Complex PTSD | CPTSD Lived Experience

having complex PTSD is a lot like being the Incredible Hulk when you're triggered you can go into the state where you're not thinking straight you can get kind of violent and scary um but also remember that the Hulk is not a villain complex PTSD isn't all terrible there are terrible things about it but there is another Shadow side to it or a bright side to the shadow side that does make you sort of a very empathetic very courageous individual I think the real trick is to learn how to calm down your Hook when you don't need him and say like okay hope not today right now it's everything is fine and how to use him when it's actually relevant people with complex PTSD can be truly the most powerful and pathetic Healers um once they have embarked on that Journey [Music] hi welcome to it's all in your head podcast I'm your host Jackie colbeth and it's great to be with you today we are going to talk about complex post-traumatic stress disorder otherwise known as cptsd with Stephanie Foo Stephanie develops cptsd after years of abuse she received that began during childhood she wrote A New York Times bestseller about her experience titled what my bones know A Memoir of healing from complex trauma her account is brave informative and extremely hopeful Stephanie is an inspiration to so many and we are so glad she took time out of her busy schedule to chat with us hey Stephanie welcome to it's all in your head hi thank you so much for having me thank you for coming on we're super excited to talk to you so complex PTSD is something relatively new in it Med Circle here we know a lot about um or we know that a lot of different diagnoses still have a way to go for understanding so I was hoping for the audience sake and just you know education wise uh it'd be super helpful if you could just describe the difference between cptsd and PTSD sure so you can get traditional PTSD from a single traumatic event okay so let's say you were in a car accident you could get PTSD from that okay eptsd is kind of like if you were in that car accident every week for years and years um it's when the trauma is recurring very often and unless you're very very unlucky person um that probably means that you you were in a relationship with or you know betrayed by somebody who was supposed to love and take care of you my complex PTSD comes from child abuse it can also come from being in an abusive relationship living in a war zone that kind of thing and I think it's super super helpful um because just to give the audience context it is really just knowing all the different types of abuse or trauma that can you know contribute to that so I think I appreciate you making that distinction I think it's really important so full disclosure I've read the book but for those who haven't read it I don't want to give anything away because I highly suggest you go read this and you'll devour it like I did you have endured physical abuse and you had mentioned that probably around the age of 12 and we uh myself with the bipolar II disorder that was the age where I started to feel like something was you know a bit different and you'd mentioned that you struggled with depression and anxiety around that time was there any sort of treatment sought at that time or was it just you know sort of okay I'm not really going to share this with anyone and we're not going to um seek any sort of help no definitely not I didn't have a safe place to um be imperfect I guess because I was in such a traumatic home um I didn't feel safe ever admitting that I was feeling depressed or anxious everything always had to be okay and good and I had to be happy in order to sort of manage my parents more scattered emotions sure no now navigating that is uh definitely quite difficult and knowing this in in knowing again what your your story is which is amazing you talk a lot about and I know a ton of people can relate to this including myself is you're feeling these emotions you're not really understanding them but damn it I'm gonna go be the best student I'm going to get a scholarship I am going to achieve my dream job by by setting out and getting it and really exceeding standards of what you know our society really ingrains in us um what makes you okay and makes you normal if you're doing all of these things and if you could share with the audience a little bit about what your experience was like with this CPT SD manifesting itself in your working career our audience totally gets what it's like to be working full-time you know working to achieve their dreams and working hard but at the same time showing up and and having panic attacks and and just some really tough experiences I'm wondering if you could share a little bit about how that manifested itself um at work yeah well growing up um I had to be again perfect in my life my I had to get straight A's uh I had to get perfect report cards and that to me Perfection equaled safety um which wasn't that easy in a workplace or in life in general especially not like being like the top of my field working at this American life I couldn't be perfect I wasn't um and often I made lots of mistakes and I wasn't very good at all um and you know as a child I was beaten for being imperfect and as an adult I just beat myself up I still felt that Terror every time I messed up that something horrible was going to happen even if I logically knew that it was going to be okay I was like I'm going to get fired my boss is going to scream at me and it just made my whole life kind of in my work environment really really terrifying and I bet that had to just you know in hindsight exacerbate the cptsd because certainly knowing I worked full-time in media so I can relate to just the onslaught of things coming at you be it clients co-workers um editors just all sorts of different people personalities um and I know sometimes that's hard to navigate because we spend the overwhelming majority of time most of us um at