I woke up yesterday morning, the start of another day. For years, I would wake up feeling some level of darkness, as if a grey cloud hung overhead, forever waiting for me to wake up and sprinkle just enough rain from a slight storm so I knew it was there. It was a daily thing, so I began to think it was normal. I can’t say I wake with that feeling anymore, or not regularly, at least. That familiar grey cloud began to fade away within about 3 to 4 months of treatment for complex PTSD – a condition I went undiagnosed with for several years.

Back to yesterday morning, five years past my initial treatment for CPTSD, the darkness I sometimes experience is linked to the present-day appreciation that I’m starting over – from pretty much scratch – to design my life the way I desire to design it. For the first time, I’m well enough to lay a foundation that I can finally build upon and sustain, unlike the many foundations I attempted to lay for the past 20 years of my life, only to have them falter and crumble due to the many cracks and holes and fractures that were present thanks to how trauma had impacted my ability, leading to sustained inability. Everything I knew I was capable of – the dreams I knew I could achieve – somehow would not come to fruition or would come to a halt before I could get things off the ground.

There were several reasons for this – trauma had impacted my ability and rendered me incapable of many things that just the day before, or the month before, or the year before, I had been able to shine and stand out in doing. Things that were once so easy for me, and likewise should have continued to be, like interviewing for a job or calling about my electric bill, all the sudden were so difficult it felt like I was operating at the capacity of a 10-year-old, and in a way, I was. Though I had two master’s degrees and had worked for some of the largest companies in the world, I was frequently rendered incapable of doing simple spreadsheets, speaking, and doing basic adult tasks – all thanks to undiagnosed CPTSD (more on the “C,” which stands for “complex,” in PTSD another time).

By the time I finally received a correct diagnosis that provided insight into why I had struggled my entire life to remain standing and moving forward, I was no longer functioning as an adult. By the time I was 30, I had worked for two of the largest companies in the world and worked my way up to quickly become a manager for a multi-billion dollar organization making six figures. However, at 40, I could barely hold down a job and often had little to no income. Eventually, I spent every ounce of savings I had on medical bills and incurred excessive debt due to attempting to survive when I couldn’t work. I was barely able to communicate with others and had a difficult time with basic tasks, like trying to talk to someone to understand my water bill or remaining present enough to comprehend a conversation.

My symptoms had gotten so extreme that I would go extremely numb – void of emotion – or have such intense emotional episodes that I’d be on my hands and knees on the floor, crying desperately for the feelings to stop, praying I would be able to make it to the next moment of my life and begging whatever higher power there was for relief. As you’ll hear me say often, it was in these moments that I understood why people cut themselves or attempted suicide – to escape the intensity and overwhelming emotional pain, often accompanied by physical pain, or to feel anything different than the intense emotions or lack of them.

I once had a friend say that she didn’t understand, though, if someone had faith in God, how they could make such a choice – a choice to hurt themselves or end it all. I responded by saying that you have to truly experience the level of pain or the level of emotional blankness to truly understand that the emotional response can be so close to unbearable that it simply takes one moment – that ultimate tipping point – to make a choice with no return, and it has nothing to do with a lack of faith or belief in God or any other higher power. It often has little to do with someone being selfish or, at their core, wanting to die – it’s to get the pain to stop or to shift attention. And though some might choose to hurt themselves for attention, I still find that, more often than not, that drive for attention has roots in deep pain for one reason or another that begs for relief, and it’s not about selfishness.

With time and being in regular treatment, it became easier to remind myself that emotions are transient and that what I was feeling or experiencing in those very dark and challenging moments was only one aspect of my reality. Still, it would take about three years before my episodes were lessoned enough that I wasn’t constantly being taken out of life due to them.

I have EMDR treatment and an amazing trauma therapist to thank for that.

I was in EMDR therapy for 2 to 3 times a week over a span of 3 years that, eventually, lessened to once per week—a treatment that literally saved my life. I know with all of my being that I would not be sitting here at this moment, writing this, if it had not been for someone finally listening close enough to me and my experience to lead me in the right direction for a correct diagnosis and the right type of treatment.

Within about three months of EMDR treatment, which I will explain in more detail in another post, I could finally function to the point that I could hold down a job. I did, however, require accommodations to allow me to perform and maintain work, which included remote work for most of the week, among some other requirements to maintain my functioning. Still, at least I could work for more extended periods of time.

Back to my symptoms at age 40, I was also dissociating to the extreme, with derealization and depersonalization occurring frequently. I would look in the mirror and not recognize myself, as if I were staring at a stranger, and I would walk into rooms I’d been in several times before, but it felt like I was on another planet. I would have out-of-body experiences and have to touch my dog to ground myself and ensure I was real and a part of the world around me. I also had significant dissociative amnesia and often felt like 15 different people at once. Logically, I understood that these symptoms made no sense and that something was very wrong, but I didn’t know what, and I didn’t have the resources or information yet, to understand it.  

I was a mess and didn’t know if I’d ever be able to function at the level I knew I could. It was right down scary and devastating at times, and I had to accept the fact that no level of tenacity or positive thinking was going to make me magically capable, once again, in the moments that PTSD rendered me incapable. I would come to learn that this was because of my brain’s learned responses to past trauma (more on that in another post).

Finally, today, at 45, after five years of consistent treatment, including EMDR and, most recently, ITR, I’m able to function with symptom reduction at about the 90 to 95% level.

Still, starting over at 45 feels exhausting in and of itself, especially when I’ve attempted to do so many times in the past only to face flareups that required me to stop, quit, or at least hit the pause button on my life, preventing me from moving the needle forward at a typical capacity. The difference today compared to those times in the past is that I finally got the treatment I required to help my brain heal from trauma. Now, I’m more in my body and present than I’ve ever been able to be in the past, and my central nervous system isn’t constantly in overdrive. My brain understands that the trauma – the sexual abuse, domestic violence, emotional abuse, and other layers of complex and compounded trauma – are truly in the past, and it no longer feels like I’m being chased by a tiger over and over and over again.

I can take a break. I can breathe.

Though not for long, it sometimes feels like, for those dreams and goals I’ve had for over two decades are still there. And sometimes, I can’t help but feel like I need to meet somehow the impossible task of catching up or making up for lost time. In those moments, I do my best to remind myself that it’s ok and that I still have time.

Maybe, just maybe, I’m right on time.  

I can’t deny, though, that there are moments when I wonder if it’s worth it. Should I just give up? 

And, I definitely wish, at times, that it was possible to find a rock and hide under it for the rest of my life.

And then, somehow, I feel the light on my existence take hold, and I’m reminded that I survived. With a ton of courage, strength, and perseverance, I did the work to recover from a condition I did not cause. And along the way, I have grown and am now in a position to support others so they, hopefully, don’t have to lose their livelihoods and dreams as I did, and they can get the support they require sooner to recover and live the lives they desire to live.

I’ve also gained the wisdom to know that my story is not unique – it’s universal – and I have a responsibility to share it because I was shown the way to recovery (even if I wish it would’ve come along a hell of a lot sooner!).

All that to say, it doesn’t feel right to keep my story to myself – to lock it away deep inside of me somewhere out of fear of judgement or being misunderstood – when there are so many people suffering in this world that don’t need to be if they just had the right resources and knowledge to pave the way to their recovery.

So, fear of being judged and silence — move over. There is no room for you here.

This is my story.

This is our story.

Much Love,

Ronda