I trained as a psychotherapist years ago and didn't go on to practice. Didn't enjoy it. I realise now I was too traumatised to be a therapist at that time. I got codependent with clients and felt overwhelmed and triggered. We had to have weekly therapy as part of the 4 year training. After 4 years I can't say I felt better I just now knew why I felt so bad. The shift was a cognitive one at best. I now understand that it dysregulated me because I didn't have enough stability and safety in my life or somatically to be able to look at traumatising stuff from childhood. And not everyone will want to do that. Sometimes building safety is enough for some people. I think building life safety and nervous system safety is very important before digging into traumatising and painful material. Most therapists seem to want to get to the deeper stuff straight away and don't understand the importance of building regulation and co-regulation with clients first so they can withstand the deeper trauma narrative if they chose to go there. This is lengthy work and expensive. There are very few trauma-informed therapists around. Hopefully this will improve over the years and in line with the research. Your work on this channel has helped me immensely, thank you for contributing so much time and energy to help people.
Thank you so much for sharing. Your insight from both sides -- trained in psychotherapy but also a trauma survivor -- yields an interesting perspective and critique. Julie@TeamFairy
@@lindaevans4753 that's so frustrating! If you want to get stuck in then you should be able to. I think so many therapists haven't done their own trauma healing so avoid going there with clients. Honestly, I wouldn't want any of the people I trained with to be my therapist!
hey what career did you pursue after this realization? I want to help others heal emotionally and be free from suffering, but I too also don’t think this traditional path is for me
@Ad-nu4tk Honestly, although I like helping others, I found being exposed to the constant suffering of others too difficult. I wanted them all the engage and 'get better' but it doesn't really work like that. I went into gardening for years, which was lovely, but exhausting and it somehow felt less meaningful for me. It's not at all really. Now I feel that unless you've faced all your s*it, I wouldn't work with others dealing with theirs, I think this is the issue with most therapists. They think they're healed and they aren't. But that's just my experience, you may be ready to work in this way and be resilient enough to weather the difficulties you're faced with.
I keep cancelling therapy because I don’t need my feelings to be validated. I already know they’re valid. I need to know how to change my patterns. In my experience, my therapists just keep “validating” me.
There are also different specializations in therapy. Talk therapy isn't the only way. Have you tried behavioral therapy? They are specifically supposed to help you create habits and routines that become healthy behaviors. Sadly, private insurance hasn't caught up yet in terms of covering all of these different therapies (at least in the US, if that's where you are), but it's worth a shot of you have the resources to give it one.
I tried to get my parents into talk therapy and it was a disaster. I then tried a 12 step program for children of dysfunctional parents. The group sat around whining about their childhood for the five weeks I went. I couldn't take it anymore so I started reading books about trauma, anger, boundaries etc it ultimately led to other things that helped including this channel.
I quit talk therapy. I didn't feel we were connected. I felt we were just talking about everyday occurrences, which isn't what I wanted. I wanted help in positive thinking, dealing with childhood trauma. After listening to your podcast, I was motivated to declutter my kitchen cabinets. I plan to keep going so I can feel free from the whole clutter state of mind.
As a therapist myself I DO NOT have my clients relive memories. I discuss HOW your traumas changed you which cause current dysfunction and issues. And I found that this is what really helps my CPTSD clients.
I am a bundle of trauma responses but I’ve yet to figure out what my trauma really is. It’s clear to me and my therapist that my family isn’t emotionally healthy but whenever she asks me about my childhood my answer is usually “I don’t remember” or “was that supposed to happen? Because that didn’t happen.” So I feel this NEED to unpack my childhood and she is agreeable to try to help me but so far nothing has helped me remember things. I know you aren’t my therapist but your comment really got my attention… should I stop trying so hard to figure out what/where/when my trauma was? There’s a part of me that does worry what might happen in my brain if I ever find it.
@@brian5001or we were made in God’s image to live in a world where there is no death, no sorrow, no pain and no tears, but we blew it. Now we live in a fallen world, experiencing good and evil and we don’t like it. .. but it’s temporary. God has made a way out through Jesus, and given us an instruction manual, with some basic information to help us. The fairy’s daily practice reminds me of, “Cast your burdens upon the Lord and he shall sustain thee.”
@@sharonthompson672just so you know, there are a couple of antinatalist trolls in the combox right now trying to stir up trouble, accounts with no subscribers and no content 🤨
I am not saying that there aren't therapists out there who really care about healing their patients. But the primary goal of many professionals, and more broadly, the care system that's giving them protocols and guidelines, is profit. They don't want you to heal and move on. A completely healed patient doesn't bring any more money. They want you to keep returning and writing your check again and again, for as long as possible. You taking matters in your own hands, and, even worse, helping others turn away from 'therapy' that doesn't really heal anything, is 'dangerous' because it 'steals' customers and lowers their profit. Money, not people, is all that matters for the system and the many who benefit from it. Your channel helped me a lot. Thank you.
EMDR made me burst into tears when I tried it, and that happened every time. My "therapist" got very "eye-rolly" with me and she was just very bad over all. It's hard for me to find a therapist I can trust, and you have to be careful who you let into your head.
