drglenndoyle

This is your brain on CPTSD. Any questions?

Trauma responses literally scramble our brains. 

Well, “scramble” may not be exactly right. But trauma responses really do hijack specific areas of our brain— specifically the hippocampus (memory central) and the prefrontal cortex (decision making central). 

Most brain functions and areas aren’t quite as well understood as many sources seem to advertise— but we do know a few things about how fight, fight, freeze, fawn, and flop seem to impact our brain. 

For example, we know that when triggers slam into us, the hippocampus doesn’t process, consolidate, or retrieve memories particularly effectively. 

It’s one reason why post traumatic memory seems to “behave” so much differently than other memories— it’s being “regulated” and filtered by a brain structure that is on the fritz after being triggered. 

We also know that, when the sympathetic nervous system— the branch of our nervous system that throws the switch on trauma responses— is active, the prefrontal cortex seems to go largely offline. 

That is to say: we literally can’t think straight when we’re gripped by fight, fight, freeze, fawn, or flop. 

I’m not, actually, a believer that neurobiology can explain everything we need to know about trauma or recovery— but I do think a baseline knowledge of what CPTSD physically, chemically does to our brain can be helpful in easing off the self blame. 

How we feel and behave in the midst of trauma responses really are not “choices.” 

They’re the product of cortisol and adrenaline and dopamine surging through our most sensitive tissues, and knee-caping the organ that creates and consolidates our integrated experience of identity. 

Nobody’s “choosing” their way out of that neurochemical onslaught. 

Give yourself a break. 

You’re up against alterations in brain chemistry, structure, and function that ANY human, regardless of intelligence or “character,” would have trouble managing. 

The situation is not hopeless— but we need to be realistic where we actually have choices, and where we really, really don’t. 

Focus on the moments right AFTER you realize a trauma response has kicked in— when you start to regain some meaningful influence over your self-talk, mental focus, and physiology. 

That’s where your wiggle room is. 

That’s where we can start hacking back into our brain. Not before. 

Breathe; blink; focus. 

drglenndoyle

Who are you “performing” for?

Who were you conditioned to “perform” for? 

Because something many trauma survivors have in common is that we were all conditioned to “perform” for somebody. 

Many of us were conditioned to believe that we did not have worth if we did not “perform.” 

Or we were not safe if we did not “perform.” 

Maybe we were conditioned to believe we would be abandoned if we did not “perform.” 

Our “performances” take many forms. Some of us were programmed we had to look a certain way. 

Some of us were heavily programmed to believe we had to weigh a certain amount. 

Maybe we were programmed to believe we had to be funny. 

Some of us were programmed to believe we had to be sexually available. 

Whatever it was, we were programmed to believe that our life literally depended on our “performance.” 

We couldn’t opt out. Not realistically, not safely. 

Fast forward to now: many of us believe that we still have to “perform.”

The person or entity that we were originally conditioned to believe we had to perform for may not even be in our lives anymore— may not even be alive anymore— yet we STILL believe we have to “perform” for them. 

Who it for you? 

For me, it tends to be a combination of my father, and my former mentor in the trauma treatment field. 

For as much as I develop my self esteem and work my trauma and addiction recovery, my brain still steers right back to imagining what ether or both of them would think or say about how my life and career are going. 

It’s no way to live. 

“Performing” for people from our past will exhaust and demoralize us. 

It’s important to know that we’re not “choosing” to “perform”— we were conditioned, programmed, brainwashed to believe we “have” to. 

Stopping it is going to take more than a one time decision. 

It’s going to require us to be patient, realistic, and self compassionate with ourselves when we stop “performing”— and our anxiety spikes. 

Because it will. 

Neither you nor I have to “perform” in the way we were once upon a time conditioned to believe we had to. 

We have worth and our lives and careers have value, whether or not our father or mentor would approve of them or not. 

But we’re going to have to sit with those “parts” of us that are so afraid of abandonment and punishment if we stop “performing.” We’re going to have to sit with those “parts,” in their uncertainty and their anxiety and their urge to just do what they were told they “had” to. 

Show time is over. 

And that’s okay. Really. 

drglenndoyle

Welcome to the sh*t show; we got fun and games.

