(((Mowtown))),

My T told me that in studying PTSD patients, especially those with "complex PTSD" or victims of abuse, they have found that these patients were actually very resilient, in spite of the trauma/abuse. If you think about yourself, and considering the psychological abuse from your father, you were "resilient" and continued to "push forward" anyway.

When someone is abused, even emotionally or verbally abused, they do tend to keep trying anyway. What tends to get to them is that when PTSD develops, they get angry because they had thought that they had overcome so much somehow so the PTSD symptoms that as you know are very challenging, feels like a betrayal.

If professionals then misdiagnose because they are not really trained to identify the outward signs of what is PTSD, and not Bipolar or other possible diagnoses, this can lead to actually "aggravating" the PTSD. The reason for the patient getting worse is that the treatment they receive tends to "invalidate them even further" which is simply "more abuse".

The reason "why" having a therapist that really understands PTSD and "Trauma recovery" is because they can "listen and validate" which is the utmost importance to "trauma recovery".

A trauma victim tends to "self blame" a lot because after a trauma they have all the facts and begin to see the "if I only did this or that" I would have not "lost so much" or "been so hurt". They also tend to "self blame" because of how the PTSD brings on symptoms that make them really struggle and they can't seem to "control themselves" or "stop the severe anxiety or mood changes, even the extreme bouts of anger that pops up".

However, if a PTSD patient actually has the right therapist to "validate" and "help them feel safe" and "listen, listen, listen, and validate, validate, validate" their initial desperation begins to "slowly subside" and they can finally gain a much needed sense of calm so they can finally "work through the traumas and learn and grow". A good trauma therapist understands that a PTSD patient, even a complex PTSD patient needs to finally be able to actually "grieve" whatever was lost to them and finally get to a point where they can feel comfortable enough with themselves and their history to be able to "continue to live out their lives with a new sense of validation and care for self" verses harboring guilt and the negative messages they received from "abuse".

No one can go back and change their past, and pretty much everyone will see things as they move through life and learn that they wish they had somehow known earlier.
It doesn't even matter "how successful" someone is, because we "all" can see the "if only" in hindsight.

Therapy is supposed to help you grieve and get "comforted" so you can finally settle into yourself and with everything you have learned and have grieved, move forward and just "live your life, more enlightened, and decide to keep on learning and growing and gaining. Therapy is also to help you learn to "care about yourself instead of "self punish" .

It will do you "no good" to hold onto the anger about something you simply cannot go back and "change" either. You need to come to "terms" with that and a therapist is there to help you finally learn to "do just that". Each person will be different depending on their history and "destructive messages or abuse they may have suffered".

(((Hugs)))
OE