Tearing off the mask- PTSD and a new start

[null24]

When i was 18, i was nearly murdered in my own home when i came home during a robbery. I was beaten and tortured for over three hours, at one point being told by the guy that i was " being taught a lesson on terror ". I escaped after being hogtied face down in my bathtub. I didn't know the guy, i lived in a crap neighborhood in Atlanta. I ran like hell all the way to the opposite end of the country. I thought i had ' dealt' with it, at least i no longer kick in the front door to my apartment with a knife in hand and cautiously open every door inside the same way before i sit down. But i didn't. I hadn't been back in that place since i walked out.

Last weekend to make a very long story short, i was set up and robbed by some kids with a shotgun. They didn't hurt me, and really didn't get much from me, but the experience has ripped all the masks i have been wearing off, allowing me to see underneath.

It's an opportunity, really, I'm actually glad it happened. I never did the work around it, not having access to resources to do so. I self medicated with heroin and other things and the only mental health i accessed was the common drug treatment available here in America to the poor- drugs i don't tolerate and ineffective treatment. I'm sorry if this is vague, I'm too tired to realty expound on this. I have not slept in four or five days. I just can't right now.

This whole experience has validated for me in a big way the path I'm walking and it's veracity. While i realized that I've only been studying and haven't done the work yet, without the things i have done using these medicines, i don't think things would be okay at all right now. And while I'm a mess, scared as hell and often breaking down in tears in public and things right now, I'm... Something. I don't want to say hopeful, but this time, for the first time i know what to do.

Whenever I've tried to access this stuff, i dive into the pain only to reach a wall of blackness i can't penetrate. The fear is so big, the revelations about humanity that i received at gunpoint too shatteringly painful. It's not the robber that hurt me, i finality realize. It's all the people who were supposed to help that didn't and abandoned me. The neighbor who asked if i wanted to f##k him when i knocked on his door looking for a phone, the cop who told me he was taking a break when a 18 year old bloody and bruised boy asked for help, the parents that didn't believe me. I had learned the lesson in terror and what i learned was that the world is made up of rapists. That's what hurts, and that's what I've never been able to face. I have the resources to do this now, to fall apart in a big nasty mess and separate the useful from the poison. I'm ready. I thank the universe for providing this opportunity for healing.

Thank you for listening, i don't need any advice or anything, i just need to let this out, again. Thanks for existing y'all.

 

[3rdI]

christ on a bike null, im glad you dont want advice cos i dont have any to give, ive heard about going through the ringer but you seem to have been kicked in nuts by life more times than is necessary for anyone.

only thing i can offer is my admiration that you are still standing and able to look upon these events in some kind of advantageous light. you seem to be on the right path and hope that you can keep your chin up, which i imagine is hard work sometimes. If i could come buy you beer and lend a hand i would.

keep battling mate, dont let them grind you down, the suns on its way up.

 

[null24]

Yeah man and don't get me wrong, i don't wonder why. Nothing ever just happens to me. I take full accountability for the actions that put me in these situations. But really it all started back in Atlanta, I'm hoping this is the full circle that finally will allow me to heal from this and do the pattern. That's what i was trying to get across. Because yeah man, I've been gone a long time and now I'm finally ready to come home.

 

[lsDxMdmaddicThc]

Wow, that is a rough story...
The strength you need is within.
If you've made it this far, then you can persevere though anything.
The best advice I have is to be strong and keep pushing on...
But don't be too hard on yourself.
Best wishes from me.

 

[Lichen]

I am so sorry you have experienced these terrible experiences.

Have you ever sought help from any professional - such as someone experienced who deals specifically with victims of PTSD?

I wish you only the best in your journey towards healing; time is the great healer of them all. Tread carefully my friend.

 

[null24]

This place is one of my foundational support systems that has never let me down. And along with that, i have in place this huge group of locals who are all working this path, and we are organizing as a public advocacy group and have incorporated as a 501(3) c non profit. I'm on the board and the work we are doing is very important to me and I'm very proud of it. I haven't said much here about it due to promotion rules, but it's cool.

Through that, everything is in place. I have the outside resources to do this work, for once i know what to do.

It's just hard, and while it hurts like hell, it is the pain of revealing, not just a well of sorrow. There's light here, this night has been going on for years, the dawn is coming. Some things are just too hard to bear alone, I'm so glad i have people now. And yes, i do have access to a professional, one who is a member of our group, who understands my world view and who has experience with deep trauma. It's all in place, nothing happens without reason or purpose.

Jesus. There's so much here. It's funny how this has revealed to me the depths of my sorrow with clarity. The three main issues that have plagued me all manifested this, poverty, isolation and the PTSD, they are all interrelated and... this is all perfect.

I know I'm loved, i just need to forgive and love me before I can return it. Yeah, it may be sad that so many years were wasted, but what this world needs are survivors, and I'm one. There are many who suffer just like i do, unable or unwilling to depend on the broken system and who flounder. All of us doing this work on this path have a responsibility to those people. They are behind us, looking desperately for light. Be an example,

F##k pain. Live.

