Posts Tagged ‘MINDFULNESS’

Distorted Thoughts and emotions from childhood abuse

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PTSD is like a T.V. rerun, our trauma movie of childhood collects many residuals throughout life.

Complex PTSD will always be alive, inside our body and mind, in some form until we die.

This movie is distorted, and stored while experiencing our fight or flight exploding.

Since cognition is offline, rational interpretation is impossible.

It is different for every person, the same stressor experienced by a group does not produce PTSD for everyone.

I have carried a feeling of impending doom, loss, or humiliation since my earliest memories.

Abused kids usually do not exhibit a happy-go-lucky demeanor, we are too busy spotting danger, then negotiating away or towards that danger.

For me, this process happens subconsciously. My mind is already assessing every situation before I know it.

Our trauma is stored in the same place, (the right amygdala) as our mechanism for spotting current danger.

Looking back, I never trusted or felt safe as a kid.

Some of that never goes away.

These emotions and thoughts are damaging to our mental health if we engage them for long.

Solution: Keep as present as possible during the day. Letting a mind like ours wander is a recipe for disaster.

Realize the battle is never over.

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Memories that we carry from an abusive childhood

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As a child being criticized constantly, followed by physical violence, my self-worth was destroyed.

I felt like I did not deserve or belong on this earth.

My nervous system stayed on constant alert, life was lived with anxiety and fear of abandonment.

I was always fighting an internal battle as life overwhelmed me. My early life was lived inside my head, in a make-believe world.

Living in constant fear as a kid, corrupted my view of myself and the world around me.

Now, as an old man of 71, memories arrive connected to emotional distress and anxiety.

Funny how trauma memories(implicit memories) have all the anxiety and fear of the original event.

It is how they are stored, short powerful snippets of charged emotions.

This morning an old buried, long-forgotten memory came back to life without provocation.

We never know what will surface from our childhood.

It’s hard to feel self-worth at times, while happiness is covered by traumas abstract fear.

My mind wants to engage and change the memory but that only fuels its longevity.

Best practice is to follow the breath while letting memories fade without attention.

Life is a minefield for adults with a history of childhood abuse.
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I did an interview about my baseball career

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Recently, I did an interview about my baseball career. It was for a college project on a 20th-century man. (If that does not make you feel old)

First question: Tell me about your childhood.

That froze me for a long minute. My brain has this well-developed record, that plays my narrative of childhood. I know it is how I perceive my childhood, saved under duress.

How can you share in words the damage this abuse has caused me? It never goes away completely. There is a void inside me, a feeling of not being good enough.

When you are physically and emotionally abused by your caregivers, self-worth never develops. Constant criticism leads to a flawed ego, a feeling of being worthless at our core.

My memory of childhood is sparse, and limited. My ability to hide most of my childhood back then saves me from more anguish.

These images are hard to share, I bluntly state a few incidents without any hint of nuance.

My childhood is recorded as a black-and-white movie, with short snippets of violence and shouting.

So after the interview, I felt vulnerable and exposed.

Abused kids never like to be judged. I have a sense of fear about what he will write.

It’s part of our disorder, PTSD, fear, and worthlessness.

It’s hard to write and own up to it.

A PTSD life.
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Our Thoughts are the Problem

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Childhood PTSD (complex PTSD): It is how our brains are wired during childhood that makes our thoughts (dissociation) the problem.

From the Complex PTSD workbook: “Dissociation, like all other symptoms of C-PTSD, is a learned behavior that initially helped you cope with a threatening environment. A neglected or abused child will rely upon built-in, biological protection mechanisms for survival to “tune out” threatening experiences. In adulthood, dissociation becomes a well-maintained division between the part of you involved in keeping up with daily tasks of living and the part of you that is holding emotions of fear, shame, or anger.”

My nervous system and emotional regulation are distorted: Childhood abuse fires the fight or flight mechanism, consequently, we store these memories as traumatic.

