[IndestructibleGirl]

Yay

Today has been peppered with flashbacks of sexual trauma. Not full on, all out. More twinges of things fleeting through my brain, and then an emotional wave will hit me for a few minutes, and then I feel really exhausted.

I will have an appointment with a new therapist in a couple weeks (agencies should let me know sometime next week about their availability) and went to see one coordinator last week. I don't think I can go straight into talking about this with a new person. Or at least, I know I can. I can sit there and talk about it factually, even describe what emotions I experience during the flashbacks, and feel not quite real. It feels like I'm a writer talking about a character I have written. It doesn't feel connected to me in an actual sense. Even as I spoke to the coordinator I had this sensation, that I was an author being interviewed about a new book. I felt like I was doing a disservice to myself, and this frustrates me because I don't know why. I'm not telling lies, I'm not holding back information, but I can't feel emotions about it with a stranger.

I need my old therapist except I don't. I need her as a human being, drinking Chablis and smoking cigarettes at my kitchen table with me, talking into the night - not 'doing therapy', but just talking about human experience in the world like two people having real contact.

And I'm fed up of my trauma. I want to shove it all away and tell myself I'm making it up. But somehow, that feels even worse, because a kernal at the very core of me knows instinctively that it's real. Even as I type that, the cognitive part of me is scoffing, thinking I don't really know.

How do you manage to not let trauma bleed into every part of your life? How can you stop it holding you back?

[CANDC]

I am sorry you feel there has been trauma in your life. It is not a sign that you have to do something about it but you can, especially if that makes you feel better.

Why not talk frankly about how you can't show emotions so what can I possibly get out of this therapy to your new therapist. By the end of the session or the next session the therapist should have goals of the therapy and you can ask how that fulfills your need.

Your last questions are very significant:

How do you manage to not let trauma bleed into every part of your life? How can you stop it holding you back?

I think that there is a common assumption that going through therapy will give me a fulfilling life. What I have found is that it brings me to the point where I can start to build a fulfilling life.

I have had abuse, maybe not like yours, but it sapped my self-esteem and put me on some sidings that went nowhere. I got over it in part by experiencing it and in part by letting go of it.

In part it was saying okay enough focus on the pain what did I come here for? What do I want to do with my life? These didn't happen over a weekend. It took me years, but starting to build a life was another milestone on the path to healing.

Feel free to private message me if you care to.

By talking about it in therapy.
But, the flashbacks are in a way a positive, it means they are memories and not repressed and being acted out

Originally Posted by IndestructibleGirl

Yay

Today has been peppered with flashbacks of sexual trauma. Not full on, all out. More twinges of things fleeting through my brain, and then an emotional wave will hit me for a few minutes, and then I feel really exhausted.

I will have an appointment with a new therapist in a couple weeks (agencies should let me know sometime next week about their availability) and went to see one coordinator last week. I don't think I can go straight into talking about this with a new person. Or at least, I know I can. I can sit there and talk about it factually, even describe what emotions I experience during the flashbacks, and feel not quite real. It feels like I'm a writer talking about a character I have written. It doesn't feel connected to me in an actual sense. Even as I spoke to the coordinator I had this sensation, that I was an author being interviewed about a new book. I felt like I was doing a disservice to myself, and this frustrates me because I don't know why. I'm not telling lies, I'm not holding back information, but I can't feel emotions about it with a stranger.

I need my old therapist except I don't. I need her as a human being, drinking Chablis and smoking cigarettes at my kitchen table with me, talking into the night - not 'doing therapy', but just talking about human experience in the world like two people having real contact.

And I'm fed up of my trauma. I want to shove it all away and tell myself I'm making it up. But somehow, that feels even worse, because a kernal at the very core of me knows instinctively that it's real. Even as I type that, the cognitive part of me is scoffing, thinking I don't really know.

How do you manage to not let trauma bleed into every part of your life? How can you stop it holding you back?

Short answer: I don't know. After a while, it's just unsustainable. I'm glad you're going to see a new therapist. I'm guessing that the way things ended with your previous therapist has made you raw and vulnerable to these flashbacks.

As for your new therapist, don't worry about being unemotional. I think they get that it doesn't mean you weren't affected. I tend to not talk about things unless something has happened in my current life that brings the past roaring back. Sometimes, it's just someone knocking on the door that does it. Otherwise, talking about the past without a connection to current issues sounds like a news report--blah blah blah.

[IndestructibleGirl]

Thank you.

I had a pretty grim day of it earlier today. Shaking. Bodily sensations. Repugnant urges. Something like an orgasm but not. Tears. An actual picture-memory that horrified me to the marrow of my bones and can't be real.

But then it faded away, and I've been fine. I'm starting to think maybe I can heal myself and muddle my own way through, and that a therapist would complicate matters.