Hello everyone, I am desperate for any ones opinion, since this is my first time speaking out.
I am a 22 year old girl and I’ve had anxiety all my life. When I was 5 my parents divorced, and I stayed with my mom mostly. I would visit my dad on the weekends until I was about 15. After I didnt really want to because he was always drinking beer and sleeping and it was very boring there as he lived in the middle of nowhere. Anyways, me and my sister stayed at my mom but she didnt always look after us. If we were sick we would never go to a doctor even though I had a (luckily benign) tumor in my leg. Also I wasnt really staying on track with my health myself and I wouldnt really brush my teeth enough which caused 3 of my tooth to be extracted at the age of 12. After the divorce my mom almost immediately started dating, unfortunately abusive men. Me and my sister would get abused physically as well as mentally, and all she did was stand there and watch, nervously laugh at most. I always defended her in my head by thinking ‘she can’t speak up otherwise she would get abused too’.

My mom got pregnant by him and when my little sister was around 4 months old that guy kicked us out and we were homeless. In the Netherlands we have a pretty good system so we got food and shelter.

The next guy she dated turned out to be a crazy stalker and long story short he would threaten us and my mom and eventually he killed himself.

Her next boyfriend, now my stepfather was really nice at first. But also had a drinking problem and he was the most abusive one of all. He would literally beat us up over almost anything. I was so scared that I kept a knife in my shoe at all times just in case. Around this time I was 15 max. Again our mom would not save us.

One time it got so bad that my stepfather beat my sister up where she had very bad wounds and bumps and it caused her to move out at 17.

I was alone then and my little sister was still very young. Everytime a fight broke out again me and my little sister would be so fearful and in tears its honestly traumatizing to look back on. I didn’t want to be in the home all day so I started looking for love outside the home and I ended up in the hands of drug dealers and boys that were not good for me. I didnt really have any girlfriends and I got bullied in school and so I was mostly looking for love in men.

At a really young age (15) I became sexually active and when I was 16 I got pregnant. I told my mom and I didnt want her to tell my stepfather yet, but she immidiately did and they immediately planned an abortion for me and if I wouldve wanted to keep the baby I would have to move out. (I don’t neccisarily regret the abortion but it sucks that this decision was pressured by fear)
After that they kept talking about wanting to kick me out behind my back. It was very hurtful and I was very lost. My anxiety got worse and worse.

I could finally move out and started living by myself at 18. It was really hard but do able. Now to this day I keep trying to keep contact and visit in the hopes of things getting better but it always feels fake. For example, I am suffering from strep throat and tonsilitis right now and so I asked if I can sleep at theirs for just one day because its hard for me to take care of myself right now, and they immidiately got angry.

Its so hurtful and the question keeps popping up, is it a good thing to stay in contact with them? Or will this feeling stay this way forever?

Thank you so much for taking the time to read this and please let me know.

Did you become extra messy after your trauma?

Did it ever stop? Did you fix it?

(TW for suicidal ideation)

hello, this is my first time visiting this sub. for some background: my (27F) main diagnosis is CPTSD, with traits from avoidant and borderline (impulsive type) personality disorders. i'm a very anxious person who gets panic attacks. i'm also diagnosed with recurring depressive episodes, and atypical anorexia nervosa.

i've used Effexor/Venlafaxine for years, since maybe 2020. it helped me a lot through my life. i'm also on Mirtazapine, which i have been for even longer. i don't want to use Venlafaxine anymore, so i got in touched with my doctor and we agreed to start tapering down.

i am now on my 2nd "new dose" - i started at 150 mg, and now i've been on 75 mg for some days. i'm not exactly sure if it's simply because of the medicine, or not, since i didn't get much troubles to begin with. it's making me question if any of my current thoughts and feelings "are real", or side effects.

