“Just let it go! “
Telling someone with complex PTSD that they have just got to let go of the past, is like telling someone with depression to pull their socks up.
Those who are dealing with a chronic mental health condition are well aware that they don’t want to be carrying pain and trauma around with them. They don’t hold on to it for fun or joy; it’s disruptive, alienating, isolating and painful. Lack of understanding or acceptance can deepen and minimise pain and may contribute to the problem of people staying stuck.
Stuck Record
Flashbacks and reoccurring symptoms, thoughts and feelings can make someone feel or seem to others like they are a ‘broken record’ . The needle feels stuck and they keep replaying the same old stuff: ‘Oh here we go again!’ others may unempathetically say.
Someone with complex PTSD would much prefer to live without the flashbacks that are triggered by seemingly small events or occurrences. Frequently the person doesn’t know what it actually is that they are holding on to, they are stuck like a broken record, but they don’t know how to move the needle.
Feeling that others don’t understand can add to a growing sense of hopelessness and compound the worthlessness. This can be retraumatising in itself. Feeling that there is lack of understanding, rather than support, can compound doubt in the self. This doubt is often directly caused by mental and emotional abuse (think gaslighting and the flying monkeys); a head fuck it’s often called and so it is.
Lack of understanding and belief from others is like a piece of grit on the record, the block which keeps someone feeling in that place of stuckness until they gain either sufficient support and validation from learned sources which recognise and name that grit, or the person themselves gains enough knowledge to see it within themselves to release that grit, obstacle or lack of self belief.
Survivors may need to reassure themselves that it did happen, they aren’t going mad and their realisations are valid.
Realistic Mental Attitude
Noone really wants to acknowledge that horrible things happen in life, denial can be a way to survive and get through. With a Realistic Mental Attitude we know that bad things sadly do happen. All the Positive Mental Attitudes cannot deny this to make it better, its only papering over the cracks, shoving things under the carpet and bandaiding wounds which need air to heal. It takes effort to see the pain of others and integrity to admit with honesty and empathy that what has happened to another must really have hurt.
One thing that you can be sure of though is that those who are stuck are actually trying their very best, in their own way, to recover from something and the resulting condition that has broken their lives wide open. This may have involved them trying countless ways of coping or trying to heal and some of those will hold like temporary glue, others will go deeper as the layers of denial and disbelief are released, to acknowledge the horror of what has happened to them.
Telling someone with complex PTSD to let it go, is like telling the record player to stop. Record players aren’t like Alexa, they don’t respond to voice control. Those who remember record players realise we have to lift the arm of the needle to come unstuck.
Coming Unstuck
Only the individual can decide what they are holding on to and when they are actually able to understand what it is they are holding onto in order to let it go. Holistically this may involve work on the arms themselves, as well as the hands and shoulders, to ‘let go’ . The legs and feet maybe about moving forward in life and taking steps to recover and the back of the head at the top of the neck can connect with the vagus nerve, which can be calming.
The shift of old toxic energy coming out can be painful, and afterwards symptoms can get temporarily worsen befoe they get better but often pass quickly. It’s a bit like being sick or lancing a boil, the relief that feels from letting it out. This process may need to be done in layers over time. Typically called a healing crisis, I prefer to call it a healing response as it is a good sign things are shifting. We often hold old energy in our body as layers of tension, if we haven’t been able to deal with it in the moment. The mechanism of massage and subsequent endorphin release, as well as soothing therapeutic touch, can help to release that trapped energy and hold a safe emotional space for the person to do that work on themselves. It can also work well alongside other talking therapies.
The person may also benefit from Energy Therapies such as reiki, spiritual energy therapy, particularly soul retrieval, and reflexology, homeopathy, cranial osteopathy or the more physical Holistic Therapies such as the soothing reaasuring scents of aromatherapy massage and Indian head massage, hot stone massage and for deeper work osteopathy. Even a holistic facial, which initially may be regarded as a beauty treatment works on the ‘whole’ person. It can help to relieve tension that is held as the person endeavours to put the ‘brave face on the world’ to others. Characteristically those who don’t communicate their emotions well may hold tension in their jaw and grind their teeth, which may be eased by regular massage.
Sitting in meditation and tuning in to the body to allow the stuck emotions to unfreeze and flow again is also a feature of ‘body talk’. This is where we tune in and learn to listen to symptoms, and the body, that may help us to understand ourselves better and help to release associated emotions and thoughts, which then might ease them.
Hidden Gems
As we release the physical blockages which can then release the mental and emotional ones, that arm on the needle of the record begins to lift. We can begin to see that the needle is actually made of a diamond. Diamond is a very hard substance, as well as a beautiful gem. When we go on a journey of recovery and start to make progress (although sometimes it feels like we will never get there) we may find that we can turn trauma around so that it can benefit others.
Our journeys open us up to more empathy and deeper connections with others and with realisation, just like the strength of diamond, we may also begin to realise that we ourselves are incredibly strong to have endured what we have. That in itself brings greater self belief. Its at this point of transformation, that the needle then becomes unstuck and the true self begins to shine through which is the song of the soul. This is the place where our heart at last begins to gladden, to warm and open up, to unfreeze and bloom, revealing that hidden gem as the song of our soul becomes at last beautiful music to our ears.
‘Have empathy for complex PTSD not antipathy 😍
As Saint Benedict wisely said ‘listen with the ear of your heart’ .
For those who know someone going through this ‘when you allow yourself to truly feel your emotions and to open up and be vulnerable, then they will know that you are strong enough to hear them as they are’ ‘