Traumatic memories or implicit memories are stored in the right amygdala, out of reach consciously.

Our brains are wired to spot danger above all else.

We spend enormous amounts of time spotting danger.

Questions bombard us on how to avoid, face, or deny our perceived danger.

Our self-worth is damaged, and we feel vulnerable and isolated too often.

Emotional regulation is a constant issue.

Our thoughts are a big issue, for me, it is a constant battle to let go and come back to the present.

How do your thoughts impact your life?
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Our Mindset as abused kids (Complex PTSD)

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Childhood abuse wires the brain in an atmosphere of perceived or real danger.

As an adult, we feel the world is much more dangerous than normal adults.

We are far more accomplished spotting danger, real or perceived.

Relationships and trust are problematic. We dissociate into the shadow thoughts of Complex PTSD.

We can experience mood swings when triggered by other people and situations.

Life hardly ever flows easily, we spot danger in most situations.

School is overwhelming because we are fighting a battle at home, we are compromised from the abuse.

Happy go lucky is reserved for children who were loved and supported.

It seems turmoil thrives inside our heads.

I have to work diligently, be aware, and meditate daily to curb this disorder.

Childhood trauma (complex PTSD) hard wires inside our brain development.

Our abuse happened before the brain developed, so certain parts of the brain are not online to protect us.

Be aware of our tendencies, and have a plan when things explode.

Learn better ways to cope with these feelings.

We never feel good enough, or worthy enough, in fact, we feel flawed to our core.

This is the dysfunction of complex PTSD.
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Fear of Failure

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It has been a while since I posted. I needed an emotional break.

Recently, while examining my behavior and habits, fear of failure was always under the surface.

Even retired, my fear of failure influences my behavior and emotional state.

I would say many professional athletes compete out of fear of failure.

We feel it’s a trial of worthiness, every challenge, game, or tournament.

If it’s a team sport, we fear letting our teammates down.

In sports, a lack of performance leads to firing, death to who we thought we were. My mother told me God made me to be a professional baseball player. Who can I be now at 71?

Some athletes have considerable difficulty losing their supposed true identity.

Fear of failure is jet fuel for worry.

Self-worth has an enormous influence on every aspect of life.

My work is to be aware of fear’s influence, then adjust letting these emotions release.

The more that I can stay present, the better chance for equanimity.

“Equanimity is steady through vicissitudes, equally close to the things you may like and the things you do not like.” By Sheila Catherine
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My teacher passed away yesterday

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My online kundalini teacher passed away yesterday. She was only 51.

There was something special about Jenn, a quality, a fearlessness, and a selfless way of living. I found her meditation group online during covid.

After five years at a zen center, no one resembled her. I sensed a special being, a selfless warrior who placed herself in the middle of others’ trauma without fear for her mental health.

Meticulously I showed up every day trying to understand how she became who she was. Somehow, someway, she elevated her being.

Jenn had a way of making you feel safe. She would make time between appointments to talk to me. I always felt better after our conversations.

Jenn was the purest person, charismatic to a fault that I have ever come across.

She always had a different perspective, outside the box.

Here is an example:


Pray for yourself to find peace and healing, pray for them to do the same, pray for forgiveness to release yourself and forgiveness to release them. Pray for an opening in your ego to allow the heart to temper it all with love and grace.”


We all feel blessed to have known her and feel a void now that she has passed.

I will miss her.
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Healing spiritually

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A decade of therapy helped me but did not stop the demon from doing damage. My spiritual healing offers me hope, calming what therapy could not.


The online kundalini group is doing a 40-day meditation on positivity (love).

Ten minutes of breath work: Inhaling for five seconds, a short pause, exhaling for five seconds followed by a 15 second pause, then repeat.

Thoughts subside with intense focus on the breath like this.

Next, we chant for ten minutes. Chanting is new for me.

We rarely chanted at the zen center, silence was cherished.