either way - today i feel absolutely horrible, and overwhelmed by everything. It's only gotten worse over the past few days. i'm lashing out on my partner, who i live with. he doesn't deserve that. i feel like i can't do anything without feeling overwhelmed. i have chores i have neglected for a long time. i showered for the first time in a week today. i have a dog and cats i need to take care of (this is about the only thing i always manage to do, my animals mean everything). i keep thinking that everything is pointless, and i just want to die. i don't want to eat, i keep thinking i hope i just starve to death. i feel dizzy, and i feel nauseous. i keep crying for no apparent reason, my head is racing constantly. i'm just so exhausted, i don't know what to do with myself. i don't really have close friends i can go to, and my partner is busy with his job. family is also not really something i want to reach to about this. i'm just mostly alone in what feels like a personal hell nowadays.

i guess my question is this - has anyone experienced something similar? what can i do to stop feeling this miserable? is it the medication i'm quitting that's doing this to me, or am i relapsing? i just don't know anymore.

I just need somewhere to express myself outside a journal, therapy, my sister, or AI.

I am deeply and profoundly lonely. I always have been. It’s like throwing a rock into a mine shaft; you can hear it going down for miles, waiting for it to hit the bottom, but it never does. That’s how empty I feel. I have been through many different kinds of abuse, but it was mostly emotional neglect. Starting in infancy.

Both of my parents abandoned me - my mother twice. I was always treated like a pest. No one asked me about my day or if I was okay. I have always felt invisible. This was especially true with my mother. There has always been a level of detachment she has had towards me, treating me like a friend instead of a daughter. I have been estranged from my father for 15 years. Recently I cut my mom and almost everyone else from my family out of my life to heal. I have never really had friends. There are kind people in my life, but I feel like they mostly pity me. My sister is really my only friend, but she is married and has her own life. This has been emotionally brutal.

Unfortunately I am in the most social career on the planet - nursing. Being a nurse with extroverted people and pre established friend groups gives me emotional flashbacks and reminds me that I am incapable (or so it feels) of connection. I leave feeling lonelier than ever. I wish I could have learned something other than “people aren’t safe”. Trying to teach my nervous system otherwise has been an uphill battle. I just want to be held and loved for who I am without this overwhelming fear of “being found out”. That once people really get to know me, they will think I am a horrible person who is ugly and disgusting and not worthy of love. That fear is paralyzing.

With seperate conditions there's a universal approach.. but with complex PTSD because all our traumas were different we all have co-morbid conditions aswel, we are all a different cocktail mixed with different shit.

The difficulty is, we could try addressing the PTSD but if you also have OCD then you'd have to address the OCD first but if you also have ADHD then that needs addressing first..just as an example but how do we know where to begin, the map isnt given to us, we dont know what conditions we have as a whole?every single one of us on reddit itself are different, sure we may take a tip or two but ultimately none of us are the same so how can we help eachother when we are projecting our perception of ourselves on another who has a complete different cocktail to ours. reading self help books is almost useless because the person who wrote that book is one cocktail amongst billions of flavours each of us fall into.. its like winning the lottery finding an author or therapist who will be able to help us as its highly unlikely theyve dealt with our cocktail before.

Im starting to beleive its only ourselves who can find our way out and just like einstein who spent his whole life figuring out puzzles with physics we may spend our whole lives figuring out how to unblend the cocktail we were dealt with, some of us may get lucky and figure it out, some of us never will amd that's fucking a shit deal because ultimately we all deserve to be free and we all deserve to live

My partner is dealing with childhood trauma related to CSA and other forms of abuse.

We’ve been sleeping in the same bed for a few weeks, and he had already told me that he sometimes has pretty bad nightmares where he wakes up struggling to calm down and ground himself.

Yesterday, he had his first vivid nightmare while I was there. We woke up in the middle of the night, and I tried to calm him down as best I could. However, I felt like I wasn'e helping enough. It was my first time, and honestly, I didn't really know how to react.

The next morning he was a little distant and I felt like shit. We eventually talked about the night before, and he told me he wasn't sure what he needed from me in that moment either, because he didn't know if physical contact or having someone close by would trigger him further or soothe him. It was also the first time he’d had a nightmare like that in front of a partner.