What a painfully invalidating experience! I agree with your comment on taking care on who is let in. A therapist who can't keep the tentative trust you've invested in her or him and can't develop increasing trust doesn't deserve more of your time or resources. For what it's worth, I apologize in behalf of the mental health profession . . . and the educational institutions that continue to turn out professionalswho aren't trauma-ready. You, and all other survivors, deserve better care. Jared Powell, LCSW
@@re-embodyingemotionalexper5040EMDR worked for me, I had a few sessions that I burst into tears, then the next time I laughed my sorry backside off instead. At that point, the issues I was having ‘just went away’. A couple more sessions and I got no reaction at all.
I've had a moment in my life where 2 psychiatrists together who told me that, despite having CPTSD because of an unsafe youth, child abuse, loss of family, depression, social isolation, debts even homelessness, they were amazed to still see me functioning properly. Yes I was very angry. And I needed to talk about it. But at the end of my rage, they were praising my resilience at a moment I was getting off the street, and rid myself of a relationship that made me feel miserable and getting away from anything that made feel miserable in general. Also the realisation that keeping talking about the things you've been through, keeps pulling you back in the past. At some point, I started to feel.strong enough to just live with it and give it a place.
I agree that Talk Therapy is a waste of time; I never found any therapist who even understood anything I was dealing with and they certainly lacked empathy. I dealt with my own issues by reading a lot of self-help books and one of best books I read was on Self-love by Robert H. Schuller. However, the most helpful activity I did was to write Ten Gratitude's each day for one whole year. When you are raised in a negative environment and nothing you do is good enough, you become a perfectionist in an imperfect world. Your thinking patterns automatically default to the negatives in life, in people and about yourself. Writing a Gratitude Journal daily for one year help me to retrain my thinking patterns to focus on the positive of all situations and to accept that there is no perfection in life, in people, or in the world.
OMG! Thank you for writing this! This resonates so much with me. I am a perfectionist too which holds me back from doing many things, or taking way too long and doing it. Your comment made so much sense to me. I was never good enough for my mom even though I was an A-B student. 😢 I will try writing 10 gratitudes a day. That sounds beautiful. Thank you!
After 25 years of talk therapy, I realized the wound came back and haunted me. I could not move forward until I used your tools for healing! Thank you!!
I have to admit, I've had good and crappy therapists. My therapist who helped me as I was exiting an abusive relationship was wonderful. My current one that I just check in with on zoom is great. But in between? Oy! 🤦
Therapy has its place. The problem I had was finding a "good" therapist. But even the good ones did not give practical advice on how to live instead of survive.
the point of therapy is to protect the capitalist system by placing blame of systemic problems on individuals who don't actually have the power to do anything. Job done! good job therapists
@@davidcrawford9026well said! Couldn't have put it more succinctly. A lot of therapists, incredibly, don't seem to see this that but many are simply living in cognitive dissonance. Plus it's an industry. It's in their financial interest to make the individual feel they just need to "work on themselves" in order for them to keep coming back.
While I do get your disappointment, please reconsider if generalizations is a good thing to do. Coaching might be a huge industry iat the moment and easier to attain then a phd, doctor’s degree, or becoming a therapist… But there are just as many humans with phd, a doctor or therapist that went to university, that are very bad at what their doing and harm more than help… My point is, no matter the industry, class, ethnicity, religion and etc. pp. - the whole world is full of egoistic, toxic people, they are everywhere! But there are also coaches, accredited studied professionals and also lay people who heal by their sheer ability to be present with all their conscious and being, with a person in pain, who’s work is gold. The key is, to connect to your inner guidance and feel whats/whos the right one for you, as opposed to falling for claims on a cognitive level. Easier said then done, l know… But it’s possible! I went x times barefoot to the borders of madness because I tried to follow “professional help” from several dr. and therapists, of which all the talking made me more dysregulated, then depressed and as if I had lost all my intelligence and ability to live my life like I desired - for several years. A decade to be precise, from the start of trying to “do everything right, as therapists suggested” till now. Some of them ment well, some where just downright disgusting in their approaches, which I then didn’t notice being in all the emotional pain in the situations… I’m still a work in progress, but I’m back in my body and start to get hope again. I’m through the process of grieving the ten years now I think, which really felt like stolen time because I was more like in a waking coma then alive . I feel the key is to work on reshaping the nervous system, because it’s normal for people with c ptsd to be stuck in fight, flight or freeze mode and attached to that, bad thought patterns that are often originated from conditioning in childhood or other bad experiences, and in fight, flight, freeze are almost impossible to exit. Also look into working on the relationship to yourself and look into, how you got related to when you where little and how you relate to yourself (attachment theory… ) .. I can, additional to Annas work here, highly recommend you the following channels: Personal Development School & Heidi Priebe (Attachment Theory), Suki Baxter (Nervous system reshaping) So, may you also regain your power and feel what’s right for YOU in the future, instead of going after what sounds right ❤
I had a therapist who is an excellent life coach. She was excellent but she admitted she was not trauma trained. I made a lot of progress in my personal growth, but the trauma remained. She quit therapy to coach full time. When I asked her if I could continue with her with coaching she gently said that I still need therapy, coaching was not a good option for me at the time. They are two completely different things. Coaching is amazing, I've received so much from it myself that I plan on becoming certified myself someday and if I get any clients who clearly need therapy, one I think I'll be able to easily sus that out, and two I will readily refer them to therapy or Anna Runkle here ☺
OMG. This comment. Yes, it was actually an awful life coaching experience that catapulted me right into discovering CPTSD and the Crappy Childhood Fairy channel. I still write about it in my daily practice - how I felt completely unheard, re-traumatized , and scammed out of $1,200, just to have a man tell me that I was a basket case and needed his help. He wanted me to go into another program he offered, and when I told him I felt it wasn't the right fit for me, he made it clear I was a waste of his time. What I learned from that is, as scary as it is, real change happens when we take responsibility for ourselves and find the strength from within (& IMO, with help from God). Relying on someone else to fix or save me is a recurring theme in my life that I've taken great strides to overcome.
