How to know who you are

[mitrekov]

Hello,

I am struggling now with the boundary between my real self and the C-PTSD.

I realized that psychological abuse in early childhood for a long time resulted in shaping my personality growth. How can you know what is the real you ad what are beliefs implemented by the abuse?  I am lost in myself since i started to uncover hidden strings that affect my life decisions, implanted by the abuser as a part of his 'education'.

[Eyessoblue]

Hi, I ask myself this question regularly, I feel like my personality doesn't belong to me it's not the real me it's with everything that's happened it's what I've become. I believe I'm not this 'frozen introvert' who can't speak up for herself but deep down I'm a fiery extrovert waiting to tell everyone who I really am. Do you disassociate like I do? That makes it even harder because when I'm faced with things I don't like I have to take myself off to my safe place and hide til I'm ready to come back out. I'm hopefully starting therapy with a properly trained trauma therapist soon and really hoping she can help find the real' me' instead of what I'm hiding away.

[mitrekov]

Hello,
Yes i understand you very well. Fear takes over very easily, it feels like you are trapped by it and can't overcome it. My persona experience and advice is to NOT try to overcome the feelings of paralyzing fear, because fight against yourself does not help. The only thing that helped me was to fully accept the fear and actually embrace these negative feelings such as dissociation, anger, frustration and fear and try to find the sources of this fear hidden deep in your mind. Search for causes, specific phrases, people, location, activities, it can be anything that when you close your eyes and say out loud makes you cringe. The important part is to accept the feelings at first, without it you can't overcome them.
Like when the wound is infected , you need to open it up even more and clean everything out, only after that it can heal properly.

[Eyessoblue]

Thank you, your advice makes a lot of sense.

[mitrekov]

I'm glad    i wish you a lot of success in the therapy, just be brave

[sanmagic7]

hey, mitrekov,

i'm struggling with this right now as well.  have just seemed to shed a huge layer of c-ptsd stuff, and finding out all the neg. thoughts/feelings about myself underneath that i never really felt or allowed in the past.  it feels daunting at the moment. 

i like your suggestions about looking for what's underneath the fear.  i am going to look into that.  thanks.  keep taking care of you.  hugs.

[joyful]

I'm struggling with this a lot too. I feel like I have no personality! I feel like I gave everything up to please my abuser and now there's nothing left...
Mitrekov, I also really liked what you said about what's underneath fear. I need to push myself to go to that place more...

[Wife#2]

This is a really good thread. I agree that we need to look under the fear, anger, or any strong emotion, to find the root cause. Under there, even before we clean out the infection of bad memories, we can begin to see our authentic selves emerge.

What makes us tick is a good indication of who we are. As in: I get angry when I hear about injustice. So, am I an angry person or do I have a strong desire that people do right by each other and pay consequences when they don't? I think it's the latter. That's one piece of me. Lot's more to explore!