Lady, it depends on the guilt. Is it a guilt you are carring that is not yours? Did you do something that you need to make amends for? Is it an old guilt, from childhood maybe, where you were just made to feel guilty for being you?

I by no means am an expert in this. I have worked with a counselor with guilt and self-worth because I believe they are connected. I remember telling someone I felt guilty for living bc my Mom told me she wished she never had me. I had to learn what was guilt and what was other emotions and maybe you have. In the case above, guilt was the emotion I knew but what I was really feeling was pain and shame. When different sitiuations would come up, I would dedicide what was i feeling and why and in the beginning I needed my C a lot to help, its coming easier. For me, trying to put away something I have not dealt with eventually comes out. Sure the group will have good suggestions.

Hi ladydi,

While I agree w/ Mila that a little more detail would help to know how to be helpful to you,.. I'll guess it's maybe guilt about the trauma that left you w/PTSD. (Since this is a PTSD group).

My first PTSD therapist was strictly a trauma specialist, and while I didn't always have the easiest time working with her, she sure did now the PTSD game book. Apparently it is very common for trauma victims to feel at least partially responsible for the damage done to them. Why? Because we blame ourselves for not being able to have avoided it. We believe we let ourselves down.

I was a mature adult when I was assaulted and it made me lose confidence in my own decision making because I felt that I should have recognized the danger signs and prevented the assault. I felt very guilty.

I was eventually able to let go of the guilt in 3 ways: realizing I was not the bad person who deliberately, premeditatively did the harm, (i.e. there was nothing for me to feel guilty about), then I fought using every means I could to see justice done to the perpetrator; and 3rd by reading the news and watching television I have tried to learn enough about the criminals that lurk around in our world so I might more easily recognize, avoid and protect myself from them. I don't feel guilty any more.

But I still have major trust issues about my own decision making processes.

So if your guilt is victim guilt you can set it down by understanding it and trying to see justice done.

Let me know if I guessed wrong here.

I have PTSD from 3 trauma categories of experience: molestation as a child, domestic violence growing up, and war. Oddly, the strongest guilt I've struggled with is the latter--survivor guilt from coming out of war alive. I have sometimes reflected on those who did not make it, and wondered if I deserved to survive when they didn't. Really fine human beings got cut down, brilliant people who had it together and had a lot to offer the future. It's truly tragic who died in the war I lived through. Sometimes I feel inadequate to fill their shoes and go forward.

What helps with that is being accepted and even celebrated by other PTSD survivors of trauma here, whatever the source. I get relief from that feeling that I'll never be able to do enough to repay my debt with the dead. Here I get told I'm great just the way I am, and just because I'm alive. That is enough. I hope it is for you, too!

I am glad that you feel relief from your guilt by being in the group. I understand survivor guilt, yet at some point its important to understand that it is not about your fellow soldiers. It is not your fault you survived and you do not in my opinion "owe" them anything but can honor them by going on and living the best lift bc you care about yourself.

I have come to learn that guilt is often a shame based feeling of unworthiness that is really self abandonment.

Complex issue. For me, rooted in dysfunctional childhood stuff & needed assistance of therapist to it sort out.

Hope you find your way and can love and embrace yourself.
Hugs, Violet

Violet, you wrote " I have come to learn that guilt is often a shame based feeling of unworthiness that is really self abandonment." I think that may explain why I felt happy enough in my marriage, but that a part of me wasn't going to be fulfilled that way. That part of my commitment to marriage wasn't just out of love, but out of guilt--husbandly duty paralleling the eldest son duty to my dysfunctional family and protecting my mother from her violent husband, my father.

I think I'm so happy here because it's not self-abandonment to relate to friends here. There's mutual support. So thanks for what you said, Violet.