Today is Halloween. It is a very big trigger.

Halloween was once my favourite day of the year. But that enjoyment has been ripped away and I resent it. Now it has become the most angry of days.

Not only did my mom pass away on this day but it is the anniversary of a horrible incident from my military past. Halloween is a huge trigger for my PTSD. I am bitter and resentful, nauseated and repulsed, and full of humiliation, shame, and feeling dirty.

How dare this day be stolen from me.

[Open Eyes]

(((justafriend))),

I am so sorry that Halloween presents you with these negative reminders and what you are describing is how you were deeply affected "emotionally". Just look at all the challenging emotions that you have listed below:

. I am bitter and resentful, nauseated and repulsed, and full of humiliation, shame, and feeling dirty

That is a lot of emotional challenge. One of the biggest challenges when it comes to PTSD is just how much a person has suffered "emotionally" that has been imprinted into their amygdala to a point where a date can present that person with a reminder of whatever hurt them so badly that they struggle with these feelings again.

I have this problem with Thanksgiving, and also Christmas, and those holidays used to be holidays I had enjoyed too. After I experienced so much loss that I experienced a post traumatic breakdown, I was so emotionally and physically exhausted that I could simply not even function. I did not get the rest and grief counseling I needed so badly, infact, I was treated as though what I was feeling was wrong and that I was a bad person because of how I was suffering. I ended up sitting at a table with strangers that were so challenged that it frightened and confused me, and my sister encouraged my family to not only be angry at me but to ABANDON me and not even call me or visit me.

What that did was present me with a huge secondary trauma, and I was certainly in "no condition" to experience that. I had been traumatized so badly and I did not deserve to be invalidated and punished and abandoned the way I was.

It has taken me a long time to understand the true gravity of how deeply that hurt me too. I can never change that horrible experience, however, what I can do is work towards coming to a deep understanding of how that hurt me and slowly work on slowly coming to terms with how nothing that I suffered was my fault and unfortunately what happened to me was due to the lack of knowledge in others where they failed to understand that how they treated me was "wrong and hurtful". I genuinely deserved "better" and I am sure you did too.

Now, that being said the feelings you have expressed are feelings that you really don't deserve to assign to yourself. That is hard to learn how to gain control over, I can feel challenged with that myself. I have had to learn how to "grieve" in such a way where I "self care and comfort" and remind myself that my own suffering and invalidation was not my fault and I don't deserve to feel guilt and shame that others have made an effort to hand to me and encourage me to feel. It is important that you have a "safe" place to be able to vent how you struggle this way too. A place where you are more likely to have others come and present you with "empathy" and "validation and understanding".
Your goal is to slowly develop a part of your mind that is often called the "wise mind" where you gain on your ability to acknowledge your emotional challenges, and also "learn" that anyone who invalidates that genuine emotional challenge is someone who really lacks the "knowledge" in how to not only validate, but comfort you in a way where you feel acknowledged, not in guilt or shame, but instead being "present" with you in the emotional challenge of whatever was threatened or lost to you.

(((Gentle Caring and Supportive ))))

thank you so very, very much

Holidays trigger me too. Keep reaching out, it helps.

[Unrigged64072835]

Halloween is triggering for me too. Having strangers coming to my door is triggering. My husband and I pretty much hide when the trick-or-treaters are out. We leave the porch light off and turn off the doorbell. Last year we still had someone come to the door. It was rather bad.