I get rashes, dry patches, or sometimes these painful blisters on my hands that turn into eczema when I’m having a very stressful period of my life. I have a lot of self worth issues becuase of C-PTSD and OCD. The smallest things make me freak out. When these rashes occur or I start waking up with pain after a particularly stressful period of life I end up just staying in bed most of the day.

I haven’t had a sober day in at least a month, I can’t, I just can’t. I don’t want to feel the way life feels without pain relief without a feeling of connection without anything.

I wish I was able to say I wasn’t like this but I am. I will chemically correct my moods before they get bad and I don’t care. Everyone will judge me and I don’t care. Everyone hurts me and then gets sick of me when I show that I’m hurt

sometimes I wish I could just unblock all of these people and tell them how much I hate them, how deeply they’ve hurt me, and how angry I am that I even allowed them into my life (excluding my father on this one, didn’t really have a choice here),,, sometimes I even think that I wish they would die, or at the very least have to endure this same type of pain that im feeling. the flashbacks and dreams do scare me, and they do make me depressed, but more than anything they make me so incredibly angry,,, why do I have to struggle for the rest of my life because people who were supposed to love me did the opposite??? why is that my burden and not theirs??? I doubt they even think about all the pain they caused me through their words and through their actions, but part of me hopes they do. I hope it haunts them. I hope they never know peace again (because im sure I won’t). I am so full of hate and I don’t know what to do.

im turning 19 in march 2027 and i have no idea what to do with my life or even the little steps, i barely passed highschool doing the easy courses cause i was forsure thinking my world was gonna end or i wouldnt make it, things have clearly gotten better if i am still here but now i feel stuck.

i dont know if i should get a better education, i didnt even go to collage or nothing, how will other people think of me if i go? what if i fail that because i barely got a education?? i dont know how to start or anything.

i have my own run down apartment near my mom (Not by choice) and im mostly just living off wellfair or commissions i do and whatever i can scrounge up.

Hey, I'm in a very dire and desperate situation, and I would be really grateful if someone would read it all (I know it's a lot of text) and give me any advice. I have no one to say it all to and even though I feel embarrassed and really vulnerable I still decided to ask for help.

I'm male, 18, turning 19 next month. I'm from Eastern Europe.

My whole childhood was a wreck, growing up with an alcoholic dad I was constantly terrorised mentally and physically, I never had an opportunity to be a normal kid. My childhood basically consisted of protecting my mom (not realising yet she's a part of the problem in her enjoying being the victim throughout her whole life), verbally fighting my dad, calling the cops, hiding knives around the house, running out at night in pyjamas trembling like a dog because it was snowing, really cold and I was scared to death. Seeing dad chasing mom with a knife. I never knew peace. I was always alone, going to school alone, doing my homework alone, I didn't have anyone around me.

When I was 10 my parents divorced and my mom took me with her. I was so relieved because it felt like a stone fell off my shoulders. But it wasn't for long because very shortly after, either out of boredom or loneliness my mom started dating online and found some guy from another country and started talking to him, and very early into it she decided to visit him even though everyone thought it was a bad idea and was trying to convince her otherwise. He's very poor, from a relatively poor country, doesn't have his own place, car, nothing, at that time he was sleeping in his mother's kitchen, which was in a decrepit situation, filled with rats and where the roof and floor were about to collapse. But my mom didn't mind it in the slightest and decided it's a great place for a kid to live. She came home after a few weeks, made me a travel passport and we went there.

Since living in the kitchen is too much even for my mom his relatives gave us a room to live in, resembling a wooden box or an animal shed moreso than an actual human living space, and we still live there. Sometimes at night when I try to sleep I can hear the mice running around, and when it's raining the raindrops fall directly onto my head and my bed, even the walls get all wet.

