Submitted by MistWeaver80 t3_10m5pqz in science
Reply to comment by autistic_bard444 in Childhood abuse may alter brain function in adults. Study found people who experienced abuse during childhood (but not adolescence) experienced altered functioning in the brain for systems associated with perceptual processing and attention. by MistWeaver80
I might be sharing something you already know, but maybe you or other people reading this thread don’t know about this, but have you ever looked into DBT (Dialectical Behavioral Therapy)? It can be helpful for a lot of things but is really optimized for Borderline Personality Disorder, PTSD, and Complex PTSD.
It requires a bit more time investment than other kinds of therapy (usually a 1 hour session a week plus a 1-2 hour separate segment called skills training, which a lot of places offer virtually nowadays) but it’s not too crazy of a time investment. There’s been a lot of research verifying that DBT is really effective, especially for these sorts of things. Basically a while back, there was CBT (a pretty common type of therapy), but they found it fell short for people with Borderline Personality Disorder and Complex PTSD especially, so they really reworked it over a number of years and developed a more optimized approach for these things
I just wanted to share this since with therapy, you tend to see a bunch of acronyms and styles of therapy and it’s easy to get lost and overwhelmed with what they all mean, but for Borderline Personality Disorder and Complex PTSD, it’s very much the gold standard for efficacy. Granted, finding a therapist you actually mesh with and like is still very important, but it’ll be very worth looking into “Full Model DBT”
I’ve learned a lot about this as someone close to me has struggled with the sorts of things it’s especially good for, and I hope maybe this can help point you or someone else reading this some help
DBT can help a lot with symptom management, and is a good starter therapy for CPTSD for this reason, but EMDR and inner child or schema therapy will do a better job of addressing the root cause of a person's symptoms.
It's unfortunate that there isn't a one size fits all treatment for stuff like this, but at least stuff like inner child therapy, DBT distress tolerance skills and journaling are all pretty helpful for me at this point. I'll take what I can get. (I went through DBT like 8-9 years ago, but I started seeing a trauma therapist in October.).
I personally found the ABCDE theory from Rational Emotive Behavioral Therapy to be helpful as well. The basic idea is that a lot of mental health issues, grief, trauma, etc are caused by our reaction to or our beliefs about certain events in our lives; so if we change how we see those events, we can eliminate the problem. It's at least been very helpful for me in terms of reframing stuff that's happening now, and putting it into perspective.
Emotional accounting can also be helpful, but for some reason journaling has taken over this skill for me. I was never really able to make it the consistent habit that I wanted it to be.
Disclaimer: I am far from healed, or even doing well, but I'm doing better and this stuff is a large part of why.
Edit: I also went through a CBT workbook for PTSD, and that also helped a lot with symptom management.
Edit #2: to clarify about DBT -- it's helped my self esteem and self image a lot, but it has never been able to do much once I get triggered and that switch flips in my brain that takes me back to my past. I still use DBT techniques for symptom management, but they're not my only tools.
I think it helped me a lot, but what's worked has been kind of ingrained into my behavior, and what hasn't worked has been dropped. I still think that it isn't going to be as good as other therapeutic modalities to treat the core issues behind CPTSD, but your mileage may vary.
If someone has CPTSD, they should see a trauma therapist; and someone specializing in trauma will be able to help you go in the right direction. For a lot of people, DBT is at least a pretty darn good start. It is 3:30 AM and I am probably contradicting my own earlier points.
EMDR saved my life, I have cptsd and ocd.
I'm gonna ask my psychiatrist about whether my insurance will pay for me to get EMDR and see my current therapist at the same time (since I'd have to see someone else for EMDR). Fingers crossed, I guess.
I'm pretty much open to anything that will realistically help, not that EMDR is anything crazy. I like that it's basically a way to take advantage of loopholes in how your brain works. It's neat.
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