 

[Lichen]

You are fighting the good fight.

 

[Pandora]

null24,

Thank you so much for your bravery and for sharing this. Also, for taking the time to write enough that it gives the reader a good sense of what you've gone through, what you are going through and why.

I'm so sorry these violence riddled experiences happened to you. You got some hard lessons out of it, but based on my own journey with extreme trauma due to violence then again due to loss (deaths) and then later on more violence that was less hardcore (choke hold from behind by a guy who had 18 inches and 120 pounds on me - I am a slim arthritic woman who has chronic pain), the lessons I took away from these things were very similar to your conclusions.

Basically I had to go through the entire grief/loss process with no outside support and with a very insensitive and mis-understanding husband. Sometimes you have to go through it when no physical person has died. I lost whatever innocence or trust I had, anyone I got to know or like or love I honestly expected them to die soon and frankly it took me decades to get a shred of sensibility back. The decades passing taught me that people do die but not everyone - it happens and it's relatively spread out and the reasons are myriad.

Regarding the violence - it's funny I got over those incidents faster than the loss. I just came to understand at a fundamental level for many things in this world I have no control. I went through the grief/loss process for my sense of control.

Regarding the extensive opiate drug addiction I developed - For me it was literally one night looking in the mirror and asking myself if I wanted to live the rest of my life this way and realizing the answer was F NO. I tapered down, then I literally locked myself in a room for three days with a bucket and some towels for my mess. Oh man did I feel great after that. Taking a shower, feeling so horney, desireing so much food that tasted so darn good.

But for me the insidious part of my detox was the phsycological phase that came after the physical detox. It lasted a solid 6-8 months for me. All I could think of was dosing. It got better after a number of weeks, but then anytime anything went wrong, any stressor that popped up in my life - ahh dosing would sure help this - fighting that temptation was quite a battle. But, well worth it because when I came out on the other side, I thought about a bunch of things other than dosing opiates. :d . Eventually there came a time when I didn't want or think about them at all, other than in a respectful medical context.

So, just in case anyone is wondering what exactly the grief process is: Denial, Anger, Depression, Bargaining and Acceptane. BUT, it is important to take note that the process is a personal process not a computer program. The steps can happen in any order and the person dealing with the loss may go backwards and forwards within their process in order to get to any sort of place that feels healing.

I want to applaud you for your strenth, your honesty and your bravery. To be honest, I don't see much of that in this world. To be brutally sexist, I don't see much of that in men in this world.

I am so glad you have found a support network and that you do have one-to-one support. It sounds to me like you are not going to sit and brood during your time but you are actively doing the work. All I can advise is that you continue doing what you are doing. It feels to me like you are on a very healing path. It also feels to me like you may accoplish in years more than I accomplished in decades. So again I applaud you for all of this, for being a REAL man.

Please keep us posted and don't hesitate to ask for one on one PM's in chat. I think a lot of Nexians have been through PTSD and hard drug addiction and have a good sense of the territory. We are not alone and acknowledging our own suffering as well as that of others is a very healing thing. Working on loving one's self, on taking care of one's self, on pampering one's self can be SO hard in this culture. But it is the RIGHT things to do in my opinion. I do know these things are not valued in our culture, but I see you as healthy and our culture as toxically ill.

Thank you Sir for your sharing and your inspiration. :thumb_up: 8) :d

 

[null24]

you know, i feel a twitch of shame every time i post one of these tragedies. Like said above, I'm sure it looks like i cannot manage my life at all, and in many ways that's true, i hope this is the door I've been looking for to change that. But i feel it's my purpose and reasonability to post, and to document all this so that maybe someone else who struggles similarly can find solace in knowing that this can be done. Same with all of you, and the people here like you, Pandora, who have fought a fight for life within darkness, and won. This has almost destroyed me in so many ways so many times.

I've been blind to my own pain. revisiting the trauma revealed it. It wasn't the stranger with the shotgun in my mouth, but more the abandonment by those who had known me my entire life. That was too hard to bear. Even peeing the layers back and looking as deeply into my soul with the use of our medicines, i had been unable to pierce it. I had put up so many walls to protect myself, and I DIDN'T EVEN KNOW! I thought all this time my inability to love, to be intimate was some deficiency inherent to me, but i see now what i fear and why i don't let anyone in. I'm afraid they'll look at me sideways in a life or death situation and leave me. That's why i began interacting with junkies and criminals, the motives with them is pure and upfront, i can see it. The knife is on their belt not hidden waiting for me to turn. Usually

I thank the manifesting universe for this. And i thank y'all for walking with me down this convoluted road. It leads home, that's all i know. Where that is in this strange land and who lives there i don't know, but it's my home and they are my people. I love you all so much, the nexus doesn't know how many times it's saved my life, literally.

 

[TGO]

"Out of the night that covers me,
Black as the Pit from pole to pole,
I thank whatever gods may be
For my unconquerable soul.