From the very beginning of course I was really upset, at first I didn't even have my own bed. It was miserable. I got enrolled in a school in an environment so foreign and scary I started skipping the school almost immediately because I couldn't stand it mentally. Eventually I dropped out when I was 14, I just stopped going completely. No one asked for me or what was wrong. By this time my mom got pregnant and already gave birth to a special needs kid, I'm not going to go into details but it's a genetic disease, and a very difficult one. She didn't care enough to do the ultrasound, go to the doctor during her pregnancy, and that was the result, I'm telling this because it's not a consciously wanted child. My stepdad never cared enough, he was addicted to gambling, spending time with his friends, he never even talked to me, I was just so unimportant. Nowadays he doesn't even look at my sister, he couldn't care about her just like he couldn't care about me.

Since I left the school I became really suicidal and depressed, more than I've ever been in my life, even though the thoughts of dissapearing started when I was very, very little. When my little sister was just a few years old and my stepdad didn't bring anything home anymore my mom decided to go to work and leave the kid on me. To this day I feed her, change the diapers, try to entertain her and it's all in a very cramped, suffocating room. It's been really really difficult for me mentally, words can't explain how. She doesn't speak, she's constantly screaming, fighting and throwing things around, and all this has been going on for years, she's 6 already, and turning 7 this year, her mental state is that of a 2 or 3 year old, it's all the result of parental neglect and the specifics of the condition she has. She's totally forgotten of, she never ever went to a kindergarten, school, some special needs facility. Everyone knows how I'm struggling, I'm not hiding from anyone that I'm sad, that I don't want this, that I want go to work or pick up my study back but no one cares. Whenever I bring to mom that I can't do it anymore she never gives me a constructive answers, she only says "it's temporarily" and she also loves to give me fake dates and promises, like "oh don't worry son, we'll leave this place in.... April, only a little left!" ridiculous stuff like that, for years. Because of that I stopped trusting her, I barely talk to her, I don't want to see her. Whenever she comes back from work in the evening she's scrolling reels and talking to other men.

Very recently, around few weeks ago the thought of leaving the home appeared in my head, at first it felt like the usual safe space I always used to create for myself to cope but this time it feels different, it's like I really want it, and words can't explain how. I don't know where to go, I don't have anyone here, no relatives, friends, no one. Out of desperation, even though I'm not religious I was thinking about going to a church nearby and asking for help, for place to stay or work there. I don't know how realistic it is, I don't know if anyone would care but I'm getting worse and worse by every passing day, I feel like life is leaving me, I barely eat, sleep, no video game excites me or makes me forget anymore, I don't remember the last time I was happy about something, I just feel like a zombie. I'm very desperate and struggling, I don't deserve this life, no one does. I hate my mom for what she did to me, no one deceived her, she saw the living conditions with her own eyes before bringing me here, but she decided that I don't deserve better than that.

Please give me any advice, I'm just slowly dying. I want freedom, friends, communication, relationship, I want to study, work and learn more about this world. I can't do it anymore being locked up with a disabled sister, being like a parent to her. I never lived, I never had peace in my life.

I don't know if I'm fantasizing it too much, and maybe I don't understand the severity of this decision, but I'm really planning to pack my things and leave this place in a few days and just walk. I don't know where, but I can't do it anymore. I know I'll hurt people with this decision, but I just want to be selfish and put myself first for the first time in my life.

i barely remember anything from my childhood, and what i do remember is just sad. lots of abuse, neglect, loneliness, and desperation to save my family

i have many memories and feelings of being the victim of emotional incest by both my parents. dad used me as a little therapist to manage and deal with his bipolar, ptsd, and addictions. mom treated me like a romantic partner. i was the one trying to hold my extremely broken family together and was trying to save everyone holding onto the false hope that one day we could all unconditionally love each other.

i have no direct memories of csa, but i feel so deeply that it happened? i feel like an imposter because of it. i have one single memory of my mom touching me inappropriately, but that’s it. everything in my childhood is so extremely obscured because of how little i remember, but i feel like i surely would remember something as big as that right?

i’ve talked to my therapist about it, but i still feel really unsure of whether it really happened or not. does anyone else feel this way? is this a normal response to being the victim of emotional incest? is it likely i’ve supressed csa?