Once I looked at myself and saw the control I have for my own emotions and behavior, it completely changed my way of thinking. Even though it wasn’t my fault that other people treated me poorly, I do have to take accountabilty in my role and what I tolerated from others.
I have been out of college about 15 years. I wrote lots of papers on Children of Alcoholics and trauma. In 15 years there is so much more help and understanding.
Talk therapy for me opened all my wounds again and made me hemorrhage emotionally. I blamed myself. Anna’s experience is so validating and healing for me.
I think talking about past wounds is like picking a scab and making the wound bleed again. I have found it best to not talk about the past and not allow myself to think about the past because I then start to wallow and get depressed. I find it best to remind myself to move on to the present and future.
Drowning in the angry stories because there is nothing new to be learned from them is probably the best objective description of where I lived in my heart and mind for nearly 30 years. It took owning my actions, apologizing to those I hurt, and building up trust with them again before I was able to be happy, healthy, and move on.
I go to Art Therapy and it's amazing. It helps me so much more than just talking and I had so many aha-moments. It really helped me a lot to understand my feelings and to make little steps towards a better life 😊
Art therapy is something that I'm hoping to start ASAP here in the UK. Apparently it is very useful for expressing ourselves. Anna, I watch a lot of your videos and I find you very interesting and down to earth. I've been having therapy for 6months now and like others 'can't remember' things from my past, is this 'normal' for trauma?
@@artwithmamafairybreadd I worked on a therapy box and the whole exercise was just frustrating for me. I am an artist and can draw or paint quite easily but trying to incorporate therapy into it was a nightmare.
@@mysocalledmidlifecrisisvlo7521 I draw and paint too…I don’t think I could stand someone telling me what to do and organising a project that had to done their way maybe….I need let me creativity run wild….if the therapy has structure maybe that would drive me mad…I’m automatically in my happy place when on my art desk…I can’t wait to draw and paint…it helps me so much just being there….
I am entering therapy now because I need guidance I can’t do this on my own anymore I’m ruining my own life, but at the same time I respect what you say in a lot of your videos including this one so far. One size doesn’t fit all I’ve learned in many ways ❤
I think if youve never been to therapy, and you’re super lost and need help, therapy is a good place to start. i think anna is just saying it’s not the end all be all and it was something that didn’t work for her. But she gave therapy a legitimate try over several years before making that decision and she is giving you a heads up so you dont have to struggle for years like she did.
make sure you don't get a cold fish, I have done not much of this and had one amazing man I saw only once he looked like Judd Hirsh in Taxi and helped so much just one visit, but went again years later and got some people who were super clueless. And they can make it worse! So, be picky!
I had major childhood trauma, I was depressed and had a lot of issues. The only thing that got me healed was God, praying and reading the bible. I am on no meds now, I'm happier, I have no more fears and I am truly living a full and happy life now. I was never real religious and really had no clue what Jesus and the bible were about. It took years (since 2008) for me to study, pray and watch God move in my life for me to honestly say it works and I'm not the only one it works for. He loves all of us, even us broken ones. I pray for everyone to get to know him and seek his face. He is in every sense of the word, my Saviour. Good luck @lovelygirl4031 , remember you are loved. (PS I am 61 now).
Oh yes, my best friend just told me few hours ago that her therapist released her bc her therapist themselves said they're not capable to treat trauma. My friend was devastated, but I said don't worry and sent her your links for your courses and your pages✨ thanks so much for your work Anna The Fairy!
@@happygoaluckyYou need to be specially trained as a trauma therapist in order to help traumatised people. It's a very different ball game. And trauma informed is not the same as trauma therapist. Like for example: I am a creative arts therapist in training and in my entire studies I had one trauma unit and CPTSD hasn't even been mentioned. I'm a trauma survivor myself and can affirm that most people I am getting educated with would also refer deeply traumatised people to a specialist. Seeing a psychologist is a bit like seeing a GP who then sends you somewhere else if they think you need special treatment.
THANK YOU SO MUCH for your strength against the “nay sayers” and all the hate mail. God lead me to YOU!!! Before I found you I was beyond lost and broken!!
I had similar experience with therapists, and felt I was wrong. All they wanted from me was talking again and again about my horrible childhood, which is gone. They kinda made me feel guilty and belittled me for being more interested in the experiences I was living at the time, that were traumatising me. I'm happy I quit talk therapy but I wish I were able to benefit from someones help.
Wow. We have a very similar experience right down to EMDR. Fast and effective. Talking took so much out of me it took 3 days to recover after my visit with the therapist. Did it for years. Now, what works for me is to reframe the memory. Thank you.
