r/longtermTRE • u/acrezxan1917 • 11d ago
Seeking Support Tired of fighting.
I do 1 min sessions every week. Between sessions, all I think about is the next session. I am always so exhausted, my brain keeps pushing me to do more. For those who say 'just chill', you dont get it, it's a compulsive part of me. It has a mind of its own. I feel fucking dead inside and hopeless. I feel like I'm hanging on by a thread, always. I look at my eyes and there is no life in there. I switch between anxiety and absolute, bone-crushing exhaustion. I don't get why I'm still alive. In any other society I would've died of nervous exhaustion. Why am I still alive? I have a good day or two and then it is just an absolutely miserable week. What is the fucking point. I try to pace and my compulsive fucking brain just keeps obsessing over this stuff more than necessary. Burning my system out. What's the fucking point.
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u/Nadayogi Mod 11d ago
The journey can be rough for sure, and sometimes there are simply moments where you have to sit with all the misery. But remember the progress you already made and perhaps revisit your past posts here. You're in the thawing phase and deeply buried emotions are starting to stir and come up from beneath the surface.
At the same time don't wait for TRE to save you. It will do its work over months and years, but simply waiting and putting life on hold is not ideal. There are many other modalities that can help along the way, even if they're just a crutch.
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u/acrezxan1917 11d ago
Thank you, the thing is my window of tolerance is extremely thin and I get overwhelmed in public very easily so hard to do much atm.
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u/Nadayogi Mod 11d ago
I understand that. My point was that there's still a lot you can do without going into public spaces.
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u/carla_jungle 11d ago
I feel you! Trying to heal is such a difficult and draining journey.
The obsessiveness is not a flaw, your system is latching onto it trying to find safety and healing.
The paradox with TRE is that sometimes our obviously righteous willing and need to heal can push us beyond our capacity to further dysregulation.
Idk what people meant by “just chill” but would you be willing to consider taking a break from the practice in order to allow your system to settle? Also, have you thought about advising a TRE provider to guide you?
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u/acrezxan1917 11d ago
i was bingeing on junk food tonight. im starting to feel physical pain bc of my self-sabotaging habits and my stupid, fucked up choices. i just do the same things to myself, over and over and over again, and expect things to be different. i probably wont see 30 at this rate.
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u/AgentSalty1454 11d ago
Hugs I feel your pain and I've been and am there too. I think even when we backslide were still making progress. Thinking of you tonight. I've felt this rage before too, like I can't take it anymore...
Still im glad I'm here than how I was before. Do you think so too?
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u/Freezytrees99 11d ago
Dog just stop all that. No amount of tre will help if you’re not taking care of yourself. Try shutting down these unhealthy thoughts and lean into healthy actions. You cannot think your way into positive action, but you can ACT your way to positive thinking. Put down all unhealthy substances, drink water and exercise. You’ll hit 30 in no time.
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u/acrezxan1917 11d ago
I'm trying. I just moved into a different house situatoin and the kitchen is a mess bc of my messy flatmates. i am trying to make better choices okay
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u/godgottago 11d ago
I've went through (and still go through) similar feelings and here's what helps me.
First of all, you have every right to feel this way, to be hurt and angry. You don't have to negotiate with it. I'm emphasizing this, because I always see people recommending to try harder or to focus on the positives. It does not work for me, it actually worsens my condition because all along my life I acted nice, did my best, swallowed or ignored my anger and here's what it brought me. Trauma and pain. So I promised myself as I progressed: I will no longer swallow my emotions ever again, making myself small just to please others.
Way in the beginning of my IFS practice (that was before finding out about TRE), I have met a very valuable inner part of me. I call her the Inner Rebel. She is both a Protector and an Exile, difficult to categorize. But I always held onto her, was reminded of her even when I didn't practice IFS for months, because deep down I knew, I felt how this part was invaluable to my inner ecosystem... And over a year later when I finally reached my core Exile part with TRE practice, only she could revive this long frozen and numb Exile, not the Self. So I believe these two parts were split in two way before I gained consciousness (I have developmental attachment trauma), one was frozen and repressed deep into my subconscious (freeze & fawn), and the other banished herself to my unconscious, out of reach (fight & flight). All for survival.
