r/CPTSD

what the title says

I believe I was sexually abused by my sister. When we were little, my mother would leave us to work for about three or four hours. During those times, my sister would make me sit on her lap, touch me, and tell me overly sexual stories about us or any individual. We were both very young at the time i was about 6-8 years and she was 13, but I didn't realize what she was doing was wrong; I thought it was out of love. She would kiss me on the mouth, using her tongue until I could choke, then suck on my lips and tongue and hold me down on the bed. Since my body was much smaller than hers, she would crush me beneath her saying the weight and suffocation would feel good, she would rub her genitals against mine ,sometimes through my clothes, and sometimes she would show me her body which i clearly didn't want to and was the only thing i knew i shouldnt be seeing but she forced me. She would put her hand inside my clothes and touch me, and she would grab my buttocks while explaining what was happening in the story, making sounds to keep me engaged. I obeyed my sister blindly out of the strange feeling i felt and again i thought that she loved me and that what live is. This went on for about two years of horrific and indecent things. At the end of the second year, I started to understand what had happened to me, but I never told anyone because I knew everyone loved her and no one would believe me. So I started begging My mother insisted I go with her to work, and my sister initially offered small gestures, but eventually stopped. Now I don't feel comfortable around her; I feel suffocated,i hate her, and i don't,but i definitely dont want her near me i immediately feel like throwing up. She hasn't apologized and acts as if nothing happened. Now my family blames me for not allowing her to hug or kiss me for long periods, saying I'm harsh. Everyone seems to dislike me, and I don't know what to do. I hate seeing her loved by everyone around her, with everyone defending her and saying she's kind, when I know she doesn't deserve it. She also says she loves children, but I'm afraid to leave any child from the daycare where we work with her for fear of their safety. I don't know what to do, please help, plus our family is strict and we don't leave the house unless necessary, and i can't ask for help and the don't believe in therapists and i can't move away from the house ... Oh god.

Basically, you cry tears that do not refresh you. Your grief doesn't move through you. It sits inside you like a deadweight, unable to budge.

i think of the toughest parts of having CPTSD for me is the fact that you could do all the things right, distance yourself from the abusers, stay sober (if that helps you), go to therapy, feel the bad feelings.

and still feel like shit.

Every therapist i’ve gone to has had a difficult time understanding what exactly it is i’m going through.

I don’t have a happy, safe place from my childhood to visualize, i don’t have a sense of self before the trauma. My entire personality has been built around surviving and people pleasing the adults around me to ensure i suffered the least amount possible.

Growing up, the little bit of relief/freedom i had was spent on the internet, or reading books i could lose myself in.

It’s hard to explain to a therapist that i’m not recovering from a single event, but from almost 2 decades of continuous abuse but also that i don’t know myself without it.

The depression, disassociation, hyper vigilance, and disconcerting from relationships is never ending. I just want someone to hear my out and understand my experience so i feel less alone in it.

I tried to google this and got a million articles on reactive abuse for some reason. I’m not talking about that.

I’ve (24F) just reached a point of clarity in my life where I finally understand my role in a lot of abusive or empty relationships/friendships. I didn’t realize this until recently, but I basically let people do whatever they wanted to me so that they’d be nice to me. Of course this was exploited heavily by my abusers— it hurts my stomach to admit, but I even remember abuse taking place and thinking to myself, “oh, well, at least they’ll have to be nice to me after this”. I was so desperate that I didn’t care at the time, as long as they were nice later.

This goes beyond though. I remember now that in ALL of my friendships that were ALL with men that they were only really nice to me because they thought I was attractive. They were only around me because they were my boyfriend’s friends, and beyond that, they wouldn’t have ever gone out of their way to speak to me. But they all wanted to fuck me to varying degrees and that’s the only reason they were nice. I let them leer at me and such, and I think I always knew that deep down that that was the only reason they enjoyed my company. I’m not friends with any of them anymore— I always had a pit in my stomach about my friendships anyway, and when I left my abusive partners they didn’t reach out after a while (even though they stopped being friends with my abusers after everything came out). I was confused about why for so long, even though I wanted it that way for my own reasons. But their reasons were a mystery to me— I think I’m starting to get it.

The reasons for my acceptance of objectification and such are tied to my trauma and I can provide more context if that’s needed, but it didn’t ever feel weird because all men and therefore all my friends treated me like that, I just knew it just felt bad at the time. I still accepted it though, like without any second thoughts. Now I’m looking back with clarity and I’m crushed by how alone I truly was and how much I dealt with just so people were nice to me. I don’t understand what to do with this information or even what it’s called. But there has to be someone else here who knows what I’m talking about, right? I’ve been basically crying all day over it. I’ve never felt shittier.

