Complex PTSD Recovery & Identity

One of the more challenging aspects of my recovery from Complex PTSD due to a childhood of repeated traumas is not allowing it to overtake my own identity.  How do I transform myself through overcoming my maladaptive and self-defeating behaviors without forever linking that transformation to who I am intrinsically?  How can I prevent this from being the defining aspect of my identity?

Surviving child abuse and recovering from its effects have been the over-arching themes of my life story for a few years now, and I’m completely fatigued from it.  I've told those few who are close to me about my recovery, but I’m not sure how much more open I should become.  I don’t want to forever be known as “the guy with PTSD because he was abused” or “the child-abuse dude who fell apart for a few years in his 30’s.” 

At the same time, however, I want to scream from the rooftops about it so others can learn from what happened to me initially in childhood and then much later in life.  Maybe a father out there somewhere stops himself before bouncing his 8-year old’s face off a fender because there was some dirt still left there after the kid washed the van.  Maybe there’s a college student out there who will hear my story, realize what he went through as a kid wasn’t normal at all, and go get help sooner rather than later.  

Look, I’m not trying to be some martyr here or anything.  I don’t need anyone to feel bad for me.  I don’t want sympathy.  This is not some vain-glorious pursuit of self-aggrandizement.  I’m just trying to fashion a silver lining in an otherwise completely dreadful set of circumstances.  Recovering fully would be sufficient enough, but I’ve gone through hell and I want more than to just break even.

It’s been suggested to me by several people in the mental health field that I should marshal my experiences, education, and ability to communicate in order to do some good for others in this particular area.  I’ve been told that I should write a book, become a peer mentor/counselor, or maybe consider being more of a public face since so few men are willing to do so. 

It’s one reason I started writing this blog.  This might be the foundation of a book, a jump start into writing for periodicals, or maybe this will stand on its own and be effective at helping others.  Of course it's quite possible this will be something that nobody really reads or cares about, and that's not the worst thing because I’m terrified that this will be the everlasting impression I leave… the thing for which I’m remembered (assuming I’m remembered at all!).

Yet I’m also starting to wonder if maybe I should just continue to do this anonymously because I don’t want this to become the predominant aspect of my identity.  I truthfully don’t want to identify with it forever even though I know it will always be a footnote on every page of my life story.  I’m still anonymous right now because I’m not completely convinced that I want to be forever associated with having recovered from Complex PTSD due to physical and psychological traumas in childhood.  Just typing those last few words and envisioning people reading it with my name attached to them stresses me more than just a bit.

On the other hand, I know that there’s no way to make a true impact anonymously.  If I’m going to have any measure of success at realizing that silver lining, I’m going to have to put my name on it.  Otherwise I’m just playing into the societal stigma and reinforcing the fear many men have about admitting what happened to them really messed them up.  How can I encourage men to be brave and face down the problems they face as a result of their childhoods if I’m not stout enough to openly own my personal experiences?

It’s just that I want my identity to be more about who I am as a person, the things I enjoy doing, and the ways that I spend my time:

I’m a granola guy who loves nature, camping, rafting, fishing, hiking, boating, and generally anything else done outdoors. 

I’m an over-the-top football fan who convinced a bar in the heart of Chicago to become an Atlanta Falcons watching spot that fills up every Sunday bringing Dirtybird fans together and now has Falcons flags, banners, and a 10-foot blow-up guy out front on the sidewalk.  It’s such an amazing thing to be a part of.

I write football columns and articles for a Falcons website affiliated with Sports Illustrated. 

I tutor adult learners trying to get their GED, pass the US citizenship test, or whatever their goals may be. 

I’m a loving and occasionally overzealous father of two girls who knows way more about My Little Pony than any 30-something man ever should. 

I’m the old guy still streetballin’ at the gym with the young bucks. 

I’m the grill-master-forever-in-training who loves nothing more than to hold court while turning racks of ribs and Vidalia onions on a hot summer day. 

I’m the MacGuyver-ish dude who gets a bizarre pleasure from fixing damn near anything. 

Don’t even get me started on my geeky side because that’s at least another 3 paragraphs!

My point is that there’s so much more to me than just being a child abuse survivor.  But if I come out hard and heavy, and I really do this right… then will the rest of me get swallowed up in the process?  Does everything else in my life get overshadowed?  I have so much trepidation that I will forever be stamped by what I’m in the process of overcoming instead of simply getting to actualize all of the other aspects of my identity. 

