A little about me

Let me start by saying that this "blog" or website is not intended to be, or to replace therapy in any shape or form. My intention is to share my story and journey through CPTSD. Selfishly, this is more for me than you! My hope is that you can identify with my story and struggles and gain some hope in your heart and realization in your soul that you are not alone, nor is any of this our fault. I hope to maintain a focus on CPTSD and not my struggles with alcoholism or my successes in sobriety. However, my sobriety is a HUGE part of my story as well. Addiction, OCD, Separation and abandonment issues seem to run parallel with CPTSD. I do not pretend to know any answers or some great secret to recovery. I have no formal education or great skill in creative writing. I am not particularly articulate in my words or thoughts. I do write from the heart and am learning as we go to be more in touch with my emotions and my reality. So, with that being said, some of my posts may be boring and bland and make no sense to anyone other than me. For that I apologize. Also, as you can probably surmise, I am not a professional web designer. I do hope, that as this blog progresses, so does my skill level of designing this page. Any suggestions for the page and topic of discussions will always be appreciated.  Criticism in any form, be it constructive or not, is something I've always struggled with. Criticism indicated that I did not reach perfection and had failed. Progress over perfection!

  So, let's start with a little about me. My push for healing, much like my sobriety, was motivated by loss. Loss of the people and things I loved and cherished. For my sobriety, I lost a good girl and my daughter, but more importantly, I had lost myself. For this journey of recovery with CPTSD, I lost the love of my life, and the only woman that I believed when she said she loved me. I also lost two littles that I loved as if they were my own. Just as necessity is the fuel for invention, pain and brokenness is the fuel for healing. When CPTSD was first mentioned to me I thought it was cute that someone was in touch with their feelings, but that wasn't who I was as a man, how wrong that turned out to be. 

  I was raised in a family of high dysfunctionality and the level of tension was determined by the level of drunkenness and the mood of my step father. The book I am currently reading, studying may be a better term. CPTSD From Surviving to Thriving talks about "Scapegoating" I was definitely his scapegoat. I was raised with extreme physical and emotional punishment. I have spent my entire life in a state of "from the front porch looking in." I have always struggled with feeling like I don't belong, or in a lot of cases, I felt like an imposter. If people really knew who I was, there was no way they would like, love or accept me. This feeling has kept me in a state of vigilance for the better part of my life. If something seems too good to be true, it probably is! I have, and do at times, still suffer from isolation and self-abandonment. I always have an exit strategy in the back of my mind. Unfortunately, the exit strategy usually involved high levels of self-sabotage, turmoil and chaos. During my active drinking days, I was great at playing the victim role. If only this would work out, If only they would act this way things would be better. Taking responsibility for my part of the story was nonexistent. I have worked hard during my sobriety to take responsibility for my part. You cannot grow or heal sitting in the victim seat. No one is coming to save me! That is my responsibility. I feel as if I am taking responsibility and growing with every key stroke. As a child, after a particularly bad night of emotional or physical abuse, I would have suicidal thoughts, or more realistically, hopes of just not being here anymore. Those thoughts do not really enter my mind anymore.  I would pray that someone would finally see what was going on and pull me from the fire. No one ever did and I held great resentment for a long time over this. I have since come to the understanding that those I needed the most were fighting their own battles. I have since lost my resentments through this understanding. I am blessed with an extremely great family and friends. I have great love for my mother and siblings. And even though my father wasn't very prevalent in my childhood and early adulthood years, he has become the one I turn to for guidance and support. He is someone that forged a trail for me to one day travel and has lived a life that I try to emulate. Even though I still struggle with the feeling that I don't belong or fit in, I know that I am loved by those around me. The beginning phase of my healing and education of who and why I am me, Is both painful and relieving. Much like my first AA meeting where I introduced myself and cried for the rest of the meeting. I feel a sense of peace and hope. Now that the problem has been recognized and accepted, I can begin the healing process. And I have great confidence that I WILL heal, I WILL grow. 

If any of this makes sense to you, welcome aboard. As I mentioned above, this is not therapy. I cannot heal you, I can only hope to share my story of how I am doing it. We are not alone, we are not broken, and we are worth the effort. Thank you for taking the time to read this. Internally, I hope nobody can identify and your childhood and life are as beautiful as can be. But unfortunately, I know I am not the only person that suffers from trauma as a result of a fucked up childhood. If nobody told you today that they love you, I do!