Complext Ptsd and Attachment Work

I wish I had a good answer but I too have complex PTSD, attachment issues, and at times have struggled with not having therapist when I needed them during the week. I would feel abandoned. I even had a therapist who let me email them and would reply back but if the reply was not as detailed as I liked, I would feel abandoned. My last couple of therapists had allowed me to call or email but essentially for emergencies. So I rarely used the phone for that reason but I did email (felt they could not get mad at me that way...assuming they would get mad for non emergency, whatever that means). I would feel guilty, worry they think I'm being needy, all those thoughts, and then would constantly check my email to see if they replied back. So in short emailing them was good option to have when needed but still did not help in some situations.

I don't know where you at in your therapy so depending on what you're working on, you may or may not need more contact outside session. With a good therapist you might be able to work on things yourself (or with other support, not therapist contact) till you see the therapist again. If uncovering new trauma or whatever, it's good to know that the therapist would have enough flexibility to allow for more support during the week. It's good to check if the therapist has that flexibility when you start with a new therapist.

I just stopped seeing my T because I did not believe that he was focusing on treating my CPTSD. Oddly, in the final session, he kept asking me about our "relationship." I had no idea what he was talking about and replied that I really don't bond with others. Still, he kept asking about the relationship we had developed over the months. Again, I replied that I really don't bond with others and always saw it as a doctor and patient relationship and nothing more. He seemed incredulous at this - that over the months I had developed no emotional warmth towards the bond that the two of us shared by talking about my most private feelings and activities. Needless to say, I was very put off by these questions and was glad that I was stopping therapy. I was there to make headway with my issues and obtain treatment for CPTSD, not make friends. I knew that I had attachment problems going into therapy but if that was how he intended to encourage me to change my mind and stay then he was really barking up the wrong tree.

I did have one therapist who encouraged me to contact him via e-mail between sessions. I did not think that I abused it by keeping them few and brief. However, over the course of a month he had changed his mind and no longer wanted my emails. I was sincerely trying to work through some issues but he did not see it that way. Frankly, after experiencing that, I would now only contact a T in an emergency.

It might help to realise that your difficulties within the relationship/attachment with the therspist IS the trauma work. It has been proven that complex PTSD is an attachment disorder: neuroscientists have found that only those with insecure early attachments will develop full blown PTSD. So it is quite normal that you keep stumbling upon attachment difficulties within your therapy. Being able to recall the trauma with a witness to help is very healing, but the main healing is within the attachment to the therapist.
It is within our primary attachment to mother that we internalise the tools to manage difficult events/feelings. The therapeutic relationship acts much in the same way - it gives us the means to cope with the trauma and to better regulate our feelings associated with it. It has been proven that a longer term relational therapy allows neural pathways in our brains to grow - that's how important attachment is. Psychotherapist Margaret Wilkinson, who writes extensively about attachment and the brain, says ' it is mother who grows our brains.' A relational Therapy can do the same thing. That's how we can heal from trauma.
Moon

Thanks for this information. I was unaware of the therapist's goal to create attachment. However, in reality, I cannot see myself bonding with a therapist. The relationship with a son/mother and a patient/therapist is very different even if the therapist says things to me like a nurturing mother would - and some have. (My Mom was big on criticism and manipulation, and was not physically warm at all.) Frankly, if that is the treatment - to create attachment - I can't see it working for me at all. Are there other treatments?

I do realise now that that is the work but how do I explain that in a way that a new therapist will understand? " I want to come to you and have a relationship with you, so I can learn how to cope in relationships" ? Just seems weird.

This is an oldish thread. I have since found a new therapist to work with and I start in March. She does seem to understand attachment stuff and about dissocation which I suspect I do a lot more of than I ever realised. But to be honest I am completely terrified of going back into therapy after the last experience. I'm not sure the risk is worth it anymore.

There's a big difference between a therapist who understands about attachement (which is all of them) and one who really understands how to work with attachment and ptsd effectively, who understands how to navigate it with the client and who doesn't get pulled into it all and becomes entrenched in the clients patterns and eventually abandons. ( about 5% of them)

If I could find a therapist who really "gets it" that would be amazing but it's hard to know whether they really "get it" unless you work with them, by which time it's too late not to get hurt. All I can do is hope this one I've hired is actually good at her job.

Thanks. I have to agree. I do not see how a "relationship" with a T can replace / heal the damage done by a parent when you were a child. Most of the Ts I've seen did not want to play the role of parent. Further, you'd have to be in therapy for a very long time for the "relationship" to supercede that of a parent lacking in parenting skills. I believe when I was in group that I did see it done successfully once when a patient was with the T for something like 17 years of both weekly private and group therapy. However, I do not understand how a T treating complex PTSD can really believe that a 45 minute relationship per week in scheduled visits that are paid for can successfully treat the damage done by a 24/7 parent when the patient was a child. Over the years, I've gotten so much poor advice from some Ts that it is unlikely I'll emotionally buy into this form of therapy. I think that the presumption that a "relationship" with a T can really successfully treat CPTSD is very weak. In my case, I don't see it working at all.

They make sense of the damage done by parents.

And provide, through the relationship, a counterpoint to that early experience.

But I agree, unguy, that it takes a very competent T who also believes in working in this way, and a relatively lengthy experience to work.

Ugh, I'm doomed!

Something about PC has been helping me too though. That and no contact with the family, and lots of reading. Getting my stuff together before i die is a full time job. Or a fool's errand

[QUOTE=moonlitsky;4285343] It has been proven that complex PTSD is an attachment disorder: neuroscientists have found that only those with insecure early attachments will develop full blown PTSD.

Could you share any research or articles on this proven fact? I would love to read them.

Yes, T's have made those points clear. But is that enough? My feelings towards attachments and skills with them have not improved.

I think its something you have to literally "master" - malcolm gladwell's 10,000 hours are equivalent to apprenticeship - journeyman - master craftsman. After 7 years i felt i knew my job as a computer programmer. 7 x 2,000 is 14k. Well time off for meetings. And it takes 7 years for all the cells in your body to replace. Its not about just learning skills. Its internalizing it. Its being able to notice that you reacted differently without even trying, not just trying to control your reactions.

Attachment is difficult when you meet with constant rejection. I am just not good looking or very worldly when it comes to interpersonal relationships. I am shocked by the casual meanness of our society. To attach with others you have to fit in and be accepted. I have a very poor record with fitting in and being accepted. I am often afraid to speak my mind and pay the price for it. And, when I do, pay the price for that too. With me, everything is a no-win situation.

On thing that T's have never been able to help with is that, to me, feelings of love are met with dread. Yes, I can say that I understand those feelings come from parental rejection as a child and also as a teen and adult. Still, I cannot override those feelings because of years of rejection by others. I've met with so much rejection and abuse as an adult that just treating my childhood is not enough.

i was severely abused throughout my childhood, and anything relating to love is always met with dread.

my abuser constantly told me he loved me. therefore i associated love with pain, and that made me dread it.
for the most part of my childhood, i was completely incapable of love.

the fact that my mother is his sister and never noticed the abuse or helped me means that i have a massive maternal abandonment issue.

i also have BPD features... as yet am undiagnosed, but this certainly doesn't help my grasp of relationships/love.

[QUOTE=MoxieDoxie;4291237]The research I am referring to is by Dr Felicity de Zulueta, a psychoanalyst, and her team at the Maudsley hospital in London. If you google her research into trauma and attachment there is alot of information online. I have attended some of her lectures and found them very helpful.

Moon