People-pleasing, hyper-independence, never trusting others fully, perfectionism, struggling to set boundaries, avoiding intimacy or zoning out during sex... These are some of the natural consequences of having been hurt by a person you’ve been in a trusting relationship with. Individuals who experience shaming, abuse, neglect, betrayal, or just a generally chaotic home environment end up with attachment systems that are uniquely wired for self-protection. The consequences listed above are just some of the ways you may have learned to both keep yourself safe from and remain connected to important people in your life.

These symptoms can also be signs of having experienced Relational Trauma, leading to Complex PTSD. C-PTSD is, as the name indicates, more complicated than regular PTSD, because it wasn’t one big event that happened, but usually a series of thousands that took place over many years. The impacts of this type of trauma can be devastating. Maybe you can’t figure out why all your relationships are painful, or why you struggle with authority figures. Maybe it’s affecting your parenting, or you just feel keyed up all the time. Because it went on for so many years, the adaptations you have adopted in order to get through the trauma have been useful to you for longer, and are a bit more ingrained. You may have even been diagnosed with a a condition like Borderline Personality Disorder, which is closely related, and arguably just another form of C-PTSD.

For these reasons, C-PTSD can be more complicated to recover from than regular PTSD, but it is possible! For many, the first and most important step is building a safe relationship with a therapist who understands and is responsive to your needs.