So what do we actually do if the last day, or the last hour, was a sh*t show? 

Because sh*t shows happen, don’t they? 

Maybe we relapse. Maybe we self-harm. Maybe we get sucked into a shame spiral. 

It happens. Not “maybe;” this is the real world, and the sh*t show sometimes wins for a minute or two. 

First thing’s first, it’s not evidence you can’t do recovery. 


The sh*t show is actually part of recovery. Or dealing with it is, at any rate. 

Come on: how realistic was it ever going to be that you committed to trauma recovery, then everything was perfect or easy? 

That was never going to happen. 

You and I have been immersed in our trauma conditioning for years. Decades, most of us. 

That’s years and years of Trauma Brain, the internalized voices of our abusers and bullies, beating the sh*t out of us in our head. 

That’s years and years of neither our head nor our heart being truly safe for our “parts” or inner child. 

That was never going to go away all at once. 

The more realistic situation was always going to be reconditioning ourselves, one day, one hour, one decision— one MICRO decision— at a time. 

Which means we’re going to have rough moments. Moments where the sh*t show pops up for a return engagement. 

That actually doesn’t matter to our overall recovery arc. 

You know what does matter, though? How we respond. 

How we understand that rough moment. 

How we talk to ourselves during and after the sh*t show. 

How we direct our mental focus, or at last that sliver of mental focus we can influence, when the sh*t show pops up. 

What we do with our breathing and body in those rough moments. 

Those patterns really, really matter to our recovery arc. Those patterns CREATE our recovery arc, actually. 

Trauma responses are not “choices.” 

What realistic trauma recovery is all about are the choices we make when we realize what’s going on, and we actually have some options again.

That is to say: don’t overreact to the sh*t show. Don’t panic. Don’t get discouraged. 

Don’t amplify or prolong the sh*t show with what you do next. 

Breathe; blink; focus; and remember who you are and what you’re all about. Remember your recovery blueprint and plan. Check your impulse scale. 

The sh*t show is not the end of recovery. It is part of recovery. 

Every survivor who has ever realistically recovered from trauma has gotten slapped with the sh*t show. 

And every survivor who has ever recovered from trauma has learned how to respond to it by doing the next right thing, with compassion, patience, and realism. 

Easy does it. 

drglenndoyle

Your pain matters, too– not just your trauma.

There are going to be things that cause us pain, that aren’t directly related to what we consider our “trauma.” 

Those things can be easy to overlook or minimize. 

We can fall into the trap of believing that, because these pain points aren’t the ones we’re “working on” in our trauma recovery, that they don’t “count.” That they can wait. 

I’m going to tell you that all of your pain points, matter. 

I’m also going to tell you that a significant part of this trauma recovery process is about respecting your pain and your needs, regardless of their origin. 

Yes, recovery from trauma often involves processing the specific pain from identifiable moments in our past. 

But just as often, it is about healing and developing our relationship with ourselves, day to day, minute to minute— and that task often doesn’t directly involve engaging our past. Not consciously, anyway. 

Part of developing our relationship with ourselves is taking our pain seriously. 

That can be hard, when we don’t even understand or pain, or have trouble putting words to our pain. 

We survivors like to feel in “control.” We like being able to draw nice, straight lines between our past trauma and our current pain and needs. 

When we can’t do that, we get squirrely. And when we get squirrely, we get avoidant. 

And when we get avoidant, trauma recovery stalls. Every time. 

For my money, self-care is the backbone of realistic trauma recovery. 

I know, I know, a lot of people think the term “self care,” alongside the term “trigger,” is overused— but whether or not the term “self care” is actually overused, I can tell you it is definitely under-PRACTICED. 

The kind of self care that is the foundation of realstic trauma recovery means doing what we need to do every day to minimize and resolve pain points in our life— that is, attending to and developing our actual quality of life. 

Put another way: pain in your life that is not directly related to the events and relationships that evoked your CPTSD is STILL valid, still deserves attention and care and self-compassion.

You are not taking away from your trauma recovery by attending to those pain points. 

To the contrary: every time you take care of yourself, every time you do something concrete to feel less pain and more lasting, authentic pleasure in your life, you are working your recovery. 