Of course, that’s the problem.  This is part of who I am and nothing will ever change that.  Either it’s a known fact of my life, or it’s something I try to hide forever. 

No.  To hell with that.  I’m tired of hiding this as though it’s something I should be ashamed of people knowing.  I didn’t ask for a childhood like that, and I surely didn’t want to be in recovery from it 15-20 years later.  Those who will think ill of me or keep their distance as a result are exactly the kind of people I don’t want in my life anyway.  Maybe it’ll be a great way of filtering out the wrong kind of people, and then they can identify me as whoever or whatever they please. 

My identity is mine and will not be subject to any label placed upon it by others.  Being a child abuse survivor may end up being what people most know me for, and it will always be a part of me, but I won’t let it become all that I am because I’m a hell of a lot more than that.

My ADHD Was Ignored For Far Too Long

I’ve spent almost 3 years in therapy working diligently on my Complex PTSD, Social Anxiety Disorder, and Panic Disorder with Agoraphobia, which stemmed from the physical and psychological traumas I endured throughout my childhood.  These were monumental challenges which completely rocked my world, and they caused me to all but ignore my ADHD diagnosis and its role in my life.  In fact, in one of my initial posts on this blog I believe I called it a “secondary diagnosis” to which I would pay scant attention (see what I did there? I'm so clever...).

I’m in the process of picking up the pieces of my life after hitting rock bottom so hard that I bounced twice, as a great lyricist once said.  I was homeless, jobless, essentially removed from my two daughters, my girlfriend had just broken things off, and I just completely de-stabilized.  However, I made it into a fairly decent wellness center, have regained stability, and I'm doing all of the things typical people do and take for granted in their lives.

After being here for awhile I finally feel relatively normal.  I’m eating well, sleeping ok, exercising regularly again, and in generally good health and spirits.  Now it’s time for me to develop a new routine that I can carry with me from here and more or less utilize for a lifetime.  So for the first time ever I sat down and really went to work on developing a schedule.

When I say I’m going to “sit down” and do something, that’s a euphemism indicating that I’m going all-out to accomplish it.  I began by doing general research online and at the library on best practices for developing schedules and began to refine this research to take into account my diagnoses.  It was interesting how little there was regarding CPTSD and creating routines and schedules.  Then I decided to see what there was regarding ADHD and it was like hitting the jackpot in Vegas.

I had always known that scheduling and routine were fairly significant challenges for those with ADHD, but for some reason it never really registered with me that I should examine this further for my own benefit.  That was a mistake of titanic proportions because it appears to be the final piece to the puzzle that day-to-day living has become.

While started down this path simply to develop a personal routine and schedule that took my ADHD into account, I ended up learning so much about how having ADHD can completely ruin a person’s life in various ways.  Even more startling was that, at one point, I actually wondered if either my psychologist or psychiatrist had ghost-written this particular article because it sounded so freakishly just like me and my experiences, past and current.

The research I uncovered on adults with ADHD include how we…

·        are more prone to high-stimulus-seeking behavior,

·        are procrastinators of the highest order,

·        brood and ruminate over bad outcomes because we've gotten distracted repeatedly from the task at  hand,

·        cannot tolerate boredom of any kind,

·        are restless and often need to be on the move,

·        feel constrained by professional conventions and chained by social norms,

·        lack/lose perspective of the long-term consequences of today’s actions,

·        feel the need to be doing multiple things simultaneously,

·        have difficulty transitioning between close engagements such as back-to-back meetings,

·        have mood swings independent of what’s occurring externally in our environment,

·        will obsess and ruminate over a psychological “startle” (some type of transition or change) that results in a loss of perspective and makes us feel as though the world is upside-down,

·        must have regular and vigorous exercise or will self-destruct,

·        have a tendency to over-focus/hyper-focus (which can be good or bad contingent upon how it's  deployed),

·        are typically impulsive, tactless in social situations,

·        are a bit tactless in social situation and often have problems maintaining social relationships for any  extended period of time.

I'm seemingly just using my ADHD to create elegant excuses for much of the knuckle-headed nonsense I tend to do… at least that how it plays in my own ears.  However, I in no way want or need excuses for anything I’ve done or continue to do.  I completely own everything.  It’s on me to figure out what’s wrong, address the issues, and correct my behaviors.