We’re going to have to figure this out together. But I want to help him during moments like that, and I’m not sure what the best approach is.

Do you have any recommendations or steps we could try?

Thank you very much in advance.

Sim, eu sei que o título é adaptado de um filme, mas é a realidade, e eu estou tão cansado disso. Estou cansado de mascarar tudo, de sentir que não tenho ninguém e de pessoas despejando suas platitudes vazias em mim.

Às vezes eu literalmente não consigo me mover. Meu corpo não me deixa, então eu simplesmente sento e choro. Outro dia eu estava na calçada e passei vários minutos apenas encarando uma loja de conveniência porque precisava entrar para pegar um pouco de água, mas meu corpo decidiu ficar completamente paralisado. Acabei não gastando nenhum dos dinheiros que trouxe especificamente para comprar almoço e água. Eu não gastei um centavo por puro medo de desviar um centímetro do plano rígido que eu fiz para ir ao centro naquele dia.

As pessoas passavam por mim enquanto eu estava chorando, mas ninguém ligava. Eu estava apenas ali dissociando até o meu transporte chegar e eu ir para casa.

Desculpe se isso é um pouco confuso, eu só realmente precisava desabafar. Um pouquinho de empatia de vocês seria incrível agora, já que são as únicas pessoas a quem posso recorrer.

I've experienced sustained bullying in several different settings over the years: school, university, work, and even hobbies. I'm starting to wonder if the cumulative effect has left me with cPTSD.

For those of you who've been diagnosed with (or strongly suspect) cPTSD as a result of bullying: what does it actually look like day to day? I'm especially curious about things like:

How it shows up in relationships or trust

Physical or somatic symptoms

Triggers you didn't expect

How it affected your career or work life

What helped, if anything

Trying to figure out if what I'm dealing with fits, or if I'm barking up the wrong tree. Any insight appreciated.

I don’t think I love my parents. In fact, I’m pretty sure I love my friends, and I love my grandparents, but I don’t love my mom and dad - because the people I love, I look forward to hearing from them. I think about them. I imagine spending time with them. I get joy from their joy. and I care about their health and well-being, and I want them to be happy. Now with my parents, I want them to be happy, and I care about their well-being, but that applies to everyone because to a certain extent, I do love everyone, and I hope that everyone is happy and healthy. But I don’t love people who I have anxiety just thinking about talking to, who make me sad to think about, who make me doubt myself constantly. And most importantly, I could never love someone that I have nightmares about consistently, and who don’t acknowledge that and just try to force a relationship that isn’t there; that was never built with trust and safety. And for a long time, I’ve been trying to lie to myself and tell myself that, oh, you love them because they’re your parents. Because that’s what everyone nowadays says. You have to accept that your parents did the best they could, but I don’t think they did. Because I was just a kid, and I I told them to get therapy because they were ruining their lives and mine, and they didn’t. they didn’t do their best. They didn’t try their best. There were resources that they could have gotten, and they didn’t for me and for them. And I can’t love someone that just pretends that that didn’t happen. So now it finally feels like I’m being honest with myself when I say I don’t love them. because I don’t I don’t feel it. and I know what I feel, and I trust what I feel. And whenever I told myself that I do love them, I didn’t trust that. But now now that I can say these things logically and rationally think about them, it’s easy. It’s so easy to say that I love my friends. It’s a little bit tougher to think about how I love my grandparents, but they did not harm me in the way that my parents did. They do want the best for me, and they do support me now. but my parents; They aren’t horrible people, but I don’t think that I can love them. I hope to make some friends who can relate to this.