I’ve said it before: so much of real world trauma recovery doesn’t even involve engaging with our trauma feelings or memories. 

But it ALWAYS involves treating our relationship with ourselves as the most important bond we have— and a relationship that absolutely must be nurtured and protected at every opportunity. 

drglenndoyle

CPTSD is a lying liar that lies.

CPTSD will straight up lie to us. 

Thats’ what CPTSD does best, actually. Lie. 

It lies to us about who we are. 

It lies to us about what we deserve. 

It lies to us about what we can do. 

Survivors know this, but everyone needs to know this. 

CPTSD specifically gets in our head and f*cks with our beliefs. 

People have this idea that PTSD is about what happened to us, and it is— but CPTSD is mostly defined by what it gets us to believe. The lies it gets us to believe. 

That’s why it ruins our relationships. Or threatens to, anyway. 

That’s why CPTSD f*cks with our ability to work. 

It’s why CPTSD has us self harming and self sabotaging all day. 

Because of the BS (Belief Systems) that inescapable, long term, relationship-flavored trauma installs in our head and in our heart. 

CPTSD is about more than flashbacks. 

It’s about more than hypervigilance, although CPTSD survivors can experience both flashbacks and hypervigilance. 

It’s about our self concept. The lies CPTSD gets us to believe about our very essence. 

This is what so many people don’t understand. 

Exposure therapy doesn’t undo this. 

Superficial cognitive therapy doesn’t undo this. Not entirely, not deeply. 

CPTSD and DID start to heal when we understand that this is overwhelmingly about our relationship with ourselves— and that the key to our healing is creating realistic safety inside our head and heart. 

CPTSD lies. 

CPTSD is probably lying to you right now, as you read this, actually. 

It’s probably telling you, “this doesn’t apply to you.”

It might be telling you, “you’re the exception.” 

It’ll tell you all sorts of things to get you to not think about things that matter to your recovery. 

Trauma Brain, the internalized voices of our abusers and bullies is nothing if not persistent. 

But remember: it lies. 

It lies, and it’s happy to use its lies to make you feel like garbage. Maybe even to get you suicidal. 

But once you understand how full of sh*t Trauma Brain is, you can’t un-know it. 

Nor do you want to. 

CPTSD is a lying liar that lies. 

Don’t mistake it for anything resembling your gut instinct. It’s not. 

Though it will do an amazing impression of it sometimes. 

drglenndoyle

Go ahead. Hear some voices.

On today’s edition of Realistic Sustainable Trauma Recovery, I’m going to ask you to hear voices. 

But not just any voices. 

Certainly not the voices you’re used to hearing in your head— the voices of your abuses and bullies, which I call Trauma Brain. 

No, you’ve head those voices enough. On repeat, for years. So much so that you might not even realize those voices are still coming at you, every day, every hour. 

Instead, I want you to install some voices to listen to. 

I want you to hear the voices of mentors. 

I want you to hear the voices of guides. 

I want you to hear the voices of therapists who have had helpful things to say. 

(Maybe not the voices of therapists who let you down or made you feel worse.)

The voices you hear don’t have to be “real” people or entities. They can be fictional characters, figures from mythology, or other people or entities that don’t have “real” voices in the “real” world. 

Maybe the voices you need are voices from historical figures. Once upon a time I was way, way into presidential history, and I got a lot of mileage out of communing with presidents from decades ago. 

Maybe the voices you need are figures from your spiritual tradition that are no longer physically here. Many people describe “hearing” the voices of saints or evangelists that offer them hope and guidance. 

Maybe I’m even one of your voices. Chances are, if you’re reading this, you probably know my toolbox and worldview well enough to guess at what I might tell you in a given situation.

Whoever your “voices” are, I want you to feel safe with them. 

Whoever they are, I want them to evoke in you feelings of realistic hope and measurable calm. 

You remember a few years ago when “What Would Jesus Do” bracelets were all the rage? I’m asking you to think similarly— only your mantra is going to be, “What Would (Insert Your Inspiring or Comforting Mentor Here) Say?” 

Have them mentally on your shoulder. 

Have them mentally in your ear. 

Have them handy, to turn to when Trauma Brain wants to steamroll you with old voices saying old sh*t that only results in you feeling like garbage. 