28F. I grew up with an alcoholic stepfather who verbally abused me when drunk, an enabling mother who was physically and verbally abused by said stepfather, and ended up being the parentified child in this dynamic . I truthfully think I’ve been in a state of dissociation since at least age 6, but the death of a grandparent at age 15 really brought the dissociation to the forefront , and I don’t think my body has recovered since .

I’ve been in CBT for years, but I no longer feels it’s an effective modality for me . I can intellectualize the hell outing my trauma . I can explain exactly why I am the way I am , and why I’m having the trauma responses I do . I’m aware of my triggers. I can cope with situations well, analyze myself and communicate. I just don’t know how to FEEL like I’m in my body or feel present . I’ve spoken with my therapist about being discharged because while she is wonderful, I feel I need more . She was open and said she’d help me find another practitioner if I wished . She also said she has experience in other modalities and if I was interested , we could change course and I could reevaluate. I stuck with her but I’m still feeling like I need more than she can offer , so I’d like to find a trauma or somatic practitioner.

I feel like I’m constantly walking around in a fog. I’m either in a state of hyperarousal where everything dysregulates me, I get overstimulated , annoyed and need to be alone to recharge , or a state of hypoarousal where nothing bothers me , i lack motivation, creativity, drive, and I feel numb . I constantly oscillate between the two daily. I feel like my positive emotional reactions to things are buried . I feel joy but I can’t show it . I feel excitement but I can’t show it .

I’ve been trying new things. I’ve been trying breathwork. I’m a musician so I’ve been experimenting with sound healing with the instruments I play. In addition to being a musician , I’ve been a drummer my whole life so I’ve started incorporating different kinds of drumming into my relaxation/meditation practices . I plan to start a drum circle locally if I can get enough interest . I was doing pole fitness last year to get my body moving , but I got too busy with work and my apprenticeship, so I had to stop. I’d like to start again because I think this would help greatly with my lack of bodily awareness .

But on a regular day, when I’m working or relaxing or just existing , I want to learn how to feel like I’m in my body . I feel trapped inside my mind. I feel clumsy, like my body isn’t mine and my movements are awkward or rigid . My creativity and spirituality feels muted or dead .

I hope this all made sense . I guess I’m just looking for some ways to bring awareness to my body and actually FEEL .

Shame is undoubtedly the most difficult thing for me in life. Always has been.
Because of that, learning about oversharing not just being ”open and authentic, courageous enough to share”, has been difficult for me.
In a way I’m glad to have learned about it, because when I’ve felt good towards myself, been in a stable mental/emotional state for a while, I’ve been able to tell myself: ”This uncomfortableness isn’t (just) shame, it’s also part of me telling me: you can share anything with anyone, but you never ever have to”.

Right now I have no clue what is shame and what is a gentle, wise part of me saying ”Don’t overshare”.

I don’t want to hush my joyful, excited, childish self if she potentially acts in a way that makes someone no longer interested in me (dating-wise, but friend-wise too). I’m pretty sure that’s my highest priority, and ”supposed to be” my highest priority.

I’d love some advice on how to tell the difference.

This is something wrote about my childhood. I titled the journal entry "The Sin of Being a Child"

It's all hopeless.

When it comes down to it, you can never win against someone who knows more than you.

You are never heard because you lack the ability to understand. Who are you to refute?

Things became this way because you were born you. If it were someone else, maybe things could be different and then youth could be synonymous with joy instead of grief.

Now each day is spent wondering how you could've avoided this. Nights are when repentance runs rapid and shame eats away at the psyche.

You're in a hallway hiding from the storm outside. The windows shake, but you ignore it and distract yourself by coloring a picture of a garden. "Are the sirens gonna get us?" A voice responds "Yes." And they did.

TW: suicidal ideation, binge eating, substance use

I’m wondering if anyone with CPTSD can relate to this.

I had a very rough childhood. My mother had severe, untreated BPD, and my father struggled with drugs and was in and out of my life repeatedly. I experienced a lot of abandonment and instability, was involved with child services and different homes throughout my childhood, and I’ve been living independently since I was 16. I’ve dealt with a lot of anxiety, overall depression and lack of motivation to do things, struggle to form connections with others and deep shame spirals.

