Taking care of younger self vs. 'just avoiding?'

Hi,
I've been in trauma therapy, and as things get more intense, even ideas like self-care are starting to confuse me. That was one of the first things we worked on, as well as safety etc. Well, these past weeks have gotten worse and the flashbacks are happening more often and are more easily triggered. In the past few days, I've been disassociating for longer amounts of time. Now, it's gotten to the point where it's taking a lot of work to write this and I feel less and less real. I'm trying to 'put my feet on the ground' so to speak, and in some ways I think I just want to know... is this going to get any better?
My therapist is always asking what I would do if I was taking care of my childhood self. Sometimes eat something. Sometimes take a nap and so on. I'm wondering, how do I know if I'm taking care of myself/younger self versus isolating or avoiding? For example, when does a nap turn into avoiding? Or if I feel overwhelmed by a project, when am I letting someone help me with the project and when am I just avoiding a responsibility? I know I won't get answers tonight, but I needed to write it. I don't know when I'm ignoring and when I'm allowing for self-care. Thank you for listening.

I think your T is probably best to answer these question..?
But I personally, do not think that taking a nap or asking for help is avoiding or in any case a bad thing.. It really sounds like self-care to me.

If you´re still taking care of the project, you´re not avoiding it, and as long as you get up at some time after your nap, you can face whatever made you tired before and maybe can handle that better too..

I know how you feel, because I have also had flashbacks and triggering incidents. But feeling terrible is almost like letting the infected feelings out, as when a wound is lanced. You will feel better in time but it will probably feel like a really long time for you.

I hope you continue to fight through this. In time, you will have more freedom. In the meantime, just believe you can make it through.

I am doing trauma work also, just scratching surface and its triggering, also dealing with flashbacks and intrusive memories, I have a hard time believing in the inner child concept, after therapy my t says to use self care, to take a nap, eat my favorite foods ect.. get in touch with my child. I really dont know how to do that, I would rather just ignore that inner child thing, it rather seems like an exta chore to trauma work ughhhh. hope that helps