I'm a 32-year-old man. For most of my life, I wasn't living. I was surviving.

Growing up

My father carries his own unhealed wounds — he grew up hurt, and he passed that hurt down. Our home was always tense. He poured his anger onto everyone in the family. My mother, meanwhile, spent years complaining to everyone around her about her miserable marriage. I was the container for both of their suffering.

I learned very early that my needs were a burden and that asking for help was dangerous. So I kept everything inside — my voice, my anger, my sadness. I became very, very good at being quiet.

The collapse

The turning point came in my mid-20s. I was studying for a graduate school entrance exam when my parents' marriage finally fell apart.

My mother had been planning to leave for a long time. She left right after I graduated and found my first job — the day I called her to tell her the news. It felt like her "task" with me was finally done.

Then came the divorce. I was dragged into the center of it. They both stood in front of me, accusing each other. My mother had an affair and left. When I refused to blame everything on her, my father told me to get out of the house and said he was cutting off our father-son relationship.

I felt abandoned by both of my parents — at 25, feeling like I was the extra person in the world, the one with no value. The exam failed. Then came years of fog: jobs that drained me, quitting, starting over, quitting again. I never understood why I kept failing — until recently.

Now

For the past few months, I've had someone to talk to who helps me sort things out.I'm slowly understanding that my "failures" were never because I was broken. They were survival strategies of a nervous system trying to keep me alive. Feeling worthless wasn't a flaw in me — it was a message I was given every day, by the people who were supposed to protect me.

Now I'm 32. I'm learning game development — the first thing I've ever chosen for myself, not for survival. Most people my age have careers, savings, families. I'm starting from almost zero.

Some days I feel like I wasted everything. A voice tells me: it's too late. You should just take a "stable" job and give up on what you actually want.

But deep down, I don't want to give up. So I'm asking here: has anyone else started over like this — at 32, or older? How did you deal with the voice that says it's too late? How do you keep going when you feel like you're behind everyone?

I'm not looking for a guarantee. I'm just looking for someone who understands.

My brother is 10 years older than me. And in this situation I would’ve been 5-7 and he was 15-17.
Me and my little brother were sleeping in his room. This was a privilege because he never let anyone in his room. My little brother was asleep and I was awake. My older brother was awake too and told me he couldn’t sleep. He asked me to play truth or dare and being a little kid I said yes. First true dares were harmless and then I couldn’t think of a dare. He said “I dare you to dare me to show you my d!ck” I said no because I felt uncomfortable. And then he said he was showing it but I closed my eyes. Then he tried to dare me to show him my vag!na and I said no. I was uncomfortable and decided to leave his room and as I was walking out he told me not to tell our mom.
I feel like I’m crazy but like idk he’s done and said other weird stuff to me as I got older and I always felt uncomfortable and he said I’m being manipulative when I get uncomfortable.

Recently just this yeae, I have been cutting people off more frequently once I feel like they cross the line, are being passive aggressive or if I feel like our friendship is too one sided. I used to be such a people pleaser and terrified of losing friends and being alone but now I find that I have a lower tolerance for bullshit the longer I go alone. I feel that its getting out of hand because I have cut off like 4 people this year. One other long time guy friend abruptly cut off contact with me but he has done this before for months on end.

While with the other 4: Two of them were just casual online friends I met for a month or two and I cut both of them off because they would make rude passive aggressive comments about me in group settings. One was a good friend but I distanced myself from her for several months because my mental health was really bad and I felt like she was expecting so much from me (I had been unemployed for awhile due to severe agoraphobia and she has been pressuring me to get an onsite job quickly). I did greet her on her birthday but I did not reply to her 2 other messages (to be fair she only messages like once a month lmao). But I had told her beforehand that I tend to isolate myself whenever I'm not doing well. So it's not like she has no idea why I'm not reaching out.

The last one was another friend who I had grown to distrust because he would try to flirt with me even when I had told him multiple times that I did not like him that way.

It feels lonely but at the same time. After everything I have been through I just can't be bothered? Because things did end for a reason and I'm tired of settling for friendships that don't even feel safe or make me fulfilled.

I live despite, everything. There is no cure, there is no solution, I am permanenlty broken.

and no, these feelings wont pass, they are reoccuring on a daily, hourly basis, no reprieve.

Spare me the platitudes, I've heard enough.

I feel like I'm already way past the time I should've left. Nothing is getting better or easier. I'm uncomfortable all the time. I used to believe I could turn my life around but I'm 37 and I'm TIRED. So much disappointment and hurt and I don't belong anywhere and I'm completely alone and it's tearing me apart.