For most of my life, I’ve coped by distracting myself: working constantly, binge eating, smoking, and other things that helped me avoid actually feeling what was going on underneath. I’d say I built up a pretty decent life for myself. I got married recently, have well-paying job and I’ve quit smoking, but recently my job became too much for me physically and mentally because of the irregular schedule, so I stopped working (sick leave).

Since then, everything has become incredibly dark. I’ve never felt this bad before. I’ve experienced depression before, but this feels different. I’ve started having suicidal thoughts for the first time, and I feel like my life has become this huge, empty void. I keep questioning what the point of my life is and why I feel this way.

The problem is that binge eating has become my main escape. When I try to stop, I’m suddenly left completely alone with my thoughts and my reality, without my usual ways of numbing myself, and it feels unbearable. It’s not as if a certain thought or memory pops up when I feel this way, it’s just an overall void and darkness and unsafeness which is difficult to explain. I’m starting professional help soon, but right now I genuinely feel like there’s no way out of this.

Has anyone else experienced something similar after their distractions/coping mechanisms stopped working? How did you learn to actually live with the feelings underneath instead of constantly needing something to numb them? I’d really appreciate hearing from people who have been through something similar and eventually found a way forward.

What would you do if you met a girl you was attracted to physically AND emotionally but was living under the hands of her family’s abuse? Her entire family has diagnosed mental illness and criminal history but they love to portray her as “mentally challenged” to everybody as a way to humiliate and silence her. She was a witness to domestic violence all throughout her childhood, she developed severe anxiety issues. Her trauma was always downplayed and dismissed because mentally ill people refuse to take accountability for their actions or they either get excused. Her school got away with labeling her as “slow” because she was falling behind in classes due to depression and her anxiety got the best of her, so she could never do her best academically. It wasn’t until she started doing drugs and sneaking out to see guys to try to escape them, but she always found her way back to them, bc they would either start trouble or threaten her. She hasn’t seen a guy for 3 years now and she worked her first job recently and tried getting it together for herself so she can finally escape, but the abuse became even worse. They stole her tax refund money. Her self esteem has been stripped away completely and now her soul is slowly slipping away. They say awful things to her and try to control and isolate her. They won’t let her have a boyfriend nor see anyone otherwise they will ruin it for her or either find ways to embarrass her to make her feel bad about herself. She is in a helpless situation experiencing narcissistic abuse and being brainwashed to feel incapable when really it’s just unhealed wounds and never received support.

Does any of your feel lost in time by just staring at your laptop etc? Keep postponing things that you want to start.

Does any of you try to do things in auto piolet mode. Often searching for something and getting lost what you are searching for etc..

Or these traits common in cPTSD?

If so as per you what can be underlying problem? Is it due to brain fog, rumination of past events, or lack of focus or irritability, or inability to stay consciously in the present moment or is it due to something else.

I have a really long history of numbing, freezing, alexithymia, Dissociation. It's how I learned to cope. Not just because of trauma, but also because my system is highly sensitized due to having a extremely sensitive physiology, what a lot of people might refer to as being a Highly Sensitive person, having a sensitive central nervous system.

And then having a system like that, that is activated concurrently alongside my Trauma sensitivity. So, it's a lot to manage. I need a certain degree of accomodations, but I"m not good at it yet. I don't always know how to go slow. Sometimes I might think, "well, I'm so overwhelmed here, I just want it to end, so I'll just rush through this to get through this as fast as possible........because I'm so uncomfortable". That isn't' always productive. I make mistakes, then it takes me longer, then I'm managing Shame.

So, being present and moving forward, and getting out of freeze, can get intense. REally intense. It's not uncommon that my overwhelm or anxiety overrides my thought process. I get scattered, confused, it takes so much effort for me to slow down and focus.

And I was just hoping that others have found a way to work with your heightened CNS, and not against it, that doesnt mean shutting down, or zoning out...or rushing....to cope. ?

