Anyone who has been around here for a while might recall that I can only remember a very small amount of time between ~2000 and 2012. This was essentially a time span when I lived with my mom up until I went to Job Corps.
I was sitting, trying to have a chill day at work after a horrible day yesterday that ended in a panic attack. And my brain says, Hey, ya wanna take a peek at something you don’t remember?
I came to the realization that I’ve been sexually asaulted on 3 seperate occasions - once when I was a young teen still living with my mom and it was the neighbor and instead of doing anything about it, the people who knew about it did literally nothing. The 2nd time I was at a bus stop in Chicago and it was a random guy, old enough to be my dad. And the 3rd time was this gross old man in Missouri, and once again, people knew but instead of doing anything they would just laugh about it.
What does this have to do with anything?? Nothing? Funny thing is I’d just come to peace with not remembering anything for those long years - I watch a childhood trauma therapist on YouTube who made a good point, in my opinion. You don’t need to recall your memories because the way your current behavior is can say a lot about your past if you don’t remember it. So I thought, that sounds right, no real point in trying to dig up that stuff, it’s buried for a reason.
I hope that your life experience in the present is going okay. Panic attacks and re-living trauma are never the most fun thing to go through. I’m sorry that you went through that experience, but I think it is healthy to both know what you have been through, and to be at peace with it. But also I think it is healthy to be focused on the present and realize that the past is the past, and you are now the person of today, not the person of yesterday. So if you are happy with the present and feel that you are doing well with your life now. I agree that it can be fine to not remember everything, or dig up things that don’t need to be dug up. I am sorry that you had to go through the experiences you have with other human beings, who treated you in ways that you should never have been treated. But I am glad that you are working on becoming the best you, and trying to learn about yourself through watching therapists.
Do you have any access to a therapist in person, or any mental health professionals? It could potentially also be more beneficial to have a professional who is focused just on you, and not something that is generalized for a larger audience. If you ever want/need to share more about what you are going through, or recalling. Please feel free to share with us, we got your back.
Thanks for the response. I do have access to a therapist, not really sure what they would do to help. Or how to even approach it. From the trauma event itself, the disassociative fugue state?
Maybe the issue is I don’t know what the root problem is.
I think just being open with what you are experiencing and seeing what they have to say would be okay. I think its the therapists job to figure out an approach and give more guidance. Maybe even help you find the root of the problem.
I wanted to check in and see how you were feeling after sitting on this for a couple of days. I have experienced panic attacks and know how horrible they can be. I am sorry you had to relive this trauma, and I want to thank you for being vulnerable with us. I think knowing and understanding your past is important if it is affecting your present life. Coming to terms with the things that have happened to you and assessing how you feel about them is crucial to moving on from them and living your best life. If you continue to think about this situation, I would encourage you to speak to your therapist about uncovering your past and working to become the best version of yourself.
Again, I am so sorry that you had to experience these horrible things. You are brave for speaking up. We are here to support you in any way we can <3.
I don’t really know how to explain how I’ve been feeling.
I shared this with my husband and he said it explains a lot of things, like its hard for me to open up when it comes to intimacy (always has been) and of course it could be one of the reasons its so hard for me to trust people.
I know when these memories came back I just thought about how sad it was because I hate hearing about people going through that and I would think, at least I didn’t go through that, but it turns out I did go through that and it made me sad, I broke down and cried.
I can say with certainty that there has been some kind of change in me since this happened. I’ve been buying a whole different style of clothing (wanting to buy more goth stuff, a style I liked decades ago but simply couldn’t afford and then for a long time I wore solid, earth/dark color shirts and tactical clothing).
I look in my closet and think, I deserve better than these drab, non descriptive pieces of clothing. I want something pretty and intricate. You know… its hard to explain.
In the midst of all this I know that, generally speaking, having a drastic change of self like this is usually a bad sign. I tell myself this is to become more like my inner self but to be honest I really don’t know. Maybe I’m regressing after remembering those events.