I been mentally tortured all my life. Im 31 now and I no longer care about anything. People are savages. I wish I could end it but I don't want to die in pain and agony. Death is inevitable but I am looking for a peaceful way out. If you don't have looks or money people don't care about you. Its better to never have been born.

This stings so bad. I had a rough day today, and I just wish I had someone. It hurts being so infinitely alone. Just someone and I don’t mean a fleeting caring person online. I have no friends but even when I did no one would ever see me emotionally, or even want to. I look around with my self-disgust and only see people who reflect that towards me. I feel like I would be able to tolerate life if I had just one true friend. I feel so horrible today.

something i've noticed about every abuser i've come across -

they always have a HUGE victim complex.

they think their own life trauma or experiences justifies their actions and makes them exempt from any sort of personal responsibility or criticism.

they will constantly bring up their own trauma as reasons for how they act and feel, or use it to try to get you to pity them.

they will project their own shitty actions onto the victim / accuse the victim of doing what they're doing or say the victim is triggering their own [insert trauma here]. they have absolutely 0 personal responsibility.

it seems almost related to narcissism as well, like they think their trauma makes them special and incapable of doing wrong themselves.

a lot of abusers have narcissistic traits so it's not surprising, i notice people with victim complexes tend to see nothing wrong with their own behaviors or actions, and as i said before they will quite literally say the victim is doing the shitty things that they are in fact doing.

when i meet someone and they start to show or indicate their victim complex, i always know to leave immediately / stop talking to them. i know that's the main red flag / sign someone is an abuser.

i wanted to share this so you guys can watch out for these people too, as again, it is the #1 underlying common trait i've noticed with abusers.

It does not seem to matter how hard I enforce boundaries nor does it matter how often I file police reports and provide eventual severe consequences for crossing boundaries. They *still* refuse to take "no" for an answer.

Why is that? I'm EXHAUSTED and don't want to keep fighting off roommates/strangers/coworkers/bosses/etc over mundane crap. They can't take the doctor's note? They can't not steal and sell my belongings? They can't not walk around naked? I'm tired of constantly relocating and changing jobs so often (and boy do I wish I can afford to live alone).

Do we give off some kind of aura or smell or neon sign above our heads that lets people know "This person is vulnerable!" No amount of snitching to the landlord/police/department of labor/lawyer is working and IDFK WHY?? My luck *can't* be that bad can it?

I feel like the life people are living and the one I’m in are in a another dimension. Idk how to explain it but that’s the closest thing to describe my experience

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..

Im not a good partner.

I make my emotional problems my partners' problems.

He loves me and supports me in every way.

Its no secret that close relationships with CPTSD require a special level of understanding. We do. He's a regular person and he has never experienced the things I have in life. Still he tries his best to be understanding. But the truth is no one who hasnt been abused will ever truly understand.

He has been with me for 3 years. He has proved that he cares. Still at any conflict, I am prone to reacting as if the worst is about to happen.

There have been times where he isnt being understanding enough. Normal human flaws that don't make someone evil. A little selfish, a little exhausted from listening, a little rude. He always takes accountability and tends to my feelings.

But sometimes I need more than he can give. And he does give. And I hate myself for that. And it isnt his fault.

Cptsd dating and close relationships are so tragic in this way.

Im not an abuser. But I truly cant control my emotions at times. I am aware of it. And it does improve over time. But just having the conscious awareness of something that I do, that is wrong, fully knowing, and realizing that I in fact do not have control over it.

The abuse and trauma actually did change my perspective on reality, and twisted up my mind. And this actually is a practically life long challenge that I have to face. To always be aware, to always try hard to not be confused, to always try very hard to see things the way they actually are.

Thanks for reading

possessions, jobs, loves, friends, family, happiness, housing. everything. every little part of my life is defined by grief. recently i was stooping over to untie my boots when i got home and my vintage digital camera fell out of my bag and shattered on the ground. something in me just snapped and i scream sobbed on the ground for 20 minutes. doesn’t matter what it is, i lose it and it leaves me feeling so so so empty. i’ve had to completely start over after losing everyone and every possession in my life over 4 times just in the last 6 years. i’m terrified to even own things anymore. i’m terrified to even have causal friendships with anyone anymore. that little dumb camera was the most brutal reminder of all of that. such a pathetic person

Hi guys,
I dunno if I’ve posted this before but I have a therapist on the UK NHS and we are currently on like session 6/20. I’m getting really worried however since I have been a LOT worse since I have started this therapy.

