maia1234

Amy,
Glad you are doing better. We all have to learn to forgive ourselves for our failures. We did the best at the time. So move forward, rebuild your strength and mentally and physically.

You will do great!!!! (((((((((((((((hugs))))))))))))))))))

Carlotta

It is so good to have you back Amy {hugs}}} and a good reminder to me that codependency is no joke and that it could lead me right back to alcohohell.

amy55

Thank you for this, this got me thinking again. As a codie, I always felt like I was weak. I needed approval. I got approval, I just didn't get it from the person I wanted it from. I'm somewhat ACOA also. Approval meant a lot to me. It's taking me a long time to type this, because I'm thinking about this.

I think sometimes as codies we don't see the strength that we possess. Really look at all we have been through. Most of us have been through hell and back, and we survived. I can still be codie if I want, but I can apply it to me instead. I can fix me. Need to think some more about this.

Can't go back to alcohohell.

I've been thinking about this PTSD. I am still giving him control over me. When I got that first email from him, I went back into the "situation". I freaked out. I felt like here you are trying to harm me again, and my fight mechanism immediately arose. I know it's "fight or flight", but I was only left in the fight mode. Felt like I had to fight for survival, I was suffocating. I dealt with many other situations since my divorce, and I came here, and I figured things out, and I'm now okay with all that. I think I never tried to figure out how to deal with, or not deal with the ex. Didn't think I would have to again. After all, I moved 3 hours away from him, and bought into a gated community.

Then he is retiring, need to split pensions, and he comes out with something that would take close to $10,000 a year from me. Rationally I knew he couldn't do it, but that PTSD kicked in and I just needed to prove my rightness. In doing so, I backed myself into a corner. I was reliving my past, I had to stop that. I drank and numbed myself. But, I had the divorce decree to back me up. I didn't even think of that, I was arguing my own rightness, expecting him to see it, when I knew he wouldn't, or didn't want to, or he just wanted to argue. I voluntarily engaged in this.

Need to do some more thinking.

(((((((((((((((hugs)))))))))))))))))
amy

SabrinaQ

Hi amy,
I hope you're feeling a bit better now,

you're an important person on this forum!!

by the way, I've heard good things about a therapy called EMDR, for PTSD.
Maybe you alredy know about it.

Take care now.

amy55

I was thinking a lot about this today, perhaps too much.

I don't like the label PTSD. I put myself in that situation. I could have gotten out. I volunteered for where I was. Yes, it was abusive, but I was a volunteer. Abusive situations, I think, at least to be is a systematic way of breaking someone down. Almost like brainwashing. You tend to then go towards primal survival. You just want to live.

I think when they told me I had PTSD then I could say, ok, well that's it. I can get pills for that and be ok. But I didn't want to take the pills anymore. I was away from him, why should I need them anymore. I thought everything was OK because I was free of the situation.

I don't think I ever accepted the notion that he can't control me. It became my life, it's the only thing I knew. I never learned that "he has no more control over me, and he never did. I just knew I was divorced, which I thought meant free.

Going to contemplate this some more.

Oh, I did hear about EMDR, I may consider that, I just thought that since he was out of my life, my problems would be gone.

PS: I'm thinking now that I was using PTSD to excuse my behavior and my actions, and my drinking

Rosiepetal

Welcome back Amy, hugs.

KKE

Hi Amy, I've not been on here for a while myself. I hope you're ok and glad you have been able to reach out for help. For what it's worth you helped me so much in the past. Thank you :-)

ShootingStar1

I don't think you have to dismiss PTSD as an excuse to rationalize your behavior. If you were traumatized, and it sounds like you were, then you have PTSD. Along with that can go gaslighting, Stockholm syndrome, and just brainwashing over time to get you to believe less in yourself. You might find some similarities to what happened to me in my earlier posts and in the sticky "What Abuse Is".

There is a book about PTSD that I found very helpful: In An Unspoken Voice: How the Body Releases Trauma and Restores Goodness.

It took me a long time to understand how abused I let myself be, and how much I allowed my own voice to be subjugated to my now XAH. It is so good that you realize that you have different choices now.

ShootingStar1

amy55

I can't allow myself to have the luxury of blaming PTSD for my actions. I drank, I binge drank for about a month more or less. That's on me. I can say that I was stressed but I still drove and I still picked up that case of beer a few times, and that is on me. I wanted to numb myself and not feel the pain, and I did that. It was my decision. I own up to this.

I will never disagree with a diagnosis of PTSD, because that is what forced me to leave the marriage. There is no diagnosis for Stockholm Syndrome, aka, Battered Wife Syndrome. Gaslighting, no diagnosis for that either. I do know whats right or wrong now, or at least I think I do.

Drinking is a big "NO". I read books where you are more prone to drinking if you are in an abusive relationship, or if you have PTSD. I can't give myself that excuse anymore. It's not working for me. I'm going to check out that book because I have many emotions that I can't express, many doubts about myself, questions about myself. I want to be able to express my emotions, my thoughts and be ok. I have put up so many walls, and I tend to not let people get close to me.

One thing that I don't know if it is normal or not, and perhaps someone here can help me with this, is I can talk about my past relationship, but I totally disassociate myself from it. It's like it happened to someone else, and I am telling their story. I would like to know if other people feel this way, or if this is something I need to work on. I feel it's sort of on the line well, my neighbor told me this or that, what do you guys here think about this. Guess that kinda means like 3rd person.

amy55

Ok, that might have came out jumbled. I think if even I read that I wouldn't understand that non-sense.

My question is, what is normal?

What is normal detachment?

When you post here and you talk about your past experience, how do you do it?

I put myself back into that place, and I feel like I am on a balcony, alone, just watching everything. I can clearly describe things, but I feel like I'm not there. Like it didn't happen to me, yet I know that it did. I don't have any emotions attached to it anymore. It is was it is, it was what it was. Is this detachment, or disassociation?

theuncertainty

Well, for me, there are times where I can talk about AXH and experience and tell it like it is _my_ story. And there are times that it feels like I'm watching it all through a dirty brown window (I think I've mentioned this window here before), so it's not really like me experiencing it, but me watching it... But in thinking a bit more, maybe it's certain aspects of the abuse that get put behind the window. And I _think_ more of it used to be there, but isn't now... I'll have to examine it a bit more.

And you know, I just found myself researching dissociation, because I doubted that how I see/feel/experience the abuse now when thinking about it would be classified as dissociation. It's weird the ways I find myself trying to convince myself I wasn't _really_ affected by it, or minimizing it.

Hugs, hugs, hugs. Take gentle care of yourself

theuncertainty

Oh, and based on my weird search on dissociation: derealization is a type of dissociation - where one feels separated from the event/reality by an immaterial something; like there is no emotional connection to what happened/is happening. Which sounds like my window or your balcony. And dissociation can range from mild detachment to severe detachment... So maybe it's all in the degree of unconnectedness. IDK.

And it's a defense mechanism. So, while it serves a purpose when dealing with the abuse, if it kicks up in other areas of my life, it doesn't really help. And, I guess, if it's not helping, or when I decide I might be ready to try to get past it, it may not need to be 'normal'?