Think of your “voices” as your cheering section, your support crew, your advisory committee. 

We are talking to ourselves all day, every day, in our heads— and we’re often doing so in “voices” that aren’t quite ours. 

There’s no reason those voices should be voices we find painful. 

Choose who you want in your cheering section. Choose who you want having your back. 

Then, practice “hearing” them in daily situations. Get good at listening for them on purpose. 

This is how we reprogram trauma conditioning. 

This is how we choose something other than our old, default tapes. 

drglenndoyle

So we’re vulnerable. And?

You are vulnerable. So am I.

We don’t have to love it. I don’t. 

But we do have to accept it. We do have to be realistic about it. 

Maybe you and I are not vulnerable in the same ways we were back then— or, maybe we are. 

We want to imagine that growing up negates our vulnerability, but it doesn’t. Not totally. 

Personally, I’ve come to understand that far more and bigger problems are created by denying our vulnerability than the fact of our vulnerability. 

If we deny and disown our vulnerability, we cannot manage it. 

If we deny and disown our vulnerability, we cannot realistically reduce it. 

After all, are we going to manage or reduce something we don’t even acknowledge? No, we’re not. 

Accepting the fact of our vulnerability doesn’t mean liking it. It doesn’t mean just letting it exist without trying to change it. 

It’s not good to wander around out there with our vulnerability on full display. 

It’s also not good to pretend we’re invulnerable. 

You are not from Krypton. 

(And even if you were,  you’d be vulnerable to Kryptonite and magic.)

So we’re vulnerable. And? 

It’s not our fault or failing that we’re vulnerable. Vulnerability is the human condition. 

It’s also not our fault that some people habitually try to exploit our vulnerability. That’s always going to happen, and it has nothing to do with what we’re wearing (metaphorically or literally). 

We are more than our vulnerability, by the way. 

And our vulnerability is also key to our authenticity— which is key to our realistic trauma recovery. 

(Seriously: no one in the history of humanity has been able to be authentic without also being vulnerable. Vulnerability is kind of the price of admission to authenticity.) 

We are vulnerable. 

And the sooner we accept that fact— as well as what it does and doesn’t mean about our “character’— the sooner we can design a realistic recovery blueprint around it. 

drglenndoyle

Just notice.

As we work our trauma recovery, we get less attached to who we’ve had to be and what we’ve had to do to survive. And that can be bittersweet. 

It’s not that we necessarily “like” those patterns and coping mechanisms. Some of them we very much dislike, actually. 

But we feel somehow…loyal to them. 

After all, those patterns and coping mechanisms got us through some gnarly sh*t. 

It’s one reason why we can get more than a little defensive when people get on our case about our habits— it’s not that we necessarily like those habits either, but those people don’t understand how important those habits have been to us. 

Nor do those people often understand how afraid we are to give those patterns and coping mechanisms up.

You’re going to run into plenty of people who will try to tell you that giving up old patters that no longer serve us “should” be easy, or at last straightforward. 

After all, if it’s not serving us anymore, if it’s creating more problems than it solves, why are we hanging on to it? 

 Because loyalty. And more than a little bit of fear. 

The reality is, shifting away from old patterns and tools and habits is complicated. And we have to let it be complicated. 

It’s not going to work to try to shame or pressure ourselves out of those old patterns. 

What we can do is just notice as we start to be less attached to them. 

What we can do is meet our own complicated and bittersweet feelings with compassion and patience. Which, I know, isn’t always the biggest strength of us trauma survivors. 

Go easy on yourself. 

None of this “recovery” thing is particularly easy or obvious. And that very much applies to how we surrender old patterns. 

Just pay attention. Just notice. 

Just notice as those old patterns and coping mechanisms and habits feel less like you— day by day, hour by hour. 

No pressure. No rush. 

It’s a long walk back to Eden. Don’t sweat the small stuff. 

drglenndoyle

Don’t contort yourself. It’s not worth it.

Harming ourselves to conform to someone else’s expectations is never worth it. 

It never supports the safety we think it will. Not really. 

Contorting to fit someone else’s image of us does not make them like us. Not really, not authentically. 