After twenty years following short therapies. Some destroyed me. Some did some good jobs. I had to quit two of them. I got desregulated. I use writing and I pray. I did progress. I understand your anger. Thank you for sharing.❤
Therapy can help us get through crisis but it is "historically" focused so combining it with a daily recovery practice helps. My therapist is a Buddhist, she taught me to practice self compassion. I've used this skill to move forward in areas I was stuck. The skills taught here are essential to fill in the "Swiss cheese holes" or gaps in learning we have from our upbringing. These "self skills" fill in a gap within the therapy world too because they provide the "how to" that's rarely offered. So I got recovery skills, compassion & support, all positive, I'm grateful. Thank you
Talk therapy was destructive to me time and time again. So many therapists took it as a personal/ego failure when they couldn't alter my thinking. It was as though technique made them pursue unlocking a certain cognitive door, and the door I needed opened was a different, perhaps atypical one. A few things that helped me: Your videos and the epiphany of learning what dysregulation is, DBT workbooks, integrating radical acceptance and value-neutrality when it comes to my many chronic illnesses, and the right medication.
My ex female trauma therapist said to me, " I've worked with hundreds and hundreds of male clients and they all understood me!" Your all the same,"men". Well, I guess I'm not a man just stupid.
I went to four sessions with a therapist. After the first one, I came home and was totally disfunctional for the rest of the day. I found it to be frustrating and really didn’t find any help going. Your discussions has been 1000% better for me!Thank you 💕
My 2 eldest siblings are therapists. I have been in and out of therapy in my now dead marriage and I would play the game like cat and mouse hoping someone could help, it didn't until I tried EMDR Therapy it was amazing but I can't afford it, expensive here. I have a degree in Mental Health and Addictions and not once in College did anything ever connect to me.....now I found you and find it very soothing to know someone on the planet can understand me. Thank you
I feel like getting a degree in counseling really helped my cptsd. Not every program is the same. A lot of the professors worked with a lot of trauma survivors. Sorry to here that didn't help but this channel was able to help.
I'm working with a therapist for the first time in decades. My dental phobia was so bad that when I had an old filling come loose I was waking up with panic attacks just like I had after I was sexually assaulted 25 years ago. I felt completely at loose ends. She doesn't lecture me and lets me take the lead as far as how much I want to tell. She also doesn't have the attitude that she's better than I am. We're just two people.
I tried "talk therapy" on and off for a few years with different practitioners but they were all the same. It seemed that they let me talk on and on about my "issues" but I never got any feedback, positive or negative. I finally gave up when I realized that talking to a wall would be just as effective. As I got older, I became more spiritual and I worked on forgiving the people who had wronged me. That has helped me but there will always be scars. Accepting that has been liberating and I can now enjoy life as it is not as I wished it was.
I've questioned treatment modalities for several decades, and stumbled on CPTSD myself, not because professionals figured it out. My academic studies weren't psychology but did leave me with serious questions that went unanswered, while not making significant progress therapeutically. NOW I understand, it all makes perfect sense to me, and I am so done with trying to explain it to most therapists, and feel no need for their well-intentioned "help" that left me feeling miserable. I want to expand on this in another format later. Once I found this channel I have made progress in leaps and bounds. THANK YOU.
I love you! I suffer from childhood PTSD as well, and I don’t go to a therapist because I can’t afford it. So I’m happy that I found you, and therapist doesn’t really help anyway, they just take your money. Just because you went to school and got a degree doesn’t qualify you as a therapist. In my book. you actually experience it and that’s more experience enough for me.
U r right dear. Most psychologists today fail to address deep rooted issues. Quoting some steps mentioned in psychology books in the name of healing is pure crap. But yes there are some really good psychologists who are able to help you deeply.
Also they expensive. The best therapy is self-therapy, with the use of a few tools, usually inexpensive such as the Fairy or books. I'm not surprised that therapists are threatened by the Fairy, she is better than them, much better and much cheaper.
Talk therapy worked in the beginning. But, it felt like all's they wanted to do is keep me stuck in the past. More money for them right? I did 3 years and it was enough. Your videos and Dr Ramani have done wonders for me.
Not to take anything away from this platform but Dr. Ramani has really ramped up the public awareness around CPTSD and Narcissistic abuse with her celebrity guests and their frank talk about their childhood and lack of support they faced. I found a certain validation that even the most successful people have had this happen and the happiness they managed to find afterwards.
Saying this respectfully, Dr Ramani is NOT a huge champion of CPTSD. Maybe PTSD…her platform is 99% about narcissism. These are all different things. Ramani’s titles about CPTSD are far and few between and date back 3 years ago. Anna has been putting out content for a longer time and bases her work on an LMFT named Pete Walker. She also cites her sources and Ramani and others do not. CPTSD is not recognized in American DSM so I’m guessing this is why Ramani doesn’t talk about it much.
@@armyofone13 I was offering an alternative for the viewership to check out because my childhood trauma was ar the hands of a narc and her discussions it helped me. Since as you say healing and help isn't exactly readily available and it's up to us to spread the gospel where we have found success. Just like I make sure to mention Anna's Crappy childhood fairy videos in Dr. Ramani's video comment section.