Yet I found these themes recurring repeatedly across so many different sources, so I had no choice but to take it all very seriously.  Part of me owning and addressing my flaws and failures is to determine the "why" first, and these ADHD-prone behaviors accurately characterize who I've been my entire life.  Take away the childhood traumas and these would be issues I would grapple with anyway because ADHD is a biological, hereditary condition.  Ironically, I likely got it from my father but, unlike the abuse, he bears no responsibility for this.

Beyond correcting the problems, much of the literature stressed taking advantage of the good aspects of ADHD and learn how to adjust my life and lifestyle to fit the profile of how my particular form of ADHD manifests itself.  Primarily I'm going to accept who I am and stop trying to force myself into conventions and norms for which I'm simply ill-suited.

For example, I'm never going to be the model student or super-organized executive even though I'm very intelligent, creative, skilled, and accomplished.

I have to accept and anticipate the inevitable collapse of a certain percentage of projects I undertake, relationships I have, obligations I take on because I have always and will continue to take on more than I can readily handle and there's nothing I can do to prevent this.

I will take advantage of my tendency towards addictive behaviors and take on healthy pursuits such as training for a triathlon.

I'm not going to go through an exhaustive list because you get the point.  I'm simply thrilled to integrate this into my ongoing recovery and hopefully have a complete plan of action for my life going forward.

My recovery plan and actions to deal with the CPTSD, anxiety, and panic attacks have provided very little in the way of applicable remedies for the basic aspects of my life.  I am not saying the treatment hasn’t worked, because it has.  I haven’t had a panic attack in half a year, and I’ve been coming out of my shell socially in a progressive if uneven fashion over roughly the same time period.  Still I pined for more in the way of practical knowledge and skills which could make my life better, easier, more manageable.

Now it's time to actually apply it and see if it works!  I’ve just finished the lion’s share of my research, and it's difficult to accurately convey the relief at having found exactly that which I’ve been seeking for a couple of years now.  More to come on how well it works…

My Frozen World: CPTSD-induced Dissociation

It’s Sunday night a bit past 9pm, the curfew during “winter hours” at the wellness center I now find myself in.  I haven’t had a curfew since I was a sophomore in high school.  It’s not that I was forced here, however.  I can come and go as I please and can grab my stuff and walk out that front door right now.  Thing is, though, I’m actually glad to be here… to a certain extent, anyway.

I was homeless for a relatively short period of time because I had to immediately move out as I was allergic to black mold which began to spew its spores once the heat and humidity of summer hit.  I had to get everything out and into storage so the spores didn’t infiltrate all of my belongings.

I couldn’t find another apartment quickly enough because of my credit, which was in tatters for much the same reason that I became homeless: a confluence of circumstances sent me spinning into my “Frozen World.”  This is my euphemism for what happens to me when a stressor or a combination thereof induce the fight-flight-freeze response.

My Complex PTSD, stemming from physical and psychological childhood traumas, indirectly brought my Frozen World into existence.  I was cognitively aware of these repeated events from my youth but I never emotionally approached them. 

I chalked them up to “childhood as usual" and unknowingly threw up a psychological defensive barrier against feeling any of the related emotions.  This is my Frozen World, but it existed solely in regards to those childhood traumas until relatively recently.

Outside the context of dealing with my childhood experiences, I never previously froze up except for extremely short-term situations.  I fought like hell to defeat the daunting challenges of my life.  That’s the only way I could have made it as far as I had in this world considering the lack of opportunities due to my original socio-economic status (that would be “white trash”).

Finding out I was to be a father caused me to reflect on what kind of father I had.  This brought out so much internal darkness and pain that it swamped my brain’s defenses and swept away the boundaries of my Frozen World. 

The flood of emotions was such that I only dealt with everything thereafter by freezing instead of fighting or fleeing.  I was never one to run away from anything, but I simply lost the capacity to fight.  My Frozen World had now expanded to encompass my entire life.

I progressively began freezing in a state of denial and inaction whenever presented with any type of significant stressor.  With regard to my apartment, I failed to quickly find a landlord willing to risk my credit score.  I had nowhere else to go and no natural support since my family is 900 miles away. 

I couldn’t live with my girlfriend at the time because she had a clause in her divorce agreement preventing that due to her young daughters.  I stayed in hotels the other 80% of nights and ate at restaurants three or four times daily, all of which quickly drained my finances.

I could no longer keep my own girls for overnights, which devastated both them and me.  It also placed me in my ex’s crosshairs because I just knew she would use it against me in court to take the 45% custody I was awarded.  The stress and frustration of it all was simply too much, so I entered my Frozen World and simply acted as though there was no problem at all. 