work amongst our peers um something that you had done that I admire so much and I just think was one of the boldest bravest moves I've heard about is you had gotten to a point you you'd achieved this successful career and you said my health needs to be focused on full time at this point and you left the comfort of all the achievements the job the identity and you prioritized your mental health and that experience I know a lot of people are super terrified to to do and take that step can you share a little bit about what that was like when you made the Bold decision that we all feel like we're gonna get stigmatized for which is you know I really need to focus on this it's gone un untreated it's gone either unidentified and I'm going to prioritize this and who the hell cares what it looks like I was always afraid I'd never be employed again was my fear right if I left if I left a job that I wasn't happy with what was it like was it liberating was it terrifying to make the decision to say my health comes first it was terrifying of course it was it was definitely the bravest thing I've ever had to do yeah and it was the it was really sad this was the job that I had worked for my whole life this is again my dream job I wanted to work at this American life so badly and you know it came with a lot of power it came with a lot of cultural cachet and it was really hard to let go of that the paycheck the health insurance the power but I really credit my partner for being super grounding at the time um he was a teacher and he was just very much like this does not define you I don't love you for this your friends your true friends don't love you for this career and what is so horrible about being normal um about even if you never work in media again is it so terrible to go and be normal and he's got a normal job somewhere else and uh I was like no that that's not so bad so I was thinking okay maybe I won't work in media again maybe I'll just become um maybe I will become a librarian maybe I'll become a researcher who knows um so that was okay and you know part of it was a choice definitely part of it also wasn't a choice part of it was like you know it was it got to the point where it was on Sundays sort of freaking out all day Sunday about going into work on Monday that having panic attacks all day work yeah it just wasn't tenable anymore right um and so I also just wanted to be a better person I didn't want to be the same person I had been this whole time I didn't want to be stressing out and I thought maybe there's a chance I could come back better stronger more capable of doing this and being happy at the same time you came back as a New York Times bestseller I think that's I think that's a pretty awesome return and awesome achievement um what did that feel like I mean that is such an honor and for those of us who've been in journalism and who've been around it and who love to write that is surely a dream and a goal of many what was that like to know your Memoir hit the New York Times bestseller you know it was never a dream and a goal of mine okay because I didn't just I just never expected that to happen I was always that's awesome kind of like well that would be great but there's no way you know right so I got the call right before I was going out to dinner with a couple of friends going to like this crazy sold out event that I had organized and my publicist called me and she told me and I was like what and I just started crying it was awful wild yeah that is that is awesome yeah I just I wrote this book with the intent of helping one person true so the the fact that it's done more than that is I'm eternally grateful really oh you're gonna make me tear up I remember saying something similar you know if this podcast in a conversation with someone makes one person feel good um yeah yeah good mission mission accomplished speaking of friends loved ones there's a part in the book that's very powerful about when you got to speak with another person who was diagnosed with with this and her you refer to her as Lacey in the book and it felt like such a powerful moment when you first met your met someone else with lived experience you know having seen therapists and doctors and all these kind of you know laboratory types and then you meet your first the first person with lived experience and how powerful was that for you I mean Lacey was and is uh uh a badass journalist is uh really successful smart powerful woman so to know that there was somebody else out there who had complex PTSD but was out there killing the game you know wasn't letting her complex PTSD Define her and wasn't um that she wasn't suffering from it constantly right was really hope inducing um and she told me like it's hard work I had to really put in the work yeah we get to this place but you can do it and so that's when I really got my butt into gear yeah well there is something there is something really bonding and special about that I quit drinking decades ago and I had entered treatment at the time and I'll never forget listening to someone describe their alcoholism in me being like but you're employed you have a family I even saw you laughing over there like I thought that just didn't occur you know it was all I was kind of gobsmacked that you know someone else could have this thing that was just dark and destructive and you know my life's kind of just dunzy and they um they had this beautiful thing going on in in that part where you speak about Lacey I I just personally love that because um she was what you had needed to see to get that motivation and that hope as you got that motivation you used the term in the book I love um which is you're like all right now it's time to hack my brain like let's get into it let's see what's what into your point this is going to be hard work but I'm down for the cause and you go on like so many of us the search for therapists in different therapists and you know again I relate many many people relate