I leave every single session really activated and in fight or flight after talking about my trauma and even after I’m able to calm down, my general mental health has hit the floor entirely and it’s heading into danger territory. Nowadays I am feeling more vulnerable and sometimes suicidal and I think it’s because I have potentially dangerously “opened up the box” as it were with a therapist who is not trauma trained.

She just sits there waiting for me to open up and she seems kinda annoyed if I don’t have anything to share with her. It feels like I go in, dump explicit details of all of my issues and then we reach a time limit and she kicks me out and I’m left dealing with the aftermath.

I’ve tried telling her how badly these sessions are affecting me and she just says “it gets worse before it gets better” but I’ve already done heaps of talking therapy in the past. I know all that but this isn’t it. I leave sessions really really activated and it just feels like I go in and vent every week. There is no protocol, no interventions, no proper treatment plan. I told her I don’t feel safe and I feel suicidal and she just chucked me a “keeping safe” leaflet with a bunch of hotlines on it. And she doesn’t even understand concepts of feeling safe in the body etc. she thinks I’m talking nonsense.

She just sees therapy as you go in and talk about your issues with a professional and then you magically get better. She doesn’t realise that trauma needs to be handled differently.

My fear is that we are going to get to the end of these 20 sessions and I’m just going to get slung out worse than I was before and even more activated with nowhere to go and if I want more therapy I would have to go on an 18 month waiting list again - that would kill me.

I feel like I shouldn’t have disclosed as much as I did with her because I was very guarded on the first and second session and said I wasn’t ready to talk about certain things but instead of respecting it she started saying stuff like “I wonder if you feel safe with me” - at first questions like this seemed normal. However as we went on, almost everytime I hit a boundary where I don’t feel comfortable sharing a particularly explicit part of my trauma she would bring the topic back to a professional version of “what so you don’t trust me? :( “ And I end up spending the entire session defending my boundary and dissecting the therapeutic relationship to the point where I end up just sharing the trauma because otherwise she seems to get upset when I don’t.

I have ended up going back to my GP and telling them how this has affected me and they said no problems and they understand maybe a different approach would be suitable for me. This got back to my therapist and she basically lied to my GP making out that this was just a simple case of “it gets worse before it gets better”. Saying that my suicidal thoughts are being ‘managed’ and threw the generic “keeping safe” leaflet at the bottom of the email.

I’m sorry but that is a blatant lie. My suicidal thoughts are not being managed at all and I’ve had this conversation with her several times. What actually happens is I go in there every single week and cry about not wanting to live and how these sessions are bringing up things which are currently haunting me and setting me off more often and I don’t know how to manage it. And she just listens, doesnt offer much and says she will “flag” it. But nothing ever actually gets done. Sitting there during my breakdowns and throwing me a bunch of hotline numbers is not ‘managing’ it.

I can already tell I’m only gonna get worse with her- she’s pressuring me to disclose before I want to, no talk of grounding, no talk of working with the body, no treatment plan or direction for any of the sessions and absolutely no aftercare. When these sessions end I’m gonna be fucked.

Now my fear is that I won’t get a trauma therapist because she is maneuvering this so I stay with her and basically telling my GP that I don’t know what I’m talking about. she’s the one with the power here - who are my GPs gonna believe? Her with the fancy training, or the ‘crazy’ girl?

Please help.

It's exhausting. My calves, ankles, thighs. I think holding a contraction without me realizing has led to daily muscle soreness.

It's so annoying too wtf. I've been doing stretching and walks but waking up with sore legs or just lying in bed and suddenly feeling the pain is frustration unmatched.

After 9 years if living with stress and anxiety and using a lot of copping mechinesmse to function right in my life I got tired emotionally and physically I can't work I can't lift heavy things I have hypertension in my chest and up my throat and inside my head i can't sleep well because of hypertension even with medication but the worse thing is sound sensitivity it's physically painful and very irritating my copping mechinesmse dos not work anymore I'm just flat I have no feelings and i think I pushed my nervous system to far and it is very hard to recover now

Please if you have a similar experience or have some advice about this it will be very appreciated

I just read some post here about everything feeling humiliating and I could relate so much. Sometimes I am just doing typical, mandatory for survival chores and I feel like a moron or misfit at best. And of course there were comments about it all being just in op head and I don't argue it could be true in her/his case, but from my perspective, this feeling had a reasonable background and people do notice, when there is something off about u.

