Hugs and Welcome. Coming to terms with it all has been quite a journey for me too.

Hello Mark. Welcome to the forum. Being able to share openly about the mysteries and confusions of cPTSD with people managing similar symptoms helps me tremendously. Hope it helps you, as well.

Welcome aboard.

Welcome to the board Mark...… This is a good board and there's several people on her with CPTSD including me

I'm sorry for what's brought you here but glad that you've found us.... Big hug....xo

Mark. welcome aboard this DS lifeboat. Dealing with cPTSD is challenging. I learned early to pretend things weren't what they were. Not feeling wasn't a real option for me, though I learned not to show them pretty young. I think we each find ways to survive that work for us. Welcoming hugs.

What about anger? Have you learned to suppress your anger? You talk about being disconnected from your feelings. I think for me I have gone the complete opposite route. My CPTSD has caused anger issues which are difficult to control. But at least I was never in denial about the narcissist in my life. I now react with disgust when I encounter anyone similar.

Hi Mark. Welcome to the DS ptsd family. Its never to late to find this place. It is filled with very supportive people, and a lot of shared tools to help us all take it a breath at a time. Triple hugs

Hi, Mark, welcome from me, too. It's great that you know about Complex PTSD or CPTSD, it's the kind I got, too, and it has to do with domestic violence in my home as a kid and a mentally ill mom.

When I was welcomed here as a newby myself, folks here at DS PTSD turned me on to therapist Pete Walker because CPTSD is his specialty. So I pass his link on to you, too, in turn, in case you find it useful.

http://pete-walker.com/fAQsComplexPTSD.html

Glad you joined us!

Hi everyone, thank you so much for the warm welcome!

getbacktoserenity I had no problem with anger (or any other such emotion) ;-( I had them all buried so deep that I rarely 'felt' anything. I think if there was a heart monitor kind of device to see emotion, mine would show as flat lined. I have in the last few years since I started working with my older sister (who found her own way out of her stuff), been able to reconnect with my emotions and really start living my life again. I still have stuff come up (like last night...I'll write about that in a bit once I have a chance to fully sit with it) but now that I can allow my feelings it has been much easier to figure things out.

mujicaptsd thanks for the info. I hadn’t come across a therapist previously that could help me. Of course I didn’t know what I had at the time and the three that I tried all listened by really didn’t have anything that I could really move forward with. In the meantime though my sister who was starting to help others with issues (learned from fixing herself…as she was also severely affected by my mother) starting talking to me and eventually I moved to the same city as her (in a different province from where I / my mother lived). She has some very effective ways of getting through the emotional knots and helping straighten things out. Anyway I still have things come up that always surprise me (I always think I’ve got through everything  ) but we work through them for a few days and I am able to move forward again.

Thanks again everyone, I have never felt so welcome, nor felt quite as understood!

Mark

So glad you felt our welcome so warmly, Mark. Thanks for saying so. This is a healing place.