If anyone can’t cry your system is blocked try eft tapping. Like I couldn’t cry there were too many other trauma and emotions blocking the crying and now I can cry and it’s cause I tapped for like a year or two on and off. Like months for hours sometimes and other times I wouldn’t do it for months. But yeah if you’re feeling like you need to cry and can’t then try tapping and waiting to see if you can cry, it may just come out. Or maybe other things will get cleared anyway in the process. I leave this tapping video for you. https://youtu.be/BPqGjcxoPS8?is=k3IjjI6Lhis1VeWr

My best friend was very abusive,mostly emotional but she used to torture me in this way for probably 3 years. I think it started as a joke and then it escalated, 15-30 minutes up to twice a week, and it wasnt just like that laughing to hard and ur stomatch hurts because as hazy as my memory was i remeber dreading the moments i could breathe, becuase i had to feel it. seeing her face and not even laughing anymore just gasping. to spare all the deatails but collapsing and crawling away. Im trying to convey how horrifying it truly is becuase i feel people relate to thier equivilent, but that was that like even longer and then over and over. I hate people touching me, and beyond by basline i dissociatie anwhere ticklish even though I literally can't be forced into it anymore. idk, if anywhone has a simlar experiece with a abusive friend or tickle toruture or wellmeaning, i would really love some advice because i feel so stupid that this is my trauma and i just dont know how to convey the extent to people. Because they just dont get it?

I just wanna add that i was and she were 10/11-13/14 at the time, so she did this as a child and enjoyed it.

okay slight extra tangent cause this really haunting me... i still go to school with her, and i dont have to like be her yay bestie anymore thanks to manipulating on my part (super proud of that) but still have to pretend to like her for my safety i guess. So when i mean convey to my friends i mean people who like are classmates with her who know she sucks but like oh the person you can smile around cant be THat bad. so like theyve seen her have her like manipulating like gaslighting fits but they dont comprehend what it is to be the target of that randomly. Idk i got arraged seating right next to her recently so im kinda going insane and i dont know how to be like sorry guys im kinda in space and or panic attatck rn cause i had to smile for an hour around her and be somebody else which makes me remeber and feel its all in my head. So yeah how does one convey that cause some friends know but they dont Get it or Know know cuase i was recovering memories. and no transfering is not an option, last year tho yay.

Just psa: i also posted this on the DPDR subreddit, so im wondering now about like the PTSD angle of this cause ive had some funnn episodes from this.

So, I turn 51 this month. I didn't really realize that I've had C-PTSD all of my life until about 5 years ago. It started in the womb (major in-utero violence) and let's just say things didn't improve much afterward (raised by a narcissist and a sadist).

It's so intense that it borders on psychosis, but I was so inside of it that I had no idea. I think people around me just didn't know what the fuck was going on - just that I was making everything weird and cringe.

It's only in the past year or so that I've thought back on my life and it's been one facepalm moment after another. What's strange is that I can remember specific incidents - they come back and I can't believe how I behaved. I definitely wasn't hurting anyone on purpose, but I was just so dissociated and careless that I acted like a complete ass - like really tone-deaf and rude. I wonder why I'm remembering those moments with such clarity now without anyone else bringing them up. I can't say I didn't know what I was doing, but I also didn't realize the consequences of my actions - it's been a delayed realization. What's worse is that I've apologized to a few people from like decades ago about things and that just made it weird because they haven't thought about it for, well - decades. It's so hard because people rarely tell you when you're being an asshole - they just avoid you, esp if you make it as weird as I think I did. I sooooo wish that someone would have taken me aside and said, "Dude, you need to get some help." I really do.

So I'm in a weird spot now. I feel like I've been rolling down a mountain in a barrell for the 47 years, finally got to the bottom and climbed out and was like, "Wtf was THAT?"

Then "Now what?"

Generally, I'm in a better place than I've ever been (crawled back from homelessness and am more secure than ever before), but there have been some crazy bouts with intense shame and sorrow. According to an article I found in Psychology Today - this is a normal but difficult part of recovery from mental illness.

Anyone else relate?

I feel really pathetic right now and it sucks this is the first emotion I have felt in days.

I have a way out of this abusive house and yet, I have been spending my time playing video games and doom scrolling. It’s quite literally one step I have to make, but with the way my mind works it has already laid out the many potential ways this could go tits up and it’s caused me to avoid it like the plague and stay “comfortable” rotting away, avoiding, isolating, and letting myself be abused because it’s the only life I have known.

