for a generalized idea of what my mind feels like, imagine a giant scar, a rift, or a bunch of wall segments in your brain. you can feel them. if you peep over those walls, youre going to experience hell. everything bad thats ever happened in your life pokes your brain all at once. it could be anything as simple as being embarrassed by a stupid thing you did, or as large as rape. it slurs together, so imagine experiencing dozens of awful things in your history happening concurrently. often times i am focusing so hard at avoiding certain ideas in my head that i cannot think and can hardly even talk to someone. sometimes these walls have cracks. sensations seep through these cracks. you can feel hands grabbing you, visceral painful sensations, and so on, even when youre having a good day. ive heard some people have visual manifestations of this, but thats usually considered a dramatization by TV, its not common, but sometimes your memory can be so visceral that it feels real even though you know it isnt. sometimes you hear things, like doors slamming. it segments your thoughts into short bursts, i am noticing it in my writing right now with how many commas im using.

a side benefit to ptsd is that if you calm yourself down, you can artificially make yourself feel happy. every memory is so visceral and real, and a beautiful thing about the brain’s trauma response is that if you can pull yourself out of a spiral, you can choose to think of things that make you happy, and you will be happier. its trippy. sometimes even an idea can make you feel happy, like living in a cabin on a mountain and feeling fresh air in your lungs. that idea and sensation feels real to me right now, even though im snuggled up next to my sleeping bf.

ive talked about what caused my cptsd on here before, but the gist of it is that i experienced continual sexual harassment, groping, and have been raped a number of times. so many people did this to me that i dont remember their faces anymore. its unnerving, because i am suspicious of anyone in my age group now, i dont know who did what. i feel like im ready to fight and die at any given moment.

the triggers for my ptsd at this point are so complicated that i often times dont know what sets me off. sometimes a familiar pattern in a carpet, a cold draft of wind, or ceiling of a particular shade of white paint will set me off. sometimes i can shrug it off. sometimes it seems like im being traumatized by my own PTSD responses and it adds new triggers to the list. its weird. it feels like parts of you, the good parts, are being rewritten with the same torturous spam memories. and i know this sounds bleak but it does get better, weirdly enough.