to this what would you give as far as advice to anyone who's like you know is what's a good kind of suggestion or maybe a bar or something people can gauge to know hey you know this one might be a little more you know effective at least with me um than another person um I just want to encourage people to remember that you are hiring the therapist that they are working for you to help you and if they are not helping you and they're not doing what you want you don't have to see them correct and that they might have the degree they might have the knowledge of how brains work they don't know your brain better than you um and if they are making you feel unsafe or scared or what they're doing is just not working for you you can always tell them and ask them for something different if they're not willing to provide that something different then you can always see somebody else um and I think particularly with people with complex PTSD it's really important to see someone who is comfortable giving up their own power and giving you power empowering you in this session to make decisions to ask for things to be confident in the session um and you know to constantly be asking what you need and affirming what you need therapy isn't just a thing that happens to you it's a thing that you make happen and you get to control you're an academic partner yes and I love that theme of agency and so many times when you are either diagnosed misdiagnosed like so many of us are all over the place it is sort of this well I'll take what I can get they are from Harvard and that's where their degree is from so obviously like I'm gonna feel like a simple 10 and sort of you know less than or inferior versus sort of a partnership of like you're Usher You're supposed to be ushering me into you know getting healthier in informing better habits but a lot of people really genuinely and I certainly didn't for many years I didn't feel that way I felt like I just kind of had to sit there and they were the best people I could get part of that agency that you displayed involved what I thought was just an awesome voracious hunger for knowledge on what is going on with me and I'm so motivated to get better I want to understand this and I want to use all of my you know really journalistic skills that you've honed all these years and we're gonna go on a journey and we're going to talk to doctors we're going to go back to my hometown we're going to really really really try to understand this and throughout your travels throughout your experience were there any therapies that really worked for you in particular I think I think one thing to remember too is there is no Silver Bullet when it comes to cptsd and often you need a cocktail of things um one therapy most of the time is not going to cut it because there's a lot of different aspects of complex PTSD that need healing like there's the somatic aspect when you are triggered you sort of need your body to calm down in order for your brain to get calm enough for you to think critically at all about what's really happening so for me um restorative yoga was really helpful for that learning some basic meditation stuff breathing all really helpful for that um also there's the intellectual side there's talk therapy that was really so some CBT some talk therapy was really helpful but also EMDR was really helpful in terms of really getting not just knowing that I was traumatized what my parents did but fully understanding it Reckoning with it sort of speaking to the inner child ifs was really ultimately helpful and sort of recognizing my inner child recognizing my hidden super powers uh relational therapy was super super critical in terms of allowing me to understand how to interact with people like retrain me how to love and be loved by other people essentially um which manifested for me is like Google Docs therapy which is a sort of unique experience um but I don't think that um I would have gotten to feel as whole as I do now without that combination of a little bit of everything yep yeah I I agree it's a multi-faceted maintaining mental health whatever you're diagnosed with it's definitely a multi uh faceted sort of consistent um type of campaign really and something you you had mentioned which I think a lot lot of us this is like the hardest thing to come to terms with is I want to stop hurting people in my life and to your point a minute ago relationships in relational therapy can be extremely helpful for those with cptsd um it was extremely helpful for me myself to go through that and say you know what even if I'm not intending to hurt people which I'm not I'm the common denominator at the very end of the day whether it's an intentional or unintentional and that's kind of a tough pill to swallow because I think a lot of people will then you know kind of beat themselves up but really busting the myth of I'm doing you a favor by you know keeping you like uh in an arm's length or I'm doing you a favor um for or I'm gonna eventually hurt you so you know it's kind of one of these things where I don't know where this this will go this will last um for those of us where that's kind of that's sort of the mix now I think it's it's hopeful and cool to hear about your experience with who you call Joey in the book but just reading about him um in what it's like to meet another person who really you don't have to feel threatened the walls you know go shooting up you feel very accepted in in a loving supportive environment was that uncomfortable at first he seems so emotionally you know available and I know for myself I was like wow this guy's a gem as I'm reading it and I thought I don't know maybe I would have gotten a little scared I mean he's not perfect you know he's he's a nuanced individual of course of course um but yeah definitely it took some getting used to um being with someone who was uh more securely attached Tendencies um you know I I remember one Christmas um I was asking him if he wanted