Breakups & Divorce Support Group
Just broke up with someone or in the midst of a difficult divorce? Breaking up is difficult no matter what the circumstances are. They say that time heals all wounds, but sometimes a listening ear or a hug can work wonders for the heart. Whether you need a place to vent, someone to hold you to No Contact, or need advice about what to do, we're here to help.
Ok...a friend mentioned this in her journal...I live it..I know. Please discuss.
*By the way - this is anamcaratx - I can not get into my old account *
Hugs lady, you are better than what he says. Really.
There should be a list of symptoms.
For me is was inability to sleep, daily nightmares, constant anxiety, invasive thoughts, reliving traumatic events, hyper-vigilance, sensitive startle response, nervousness (trembling, stuttering), chronic headache, nausea, irregular heartbeat, poor concentration and short term memory, easily triggered into severe responses (I would have an overwhelming urge to run over anyone who looked like him on the street), isolation/withdrawl, pre-occupied, in a daze, confused.
There are a number of ways to treat CPTSD, I sought out the PTSD specialist in my city and went to her for extended EMDR treatments.
It helped a LOT.
Interestingly enough, my stbx did emdr to try to 'unlock' things for him (he was 'concerned' about his lack of empathy) and his therapist tried to use a tramatic incident from his childhood, but he just couldn't get into it. It did nothing for him. She said he needed more talk therapy before it would work for him. Right. More talk therapy so he can learn how to manipulate her.
they measure differences using brain scans
fascinating stuff
sociopathy
THE GIFT OF FEAR/THE CURSE OF ANXIETY: IS IT FEAR OR IS IT ANXIETY?
by Sandra L. Brown, M.A.
Women who have been in pathological relationships come away from the relationships with problems associated with fear, worry, and anxiety. This is often related to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) or what we call 'High Harm Avoidance'-- being on high alert looking for ways she might get harmed now or in the future.
PTSD, by its own nature as a disorder, is an anxiety disorder that is preoccupied by both the past (flashbacks and intrusive thoughts of him or events) and by the future (worry about future events, trying to anticipate his behaviors, etc.). With long term exposure to PTSD, this anxiety and worry begins to mask itself, at least in her mind, as 'fear.' In fact, most women lump together the sensations of anxiety, worry, and fear into one feeling and don't differentiate them.
Fear is helpful and safety-oriented whereas worry and anxiety are not helpful and related to phantom possible events that often don't end up happening. To that degree, worry and anxiety are distracting away from real fear signals that could help you.
In the book which is now a classic on predicting harmful behavior in others, Gavin deBecker in 'The Gift of Fear' delineates the difference between what we need fear for and what we DONT need anxiety and worry for. In some ways, the ability to use fear correctly while stopping the use of anxiety and worry may do much to curtail PTSD symptoms.
De Becker who is not a therapist but a Danger Analyst has done what other therapists haven't even done--nix PTSD symptoms of anxiety and worry by focusing on true fear and its necessity versus anxiety and it's faux meaning to us.
The term fear was used by Freud (in contrast to anxiety), to refer to the reaction to real danger. Freud emphasized the difference between fear and anxiety in terms of their relation to danger:
~ Anxiety is a state characterized by the expectation and preparation for a danger--even if it's unknown ~
~ While fear implies a specific object to be feared in the here/now. ~
(Anxiety is: 'He MIGHT harm me' where fear is: "He is harming me with his fist.")
If you heard there was a weapon proven to prevent most crimes (including picking a dangerous partner) before it happened, would you run out and buy it?
World-renowned security expert Gavin de Becker says this weapon exists, but you already have it. He calls it "the gift of fear."
The story of a woman named Kelly begins with a simple warning sign. A man offers to help carry her groceries into her apartment--and instantly, Kelly doesn't like the sound of his voice. Kelly goes against her gut and lets him help her--and in doing so, she lets a rapist into her home.
"We get a signal prior to violence," Gavin says. "There are preincident indicators. Things that happen before violence occurs."
Gavin says that unlike any other living creature, humans will sense danger, yet still walk right into it.
"You're in a hallway waiting for an elevator late at night. The elevator door opens, and there's a guy inside, and he makes you afraid. You don't know why, you don't know what it is. And many women will stand there and look at that guy and say, 'Oh, I don't want to think like that. I don't want to be the kind of person who lets the door close in his face. I've got to be nice. I don't want him to think I'm not nice.'