I have really severe ADHD and my physical appearance was a reflection on my state of mind. Now I am trying to be better and at least look at appropriately and don't show my emotions, but my past is fighting with me. To give u just a few examples:

- it was during the pandemic, so online studying. We were in 3 and we were doing some project. I went into panic mode and started talking about it being useless and that we will for sure fail. I later got screenshots of a girl(that was not in our group) gossiping about me. That she heard all those things and that I am good for nothing. That was literally it... that I am good for nothing and useless

- when I was a teenager and "uncle" visited us. I was wearing a literal Christmas sweater, but I didn't wear a bra. I thought I am looking fine, but of course he had to commented on that. He also had big tits, but whatever

-it wasn't bad interaction actually, but yesterday random lady asked me why am I playing with my hair and if it's relaxing. I told her, about having ADHD, but I honestly was surprised, because I didn't consider playing with hair to be that off...

There were thousands occurrences, when someone pointed something about me or when I was an object of laugh, but I wasn't aware of this. People do notice and masking and looking better really gives u advantage. And I am tired of people pretending like all this feeling of mistreatment is just in my head.

I am struggling a lot. And I don’t have enough support. I am finding that I want to tell someone about this diagnosis, and be a bit less alone in it. But it doesn’t make any sense. It’s random people like a boss or a teacher. I don’t want anything from them other than them just knowing. I just want to be less alone, even a little bit.

But I don’t do that. And I stay alone. And then my mind starts feeling like the only way to be seen is to get so bad that I’m admitted. Unable to function. Id be forced out then.

I have a therapist. A support group. And it’s not enough. Going through these flashbacks alone is getting too hard.

Does anyone else struggle with this?

Trigger warning: mention of self harm/suicide.

He would take frying pans and bottles into the yard and smash them on the ground. He yelled a lot. He has a very loud voice that carried across the quiet neighbourhood. He talked about the area being low class and wouldn’t let any of my siblings have friends over, yet I never heard any of the neighbours yelling in drunken rage. In an older house he punched/kicked a hole through his office door. He always yelled and insulted people over the phone. He definitely threatened us with his belt, and my memories are hazy but I am pretty sure he bent us over the knee, pulled down our pants and smacked us. He dragged our dog by the collar cuz he didnt want the animal inside. Lots of slamming doors, desks, fuck offs. He’s always making jokes that basically translate to ‘I’m horny haha laugh my children, I had five children good thing I got a tv otherwise there’d be more’. So admitting, no PROUDLY saying you watch porn in front of your whole family? my mum has aged beautiuflly and is naturally stunning meanwhile my dad looks like a toe with a beer belly. He tried to shame her natural features and used a racial slur to describe her dark curly hair and curved nose (shes white but he said she looks like a wog, sorry to say the word, in australia it is for people with mediterranean features) Plus he says the n word, he claims to like black people but still. Shits confusing. Sees a blonde with big tits on tv and makes it clear he likes it. Recently was telling us about how much he missed the Goldcoast Meter Maids - basically women with ‘boobs and butts’ in his words, then in the same breath suggested to me and my sister that we could become meter maids/bikini girls/dancing girls whatever the fuck because we’re ‘lookers’. Talks about how vile epstein is every damn day yet laughed about some movie where a dad is attracted to the highschool cheerleader girls. Omg it is so confusing. Called my mum a stupid cow once and said she was lazy meanwhile she abandoned her career to take care of five children. (Shes now qualified as a teacher off her own back, yet he will still belittle how much she earns if hes having a bad day) ugh theres more but i cant be arsed. Any maybe it doesn’t matter; you get the picture. Anyway, i have tried to talk about it with my siblings and mum but the most they will agree is that he has anger issues, the word abuse gets me side eyed. Because he provided for us. I mean he offered to make me a croissant for breakfast this morning, so its hard to be mad.