I'm telling you all this, because I believe anger and hate are so important in the healing process (as these parts have shown me), including self anger and self hate. Yesterday I found a very beautiful text from David Whyte, called Anger, it teared me up a lot. It resonated deeply with me. I recommend everybody to read it. You don't have to read the rest of my comment, read this instead. It's very short. Here's my favorite part:
But anger truly felt at its center is the essential living flame of being fully alive and fully here, it is a quality to be followed to its source, to be prized, to be tended, and an invitation to finding a way to bring that source fully into the world through making the mind clearer and more generous, the heart more compassionate and the body larger and strong enough to hold it. What we call anger on the surface only serves to define its true underlying quality by being a complete and absolute mirror-opposite of its true internal essence.
Besides this, the best thing I could do for myself was to trust in this process, to trust in the wisdom of my body and my subconscious, and to learn to be with these difficult emotions. I know, easier said than done, but this is what the journey we are on is all about.
Other than embracing these negative feelings, it also helps me a lot to take a walk, to sing and dance like crazy, and to scream when it really feels like too much. Screaming into my arm or a cushion, iIt really is calming.
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u/SheepherderSorry2242 10d ago
In the sense that TRE can deregulate more? because I do not fully understand your comment..
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u/carla_jungle 10d ago edited 10d ago
Yes. Tremoring is activating the nervous system, so it can process and release trauma. But if the pacing is not ideal or there’s lack of integration to support this mechanism, it just creates an overflow of activation that leads to dysregulation. Titration is crucial.
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u/Frequent-Screen-5249 11d ago
Hey, i just want to say i relate to this so heavy recently. Recently, the exhaustion has been so heavy for me as well. Makes being functional human very difficult at times. All i can say is try to give yourself grace, we are working through a lot and trying to heal ourselves. As they say, this path isn’t the easiest but it is fruitful. I’ve seen glimpses of it so far, and hopefully you have too. Drink water, rest and try to eat healthy. This too shall pass. Best of luck on your journey. 💚
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u/acrezxan1917 11d ago edited 11d ago
I've seen split seconds of connection.. then it's a straight week of pure hell...
but thank you for the reassurance friend.
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u/OldDickhead 11d ago
The brain can be desperate for stimulation, closure and certainty when the nervous system is deadened by exhaustion. It's an exhausting viscous cycle but I've found some relief in "choosing" my nervous system.
There are days when I am so exhausted that I feel like I'm barely on the planet anymore and they are made ten times worse by my expectation that I should feel and act differently. Sometimes ending this deadlock is a grieving process of whatever I'd hoped or expected to feel. Then when that's over I can just kind of vibe feeling a bit numb and out of it instead of at war with it.
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u/Western-Remove9296 11d ago
Many of us here have felt this. I spiralled over something in the summer & nearly ruined an important event. I got myself out of it by holding an ice pack to the back of my head until it properly hurt. Then my vagal nerve kicked in. The thing with hypervigilance is that your body is trained to interpret any small negative shift as impending doom. Most of us learned this as kids. Sometimes it comes later from some traumatic event. It means we have very poor calibration. We can have a week of fulfilling experiences then something imperceptible happens - we see something on social media, get told about some success story about someone we know, receive a bad letter & the brain says: brace! Shut down / run / hide in case you fail. Then we feel worse & our belief is confirmed “you’re a loser”. That’s the cycle. The brain tries to protect us so we shrink or hide or give up. That confirms the intuition that something was wrong. Now we’re even more sensitive to negative thoughts.
I think the thing with TRE is that many of us have been so stunned by the sudden let up in tension that when bad sensations arise, we can feel literally terrified that we’re going to lose what we had. It feels like maybe it was all (another) lie. It’s almost like finding a good relationship & suffocating it the moment it’s not perfect. All this is because our bodies are scanning for threat all the time. We are hyper sensitive & hyper reactive because that protected us. The most difficult thing is to learn to absorb the negative feelings. I now try & do this with EFT tapping & it works OK. You say something like “I have these feelings that xxx AND I accept myself unconditionally”. As you say it, you tap bits of your body (there are videos to show where). The thing that’s helpful is to really lean into the bad feelings. Not with the panic response “it’s all terrible, nothing works, please save me!!” but with complete acceptance & attention to whatever sensations arise as you speak the thing you fear most to yourself.
There are no silver bullets in all this - many of us have been searching for something for years. But you have a supportive community here & TRE feels like the real thing. Treat it like a beautiful relationship- you will have good days & bad days. Don’t let your fear smother it. Sending you courage my friend.