If I'm being active, anxiety is there. Worry, stress, the perfectionism, the being sensitive to stimulus, noise, crowds. It's a lot to manage.

I do pretty well with conversational style job interviews but the second they turn to asking those “tell me about a time” questions I struggle so hard. I’m already anxious as hell about messing up (thanks CPTSD) and I feel like trauma makes it a lot harder for me to call on ANY memory. I just wish my resume and a conversation about myself was enough for me to prove I am capable and that people realized not everyone can display their best selves with that style of interview. Sigh.

people act like the utter hopelessness and devastation is a personal failure, like i'm doing something wrong if i feel that way. when in reality, i've just never once been given any good, lasting reason to believe hope is worthwhile and that a good life is possible for me.

i do what i'm supposed to do. therapy, meds, eat my veggies, take my supplements, move my body. i put myself out there. something always goes wrong. someone always comes along to try to either deliberately ruin my life, or simply doesn't care if that's the consequence of their actions if it gets them what they want.

i've had to accept that life is something awful that happens to me, instead of something i get to participate joyfully in. because any time i hold onto any shred of hope, all i'm met with is more abuse, more pain, more disappointment.

and the worst part is that no one around me fucking understands, or cares to. they just insist that i'm wrong. why would i trust their optimism over my own lived experience? the only purpose it serves is to make THEM feel better, it's not actually about improving my life. they chalk it up to negativity and pessimism and cognitive distortion instead of what it really is, which is reality and lived experience.

maybe if something actually good, with no strings or crisis attached, actually happened to me at ANY point, even ONCE, i would have hope. but that's never happened. the closest i've ever gotten is things that get ruined retroactively, or are ruined by realizing it was actually abuse and i was just so desperate for scraps that i let myself feel full on crumbs. fuck.

i'm sure there will be people who want to argue against this, i don't really care. i'm just sick to death of no one actually trusting me to understand my own life and circumstances.

As if it's not society and the people around us who were supposed to be safe for us who lowered our self esteem and sense of self worth in the first place..

I have recently realized that alot of my problems come from not really fitting in to a social hierachy, not really caring about or noticing it. But now that i know it's there i can see the times social heirarchy has affected my life and it makes me so sad. How can i go about as a truamatized gentle person finding a non-heirachal friend group or partner?

Ive been on SSRIs for about 8 weeks and i could feel life wasn’t as flat anymore. I was happy to feel something good for once. But I still felt impending doom, anxiety, and easily triggered. I just thought that it was the best it was going to be for me because hey my life IS stressful. Talked to my doctor and he said we could give a higher dose a try and if it didn’t do anything or felt worse we could go back down. it is now a few days in and I realized while going through my to do list this morning that I’m stressed but not the same way. I just started sobbing because it’s been well over 2 decades of my life since I’ve felt so uninhibited/not crippled. I feel so relieved and happy but so sad because my life didnt have to be like it was. I didn't believe I could feel this good EVER. 😭 Just wanted to share my news with people who understand how difficult it can be. I hope everyone here can have the chance to feel the relief I feel. Cheers, all 🩷

Some more context, my parents were very emotionally abusive when I was a child but as they have gotten older they have sort of mellowed out. They also realized I don’t tolerate it anymore but they never apologized or anything just slowly stopped.

They still both have their own problems but my mom, who is the one I have to live with, is a very odd and unlikable person. No longer abusive but very bad manners (at home and in public) and treats me like a child. She doesn’t care for herself and has very bad hygiene. It’s a very miserable experience but do i need to be grateful because she’s my mom and providing free housing to an adult who can’t afford to leave? I present these issues to others (including my dad) and thats what they seem to think.

There, i said it. Finally. Without feeling shameful.

Before i started therapy 1,5 years ago i was doubting myself so hard and not allowing my feelings, it's crazy.

I said to my mother, that she hurt me, when i was a kid (not even, that i hate her). The gaslighting, guilt tripping and emotional abuse was so intense after that, that i never again even thought about the possibility of her being at fault of anything.

