfortable around other people as a child and with touching them because I wasn’t socialized with well. No one ineracted with me.
I felt worthless and didn’t understand why because I was shown this in unsaid ways everyday for years.
I had issues with identity because the trauma was significant enough to make me forget who I was all together, not be able to recognize myself in a mirror, and to feel as if my personality and sense of identity were gone completely. I also felt shattered in my concept of identity because of having to meet my own needs in such an unhealthy way for development.
These are new discoveries I’ve only made this year, and have given me a good deal of healing and peace... so I hope to continue to have more understandings. To untangle a little more of the hurt, pain, anguish, panic, and other negative symptoms.
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Regarding my panic attacks around other issues than food, my therapist wanted to do EMDR with me on them but we kept starting and stopping because I was getting too emotionally overwhelmed. I don’t think I was ready, though I wanted to be.
I would dissociate because it was too uncomfortable and whatever we brought to the surface my brain would re-bury so quickly and I would forget.
she wrote everything down for that reason, because I told her- I will forget everything I just said. Very very quickly.
and she explained to me, this is just how your brain has handled things for all these years because it was too much. Something bad happens and you just separate from it so quickly before you can even feel it.
But yeah I’ll get there eventually. There’s quite a few triggers I know of that I barely understand why they exist. And it makes me wonder is this trauma and ptsd panic or is it anxiety panic from an imbalance of seratonin or what is causing it you know... I just don’t understand... but I’m trying my best to cope. It’s hard.
because of my suicidal tendencies, this coupled with anxiety- it’s kind of like drinking heavily coupled with lots of caffeine of cocaine, you can drink yourself to death in one night just because the stimulants fueled that process forward and allows the extreme alcohol intake to even take place
the anxiety and the depression coupled when pushed to a point of, extreme... its, so impossible to handle and hard to explain what that’s like but it’s madness.
it’s truly dibilitating and scary... and difficult to treat without meds essentially so.
im just taking my meds consistently, trying to stay as stable as I can, and dealing with my issues... trying to stay clean as well.
which, as you can see from everything I have going on, is very difficult.
eveythjbg I’m talking about is made so much easier and soothed so quickly with getting high.
but it does reach a point where it doesn’t work anymore, and you’re just doing it forcibly because of physiological addiction and it becomes a hell of its own. It only prolongs the suffering inevitably, and blocks you from progressing or healing in the ways you need to in order to live an enjoyable existence sober.
So for that reason I’m staying clean, and when I forget why I’m doing it I go to meetings. I try to go everyday but yeah. And the rest of the time I try and keep myself busy.
working is crucial, it helps a lot for me personally because, I’m just too busy to even think about using and then I come home after working 14 hours and I’m beyond exhausted all I can do is pass out.
it’s no anti-anxiety but this method works just as well to cure the burning desire or the incessant gnawing anxiety that forces you to want to use.
It’s like knocking yourself out with hard hard work instead of with hard drugs. I enjoy being so exhausted I can’t move or think straight, to me it’s the most relieving feeling in the world.
and some people will probablt not understand that but... if you are an addict you probably understand
