Ladylullaby, the reason trauma therapy is so difficult is because when someone talks about their trauma history they HATE remembering and feeling how "powerless" they felt when they experienced that trauma.

When I experienced a major trauma that caused me to experience a great deal of loss to everything I loved that was something I put a great deal of time into, I got so overwhelmed with "powerlessness" that I experienced a post traumatic stress breakdown. I did not know what that was and unfortunately, instead of getting the right help I was further traumatized and rendered even more powerless.

At first without my even knowing I was misdiagnosed and that was mainly because the first psychiatrist that treated me was not educated about identifying the clear red flags I did definitely express as that of a trauma patient. Instead, he decided that what I lost should not have been important because it was not important to him. On top of that he was Indian and spoke with a heavy accent and in his culture women are not supposed to any power or even much say. So he really missed the boat. On top of that my older sister decided to "handle it" and that was also a bad choice because she ended up saying all the things you NEVER say to any trauma patient. NEVER do you make a trauma patient feel bad or guilty for being traumatized. Especially when that patient is so traumatized and feeling so completely powerless they are saying they wish they were dead.

Then I was actually kept in this place not because the psychiatrist or treatment providers wanted me to stay there, but because my husband kept saying HE was not ready to have me come home. Then I went to out patient after my husband FINALLY agreed to me coming home. I tried to talk to the first outpatient therapist who AGAIN decided that what I talked about losing should not be considered important because AGAIN it was never important to her and she had absolutely NO experience or knowledge about what I talked about either. I did not get the right treatment so instead of recovering I ended up only getting worse. I actually came extremely close to not even being here it got so bad. And the one thing I knew was I never wanted to go back to that place that only traumatized me more so I kept a lot to myself. Luckily, my husband met someone in the field that actually knew the psychiatrist I had seen and also knew he was a lousy psychiatrist and that I was not the only one that had problems with him or that was misdiagnosed. This individual gave my husband a name of an actual "trauma specialist" that did a lot of trauma therapy. That was not long after I joined this site. I was in bad shape when I joined this site and yet at least I was able to learn more and read things. So this was almost 4 years after I experienced a pts breakdown and not getting the right help. So, with this new therapist I finally began to experience actual "trauma therapy" and the one thing he worked very hard at with me is to make sure I felt safe with him. Sigh...it was not easy at this point because of all the bad therapy I had experienced. So I had to have therapy for having bad therapy and he also educated me on what UNEDUCATED professionals that did not understand the red flags that mean trauma patient ended up misdiagnosing me with that was totally wrong.

While I was seeing this therapist I faced another growing toxic scenario that was triggering me to begin feeling "powerless" and I began experiencing flashbacks from my past that totally frightened and confused me. When you wrote "I don't want this silly childhood stuff", oh can I so relate. I actually have a lot of trauma in my history, I was angry about these flashbacks because I really thought I got past it all and moved on.

There are things or certain behaviors in other individuals that can trigger me to experience things I don't want to experience. It has definitely taken me a long time to figure that out too. What I have learned is there are certain behaviors I experienced in these trauma events that if I experience them in the now can trigger me to certain events where I experienced trauma and that powerlessness I experienced of not being able to stop that trauma from happening.

I think each person is different in what helps them. Often the reason to finally talk about trauma events with a qualified trauma therapist is to slowly recognize what in that even contributed to this feeling of powerlessness. The reason DBT can be helpful is because it can provide a person with new ways of reducing the powerlessness experienced in a trauma. However, a lot depends on what kind of trauma the person endured.

One thing that can trigger me is when someone pursues me and cross examines me and argures with me. That is exactly what I experienced in situations that resulted in further making me powerless. A rapist doesn't listen, doesn't care and just takes over. Yes, dealing with an intrusive know it all bossy person can trigger me. And that person often will say "well I was just trying to help" when they don't even realize their style of helping is too critical and bossy and is only reflecting the way THEY look at things.

You deserve to heal instead of dragging yourself through the day. The therapy I am doing now has been helpful. I can see that there are traumas I never processed and I sure have a lot of them. The therapist I am working with now explained to me that often it's like a vine that one needs to follow until they finally process the root where this powerlessness originated. Each person is different depending on their personal history.

In my last session I ended up talking about many of the traumas I have in my history. I talked about things I have never shared before with him. He is making up a plan where he can work on these different traumas in this therapy. We never forget anything we experienced, however, with this therapy he explained to me that we take out the impact that whatever the event has on us that we never processed. I have noticed it helps. What I do like about this new therapist is he knows NOT to do anything that can trigger me to feel powerless, HE GETS IT. A therapist that rolls their eyes or practices any kind of dismissiveness is not a good trauma therapist. If you do love your therapist, that's good and a must while sitting and working through trauma that involves talking about things that you would rather not talk about because no one cares to feel that powerlessness they experienced in a traumatic event. Overwhelming emotions tend to be a part of the challenge so it's very important to be extra patient with yourself as you work on your healing.