It’s not like I went into a deep depression or anything.  I didn’t go on some substance abuse bender.  I was happy with my new girlfriend, enjoyed summertime Chicago, went camping, was hanging out socially for the first time in years, and was more or less free of my ex-wife and her manipulative family.  I simply enjoyed life while completely ignoring all of the problems I cognitively knew about but could not emotionally handle.  There’s no room for emotion on my Frozen World.

I eventually began sleeping in my SUV, but that wasn’t so bad because it’s designed for that purpose when camping.  This became my norm for many weeks, even though I still sometimes stayed in a hotel when my spinal fusion acted up. 

Then the money essentially ran out altogether.  Even still I was safely ensconced within my Frozen World, so I just kept on living as normally as I could.  It was fairly normal actually, and yet also simultaneously de-stabilizing in ways which I only now understand after the fact.

So I’m basically homeless, almost completely out of money, the bond between me and my girls was straining, and then my girlfriend ran for the hills (or Lincoln Park).  She knew about everything, but it became too much for her to handle.  She tried to tough it out, but her heart couldn’t bear the weight of it all and she had to kill our special connection to save herself.  I don’t blame her at all.  It’s what I would have told my own daughters to do.

Once she left me, however, I completely came apart at the seams.  Her resilience was a crutch allowing my mind to continue its presence on my Frozen World.  I almost immediately had two bouts of suicidal ideation within 10 days, but these were little more than elaborate cries for help.  Suicide could never have happened because to kill myself would have been either a fight or flight response.  All I seem to be able to do anymore is freeze. 

Fact is, I love this life.  Even with all the horrific things I went through and how I’m currently reduced to essentially nothing, I am so grateful to be alive.  I need only to think of this past summer in order to reflect on the simple wonders this world provides.  Even if I didn’t feel this way, the fact is that I have two little girls who deserve to grow up with their Daddy.  I could never be so selfish as to willingly abandon them via suicide or any other means.

The social worker at the hospital I checked myself into at the end of my final ideation suggested I come to the wellness center from which I now write this.  I went on the wait list and luckily just a week or so later I found my sanctuary.  This is a place for persons with various mental health challenges to get short-term stabilization in their lives, tame or control the effects of their condition(s), and get back to successfully restart their lives.

In only my third night here I have already developed a sense of safety, stability, and hope I wasn’t sure I’d ever get back.  This has unfortunately been intermittently interrupted by thoughts of that which I once was, had, and dreamed.  

It’s impossible to not be introspective given the opportunities and successes I’ve already experienced.  Yet I need only to look around at the significance of what other residents here face to confirm just how fortunate I am to have the abilities and talents Mother Nature has lovingly bestowed upon me.

I’ve been stripped almost completely of my confidence, pride, and ego.  Yet I consider this to be a positive development.  My life can now be reconstructed in a healthy way and be cognizant of all that which I could never admit or even know about myself before now.  

For the first time in my life I have support from people without any ulterior motives.  They aren’t invested in specifically what I do with my life like the “support” I had before with my family, my ex-wife, and her family.  Now it’s simply about me being healthy and happy regardless of what form that takes.  

It’s akin to being forced to demolish and then rebuild your dream home because it had a poorly-constructed foundation hidden beneath a façade of finery.   I’ve cried a monsoon of tears as my old life caved in on itself, and I will continue to weep on occasion for the wonderful yet irreplaceable parts of my life which were irretrievably destroyed.  

Those tears are no longer ones of regret or shame, though.  Those are feelings which breed self-loathing and can quickly spiral me down back into my Frozen World.  These are tears of grieving and, like all grief, they will diminish over time.

I understand myself so much better and have a deeper trust in what my therapy/recovery can accomplish.  There's no lingering doubt in my mind about whether I'm capable of true change.  I’m no longer on my Frozen World and I endeavor to never return but, if I do, I know how to better handle it.  My second life will be vastly superior because it’s to be built on a stronger and more secure foundation like that second dream home... and I'm finally ready to start pouring the concrete.

Complex PTSD Recovery: The Neutral Zone of Transition

I'm now moving from my personal nadir into something I refer to as the "neutral zone" of transition based on William Bridges' work.  This neutral zone is the time after mourning for the childhood I never had and regret over not avoiding just how screwed up my life has become by getting therapy earlier. 