We finish with ten minutes of deep breathing.

Instructions are to think of ourselves in the most positive, healthy, and happy way.

This is a task for us. No negativity, no gossiping all day.

I am working on opening my heart and trying to heal more spiritually.

Our job is to continually find new ways to improve, then take action.

The act of trying, and never giving up sustains us during the rough times.
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What’s the difference between PTSD and Borderline Personality Disorder?

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From the blog ptsduk.org

Is it BPD or PTSD?

BPD (sometimes called Emotionally Unstable Personality Disorder, or EUPD) is a lifelong mood disorder which can affect how someone thinks, feels, perceives, and relates to others.

People with BPD may struggle with a fear of abandonment, impulsive behaviour, intense emotions and relationships, and an unstable self-image.

Although there’s no single cause, research suggests genetics and brain chemistry may make someone more susceptible to the condition.

BPD often stems from prolonged childhood trauma, which can also increase someone’s chance of developing PTSD. PTSD is a psychological response to a traumatic event (which of course might include childhood events).

The symptoms of PTSD can include flashbacks, depression, anxiety, shame, anger and relationship problems.

Can someone have both BPD and PTSD?

It’s thought that between 25% and 60% of people with BPD also have PTSD. This could be because living with a mood disorder can both increase the risk of experiencing a traumatic situation, and make it more likely that experiencing a traumatic event leads to PTSD.

When someone has both conditions, the symptoms tend to be worse than if they had BPD or PTSD alone.

PTSD can increase the likelihood of dissociative, intrusive and suicidal thoughts in people with BPD.

That’s why it’s so important to get the correct diagnosis.

Making a correct diagnosis for BPD or PTSD

BPD can sometimes be mistaken for PTSD or C-PTSD, and vice-versa.

C-PTSD is a subset of PTSD which is associated with long-term or chronic exposure to trauma – much like BPD.

Both can cause emotional distress, mood swings, flashbacks, anxiety and anger.

It’s thought there are some generalised key differences to look out for, but of course, everybody is different:

Although both conditions can lead to problems maintaining personal relationships, people with BPD tend to fear abandonment, whereas people with C-PTSD may avoid intimacy or relationships altogether because of ‘feeling somehow unlovable or undeserving because of the abuse they endured’.

People with BPD are more likely to self-harm, than people with PTSD or C-PTSD.

‘While both those with BPD and C-PTSD struggle with emotional regulation and often experience outbursts of anger or crying, those with C-PTSD may experience emotional numbing, emptiness, or a detachment from emotions.’

Someone with PTSD may be calmed by going to a familiar environment and being reassured that they are safe. This might irritate someone with BPD, who may respond more positively to being told their feelings are valid.

People with PTSD are more likely to be triggered by a specific external trigger and think and behave rationally outside those triggers.

For people with BPD, the triggers tend to be internal thoughts and feelings, which can be less predictable.

Unfortunately, because of the overlap in symptoms, and because some differences appear similar from the outside, some people with C-PTSD end up being misdiagnosed with BPD, or vice-versa.

Sometimes someone will have both conditions, but only one is picked up.”
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PTSD: trauma over time

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Childhood abuse impacts our life and does the most damage by repeatedly exploding month after month, year after year.

This strengthens the symptoms of PTSD and makes them almost a habit. We adjust our behavior, avoid triggers, while trying to limit the danger we feel.

Then, we start to anticipate danger, it feels like real fear.

It sure secretes our fear drugs (cortisol and adrenaline) numerous times a day.

We navigate life by avoiding triggers and danger subconsciously. It becomes a habit over time.

Hypervigilance becomes a way of keeping safe.

Avoiding calms our hypervigilance for a while but narrows life.

Hypervigilance happens quickly without thought, every time I go out, enter a building, or plan an outing.

I have never been able to stop my hypervigilance from happening but I can ignore the danger as not real at times.
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