It may make them temporarily like the role we’re playing for a minute— but if that role isn’t sustainable, we’re setting ourselves up for a bigger problem than we had. 

If you think people don’t like when you don’t conform to their expectations, wait till you see what they do when we signal that we’re one thing they like…then we revert to something they don’t like or understand. 

Roleplaying to try to get them to like us is just not worth it. 

It trashes our self-esteem, and for what? 

It communicates to our “parts” and inner child that we’re not acceptable or lovable as we are, and for what? 

I understand: of course we WANT “them” to like us. Hell, we want everyone to like us. Part of us really believes that if we can just figure that equation out, just push the right buttons in everybody around us to get them to like us, maybe, maybe, we’ll feel safe and secure. 

But we won’t. 

Because deep down we’ll know: that’s built on an illusion. An inauthentic, unsustainable illusion. 

Roleplaying to try to get them to like us actually increases our anxiety. 

It’s actually worse when it works for a minute. Then the stakes of the facade are even HIGHER. Then we have something to lose. 

F*ck all of this. 

You are working a trauma recovery that prioritizes authenticity and sustainability. You do not have the time or the bandwidth to play some role, to pretend to be someone, to contort yourself to fit into someone else’s “box.” 

You are valuable and lovable just as you are. 

Maybe not everybody can appreciate your value— which is true of anything of value, by the way, there are people who don’t appreciate its worth— but that does not mean their lack of appreciation means anything real. 

Don’t contort yourself. 

Don’t twist yourself into a pretzel trying to be “their” ideal anything. 

The only way to build a realistic, sustainable trauma recovery is by being you. 

That’s a harder truth than many people appreciate, but this is how it works. 

Breathe; blink; focus. 

drglenndoyle

Positive thinking won’t save us from CPTD– but.

Positive thinking isn’t going to save you or me from CPTSD. 

I wish it would. 

I wish I could tell you that all this CPTSD bullsh*t was a bad dream, that we could think our way out of. 

I wish I could tell you that all you or I had to do to recover from CPTSD is to fix our attitude. Because attitude is everything, and everything is attitude…right? 

Well. Not quite. 

Positive thinking doesn’t save anyone from anything. 

That said, what we think does matter. 

I’m not saying that we can think our way out of CPTSD, or that the only reason anyone suffers from CPTSD is because they’re “choosing” the “wrong” thoughts. 

(Though I’m sure someone in the comments who didn’t read this far into the post is probably going to say that. Stay toxic.) 

What I am saying is, we have a little bit of wiggle room in our thoughts. 

We have a little bit of wiggle room with how we talk to ourselves. 

We have a little bit of wiggle room in how we direct our mental focus. 

Mind you, that wiggle room may seem impossible tiny some days.

Some days it may very much feel like CPTSD is hijacking every goddamn thought in our goddamn head. 

(By the way, shout out to everyone who has ever asked if, strictly speaking, I “need” to use profanity on my posts. It’s a very f*cking good question that I will f*cking think about very f*cking hard, and get back to you. Thanks for reading.) 

I’m not saying we we have complete freedom inside our head or heart. 

I’m saying we have wiggle room— and, if we’re serious about trauma recovery, we need to take advantage of that wiggle room. 

If we use that wiggle room to focus on and amplify our limitations and our deficits— that’s going to have consequences in how we feel and function. 

Understand: negative thinking doesn’t CREATE CPTSD— but it can sure as hell be its biggest cheerleader and benefactor. 

Conversely, if we use that wiggle room to focus on and amplify our strengths and resources— that’s going to have consequences in how we feel and function as well. 

It will not “solve” all, or probably any, of our problems, and it will definitely not “cure” our PTSD. 

Positive thinking will not save us. 

But it will support our recovery a hell of a lot more realistically than negative thinking. 

I’m not saying bullsh*t yourself. 

I’m not saying “good vibes only.” 

I’m not saying your habitual thinking is your fault, or the “cause” of your pain. 

I’m just saying, get mindful and intentional about how you use your cognitive “wiggle room.” 

I’m saying that, for all the choices we DON’T have when it comes to self talk and mental focus, there are absolutely some choices we DO have. 

And I don’t believe in throwing away ANY tool that could potentially help us crawl out of this pit called CPTSD.