to do something on Christmas Eve and he was like oh no of course I need to spend it with my family and I thought oh that means she's gonna be doing Christmas Eve with them whatever it's fine and then but I was a little pouty about it because I thought that we had sort of agreed previously that we were going to spend Christmas Eve together and then he was like well obviously you're coming like you're you're going to be there with my family duh you know so uh it was definitely something to get used to I didn't want to move in with him at first he really did want to move in very quickly like this is psycho um you're a crazy person but uh I I followed his lead on a lot of things oh and he has turned out to be right on a lot of things oh well that's awesome I'm I'm glad you found that special person because I know how awesome it can be to to have them in your life so thanks for sharing a little bit about him although he is not perfect we are noting we are node into Stephanie in the book which I definitely wanted to cover for this conversation because I found it um well really impressive but also super super super important um maybe now more than ever but what you describe is immigrant trauma and what that is like for communities who suffer that because as you read about it obviously you know it's horrific um for certain communities but for those um my grandparents were immigrants from Italy um they weren't treated kindly at all when they came to this country either by you know the people here or the mafia who actually would Target you know their own um so they had their um adversities so for those of us who don't have that awareness and a lot of us don't at this point this age or younger can you talk a little bit about what you've learned about that topic yeah I think that it's really important to try and understand a little bit of our ancestral trauma if we can um because our trauma is passed down culturally of course um you know my parents uh went through some traumatic things and they probably just really did not know how to parent me and yep then messed up pretty badly um but also there is like an epigenetic element to it um there is evidence that the trauma that we undergo actually affects our epigenome and that we can pass on our trauma to our children so the fact that my great-grandmother my grandmother survived some of the wars conflicts were you know really struggling to survive and feed their families and not get you know assaulted by Japanese soldiers right that has a possible impact on my genome and the way that I process trauma and scary things um and so yeah the fact that I hustle so hard at work it might be because of my parents it might be because of capitalism it might be because this is how my parents my grand great grandparents literally survived so that's all really important and then yeah there are definitely racial elements to complex PTSD and complex PTSD can probably occur from experiencing repeated instances of racism if you're made to feel unsafe all the time because of your race your gender identity um if you're very very very poor growing up you know um and so it's really important to understand that trauma isn't just you isn't just from your parents it really comes from society at large from history from Global Wars and and immigration and all of that and you know it's a big task to tell yourself that you're going to heal all of that and so you probably can't there's some got to be some level of acceptance of that yes genetics are powerful things and things that you know get passed down I remember when I was first looking through my family's genealogy and reading Diaries things we found you know all these people and obviously I struggled with depression but all these people were were dying of exhaustion um that's what they used to put on there for like a full-blown kind of like you know nervous breakdown I think is what you know would be more accurate today but this was way back when and we had records and I remember thinking they died of exhaustion you know that is just man you don't know really anything as far as a diagnosis you know um different things like that but I I think it's important to highlight that because I think a lot of people assume if they're struggling with their mental health it's taking place in some vacuum like you know their their parents and their parents parents and their parents parents parents you know like to your point things they experienced aren't going to be passed down um I think that's actually pretty relieving or it was to me at least to learn that you know what this didn't come out of nowhere there is a lineage that I can trace and it's you know I'm looking at it and um there's almost a sense I think of at least for me relief in a in a weird way knowing right you know I didn't know you've you have some responsibility over that but it's not your fault yes that's a beautiful way to put it and I also like to you know I'm big on realistic expectations right like I don't want anyone blowing Sunshine up my new year you know my new year my you know what um you know being in you're from the East Coast too you know I'm big on don't lead me down a primrose path give it to me straight don't tell me I'm gonna take this pill and everything's gonna be fine um I've come to find in my 40 some odd years here that I think a lot of strife with mental health comes with really dumb unrealistic expectations you know people walking out of sessions like you know okay you know I'm not feeling Lessing yet anxiety yet I'm not and I think it's super important you know to to highlight that you know the first time someone sat me down and said look you got this for life there's no pill that can cure it but there's a whole lot we can do to make your life fulfilling you can be content um but but do know in a realistic way you're just going to have to do more maintenance maybe than the average person was how it was described to me but man just knowing that you know