Why I got diagnosed with Complex PTSD
Yesterday, during our annual Suicide Prevention training, I shared my story of childhood trauma, where I endured mental abuse on a routine basis for the first 17 years of my life at the hands of a caregiver. I had to leave right after speaking, so I'm not sure how much it may have resonated, and I even forgot to bring one of the pages. Ugh! I'm sure it was a jumbled mess, and I look forward to learning how to tighten up this story better when delivered in person as the years go on. However, this is the culmination of a few posts I have shared on social media, reflecting on my upbringing and my journey to making sense of it. I hope this gives you the courage to share and know you are not alone. This is what I was supposed to read yesterday in its entirety.
When you are a child, you have no choice but to depend on your parents for survival.
My therapist drilled this into my head multiple times so I could understand why I kept hanging onto the crumbs my Mother tossed at me.
I cherished our deep conversations, intimate connection, and fantastic relationship when it was “on.” She could be so charming when she felt like it.
It’s why nobody saw around me what was going on or the extent of it. There were no physical scars, and my material needs were met.
People just saw an incredibly kind Father and a charming Mother. They wondered why I was always grounded in my room, however, often for months. I must have been that bad, they figured.
My Dad was my 1st podcast guest, and I idolized him as my savior from her. He was kind to me and was the buffer when I could take him away temporarily from doting on her.
I only wish he’d have stepped in; after all, he saw everything, all my Mother’s temper tantrums and histrionics, but never went past his role as her enabler. He did nothing.
Others outside the home nobody knew brother knock my Mother out with a closed fist when he was just 13. I believe he was on a path to kill her, as was I. We both entertained thoughts of killing her, and it’s why I have empathy for children who do so.
Those outside the family did not know he was sent to military school a state away, which resulted from his fighting back (and his issues getting in fights at school). Appearances were significant in the Pickard household, so nobody was close enough to us to intervene. And even if there was, this was mental abuse, not physical or sexual.
So here I was, left in this hellhole of a home in constant fear of my Mother’s wrath, hoping for the next time she’d choose to be kind. My brother had been my occasional protector and sometimes bully, but now he was away at boarding school, unable to take some of the heat off of me.
I always thought I was the problem when my Mother withheld love, called me fat, said I was dumb, criticized me endlessly about everything, and even gave up on me when trying to teach me something. I went days/weeks “grounded” in my room, left to rot and turn inward. Watch TV and read books for solace.
It’s why I blamed myself when she told me as a baby, after my adoption at one-month-old, I pulled away from her. I believed her lie that I was inconsolable and that the rift in our relationship was my fault.
I internalized this shame and thought because I wasn’t repeatedly beaten or molested, my childhood wasn’t that bad. I mean, so many have it so much worse. I learned later in therapy and doing self-help research that this comparative suffering helps us shame ourselves further.
It’s why I became deeply insecure most of my adult life, addicted to friends and lovers who also doled out crumbs like her. It’s what I knew, what was familiar, and what I was subconsciously drawn towards.
My success in the Navy was another “drug” for validation that helped me feel okay. Alcohol did the same.
A child only knows to do whatever it takes to keep their abuser happy, and it’s why we become people pleasers. It’s why sometimes we become abusers ourselves, as we don’t understand the ramifications of generational trauma.
It’s why medication fails (it only numbs the pain) and why I believe symptoms such as anxiety, depression, and ADHD develop. It’s why some of us even become suicidal.
Treatment for those symptoms with pharmaceuticals is often insufficient if the processing and making sense of the abuse doesn't happen. If we don’t understand that it’s not our fault any of this happened.
When we don’t make sense of this childhood wound and ultimately understand nothing is wrong with us. We are not stupid. We don’t deserve to be endlessly attacked and criticized.
This lack of understanding and processing is why I developed an unhealthy relationship with alcohol. I used it to soothe this hole in my heart. I was unaware of all this because I never got adequately treated for complex PTSD.
When you are a child, you need the withholding parent for your survival, but as an adult, you can recognize when an unhealthy person is pulling you into this never-ending hamster wheel, this dance with the devil.
And guess what?
With intensive work on yourself, you can choose to get off of the on-again and off-again tornado, break free of toxic relationships, and live and love differently.
However, you must own that as an adult, you are playing into the problem.
Instead of ruminating on the pain and furthering your addiction to the trauma, you can separate emotionally from your narcissistic coworkers and bosses with polite professionalism. Employ short and respectful responses. You can display no emotional reaction to those who know your triggers and intentionally try to stoke them.
You can develop empathy for parents who mistreated you and maybe in time, even forgive them.
I’m working on that now, and I hope this helps you have the courage to do the same.
I have a long road ahead in healing, but I recently completed intensive therapy and heavy processing EMDR.
The work is now on me to integrate and internalize what my therapist and I discussed in all those weekly sessions.
Today, I already feel a weight has already been lifted. I hope this testimony will also encourage you to get help and support.