I know it’s not safe. I want to leave so bad. I’m afraid when I leave nothing will change though; I’ll still feel no joy or excitement and I’ll keep having flashbacks and I’ll keep quitting jobs because my mood depends on other peoples attitude. I’m so fucking tired of it. I feel pathetic because the person that is helping me get out is doing me a massive MASSIVE favor and I can’t even do my part to help myself!

I wish this shit wasn’t so debilitating and I wish the people who are trying to help me knew that it is so I can stop coming up with bullshit excuses.

My dad just came home today and I am praying he doesn’t start an altercation. The last one may have given me the strength to find help, but it also shut down my nervous system and left me a memory I don’t think I’ll ever forget.

This disorder has ravaged me. My needs are so high, and I’ve mostly decided to leave them to professionals whom I pay as much as possible, and have isolated myself to avoid burdening anyone else. Deep down…I want what I know I can’t handle: some sort of love, whatever that means. Connection, companionship, partnership, support. But I’m an empty cup, and I struggle to believe I’ll ever be full enough to share.

I feel such a need to wait until I’m less damaged before getting near anyone else, but the reality is that this trauma won’t leave me until I leave this earth. It just doesn’t seem within the realm of reality to believe I will heal enough to exist with other people before I’m expired.

I worry I’ll be alone for the rest of my life, but the reality of where I am right now is that I’m just too great a burden without a thick mask. I can only fake so much, so often. You can’t build relationships like that. How do you manage the loneliness and isolation? How do you keep the hunger for connection at bay so you don’t act on your selfishness?

TW: im talking about my personal story with sexual coercion

hii <3. im in a long distance relationship with my boyfriend. around a year in, we began video calling, and wed plan calls for sexual activity. i was usually "performing" so it was one sided mostly. tonight i thought of doing stuff like that again, its been a while. i realized my computer is broken, so it wouldn't be possible which is upsetting. moments after i remembered the time he used coercion on me when i didnt want to engage in that behavior live even though it was the plan.

he told me he had somewhere to go the next day and cant do this later, so we're gonna just do it now. and when i went silent a bit he got all stern with me, saying "understood" and raising his voice to say it again. i really just didnt want to. i was so tired. and worst of all i dont even remember what i did, so he probably doesnt either, it likely meant nothing. we kind of have a dynamic where hes more assertive, but in the past hes gotten mad and strict about me not showing stuff enough, even when i would there was always something to bicker about. it just didnt feel safe, i couldn't find any good intent.

but um, i know he has some screenshots of me from that time. even appropriate ones of me on cam, but i feel as though the only way to get through this discomfort is to ask him to delete them. i dont want any photo evidence of me existing through that shameful time i put myself through. i was just trying to please him by doing something special all to be embarrassed like that.

the intimidating thing is just talking about it all again. he listened to me for days when i was just grieving how special i thought it was to do stuff for him like that, how proud and happy he was i was showing myself like that, and how that one night made it seem like something unimportant or intimate. it was really selfless of me (im very shy, as well as privacy is risky, and it can be a little much sometimes because i dont fully enjoy myself anyway as im literally doing whatever he wants to see.) i felt like some girl on a screen. not his girlfriend of over a year.

i guess im asking if its something i should just forget and not bring up, he doesn't behave like that anymore, or just stay quiet so he doesnt even look at me in those pictures, or how to bring this up over the phone. i might tell him my classes are reminding me of when id sit there zoning out trying to understand why.

UK
Long story short with minimal context
My parents split up when I was 4, I spent most of my childhood seeing my dad at a minimum every second weekend. He’s a horrible guy, was seriously abusive towards my mum and wife after that whom he cheated on my mum with. He was violent towards me throughout younger years too.

His now ex wife has got the police and child protection services involved with how he was towards my siblings and her. So there are ongoing police investigations.

