CPTSD shreds our identity.
This is one of the hardest things for many survivors to express or explain.
The symptoms and struggles of CPTSD are not primarily about what happened to us. They’re about what happened to us impacted how we understand ourselves, how we communicate with ourselves, what we believe about ourselves.
If CPTSD was just about what happened, we could heal that by working exclusively with the memories of what happened.
But it’s just not that simple.
We could erase or transform every trauma memory we have— and the damage of CPTSD would still be deeply entrenched.
We would still struggle with our self-esteem.
We would stills struggle with our relationships.
We would still struggle with managing our money and our time.
Those are all things linked to our identity and our relationship with ourselves— which is what CPTSD really goes after.
Realistic, sustainable recovery has to focus on not just what happened to us— but also who we are.
In realistic recovery we have to develop tools to understand and communicate with ourselves in ways that support our authenticity— instead of conforming to others’ expectations or pressure.
The reality is, we humans are not really taught how to intentionally develop our identity.
Most of us, traumatized or not, are living out someone else’s vision of who we “should” be.
For some people, that’s not a problem— if they grew up with adults around them who nurtured a positive, proactive concept of who they should be.
But we survivors of complex trauma grew up with something different, didn’t we?
Many people reading this grew up with people mocking them. Or gaslighting them. Or ignoring them.
What results is an identity that is patchwork of negative ideas and stereotypes and assumptions that has almost no relationship to who we actually are.
Then we wonder why we’re such a sh*t show in relationships, at work, in the world?
Some people are confused and frustrated that CPTSD recovery, at least as I teach and support the concept, isn’t entirely focused on eradicating trauma memories.
They don’t want to get into issues of who they are and how they relate to who they are.
But that’s where the real pain is, and that’s where the real movement in recovery is.
That’s why it’s so important in realistic trauma recovery to broaden the conversation from wha happened to us us, to who we are and what we want our personality and life to be about.
CPTSD recovery is identity work, grief work, and life development work— not just memory work.
And it all keeps coming back to, “who do you want to be?”
Breathe. Blink. Focus.
And look inward, without judgment or rush.
