Hmmmmmm, got me thinking......lots of thoughts about this are popping up in my mind (for me the trauma I went through was only back in 2004 but it feels stuck there for life)

I struggled with the concept of RADICAL ACCEPTANCE in DBT, thinking I just had to do it once & it was done.....but that's not the case.....Radical Acceptance most of the time has to be done over & over & over & over & over until it can finally be felt & then sometimes Radical Acceptance is a constant thing that we continually have to do until what ever it is that we are needing to accept has either changed, gone away, or we have changed enough that it really doesn't bother us. It seems like what we are doing with the pain is actually radically accepting what happened & the pain we felt (so that we can let it go)

Another thought: I always wondered why we hold onto the bad things that happen in our life......again, something we were discussing in DBT.....we hold onto the bad things in our memory because those are the things we learn from & we feel the need to remember so that we won't be caught by them again in the future.

Another thought which ties with the number of times (once is not enough) it takes to let go of the pains. I The more pain we have gone through & the longer it lasted while we had to deal with the trauma, those neuropathways in our mind on how we handled it & the thoughts on what was going on, grew in thickness & solidarity. Those neuropathways need to be broken & new ones set in place......the thicker the pathways, the longer it takes & the more work it is to be successful.

It's important to know that we are who we are today because of the past experiences we have lived through......doesn't mean that all those things work in our life today & those things that are a problem need to be addressed & dealt with like the pain & the anger. I think ListenMoreTalkLess really hit the reality of what letting the pain & anger go, but you don't forget what you have gone through because it is an important part of your life that you have learned valuable things from.......letting go of the strong emotions tied to it is the goal. Our mind is made up of many areas, the 2 major ones dealing with mental health issues is the limbic system (the inner part of our brain where our emotions come from) which controls our action responses to things comes from, & the frontal lobe where our reasoning & morals & logic is located. It takes both parts working together to have a truly healthy way of dealing with problems & traumas. Emotions are important because they tell us there is a problem & want action......the logic is important because it's our problem solving area of the mind that helps us determine the best action we need to take. It's when the trauma gets stuck in the emotional mind (Pain, anger) that we have the problems. It's important to process the pain & anger (it sounds like you have been doing that)......the letting it go of those emotions is a long process.....not a "flip of the switch", "I let it go so it should be gone" sort of thing. It takes a long time to remove something that has been built up over such a long period of time & there will always be some level of emotion that may be triggered out of the blue once you felt like you had let go of it all......so don't feel discouraged because it takes the mind so long to be able to let go. It's not that you aren't letting go a little bit at a time, but it just feels like it's not doing anything (patience is critical with situations like this). Sometimes we don't see all the progress we've made until farther down the road because it takes so many little baby steps to get there.

I think the ultimate goal is to remove the extreme emotional feelings & reactions that are still holding you captive from the trauma & get it so that the memories of the trauma are sitting more in your reasonable, logical mind then in the emotional area of it......just a thought.

I know that I am still working on dealing with the trauma I went through in 2004 with the home care person when my mother was dying of cancer......blaming my mother for her stupid thinking that caused the situation in the first place & the anger I felt toward her because of putting me in a situation that had always been my worst fear of being accused of something that I never did when the home care person tried to get me out of her way (think she was after my mother's house) by calling the police & having them accuse me of the abuse that she was doing to my mother. Also felt anger at all those around me who didn't support me when it was all happening around us because things like that just don't happen to normal people. I look at that trauma & realize how trivial it is compared to the major trauma & the extended trauma's that others go through. When I look at how I have reacted to that situation, it makes me understand much better what others are going through......& it's not easy to let go of any part of it & still find a way that I can usefully use the experience to help others avoid any similar situation.

Be nice to yourself in this process & be patient. As they say, Rome wasn't built in a day & it didn't end up in ruins over night. You will get to a comfortable place with this & have a better understanding of yourself in the process