It’s time to reinvent myself now, though.  I’ve done much of the initial work required to recover, but not quite all of it.  However, my progress has been sufficient enough to begin advancing to the next stage.  It's this period of time in which so many things are now possible which weren't before I began my therapy, and for the first time ever I get to do it on my own terms. 

While my marriage ended in a cluster-bomb of animosity, regret, and confusion, I can now find a partner better suited to how I need to live happily.  Not only did my personal life run off the rails, but my career in healthcare management and consulting is in tatters from neglect and the inability to effectively network because of my past problems socializing as an adult.  

However, starting from scratch allows me the freedom in this neutral zone to consider becoming a teacher/professor, maybe start an outdoors excursions outfit, or run a small non-profit without regret or guilt that I should be out there making well into six figures annually just because I feel an internal pressure given I have the education and ability to easily do so. 

There’s been considerable external pressure in the past as well.  Besides the fact that I’m the golden child of the family, my ex-wife once told me the only thing she truly cared about regarding my career was that I make at least $100k/year for her to be comfortable.  I didn't realize the impact that had on me at the time, but thereafter I was consumed with making sure my career path brought me into that income tier.  Now I can find a partner who doesn't care which income bracket I’m in, but she'll rather want me for who I am and prefer I do something fulfilling that gives me a sense of joy. 

Most of my old friends have been out of the picture after I basically went into hiding for 2 years, but it'll be interesting to see who's still there for me as I embark on the beginning of the post-apocalyptic chapter of my life.  It's truly exciting to think about all of the new friendships and romances I can have without all of that emotional baggage holding me down and screwing things up for me.  

Yes, my first real relationship after splitting from my ex-wife has recently been snuffed out mainly because I still have not completely escaped some of the bad habits from my past.  To be specific, I subconsciously hit the self-destruct button on any relationship when someone gets too close and I feel vulnerable.  

It's a direct result of being abused or neglected by the people I loved and idolized growing up.  I learned then that allowing people too close to you only results in pain.  Keep them at arms' length and I'm protected.  It's amazing to look back and see the patterns across relationships of all types, and it's even more amazing I never saw them before.  

The only exception thus far has been my ex-wife, but that's only because she's a psychologist and could recognize and dismiss my nonsense as just that instead of thinking it really had anything to do with her.  Yet I won't go into a downward spiral fueled by self-loathing and regret for my mistakes with this most recent relationship.  I accept it as another opportunity to recognize, learn, and change so that it doesn't happen again.  It’s easy to say, but so damn hard to do.

So this post is all about transitioning from whatever low point you're currently at in your life to a more healthy and functional one.  If you feel like your life is over, then good!  Unless you're dead and reading this from the afterlife, your life is not in fact over.  This means there’s a litany of opportunities awaiting you now.  It's time to relinquish the behavioral programming from childhood and learn more sophisticated and mature behaviors.  

I'm not saying that you should reject and ignore your old life.  Never forget that owning your past is the key to overcoming it.  It's critical to extricate the impact of our past traumas from our present reality.  The avoidance, repression, and suppression causes us to be clueless as to what's happening around us, which was great for us when we were kids under constant threat... but we can't afford to check out from reality as adults.  

This is what I did for a few years: I simply checked out little by little around the time my first child was born.  That adult experience of becoming a parent triggered a jail-break release for my childhood demons who had been in repressive purgatory... and I was simply overwhelmed emotionally.  It's similar to what happened with Hurricane Katrina in New Orleans.  The defenses which held all that water at bay were simply insufficient in the face of such a deluge.  

This was what I experienced starting a little bit before the birth of my first born.  Then came the ever-quickening descent into the black hole of CPTSD: night terrors; flashbacks; self-loathing; you name it.  That was then, though.  Now is completely different.  I'm into my Neutral Zone now.  I no longer have panic attacks.  I recognize my maladaptive behaviors even though I've not completely conquered them.  The point is that my loss and grieving period is over, and now I have to figure what my new beginning looks like.  This is what the neutral zone is all about.

It's true that I'm in a limbo of sorts because I no longer hold onto the past and haven't quite set my future plan, but this is not filled with stress and consternation.  Yes, I'm still unsure of how to configure my future, but I'm figuring things out little by little as I continue through this introspective journey called recovery.  In the past, this type of limbo would have brought me crashing down to my knees, but now I'm truly enjoying this time of discovery about myself and how I want the next half of my life to materialize.  

Don't get it twisted, though.  I still go through some fairly craptastic days because I still grapple with the consequences of my old world: lack of social circle, financial difficulties, legal problems, employment difficulties, etc.  However, I never expected there to be a clear line of demarcation between the old me and the newly forming one. 