@@villaineramatriarchy I guess I haven't gotten that far in her video catalog. When that happens and if I see something harmful I shall proceed with caution.
@villaineramatriarchy Yeah claiming that parents are victims of children is completely absurd in most cases. The only exception I might make is if the child is an adult or almost an adult and physically attacks the parent. However your children are acting, you bear a large portion of the responsibility for that! Calling yourself a victim is ridiculous. Also children inherently have a certain level of narcissism because they haven't completely learned empathy yet. That's totally normal!
I listened to a presentation by a marriage counselor from my religion, and he said he doesn't support therapy very much because of the narcissism trend. He said he dealt with a few couples where one person had something like schizophrenia or EXTREMELY severe depression, and you could say that this person's mental illness was *the problem.* However such cases are very rare. Most often one person comes in and accuses the other of being "a narcissist." Everyone is inherently narcissistic to a certain degree. And it's easier to label the other person a narcissist than examine your own level of responsibility in the situation. He claimed that he has seen many marriages that were actually salvageable get ruined by this trend. I believe him honestly.
The wounds keep coming back in therapy, I’m so sick of it! I’m looking for the tools to arrest my past so I can make my future not like my past… a haunting open wound . Thank you Anna ⭐️❤️ You make so much sense!
Thank you so much for persevering. I’m glad you’re here and that you created this community and channel. My sister is a therapist and she’s told me once on a discussion about our family, ‘well, I am the one who’s a trained therapist!’, so I stopped telling her what’s going on with me. I haven’t shared this channel with her becos I’m afraid her judgement would spoil it for me. Perhaps I will one day - when I no longer need her approval. Which I didn’t know I needed until I typed that sentence!. I’m keeping crappy childhood fairy to myself for now. I’ve benefitted so much from your content. Thank you Anna. Many blessings to you
It worked for me. I think it’s different for everyone. It helped me figure out what was going on inside of me. I feel my therapist helps me figure out things I can’t see it. I think you have to find the right therapist
I'm planning on studying to become a therapist soon and I just wanted to thank you for your wisdom. Your channel is one of the best I've found and I totally support your mission! I'm also a survivor with cptsd and I want to help others who have trauma because like you I found therapy to be largely ineffective until recently. Keep making videos please! They are invaluable.
I’m a medical professional that frequently refers patients to your channel. What you do is amazing. It is raw and honest. It is healing. It is empathetic. It is an eye opener for so much chaos tied to CPTSD that so many couldn’t make the connection. You may not have the “formal” certification but essentially what that is is lots of book reading, doing research about the subject matter and staying abreast the updated treatments. You, Ana, ARE a therapist because you’ve done all that too. Love how you have helped me, how you help so many and how we can help others because of you. A most heartfelt THANK YOU!!
I just had a therapy session again today and I feel a lot worse than I did before. She’s a very nice lady. I’ve been seeing her for months but I don’t feel like I’m going anywhere. I feel like I’m spinning my wheels in quicksand. There’s been more than a few times I feel I need to change chairs with her. I honestly don’t feel like she cares. I think she has too many patients and her plate is overflowing. I have panic and anxiety disorder since since the age of 15. I also have PTSD Manic depressive and I don’t know what else I can’t keep up lol but in all seriousness, a friend of mine told me about your channel so I’m here and I’m listening. Praying for a miracle. I’m a 57 year old woman . God bless you.
Here's my take on talk therapy, which I spent many years doing with several therapists. Full disclosure: I also trained as a therapist, although I don't work in the field. I saw my first therapist around the time I turned 14 (like you Anna) and my last therapist last year at 50. The therapy I have done has been mostly psychodynamic, but has also included EMDR (very helpful), CBT/DBT (somewhat helpful), and mindfulness training (somewhat helpful). The therapeutic relationships I have had with MH practitioners has ranged from warm and supportive to impatient and even punitive (the saddest thing is that the most "punitive" treatment I received happened when I was at my most vulnerable-severely depressed and suicidal). The most helpful thing for me about therapy was learning that what happened to me as a child was not my fault and that I am not "bad." The therapist who did EMDR (this was three decades ago when EMDR was in its infancy) also taught me about some PTSD symptoms. Unfortunately, this same therapist later befriended my covert narcissist mother even though she KNEW what my mother had put me through as a child. Talk about terribly violated boundaries! One thing that therapy could never give me is the tools to stop sabotaging my own life. I think you are right Anna that most therapists won't help you with this because it could look like "blaming the victim." In other words, knowing the trauma you survived at a young age makes them loath to ever make you take responsibility for your own life. Luckily, I found your channel and some other ones (Heidi Priebe is one of my favorites). I am really geared toward learning tools to help with self-regulation and keeping myself safe as well as learning how to not stand in my own way. And it has only taken me a half century to get here (LOL)! Thank you for all that you do.
I have been so ashamed for always quitting talk therapy-I’ve tried about 5 separate times with 5 separate therapists and every single time I have felt exactly what you described-and I just couldn’t keep doing it to myself-but it always made me feel like I was quitting at seeking help. Thank you for posting this.
I love your teachings and the way it is explained. I have trauma from so many types of abuse and I have done a lot of traditional and non-traditional therapy and you have helped me the best. Someone who hasn't experienced trauma doesn't really get it. They can be empathetic but unless you've been in the trenches you don't understand. Thank you for all you do and keep up the great work!