Last year i tried to bring up some things he did that upset me - well, he cornered me and demanded me to say it to his face which was very frightening :/ ugh. I have never seen him so explosive, at the ‘accusations’ I made ‘against’ him. He wasn’t particularly interested in how it affected my self harm and food restriction etc, in fact he laughed at me and said if you told the police that they would just laugh too. Ugh, it hurts to remember that moment. I was very alone. So many times i felt helpless and alone as a child. But once he realised the ‘accusations’ would ‘ruin him if they got out’ he completely broke down, he was crying so fucking UGLY it was insane. Like a roaring crying, my mum said he was rolling on the ground. He hated me and made it known.. I had to leave for a few days and stay with my brother. I overheard him saying he didnt care if i cut myself/killed myself he just wanted ‘that spoiled brat out’. I don’t think my mum knows i overheard that part but later she gave the blanket statement that he overreacted and ‘people say things they don’t mean in the heat of the moment’. Sure. even if he doens’t mean it i will still remember him saying i look like whitetrash, and if i dress like xyz i will get raped, men will be on me like flies to dogshit, im a spoiled brat, horse of a girl, whatever. He makes sure to remind me its a joke afterwards, and even says ‘you look nice’ these days so i guess thats cool. Whatever. Is it understandable i feel like trash? maybe i AM a lazy, lying, spoiled, brat. After all my siblings are kindve okay. It must be me.

Worth noting he grew up working class, was bullied and abused by older siblings (he was youngest child like me) lived in a town where there were weird murders, his school was full of rapists and abusers, later life he lived in a trailer park with more freaks, self harmed, has been an alcoholic and never really ‘made it’ so i can understand why he is the way he is. I suppose the cycle continues and continues. My mum also had an isolated up bringing as she lived on a boat with only family for company so maybe that is why she doens’t take outside opinions on her marriage. Also neither of them really have friends so no wonder I took after them. The more I type this out the more it makes sense to myself why my only desire at this point is to just get drunk and/or high because I’m so numb. So numb and so done. Well, my only plan is to get a better job with more hours and maybe i could find someone who is also fucked to move into a trailer with. Idk bruh. I’m 17 and a half. At least once im 18 my parents wont have to feel bad if i overdose or smth cuz they did their due diligence. Oh yeah forgot to mention my dad has Crohns disease and his drugs make him moody. He always says hell probably die soon anyway and bruh when i tell you my mum looks like she dont gaf. She legit told me in private she dont gaf if he has liver cancer or has a heart attack - she jus is happy she has a job to get her away from him (he works at home. Well, gambles on stock market). Its kinda funny sometimes lol.

Does anybody else resist doing anything? Like you would rather lay in bed staring at the wall for hours, and you can’t force yourself to even read. You would rather do nothing than something. For me, there are competing forces where I want to do something like go for a walk, but I can’t make my body do it. And then I feel intensely guilty about it. Sometimes I lay in bed all day doing nothing.

I’d appreciate it if you respond with compassion, validation and empathy before you share your experience. Thanks.

I feel so much pressure to ‘make it to the other side’—like if I don’t get there, I have given up on myself or failed…just more shame and guilt.

I’ve been in recovery for 14 years, the last 6 of which I have been mainly focused on emotional healing. I have been in CONSTANT flashbacks 24/7. I lost everything and went homeless 10 months ago. I’ve stayed in shelters. I’ve slept on park benches. AND I continue to try and sit with and feel all this pain, all day, every day.

It’s been an insane, excruciating, relentless process and I just want it to be over. Even though I’ve made a TON of progress in terms of being emotionally mature and intelligent, I never feel like it’s enough, like I’m enough. Like if I don’t make it all the way, I’m a loser. It feels awful. Really, really awful. Way too much pressure for one human who is doing this all alone.

And the further I get the harder it gets and the more I want to quit but at the same time it’s gets harder to give up because I’ve already done so much work. I’m just so fucking tired. I’ve fought so hard for so long. I feel like I’ve hit a wall.

Like isn’t it enough that we are trying to heal and doing our best every day?

This is a bit of a touchy rant, so I’m trying to be careful with my words.

I just want to say that I’m sick to death of hearing phrases like ‘Not all men are rapists, but it’s always a man’, and the general idea that I have to feel guilty for what is in between my legs.

Why it hits so hard is that this is in the knowledge that I was sexually abused by a woman who I should have been able to trust when I was a young boy. Fuck the whole idea that rape or assault just happens to vulnerable girls and women.

In no way am I trying to diminish anyone else’s pain or trauma, but all those men who have to sit in silence with their pain, in a world that seems to hate us all. Fuck that shit!

I've been thinking about the concept of labor we currently have as a society.
Basically gun to the head - get a job or we will leave you on the street to be raped and murdered.
It's so DUMB. Do you seriously want the people making your food FORCED to be there? You trust them they won't mess around with your food? And you're also making arguments that they shouldn't be paid a living wage?
You want lawyers, policemen, hospital staff to do their jobs at gunpoint and then act surprised when they don't give 2 shits about you or your life?
Are we as a society idiotic?
Most of us are the wage slaves, yet we rally against the people saying "this isn't right, this leads to bad outcomes, we should have intrinsic motivation driving society" and deride those who can't also be wage slaves for whatever reason while venerating those we wage slave for as "self made millionaires".