In the fell clutch of circumstance
I have not winced nor cried aloud.
Under the bludgeonings of chance
My head is bloody, but unbowed.

Beyond this place of wrath and tears
Looms but the Horror of the shade,
And yet the menace of the years
Finds, and shall find, me unafraid.

It matters not how strait the gate,
How charged with punishments the scroll,
I am the master of my fate:
I am the captain of my soul."

"Invictus" By William Ernest Henley

Be strong, Null. Life is all sorts of messed up but you know that and experienced that on levels that not many of us have. Don't be ashamed to share something like this. It takes courage. Hold your head up high and move valiantly into the next chapter of your life! Much love and peace, truly.

 

[Doc Buxin]

Godspeed null!

 

[jamie]

I hope you can find some peace, null.

 

[universecannon]

Sending much love to you null

 

[null24]

TGO, thanks i needed that.

It's funny, it took a massive dose of reality to break through the wall of self protective lies that I'd constructed, but it's another confirmation of the veracity of this path to healing, through the use of psychedelic medicine. Without the self knowledge and universal truth that has been revealed to me, and without the community of like minded people, i wouldn't be able to process this. With the clarity this whole thing has given me, I've been mourning all the unnecessary loss and all the things that could have been. Twenty five years of self delusion is a lot to take in.

"I was young, once, and i created a lie.
Although my body was strong, i was self deluded, confident and blind."- m. Gira/swans

 

[Pandora]

Amen to that and yeah 25 years is indeed a really long time. But, as you know it's never too late.

You know guys it's not all about being strong. Sometimes it's about finding an acceptance that is so deep that one realizes that by forgiving those who have hurt us, we find new strength and tremendous healing withn ourselves.

Sometimes it's about a fundamental acknowledgement that we do not control as much as we and our culture would like to believe/tell us.

There is a great quote from the movie Firefly, I am a leaf in the wind . . . see how I soar!

 

[thymamai]

Yeah gira is great

Keep on knocking those curve balls out of the park. I'm going to do the same. Because gira, and because badasses like you my friend.

 

[Alloklais]

Yeah man and don't get me wrong, i don't wonder why. Nothing ever just happens to me. I take full accountability for the actions that put me in these situations. But really it all started back in Atlanta, I'm hoping this is the full circle that finally will allow me to heal from this and do the pattern. That's what i was trying to get across. Because yeah man, I've been gone a long time and now I'm finally ready to come home.

Null, really dont know you too well, as I'm kind of new here, but when you say:
Ready to come home, it touches a nerve, a good one. A favorite and inspiring book that helped me deal with some pretty hard times, title is "All sickness is home sickness" by Diane Connelly. It was also a foundational book too for my thesis work in garden design to help better treatment of PTSD.

The veterans I worked with, they telling their stories and being engaged in a compassionate community (they were caring for rescued birds and dogs), and tending a garden, it made all the difference in the world to start healing the searing wounds left on their psyches and spirits that they endured. Sounds like to me you're on your Way Home.

You know the Swans did a great cover too of Steve Winwood's "Can't Find My Way Home..."
Finding that place where feeling most like myself, where its okay to be that vulnerable, feels most like Home.

Here's to being on your Way...

 

[null24]

Thanks, man, i know you're doing some important work. I'm hoping one of the consequences of this removal of a deep blockage will allow empathy and compassion to flow more freely within me, so that somehow i can be of service to others who suffer needless pain like you. Thanks for your efforts, i can tell you one truth at least, and that is that the system is broken and we need people like you once someone can find their way out of it and into an effective modality

This could become a Swans/Gira appreciation thread! His music has gotten me through some tough spots, from being curled in a ball with a broken heart listening to 'goddamn the sun' on repeat until it becomes funny again, to this. Listening to the band this morning and the lines ' where are you now, my must unfortunate, irreversible lie...' Yeah man, where is that safety system i set up? Gone, and I'm glad.

Moving on, getting rest and nutrition and clarity, things are opening up. It's all good, all of it is good.

 

[DreaMTripper]

Oh man youve had some shitty hands dealt! Ive had a period of PTSD myself, not to the extreme you experienced thats rough! It was after having lived through someones psychotic breakdown which culminated in an armed response unit being called to my house.
I know that on edge feeling each day merges into the next like one long day. Always alert and nervous. It took some cacti and some MDA (on separate occasions) to kick it in the end, cacti really shone a light on how it was pulling the strings in my life and MDA (and bongos) made me realise I can be free of the fear.
You seem to have the right mindset, look after the present, and your body rest when you can let peace and trust back in slowly but surely.
My most profound dmt trip many years ago left me with an overriding message that 'Everything is going to be ok'. To this day the message has the same impact.

 

[null24]

Yeah man, thanks. I'm thinking about going either the LSD or psilocybin route, but first I'm accessing some deep trauma therapy and an looking into EMDR.

Every day gets better. It's actually pretty cool. Whereas I've carried all this anger and hate and fear for so long, now it's absent, i even walk slow. Things are changing, finally.