I find it often has to do with dynamics a normal therapist isn't aware of. I personally already know that I will try and refuse to be working in drug and alcohol abuse. It's too far away from my lived experience (I don't drink at all nor has my family any drug or alcohol issues). But when it comes to narcissistic abuse I can pick up on all the nuances and thinking patterns of a survivor because I lived through it. Sometimes it helped to look up what the therapist is specifically trained in - because that's usually telling of the therapists personal lived experience.
My first therapist wasn't very helpful because she was very woowoo new age with listing gratitudes and chanting positive affirmations that made me feel silly. The second one was too pushy. Our first session was about building a healthy routine, then on our second session she wanted me to do more with my circumstances. Her advice was good but her wording was tactless. She assumed that I'm wealthy because my family owns two businesses, and that I do nothing in my house. She said I'm wasting away my youth, and if I don't make a change I'd still be miserable years later. I can't go shopping for anymore therapists because it's expensive in my country. If anything, it taught me that I already have the tools to manage my depression and trust myself.
When we have CPTS….why?…where do we get the perfect childhood story we never knew existed to compare to and develop trauma it takes a lifetime to get over…how do we KNOW our not perfect childhood story is devastating that makes us so nutty…when we never had the positive to compare to…I must hope in the next life I do not have to be around and process my mother…she needs to be a zero eternally
My therapist teaches a technique to me on how to sit with my emotions without pushing into isolation, staying in contact, being here and now, with respect to my own and boundaries of the other. I go to him and feel seen, present and safe to face my darkness. I trust him, and that is my 8th therapist in 10 years. So, yea, journey was long. I also do daily practice by CCF and join some social event that includes dance every week. These activities are basically my minimum mental maintenance protocol at this point in my life. It’s like brushing teeth, i do it, to keep being here on Earth. I believe I will at some point stop therapy, but now it gives me that extra cushioning, where I have an objective and compassionate witness to my states, not stories . I think therapy does work for most people, when you find the right one, but it does drain when you’re with the wrong one, and sometimes they can give you extra trauma. I had one like that, I suspect she wasn’t very sane. Btw, daily practice is really something, do it, it’s so empowering.
I tried Better Help twice and both experiences were ineffective and I felt exposed speaking with them. I also felt unsafe speaking with the therapists because they attempted to find something to diagnose me first meeting. I didn't get the opportunity to talk, they asked me a list of questions to label me and talked about themselves and one lady was clearly occupied every time we spoke, not to mention late to both meetings.
I saw a therapist who was well-meaning, but poorly trained in the situation I was facing. Her advice would have thrown more gasoline on the fire if I’d tried it, and in the end she wanted to put me on antidepressants. In other words, to anesthetize me to a completely bizarre situation. In the end I found help with online support groups and spiritual direction. Also telling my testimony to people in the Real World.
~Yes, Anna, you have indeed started a movement!!!~Traditional therapy left much to be desired, at least for me!!!~I rarely got any practical advice, and i spent years of my time, and loads of money on it~You are a true revolutionary & its an exciting honor for me to be a part of it, not just seeing it happen, finally, but benefiting from it myself~Thank you!!!~♡~
I've had some useless therapy experiences and later two good ones. The two good ones helped me a lot. However, the most useful was the women's group therapy I went to. Learned so much doing that.
I first started off with therapy. My therapist is amazing, she really helped me, because a lot of my acute symptoms were because of narcissistic abuse (which is an area she is really knowledgable and has a lot of experience). And after I managed to change my life circumstances (ended relationships, moved away, etc), I still noticed I was having flashbacks, anxiety attacks... and then I discovered your channel and what dissregulation is. I was shocked how much the writing technique helped my anxiety and panic attacks. I should also point out that my therapist never forced me to talk about my trauma more than it was necessary for her to understand some of my thinking/patterns. I suppose what I'm trying to say is, that the combination of talking therapy (specifically cognitive behavioral therapy) AND your techniques really made the biggest difference, and I encourage everyone who is currently in therapy but needs something that will help them self-soothe and stabilize their mood - do try the technique Anna teaches. It's incredibly helpful if you can work on yourself and work through things with a calm a clear mind.
@@villaineramatriarchy I have no data about that, but I do know that it helped me at that point on time. But I did notice that it wasn't helping with anxiety and disregulation, so I sought out others forms and thankfully found this channel.
Thanks very much Fairy for reproducing the video that helped me so much. I've found my own way to heal. I have video session with a coach (not a therapist or a psychologist!) specialized in healing victims of narcissism which is my case. I practice yoga and mindfulness but I can't make the daily practice because I get paralyzed. but I still follow your videos and listen to you. My experience with trauma and therapists was like yours. thanks to you I've progressed a lot and I'm very near to healing. Thanks very much❤❤❤
Amen! I refused to rely on external factors and went inward.....it is working a million times better. Exercise, good food, good sleep, great community, mind observation, writing, running, reading, cycling, walking......and more than anything....listening to the inner stillness. Less talk, more listening to the inner awareness. Being ok with the journey as it is, appreciating the is-ness of life. No regret.
