Hi and Welcome NJ.... I'm so sorry that you have been through so much.... It's going to take some time to rebuild after so many years of torment however you had the courage to leave and kudos to you for being so brave
Sometimes I think baby steps are the best when we're feeling fragile.... They aren't overwhelming and yet they are steps in the right direction
This is a good board.... I'm glad you've found us

There is also a good Alcoholism board on DS

https://www.dailystrength.org/group/alcoholism

Big hug.....xo

It's not something you get over over night. There is no quick fix and as you figured out the booze makes it worse. In the throws of flashbacks it's good to identify the flashbacks for what they are so you don't do your head in and reach for the booze. Memories suck but you don't have to obsess about them. What I've learned through therapy is to accept they are going to come but control them leaving just as fast as they come. I watch them float away in my head. Like little blurb bubbles exiting my brain. My advice is learn as much as you can about ptsd, I like personal blogs because they're easier to identify with vs a list of cookie cutter symptoms, facts, etc etc.

I only understand complex ptsd and the way I'd describe it is like a movie reel playing all the bad shit that's happened on repeat for hours to a week tops on end. I see a stripped shirt that reminds me of something someone wore during trauma X then all the sudden I'm thinking about trauma y and z and it just snow balls if I let it. Wish what I was saying was fool proof because I honestly can't control it all the time but sometimes, a lot of times, I can ground myself with either a glass of juice and deep breathing and visualize each memory or thought floating in then out...I can do this until I'm calmer. It's pretty nice taking control.

Hope you are seeing a counsellor. This group is great but the individual is pretty vital, I've found, for regurgitating everything kept inside that you can't get help for here. Talking helps and people getting it is validating, which I'm sure a lot of us here will get you. Welcome to the boards. Hugs.

Hi NJ. Welcome to the forum.

I'm not big on advice-giving, but I will risk the suggestion that you keep on building your peer support network, precisely as you have done with this post, as well as live support groups. Go there often to sort freely with a little help from your friends.

Welcome to DS.

Hello NJgirl,
You are so welcome and worthy of a new life. Live in complete expectancy of better and joyful days. Stay vigilant and aware of your emotions and WHY you may feel the way you do, at any given moment. I love what Arfie said above, press in on a peer group, use those lifelines and don't ever feel like a burden! Here to lift you up and pray for your complete wholeness!

Thank you for sharing,
Mia

Welcome. My second marriage was supposed to make up for my first and for having grown up in an abusive family myself. It was born by meeting in a support group, we went to counseling together before marriage, we shared self help books. Then 10 years into my marriage I came home from a weekly support group meeting to find my spouse schedule infidelity at that time every week with a coworker of mine.

Rather than admit fault, my spouse became abusive about it, too, and I went through a long, hostile divorce that bankrupted me. At work, at the same time, my department was eliminated, and I ended up out of a job. So my PTSD recovery received a big set back, and I ended up in the hospital and then moving in with my parents at 40.

It has taken a long time to rebuild my life in the last 17 years from that, and I'm not totally back to the point that I'm in any relationship. But I started a new career, though I'll never get back to my earning level I had before and I'll never own a house again. My PTSD recovery is back, and that was proven in 2011 when I had a big setback getting kidney disease that required a big job change. I made it through that without the crash of 10 years before, so it showed I had built up some resilience.

None of this has been fair, that's an idea I've had to put to one side just to get things done. I did learn that even if others may not be fair to me, I can be and I can be resilient and be my own hero when the times require it. Of course, to be my own hero requires support elsewhere, and this is the place where I found it. That's how I got through 2011 without a crash that time. I came here. It's a healing place, though healing is a slow process.