And so human beings will get into a steel soundproof chamber with someone they're afraid of, and there's not another animal in nature that would even consider it."
Gavin says that "eerie feelings" is exactly what he wants women to pay attention to. "We're trying to analyze the warning signs," he says. "And what I really want to teach today and forever is the feeling of the warning sign. All the other stuff is our explanation for the feeling. Why it was this, why it was that. The feeling itself IS the warning sign."
What happens over and over again is that women dismantle their OWN internal safety system by ignoring it. The longer you ignore it, the more 'over rides' it receives and retrains your brain to ignore the fear signal. Once rewired women are at tremendous risks of all kinds...risks of picking the wrong men, of squelching fear signals of impending violence, shutting off alarms about potential sexual assaults, shutting down red flags about financial rip offs, squeaking out hints about poor character in other people...and the list goes on. What is left after your whole entire safety system is dismantled? Not much....
Women, subconsciously sensing they need to have 'something' to fall back on, swap out true and profoundly accurate fear signals with the miserly counterfeit and highly unproductive feeling of worry/anxiety. LADIES-- WRONG FEELING!
Then they end up in counseling for their 4th dangerous relationship and wonder if they have a target sign on their forehead. No they don't. They have learned to dismantle, rename, minimize, justify, or deny the fear signals they get or got in the relationship.
As if their ability to 'take it' or 'not be afraid' of very dangerous behavior is some sort of win for them. As if their ability to look danger in the face and STAY means they are as tough or competitive as he is...No--it means they have a fear signal that no longer saves them. Their barely stuttering signal means it's been over-ridden by her. She felt it, labeled it, and released it all the while staring eye-to-eye with what she should fear most.
Then later, or another day or week passes and she has mounting anxiety--over what she wonders? She has a chronic low grade worry, wisps of anxiety that waif thru her life. She can't put 2+2 together to figure out that ignoring true fear will demand to be recognized by her subconscious in some way---an illegitimate way through worry and anxiety that does nothing to save her from real danger. Her real ally (her true fear) has been squelched and banished. When coming to us for counseling she wants us to help her 'feel safe' again when actually, we can't do any of that. It's all in her internal system as it's always been. Her safety is inside her and her future healing is too.
She will sit in the counselor's office denying true fear and begging for relief from the mounting anxiety she is experiencing. She doesn't trust herself, her intuition, her judgments--all she can feel is anxiety. And with good reason! True fear is her true intuition...not anxiety. But she's already canned what can save her and now on some level she must know she has nothing left that can help her feel and react.
Animals instinctively react to the danger signal--the adrenaline, flash of fear, and flood of cortisol. They don't have internal dialogue with themselves like "What did that mean? Why did he say that? I don't like that behavior---I wonder if he was abused as a child." An animal is trained to have a natural reaction to the fear signal--they run. You don't see animals 'stuck' in abusive mating environments! In nature, as in us, we are wired with the King of Comments which is the danger signal. When we respond to the flash of true fear, we aren't left having a commentary with ourselves.
Below are links you can click on to hear Gavin deBecker on Oprah discussing The Gift of Fear and what every human being alive much know in order to stop ignoring their safety switch and stop believing the false internal testimonies of mere anxiety and worry. More on this next week....
"The future is not some place we are going to, but one we are creating. The paths are not to be found, but made, and the activity of making them, changes both the maker and the destination." - John Schaar
For me, my life changed forever from the moment I let her into my life. I have always had many friends but after about a year, most of the friends were gone. Talk about insidious. My ex would regularly pout to get sympathy and whenever she got it she would talk about how her father left her when she was young. At first I fell for it too, and moved mountains for them to communicate with each other, but I soon realised she was using this truth to get sympathy/attention from others. She would never smile in public. She hardly ever smiled even when i had only just met her. But in our house, she was always laughing, smiling etc. But in public, not even a smile. Financial abuse...she stole money from me regularly, emotional abuse. she lied, manipulated and isolated me from our mutual friends. Physical abuse-she would hit me when she got into a rage. Sexual abuse. She would deliberately start a fight and then expect me to seduce her, cause she felt that make-up sex was the best sex there is. She said 'whenever we fight, al I want you to do is have sex with me'.
The list goes on, but thats enough for now.
Like Desert said 'abuse of any kind is cruel'
I'm just shaking my head right now.
WoW.