Part of the problem is therapists aren’t really supposed to give advice so much as to guide us to find the answers. Which sounds good on patper, but if the client has gone to the trouble of seeking a therapist, spending the time and money, they probably just need some advice.
As a former psychotherapist, I have come to the conclusion that talk therapy is not very effective for most conditions and people. Talking about our problems only works if the therapist can offer insight, guidance, or solutions. PTSD and CPTSD can not be resolved through talk therapy, and as a matter-of-fact, most likely will actually re-traumatize the person. If you go to a therapist and you leave feeling drained, confused, angry or triggered, that's usually a warning sign that something's not right. Don't ignore it and don't keep going back hoping things will get better. Try art therapy or sand play therapy instead. And ALWAYS listen to your intuition and inner voice and don't second guess yourself.
❤😊 THANK YOU!!!!!!! THANK YOU!!!!!!THANK YOU!!!! YOU ARE THE PIONEER SCOUT LEADER!!!!!! SORRY NOT SORRY! I KNOW ITS SOMETIMES A BIT OF A PAIN. BUT YOU ARE SO FUCKING WONDERFUL AND HONEST AND TRULY A SPIRIT WHO EMBODIES SERVICE ABOVE SELF! STILL TRAVELLING THIS ROAD ...STUMBLING ALONG. SO GLAD I FOUND YOUR VIDEOS AND WAS ABLE TO KEEP WATCHING AND LEARNING❤❤❤❤❤ YOU ARE AMAZING.
Funny I just got back home from a therapy session where I mentioned how helpful these videos have been for me, how watching these videos have helped me feel more SEEN and understood than ever and how these videos have been genuinely saving my life, but then one of my family members called it a poor tool in a toolbox and that got latched on for the rest of the session. I also kept getting a heavy feeling like somehow, after seeing this therapist twice, I was seen as some kind of powder keg, like I haven't put up with my parents getting physically violent with me for most of my life and only just within the past couple of years started to have my own outbursts at 31. Funny enough, it's because I started therapy and realized more and more how bad they treat me and they get louder and angrier when I stand up for myself. I think I have also handled being asked about how often I go outside for the last time. I have mobility issues from an injury and clearly a cane isn't even enough to get people to realize a jaunty little walk in the sun isn't possible for me unless I want to snap my ankle. I used to love going outside, it feels like therapists see me as some cave dwelling nobody and THAT'S why I am depressed. I'm really quickly realizing that therapy is not for me. I know myself better than anyone else so I can look into the issues I know I have and tackle them one at a time at an easy pace, instead of splitting up all these conversations for one specific visit on one specific day for a few hours, and on top of that I won't judge myself as harsh as I feel judged by therapists so I'm definitely more receptive to the input.
@FlyingMonkies325 I'm really glad you commented, I even added a couple notes from your comment for the next time I go in because I decided I will give this person one last visit to discuss how the one I just went to affected me. Honestly I was still angry over that last session even after going to sleep and even after being up for a few hours I am still thinking about how that therapist agreed with my parents (very poor observation) that my tools are poor. Especially because I have been browsing through my usual music, videos such as this one, and using other mindful techniques to not let this hit me even harder. I can't help but fear for anyone else going there who doesn't has as solid as a toolbox as I have because I had to bring out the big gun Jee Veerey tonight. (Fantastic song by the way. Bloodywood is VERY wholesome, I'm a huge fan. Metal has always been very healing for me.) Comparing to an artist or an actor is wonderful because it actually fits me pretty well. I am an artist anyways, and in general I prefer to show my work rather than be judged for however it was that I got there. I know my truth better than anyone else could, even if they are someone who has stuck with me for years. I know what helps me, and that I am going by the direction of my last therapist because she was the best I have found in the past decade until I had to move and couldn't stay with her. Just because this new one hears "youtube" and thinks "bad tool" without even hearing the contents, or acknowledging that the diagnosis I spoke of came from that therapist and not a self-diagnosis pulled out of the depths of my backside on wild theories. She can invalidate me with whatever she thought after only two visits, but I know my truth and how long my path in therapy has been.
I don't think talk therapy was for me. Something happens in therapy for people who have high sensitivity to the changes of the vibes in a room. When someone NEEDS to air how they feel to another person, talk therapy makes a difference, but when you are sensitive to how other people feel to the extent that even slight changes in other people's moods will set you off, sometimes talking about things that upset you can just spiral. My last therapist was a very sweet old lady, but she would freeze up when I would talk about certain things, and I could tell that what I was talking about was triggering for her, and that at some points in our conversations, she would be placating me rather than really challenging me to better myself. She was very kind, but I think emotional sensitivity and ctpsd tend to produce someone who can't really talk to another person about what's going on, because it just ends up either a performance or the person with CPTSD trying to placate the therapist with what they think someone in therapy should sound like. What works for me at this point is just exercise and eating better. Talking about my past is so dysregulating that I only refer to it vaguely at this point.