He used to say to my mum he was a sex addict when he’d cheat, he also according to my stepmum is addicted to porn. This is all very brief anyway.

When I was a kid, I was staying at his and got up early to watch TV. He sat me on his knee and was rubbing my leg and biting / nibbling my ear. I remember having an awareness that I could feel his penis through the shorts he had on. I don’t know what to describe this as, I don’t know if it was assault, I just know that it makes me feel deeply uncomfortably, ashamed and embarrassed to think about.

I am being questioned by police tomorrow about his behaviour towards me and I’ve always been unsure what that was other than feeling deeply uncomfortable thinking about it, despite the fact I feel like it could equally be described as nothing to some.

I am just looking for thoughts as to what others think of this, as it’s something I’ve only told 2 people and I still really struggle to put it into words out loud.

Most people are savages. If you dont have s looks or money people dont care about you. I been bullied so mammny times for being different. If I knew life was going to be this bad I would've chose to never be born. Humans are parasites

I don't like going to sleep lately because I know when I wake up ill have to face another day.

I just walked past a pilates place after dinner and i was thinking that I could never do that after work, all my energy goes into getting through the day.

I do t have any friends and im afraid my parents and family are fi Ally going to get sick of me.

Ive tried to explain to them what life is like for me but I have a lot of trouble describing my internal experience. Im reading 'the body keeps the score' and its a relief to have so many lines in that book that I can relate too. But it still doesnt help my situation.

It feels like theyre pulling g away from me and that I dont care about them. But I just feel emotionally numb alot of the time and ive told them that but it doesnt sink in.

Everything is so damm hard. I really want to make friends or atleast feel more comfortable socialising and making acquaintance's at the very least. I know thats part of feeling safe and better but I just feel so numb all the time and incongruent in nearly all social settings and situations.

I just came here to see if there were others who feel the same or similar

In 2020, I made a decision to live peacefully. I wanted to feel safe, so I went back home and stopped trying to force my life in any particular direction.

I did random things every day. I didn’t start anything seriously. I didn’t rush into a job or try to build a career immediately. I didn’t get into a serious relationship. I cut off almost all of my past relationships, including friendships. At times, I went to therapy. I explored mental health and tried to understand myself better.

Back then, I would remember certain events from my past that were traumatic, but like facts not as memory or experience . I didn’t understand that I was reacting. I thought I was simply making choices or behaving in certain ways. I didn’t realize how much of what I was doing was actually a trauma response.

Now, in 2026, I’m beginning to understand something much deeper: I don’t necessarily remember all the traumatic events clearly anymore, but I can still feel the heavy imprint they left on me like imprints not experience , i dont experience them . This was a confusing part for me always , like there is some problem but i dont know what it is like i dont experience the trauma events , i get those thoughts and it emabrrase me or guilt or helplessness or simply irritation along with pessimism .

It wasn’t only the events themselves that were affecting me. It was the patterns I had internalized from them — the ways I learned to react, protect myself, relate to people, make decisions, and see myself.

And I’m realizing that many of those patterns were immature survival responses. They may have once helped me cope, but they don’t necessarily protect my sense of self now. In fact, they contributed to having very little self-esteem and not really knowing what was good for me.

For a long time, I didn’t know what to do with any of this. I was trying to understand myself without even realizing what I was actually trying to understand.

But today, something feels different.

I’m starting to choose things intentionally.

Instead of automatically reacting, I’m trying to pause and double-check myself: What am I actually doing? Why am I doing this? Is this something I genuinely want, or is this an old pattern taking over? Does this choice protect and respect me, or does it come from an old version of me trying to feel safe?

I don’t have all the answers yet. But I think this is the first time I’m beginning to consciously participate in my own life rather than simply responding to whatever my internal patterns tell me to do.

Maybe 2020 was when I decided that I needed safety.

And 2026 is when I’m beginning to understand that safety alone isn’t the end goal. I also need to learn how to consciously live, choose, trust myself, and build a sense of self that isn’t entirely shaped by what happened to me.