Carefully moving forward from H's mlc - ctflor

[AntoniaB]

Ctflor the reason you feel like it's some form of PTSD is because it is...I talked about this with my psychiatrist, and it's one of those things where the PTSD symptoms go away if you can come to terms with the possibility that he might still leave. I'm not personally saying he might. I'm saying that your anxiety is coming from the fear of reliving the pain you went through before and your worry that if you are vulnerable to him, he'll hurt you and your family again, and you're worrying over the future but linking it to past hurt.

One of the ways to "combat" that type of PTSD is to "relive" the experience and make it ok the second (or whatever) time. Like, for me, recently, I felt every single thing again as far as my XH's abandonment when our closet pet died, because I had really "substituted" our boy cat for my XH emotionally. But having navigated the "trauma" a second time faster and better by far than the first, with the "tools" I learned, I was able to see that I could make it through "another bad event in my life that causes abandonment feelings."

I have read that sometimes a doctor can guide you through an abandonment experience in a clinical setting if one does not present itself in your life, and as a guide, be there to point out to you that you COULD make it, that you'd probably handle it better than in the past.

This sort of "victory" can help bring an end to the PTSD anxiety symptoms you're having.

So my advice to you would be to, in addition to your piecing techniques, prayer, etc., that you perhaps bring up "PTSD" and anxiety about the future that is sort of attacking you in the present with a doctor or counselor. I think any trained counselor who deals with abandonment can help with this; you wouldnt' need a psychiatrist per se, and maybe you're even seeing someone already.

But you may as well get another tool in your arsenal to deal with anxiety and this might help you be more peaceful day to day, which in turn would help him.