I feel like I've had enough and I'm honestly scared of what else the future can throw at me. I don't think I have the capacity to deal with it anymore. Like constant anxiety/burnout/depression.

The past two months have been absolute hell for me. I ended up in an emergency session again today. The fifth time this month.

A therapist and a nurse (both complete strangers to me) stayed with me. I cried my eyes out and kept hurting myself. They sat there and listened as I told them, over and over again, how much pain I was in, and also, my suicide plan. And they just kept telling me, “Please stay alive, please stay with us.”

I don’t really have anything wise or hopeful to say right now. I still left that room in pain. I’m still in so much pain. But for some reason, I needed someone to ask me to stay, and they did. Maybe someone reading this needs that too.

Please stay alive. Please stay with us.

I have no safe person in my life. I don't have that one person i can rely on, and just feel safe with. I am so tired and burned out of having to keep it all inside. I have tried therapy but it made things even worse! I am truly a hopeless case.

To elaborate a bit: I find it really easy to socialize at events where I have a specific role, but the moment there aren't clear professional obligations, I shy away. I feel like I'm being annoying, and they prb don't like me anyway. They'll prb leave so might as well leave before they leave, cause it'd be less hurtful that way...Is this a common CPTSD experience?

I was doing EMDR therapy for about a year until recently and one of the things I rediscovered were several suicide attempts made before the age of six. Putting a bag over my head, trying to suffocate my self with a pillow and pulling the cord from my bathrobe around my neck.

It came as a shock to remember that but it also felt very familiar and I distinctly remember the moment of realisation I eventually had as a child: “you can’t kill yourself. The body always fights back.”

That’s obviously not true, people can and do kill themselves, but that was what I felt at the time. I was stuck there, there was no escape. As an adult, it was shocking realisation that I was trying to kill myself at such a young age, even if the attempts were childish.

I’m no longer in therapy and can’t find any reliable stats online so I’m just wondering how many other people in this community made suicide attempts at a young age. I’m curious to understand how common it is in traumatised children.

you deserve to be heard, not silenced. ❤

Like it rly feels like that all I need.

I've been fighting through dissociation for so long, trying to fix and heal me, and sure some of it has helped, but none can replace feeling loved by someone.

Being seen and taken care of, held when things are too much, that's all I want, and it feels like until I get that nothing else matters. My work, status, accolades, none of it.

I just want to feel loved.

I only recently realized that I am triggered by their whole generation, probably because of my own background with Narc boomer parents. I feel much more comfortable with people older or younger than them, but if someone’s a boomer it always makes me unfomfortable talking to them. Even if they are good people

I hate myself FOR hating myself. I’m angry at myself FOR being angry at myself. And then I look weak because I’m so upset, which makes me even angrier. The spiral never ends.

And by "so cool" I mean "I have literally withdrawn from everyone left in my life to preemptively prevent them from abandoning me too after having this happen a few times with people I trusted enough to be vulnerable around, and now I have zero human connections, zero trust left in other people, and zero reason to keep trying to survive and heal since I can't be close to another person without feeling like the most disgusting and evil person in the entire world." I am so so so so so terrified of ever opening up about my trauma and mental health with another human being again after some of the things that have happened in the last couple years since I started treatment and thought I could let my guard down a little because I was finally making progress. Now I have literally no one in my life, I am so lonely and isolated all the time, and I cannot bring myself to inflict myself on another person because it just feels like a punishment.

I have a high number of ACEs, have been in intensive treatment (3-4x a week) for coming up on two years, have been working on healing myself so fucking hard but am seemingly only getting worse and worse. I don't even want to be here anymore but I can't abandon my pets so I have to stick around.

I don't want to, though.

TW very vulgar language/CSA

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It really hurts and makes me want to cry. He's covering my face up of a pic of when I was 8. Ya know the age he thought it was fine to touch and make me give him a blow job. In fact I was even young then that. As he used to brag about how good it felt when I was an infant as I thought I was sucking a "bottle."

I am to blame for the years of trauma he inflicted. In his head I somehow wanted him to fuck me in my sleep. I wanted him to show me other children being sexually assault while he jacked off to it. I wanted everything apparently!

And the worst part. Is that he dares be close to my sister. When, he also did to her as he did to me, when she was an infant. She is disabled and can't fucking talk or walk! And she was a goddamn baby!!!! And he jokes "I think its thick enough?" Because she needed specific formula milk or else she'd die.

You know what. I'm done. I have enough. Evidence. Who cares if I lose my family. That bastard deserves to be in prison and hopefully murdered there. I can't fucking stand him!