Trigger Relapse
JayBro
Registrant
Hello Everyone,
It's been a while since I last posted, but I have been reading and re-reading new posts and some of my older ones. It has taken some courage to come back on here, even though this place has been one of my biggest refuges.
At some point this summer (I cannot recall when), I was really heavily triggered about my abuse. Often it comes from news stories of people abuse kids or being caught with child pornography. One major blowback to my recovery was two years ago when a former classmate and someone who lived in the same building as me was arrested for that stuff. But what usually triggers me is how in so many mediums such as on gay dating apps, but especially in the porn world online, there is so much glorification and normalisation of stuff that resembles child abuse but with adults. It has been bothering me so much and I want to scream and shout but instead I internalise my feelings inwardly, have extreme anxiety and bursts of sexual compulsion (such as hours on a dating app like a zombie) where I oscillate between wanting to be abused and recreate the feelings of what I went through and desperately seeking positive, healthy sexual encounters to balance all that out.
I keep putting myself into situations which only trigger me further and exacerbate my anxiety and self-hate, as well as feelings of overwhelming despair that there is nothing I can do to change what happened or that people out there glorify abuse. I feel like I have re-opened wounds and taken some steps back in my recovery journey. I keep thinking I was doing so well and now it feels like there is a giant void inside me again. It is a weird cycle: if I don't want to have sex, I can look at porn but that will trigger me and there is so much out there that isn't safe for me: so if I go out into the real world for relationships, I often find myself being forced to do stuff I don't want to by older men and I am also re-traumatised. I don't want any of this. My heart and mind are aching.
I think of my complex PTSD as like a skin condition that no one can see, but I can feel it burning and distracting me from other thoughts: since August it's been flaring up again.
My sleeping has been erratic and sometimes after eating I get so anxious I need to throw up.
Where I am right now I don't have a therapist or support group like before. Just some resource books, some close friends, and these forums.
It's been a while since I last posted, but I have been reading and re-reading new posts and some of my older ones. It has taken some courage to come back on here, even though this place has been one of my biggest refuges.
At some point this summer (I cannot recall when), I was really heavily triggered about my abuse. Often it comes from news stories of people abuse kids or being caught with child pornography. One major blowback to my recovery was two years ago when a former classmate and someone who lived in the same building as me was arrested for that stuff. But what usually triggers me is how in so many mediums such as on gay dating apps, but especially in the porn world online, there is so much glorification and normalisation of stuff that resembles child abuse but with adults. It has been bothering me so much and I want to scream and shout but instead I internalise my feelings inwardly, have extreme anxiety and bursts of sexual compulsion (such as hours on a dating app like a zombie) where I oscillate between wanting to be abused and recreate the feelings of what I went through and desperately seeking positive, healthy sexual encounters to balance all that out.
I keep putting myself into situations which only trigger me further and exacerbate my anxiety and self-hate, as well as feelings of overwhelming despair that there is nothing I can do to change what happened or that people out there glorify abuse. I feel like I have re-opened wounds and taken some steps back in my recovery journey. I keep thinking I was doing so well and now it feels like there is a giant void inside me again. It is a weird cycle: if I don't want to have sex, I can look at porn but that will trigger me and there is so much out there that isn't safe for me: so if I go out into the real world for relationships, I often find myself being forced to do stuff I don't want to by older men and I am also re-traumatised. I don't want any of this. My heart and mind are aching.
I think of my complex PTSD as like a skin condition that no one can see, but I can feel it burning and distracting me from other thoughts: since August it's been flaring up again.
My sleeping has been erratic and sometimes after eating I get so anxious I need to throw up.
Where I am right now I don't have a therapist or support group like before. Just some resource books, some close friends, and these forums.