This is a transition and not just a mere change.  A change is really just a function of a singular decision or one-time situation.  My transition is an inner release of how my life was and embracing what my life is becoming.  Being in the neutral zone portion of my transition has meant serious and rapid progress for me.  I’m trying to push out of it now, but I’m okay with the idea that it may take longer than I want because I’m confident that I’ll make it eventually.

Hopefully this will help you advance in your recovery, get past the problems of your old life, and feel more comfortable about your own neutral zone as you realize how much better it’s all going to get if you put the work in. 

CPTSD Recovery & My New Life

I'm just now realizing, two years after separation from my ex-wife, that there's an entire world out there that always existed, but was completely outside my grasp.  I began the relationship with my ex at 20 years old, and every major decision thereafter was either made for me by her or made with her as the primary consideration.

Eighteen years later I find myself feeling like I'm 20 again.  I'm rudderless in an ocean of possibilities...  I just don't know what to do or how to do it.  I missed the selfish years most people get in their 20's.   Living in a few different cities; The trips with the guys to Vegas;  having complete responsibility over career direction;  the crazy relationships of 20-somethings;  I never got a chance at any of that.

I was too confident back in the day to realize what I didn’t know.   Now I have the experiential benefit yet lack the required self-assurance to move forward with any real measure of conviction.  It’s a strange space to inhabit.  Add a very unhealthy dose of CPTSD-driven anxiety and you have my recipe for paralysis of action.

Not that I regret the decision to marry my ex.  The love and life we shared was mostly wonderful and infinitely more worthy than those selfish pursuits.  I only mention this because most people don’t get divorced in their late 30s from the only person they’ve been with since the age of 20.  Most of the divorced people I know got married somewhere in their mid-to-late 20s, and so they’ve already experienced “the single life.”  I haven’t, and so this is all so new to me.

I'm stuck in this city that I mostly detest until my 2 daughters go to college in roughly 14 years.  I have a deep feeling of helplessness regarding where I live even after no longer having to factor my ex into the equation.  This helplessness is one reason my life has been stuck in neutral for the past two years.  I now recognize that resentment and helplessness are feelings leading to nowhere.  Now it's critical that I make the most of my time here, and this is what my post today is all about.

My first real post-marital relationship has just ended.  While lasting only a few months, it was sufficient enough to provide me with the confidence required to kick-start my life into first and then second gears.  It was exactly what I needed, if not necessarily everything I wanted.  She made me understand I’m still worthy and valued by women of her caliber... even with my psychological warts and all.   .

Just dating her and introducing her to my girls gave me the ability to recognize the power I now have over my life.  It's been quite the revelation that I'm now making my own life decisions based solely on myself and what I want out of life.  (Of course, my daughters are a factor but not an anchor-like one as before.)  That's not to say I won't adjust once I'm in a long-term relationship, but it's good for me to have a period in my life like this. I had always wondered what it would be like.

Well, I'm about to find out!

While I can't exactly act as though I'm in my 20's, it does approximate how I'm approaching this.  I'm considering a complete career change.  I chose my own apartment.  I’m dating different women.  I'm choosing my own friends based on my own opinions.  That may not seem like much to most people, but consider that I've spent 2 years in almost complete social isolation because of my CPTSD-induced combination of self-loathing, shame, and confusion. 

I could barely understand everything happening inside of me much less explain it to others.  Most of my close friends were either part of my ex's family or somehow closely related to her, and I did not need any more of her in my life than absolutely required.  That, coupled with my brother moving to Atlanta around the same time, is how I instantly lost my entire social network.  I never developed my own due to, you guessed it, CPTSD-induced trust issues.  I naturally latched on to those my ex already trusted, my brother moved here just after I did, and it was plenty for me. 

I’m slowly building my own network, but it’s incredibly difficult for me even though I’m very gregarious and outgoing.  I make acquaintances so very easily.  My problem has always been my predilection toward detonating relationships of any kind once the person gets too close to me.  It’s an old self-defense mechanism learned from my childhood that’s so ingrained that I have to make conscious efforts to overcome.

As for the non-relational parts of my life, I still don't know what to do.  At least I'm finally moving in the right directions and making progress.  While more than just a tad frightened, I’m also thrilled at all of the opportunities which lie before me (almost too many).  There’s a whole world waiting for me, and I’m so glad to finally have the ability to go exploring on my own.