Grieving Losses After Abuse

For most of my life, I ran from my feelings. I avoided them to survive because I wasn’t ready. I could not cope with the truth of what had happened to me. I was still just surviving every day, every minute while trying to hide all those pent up feelings, thoughts, and memories at the same time. I lied and pretended to be well when every day I wanted to die. I didn’t die though. I lived but I have lost a lot in the process. There are things I never had due to the abuse and I am trying to come to terms with that.

In this new stage of CPTSD recovery, life has finally slowed down. I am no longer in a state of heightened anxiety. Helping myself through anxiety and back to a calmer place has become much easier with practice. While less anxiety is fucking fantastic life has slowed down to where I can stake stock of my losses. I can see them now. The pain is immense.

The pain is constant as always but it has changed. It’s not quite as sharp as before. It has expanded and it taking up a lot of space. I spend a lot of time with it trying to accept where I am with coping. I am learning to live differently and it is an ongoing and difficult process.

To cope with the grief I have been trying to take very good care of myself. I have been exhausted so I’m resting as much as I can. Hygiene and eating well have been challenging and I am isolating a lot. I try to stay in the present moment and use grounding. I still burst into tears and feel overwhelmed a lot. Things are improving though, ever so slowly.

I wasn’t able to complete some custom orders for work so I had to refund the customers. They were all kind about it but I was not kind to myself about it. At least I am realizing what I am doing. Changing it is difficult. I have begun to notice the cruelty while it is happening and reversing course to be more nurturing to myself. I have a difficult time accepting my limitations. Accepting that I still have CPTSD is difficult. I tend to treat myself like I should be able to do everything with no problems and it’s a personal failing if I don’t. I just have to accept that I can not be an entertainer right now while I am grieving. That may be something I can do in the future but for now, I just can’t.

So, I acknowledge that CPTSD has taken away a lot of my ability to work. Focusing is difficult. Most of my time and energy goes to coping with my symptoms still. My healing has not become easier or less painful. It is just difficult in new ways.

The abuse I suffered as a child and young adult has stolen parts of my life. I do not remember a lot of my life right now. I also feel that I have done my best with my circumstances. I am determined to have a better life. I am not finished here and have more work to do by sharing what I have learned about healing, coping skills, and how to love yourself through the healing process.

Trauma has taken my ability to work, concentrate, focus, remember, connect, remain present, and more things than I can count. I have to name the things to accept that trauma played a huge part and still does in my life. I will keep trying. Thank you for reading.