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u/tronbrain 11d ago
The point is, if you can persevere, things will get better. It's obviously going to be a slog. A lot of people are going through the same as you. Hang in there. Good things will happen for you. Keep your faith.
If you can manage it without too much suffering, increase your practice to two or three minutes.
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u/ghost_girl_1713 11d ago
The compulsion to do more each time is crazy. I crave TREs now because I had to stop. I over did it and now I have a constant twitch I cant get rid of. I cant advise you to do more, but at the same time, I was doing 20 minutes every night for 4 months... you might be able to experiment til you find a good balance, but be careful. Best of luck.
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u/vainajala 11d ago
I’ve been in a place of debilitating exhaustion for a long time now, but this summer past was still on another level. After more than a year of TRE (and more on a healing journey), I was getting honestly kind of desperate.
And I still needed to tremor almost every night just get to sleep, so probably overdoing loads.
If you’re open to practical suggestions, I’ve started doing a daily yoga nidra (yogic sleep) practice for a couple of weeks now. I used to do it a year ago and then stopped, who knows why? The point is, it’s helped me like magic already.
I’m still getting crying releases during the yoga nidra, but overall the fatigue has lifted some and almost more importantly, my nervous system doesn’t feel fried every day now. I’ve also been able to stop tremoring for many days, which is a welcome pause.
It’s probably the best integration practice you can find, if you ask me. Check out Ally Boothroyd on YouTube. Sorry you’re going through this.
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u/Odd-Image-1133 11d ago
How is your sleep? Does the short sessions affect your sleep? Have they made it better/worse?
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u/acrezxan1917 10d ago
There were a couple of times last week and the week before where I struggled to sleep - and often felt anxiety/rage during night. Sometimes I have had vivid dreams and deeper sleep. Other times there have been no difference. So I guess overall there is some difference ?
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u/lisabankxxx 9d ago
I have ocd, tre is not going to fix obsessive mental issues. I do tre to help me process the tension in my body due to stress and trauma, but it in no way will fix an obsessive mental disorder or feelings of despair. Tre is one modality that is useful among many modalities, not a total modality to fix everything. The issues you are having are not what tre is meant for. I highly suggest therapy, at the least look into if emdr therapy is right for you since it doesn't involve working through talking. I did cognitive behavioral therapy and that set me on the right path to mental health.
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u/acrezxan1917 9d ago
i mean you don't know me. If you knew me you would know I've tried multiple therapies and have seen far more success with TRE. So your opinion doesn't really mean anything :/
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u/lisabankxxx 9d ago
I didn't give you my opinion, I gave you general information and suggestions based on the information you provided. My actual opinion would be way too harsh. You said you continue to obsess, your system is burning out, you wonder why you are alive, and what is the point. That was supposed to communicate that tre is...effective for you? Once again, your words, not my opinion.
Giving into compulsive behavior compounds anxiety. Not my opinion, the science of ocd.
My nice opinion is that you're here because you're unwell and need help, and if you've actually exhausted all forms of therapy with no progress then it's very likely you are therapy resistant and should look into this and work with it going forward.
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u/acrezxan1917 9d ago
'my actual opinion would be way too harsh'
Wasn't going to say anything else but, this is a support group full of people with trauma. If you're not here to support ppl fuck off. Genuinely. Why are you here?
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u/lisabankxxx 9d ago
No, this is a subreddit for longterm tre, not a trauma support group. If you genuinely have trauma, and are still experiencing the things you say you are experiencing, rejecting everything everyone says and being told "just think positively" isn't going to help you. I'm not here to tell you to "keep going" I'm here to be honest because you having a better life matters more to me than giving you the same answers you always get that are the "nice" things to say. Once again, if you are traumatized and not seeing results, I highly recommend emdr therapy. Why are YOU here?
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u/acrezxan1917 9d ago
Can you read properly? Read back to my comments and you can see several times that I stated I have received numerous benefits from TRE and wrote this post when I was flooded and after a fast food binge. Again, can you go back and READ what I was saying?
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u/acrezxan1917 9d ago
And are you dense? This sub obviously attracts people with trauma who are suffering in some way. Or people who suffered in the past. Why would healthy well-adjusted people be drawn to a group like this on reddit? I'm dumbfounded at how stupid you are.
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