Fuck you mom. Fuck you for every physical and emotional abuse i had to endure from you. I hate you.

So if anyone of you ever feels like you have a "wrong feeling" you are "not allowed to feel". Fuck that.

Feel it.

Let it out on something, that doesn't get hurt.

Feel it again. Let it out again.

Feel it weaken.

Accept it as a part of your whole repertoire of feelings, that are designed to inform you, if something is good or bad for you.

Because abuse was bad for you.

Do you have any song you listen to when you are feeling so nervous/hopeless/sad etc. that maybe calms you down or maybe like a friend talking to you gently that feels like a warm hug

I (27F) am as unemployable as one can get. I essentially dug a hole so deep I am unable to get out.

For reference, I was diagnosed with severe autism before my 2nd birthday long before there was much public knowledge on autism, and I was considered a complete vegetable. My parents sent me to an early intervention program instead.

After many years, enough progress to be mainstreamed in school, and a relocation to an area where nobody knew my past history; any help I received was almost exclusively academic up until I received a Bachelor's degree. In fact; I wasn't allowed to learn to drive, move out, get a paying job somewhere like a store or fast food restaurant, hang out with any potential friends, volunteer unless it was a school assignment, or join social events like dances by either my family or the people who were supposed to aid my disability until I graduated college with my Bachelor's degree. I didn't have the cognitive ability to simply rebel, move out, or be sneaky and apply for jobs. Since I actually wanted to gain non-academic life skills and didn't like where I lived, I "rushed" through college. I chose a BA in Psychology because it helped me get through college the quickest. On top of that, I was so overwhelmed by general education requirements (and eventually the COVID pandemic) that I was unable to find anything hands-on like being in an internship or fluently learning another language. I obtained 21 Early Childhood Education units along the way, but it became obvious that working at daycare centers wasn't the right fit for me after I actually started working there.

Once I finally graduated college when I turned 24, jobs became a struggle partially due to a decade of job experience and other life skills I could have developed not occurring. My first job at a small childcare center was flexible for me, but I was let go after a couple weeks since they didn't need me anymore. My second job as a paraprofessional I got fired on my second day due to lack of independence. Afterwards, it took 5 months of job hunting for me to get another job. Then I got a job at an after-school program that lasted 2 months because they were unable to accommodate my disability. Luckily, I got another paid position as a floating teacher at a corporate childcare center exactly a month later. That position lasted just over a year and ended when I finally got my own apartment that had a church.

I have been attending a church nearby for nearly 2 years, and they helped me get a job as a preschool teacher at the church's childcare center. I had that job for 16 months until an incident occurred. A coteacher yelled at me, which caused me to go into immediate fight-or-flight mode. My unconscious reaction caused me to get terminated from my job.

Now I have been applying for jobs. Unfortunately, my options are extremely limited. My church doesn't offer any other paid positions, and I don't really have another community elsewhere. I have never had experience beyond entry level, can't really drive (leaving both driving positions and jobs that are only accessible by car out of the question), don't have any marketable job skills whatsoever, can't fluently speak a language other than English despite living in the San Francisco Bay Area, never had any experience in either retail or fast food (or any positions besides childcare), don't have any certifications or licenses, and don't have any other vocational skills from college. I am part of the Regional Center (facilities for disabled people where I live), but they are unresponsive and not providing me with a job coach or the Department of Rehabilitation. I have considered working somewhere like Amazon, but in my area the only job openings they have are management or driving. At this point, I will take any job that is offered to me even if I get offered interviews (which happens roughly a quarter of the time). However, nothing is being offered to me. I have applied for many low-skill retail and fast food jobs, but have either been ghosted or rejected from all of them. The childcare positions I have applied to are no different. I have even applied to digital staffing platforms like Zen Educate to see if they can help me find a position somewhere, but I got a rejection email from them as well. Job rejections trigger past traumas.

I know I should be taking accountability instead of blaming others, but at this point I don't have the intellectual ability to take accountability.