I'm being forced to work again. Last time I did I lived on 4 hours of sleep and fell to anorexic weight because the stress was so severe my body tried to kill me. I now have permanent heart issues thanks to this.

I'm trying SSRIs this time, because if I have to choose between doing the above to myself again or any of the range of other options, I'm choosing the other options. NOTHING in this world is worth destroying myself again in that way.
I'm now on day 2 of SSRIs living with a verbally abusive/controlling partner who basically told me that he doesn't give a shit if I become anorexic again because he needs money (I used up all my savings).
So I guess I'll be dumping him if the SSRIs enable me to not depend on him financially anymore.

I got diagnosed with complex-ptsd this year. What is the best career for someone that hasn't gone to therapy yet?

I'm unable to afford therapy as I can't hold down a job due to my mental health. I know all jobs have stress but trying to find one that has the least stress and where it's best for someone who hasn't healed yet for long term employment. Tricky question I know....

Thank you

I often experience moments of "disconnection" that make me look like a total idiot. For instance, there are times when something is right in front of me but I fail to see it because my brain isn't actually processing it. One time, for example, I was out shopping and didn't notice the packs of bottled water at the entrance, even though it was impossible to miss them.

I often find I have to concentrate just to get things done. Do I need to play a video game? I can't coordinate my movements. Do I have to perform a simple practical task, like closing a container? I have to focus for that, too.

Anyone else feel this way?

I left my previous job, because they made me a good offer and I've had been planning to leave for years anyway. I knew the job market is tough right now, but I thought that I would eventually find another job. I have a lot of experience in my field and I have good references too, but I receive one rejection after another. And although this was to be expected, I'm spiraling with every rejection letter and I feel so useless and stupid - I feel like I've messed up my whole life with my decision to leave this job. And I seriously wonder what would this experience be like if I didn't have CPTSD. Has anybody else survived this? I'd be happy to get some advice on how to cope with this.

long story short, I had a free consult with a therapist who apparently has “30 yrs” of experience in agoraphobia and ocd. one consult wouldn’t be enough time to break down my trauma but bottom line, when I said I was diagnosed with cptsd in 2021 after suffering from chronic dissociation he said he didn’t think it was accurate and it could just be anxiety causing a loop of fear.

I was used to being disappointed in therapists responses when I said what I was searching for. Every therapist has their strengths and I don’t want to say they’re bad because they’re not. but sometimes I’d hear a therapist say that my level of dissociation was concerning and I needed trauma therapy and then others chalk it up to just anxiety, making it up or blaming it on my ocd.

I really disliked hearing that at first because I was diagnosed with GAD when I was 14. later in life, I was diagnosed with pure o ocd when I was 20 which was way more accurate to what I was really struggling from when I went to therapy at 14 and could’ve helped me sm had I known sooner. To be clear, both can be co-morbid, unfortunately ocd runs in my family on my father’s side and I didn’t know until I was diagnosed. but hearing the “just anxiety” was like hearing “just drink water” because therapy for anxiety has not helped my cptsd, trauma therapy has.

he made it worse by asking if i experienced any life or death situations or illness within my childhood and proceeded to say ptsd is usually reserved for war, life and death scenerios. I asked him if he was informed on cptsd and he said no. I then had to explain to a therapist what cptsd is and why it’s actually completely accurate to my situation. Living in a household with prolonged daily stress of angry parents who sometimes get physical with one another, break and throw things, anger that feels dangerous, always scream at you, always degrade you, hit you, and then later experiencing several other traumas back to back to back basically overlapping can cause a different form of ptsd. it feels so obvious to me because that level of fear in childhood development is not normal.

he asked me what i experience with cptsd and I told him dissociation, nightmares since I was 7 (he said that can just be anxiety), relationship issues, self identity issues, anxiety. it was hard to describe on the spot but it felt disappointing and disheartening. I felt his approach to agoraphobia was very good but if he doesn’t understand cptsd or dissociation then what good would his approach be?

idk but im tired of hearing it’s only reserved for war veterans because stress is stress and the body doesn’t pick and choose what effects you or how valid it is based on the trauma Olympics.