It's one thing to be reminded of the trauma itself, but right now my worst issue is that all these little things remind me of neutral (or even positive) memories about the thing from before. They're not bad memories, but it hurts to know that I can't get them back. The problem is, the reminders are incredibly wide and varied and all over the place; it's not something I can blacklist, especially not in real life. Just now, for example, I almost cried because of the view through my bedroom window. It's incredibly inconvenient. What can I do? Dwelling on the memories makes it worse, but I don't know how to stop. I want to learn how to redirect my thoughts when this happens. (Mindfulness techniques are not an option, for the record. Long story.)
Update: I think I need to get one of those lamps with the rectangular green lampshades, the kind you find in old-fashioned British offices and libraries. Then I can desensitise myself to them and enjoy them once again, rather than having them as a truly ridiculous trigger. (I cried during Wonder Woman because of those fucking lamps.)
Another, far later, update: I painted three of those lamps on my desk. It kind of helped! When I see that type of lamp on TV or whatever, I only get mildly uncomfortable instead of breaking into tears. I haven't been diagnosed with PTSD, but my new therapist veered into the PTSD assessment questions during our assessment. Her letter reporting back to my GP just describes me as having a depressive episode "related to trauma", but I know from my ironically unhelpful knowledge of psychiatry that the only reason I didn't meet the criteria she was checking against was the infrequency of nightmares. She did specifically ask about them, and I could see on her face that that led to an insufficient check-marking of the category. I mean, I know I definitely used to meet the criteria of PTSD ... I'm not sure whether or not I'm glad that I've improved enough to have my PTSD symptoms be subclinical. I know, honestly, that I met the criteria for like 3 years, minimum. Anyways. I'm supposed to start EMDR soon, possibly actually tomorrow; my therapist wants to move from CBT to EMDR at some point, and the NHS only granted 6 sessions, and they might extend that, but for the moment I'm onto my 4th out of 6 sessions, so I'm guessing the EMDR will start tomorrow-ish. I almost cried today because I realised that there are apartments right above the nearest corner shop. In my last room in That Place, I was one flight of stairs above its bar and its café, which were all part of the same building; I could go down like 18 steps and be immediately in a place where I could buy food and drink. The shop four minutes' walk away from me sells both food and drink, and there are a number of people who live on the floor directly above it. It's been five years and this is still fucking similar enough that it gives me fucking flashbacks. I hate having sub-threshold PTSD symptoms.
just saying witnessed and i feel all that. i deal with a lot of this sort of thing too. i've dropped hobbies that i love because they remind me of the past. the ptsd is not debilitating or anything anymore, i am pretty functional these days, but man it's definitely still there and i definitely still hate it.