okay yeah maybe I don't I'm not gonna you know get cured but I can at least uh live with this and laugh and and you know have a family and meet wonderful people but I think a lot of times expectations are so whack um that's almost you know half the problem you know nobody is perfect and I don't know if even yourself to this perfectly sane idealized person that that person just doesn't exist everyone's got their own neuroses everyone's got their own problems even like their richest most privileged people definitely have dysfunction going up the chain maybe more maybe more and so you know I think for a long time I thought cptsd made me really freakish made me really different and like certainly I there are things that are exaggerated in the way that I feel um but I don't think that any of these feelings that I have are totally foreign I mean most of them are human emotions absolutely sometimes exaggerated human emotions but they are just regular human emotions that my responses to Things Are like healthy human responses to threat um maybe maybe I may sense threat too often but right right normal responses to threat so it's it's important to keep those things in mind yep no that's that's definitely great advice because I remember always thinking you know what do you mean people can't relate to depression what do you mean people can't relate surely you've been sad just imagine that unlike an everyday sustained basis you know and and that's more what it's like but man these all involve emotions so shortly you know there there is a way people can can step in to your shoes so you're putting all this work in and you're working really hard was there a point or was it just you know started to become so ingrained as just a fabric of your routine was there any sort of point where obviously you know it's never going to be I'm cured but was there a point where you're like I'm doing pretty good right now like I've come if I'm drawing a bar from like maybe where my worst was like I'm seeing some improvement yeah I think uh it was sort of it was sort of like this you know I definitely during Midway points through the through the healing process were like this is better than it used to be it's still very painful but it's better but definitely after uh my four months of therapy with Dr hom it really was a feeling of oh I think I have a grasp on this and I think I'm not the worst person in the world which is that feeling it was was really great and at that point I had sort of had a couple of years a year and a half at least of really practicing why I was feeling the way that I was feeling yeah so I think the big difference was a lot of the times I still felt bad yeah but I understood why I felt bad yeah and I was like let me root through the toolbox and see if there's anything that I can do about it in this scenario yep um and so of course I still have my my bad days I just have better ways of coping with it yep yeah I like I love the word toolkit because you're right sometimes you gotta get in there and and take some of them out for those who are struggling with cptsd or might not even know they're struggling with it something we we like to to end on with all of our guests is what piece of advice would you give to that person who's watching who's either you know at the Hopeless Point um what advice would you impart I would say uh I love to sort of talk about the Hulk metaphor that Dr hom told me which is that having complex PTSD is a lot like being the Incredible Hulk in that when you're triggered you can go into the state where you're not thinking straight you're a little stupid actually you're speaking like maybe two word sentences um you can get kind of violent and scary um but also remember that the Hulk is not a villain Hulk often uses those powers to help his friends yes to stand up for what is right and so complex PTSD isn't all terrible there are terrible things about it but there is another Shadow side to it or a bright side to the shadow side that does make you sort of a very empathetic very courageous individual who has the guts to really stand up for those who are being oppressed to her who are suffering um and that and so I think the real trick is to learn how to calm down your help when you don't need him and say like okay hope not today right now it's everything is fine and how to use him when it's actually relevant and I think once you're able to sort of harness the Hulk your life gets so much better and people with complex PTSD can be truly the most powerful and pathetic healers um once they have embarked on that Journey um it's a hard journey sure it's worth it well I can't thank you enough for coming on today and speaking with us this has been so informative and and fun to chat with you about it and I know you're going to help way more than one person um today with this but just want to thank you again for your honesty your bravery and um again congratulations on the book it's a amazing thank you so much I really appreciate that thank you all for joining today's conversation with Stephanie if you visit medcircle.com you can access tons of other conversations including weekly workshops with our credentialed doctors an award-winning video Library featuring almost 1 000 educational videos become a member of our community today visit medcircle.com to learn more and thanks for listening to it's all on your head

Channel: MedCircle

Views: 7,698

Keywords: complex ptsd, cptsd, medcircle, med circle, jackie colbeth, stephanie foo, mental health, childhood trauma, complex ptsd after narcissistic abuse, complex ptsd podcast, complex ptsd recovery, complex ptsd emdr, complex ptsd diagnosis, complex ptsd brain, trauma, complex ptsd awareness, complex ptsd help, psychology, complex ptsd healing, complex ptsd symptoms, mental health awareness, complex trauma, mental illness, cptsd symptoms, complex ptsd book, medcirle cptsd

Id: 9qGV-IVn0Pw

Length: 39min 36sec (2376 seconds)

Published: Mon Jun 05 2023