Thank you!!!! I always felt like I wanted to die after a talk therapy session and said that once and ended up in a hospital ward for a week under lock and key... never went near a therapist after they let me out "healed" your vlogs have been life changing, of course it's far too late for me, but I try to watch until the end of your posts and this one was such a relief....piling all my trauma on the doctors desk verbally each week destroyed me for days and then after he locked me up for telling the truth, sigh , years and years of new trauma. Trying to feel beter before I get to eighty. Thanks again
This is helpful I’m really tired of retelling everything it’s reopening wounds. I feel stuck and I know I’d gravitate towards approval seining instead of fixing the problem
Keep talking about trauma brings no sense of relief, no greater understanding from others or yourself. Occasionally sharig brings moments of clarity that are useful in a practical way. But mainly it brings shame, hatred even agressive actions from others. Talking about how trauma made you a better person or maybe just even the person you are can be useful for others but usually it's not. Those who love unconditionally love...well, unconditionally. We just attract more abuse, physical symptoms with no resolve. Love happens not because people understand but because they've simply chosen to love. ❤
"I am in charge of my healing" AMEN When I took my healing into my own hands I started on the right path. I learned that just because something works for others doesn't mean it has to work for you. Keep looking until you find what does. Reading books on healing, EmDR, neurotherapy and prayer worked for me. I found this channel and it is helping me put names to things. I can now see those moments in my life when I lost it for what it was "disregulation". I also understand that I am third generation cptsd on both sides of the family so I can look at my family with compassion and admiration for what they were able to accomplish given the struggles and inner battles they were fighting . Glad I found you.
the way you're describing dysregulation @ around 6 minutes, is exactly how i feel when i go onto twitter! i call it "noisy" without sound. maybe it's like that for everyone? makes me feel the way i felt having dinner with my malignant narc brother and parents, too. can't be heard, can't escape and overwhelmed by the "noise", which, in real life, was my brother's obnoxiously loud talking/over-talking, and on twitter, is the chaos, everyone up in arms about something, complaining, shouting, all talking at once. i probably sound insane right now!
@@CrappyChildhoodFairy i'd be over my trauma if it wasn't still happening or rather accellerating exponentially. thanks to my previously-mentioned brother. he has a very VERY long history of projecting, which hit me like a ton of lead in 2018 when he a) accused me of slandering him (after he'd obviously/publicly slandered me; b) called me delusional and historically psychotic and has been stalking me among other very creepy, sick things. and he unfortunately has help from someone who's even more insane than he is!
You, Patrick Teahan & Byron Katie Mitchell are Godsends along my healing journey. The struggle I had was finding a therapist who understands the dynamics of abuse. I am & have been passionate about personal responsibility in my healing path & have slowly navigated that path for 20 years. The fact that all 3 of you focus on empowering people by taking personal responsibility for their part, no matter how small or large, is what has helped me more than any of the 5 therapists I spent time with. Thank you for your courage to speak your truth & for continue doing so in the face of negative backlash. Blessings, Kellie 😊❤
Patrick Teahan is amazing... I personally get more out of his videos than anyone's and damn he is funny and likable too! But I'll check out the other u mention!
It’s very hard but absolutely critical to find the *right* therapist. Not every therapist is good, not every therapist is a good fit, and even fewer therapists actually understand trauma. So, it takes time to find the right person. That being said, the only reason therapy has worked for me at all is because I’ve supplemented it with psychedelic journeys. I’m not sure I’d even be here if it wasn’t for that; it’s been a game changer. But the goal is to find a setting where we feel safe and “held” enough to get into the vulnerable places necessary to deeply explore what happened to us and how it’s impacted us. It’s the only way to untangle it. ❤
Sometimes the “flip the narrative” or having a “different perspective” just doesn’t work. If there’s a real problem, that’s not being addressed. I went back to therapy to work on my shadow self. However, it hasn’t worked for me either.
I love my therapist. She lets me take the lead. I feel like I am talked out, so we are working towards EMDR. Thank you for this. It also made me think of other directions I want to explore in my trauma.
Hi everyone! So glad to hear these techniques are helpful. I am a Psychologist and in my experience, a type of therapy for C-PTSD for those who would like to work with a therapist would be DBT - especially comprehensive DBT! It is very present based, positive coping skills, improving our lives starting today. ✨
I’ve pretty much abandoned therapy too. Had a couple of great ones years ago who weren’t afraid to dig in and get their hands dirty - - I still go back and review the notes I took in those sessions when I get in a crisis mode. Really helps, those therapists who took the time to explore my early family history and enlighten me and how and why I was behaving a certain way in the present. But pretty much every shrink I’ve tried over the last few difficult years have been what I call Shell Answer Man therapists. They wait for you to ask them questions and then they answer rather generally/superficially/whatever because they’re too lazy to do the deep dive. They just want to keep you coming back and don’t seem to care about knowing you or a deeper level. I just decided all that money I was spending and getting nothing from could be put to better use. And I won’t even go into 😂 shrinks who were actually nasty covert narcissists. No thank you. I get more insight from you tube.
I think I know what you mean by "Shell Answer Man" ... stock & standard responses, as if from a manual, workbook or answer key, without the human connection needed to co-regulate. - Julie@TeamFairy
Talk theraphy had helped me but i cant understand why anyone would judge someone who finds a different healing path that works for themselves. Like meditatuon Journaling ways to message the vegus nerve. We are all on the same team seeking a life less suffering. I can say that therapists are like dating its necessary to see different ones until finding the one that can help. I have had therapists that did not help but they also taught me more about what i needed to find.
I’ve been to therapy since childhood. Your experience seeing a therapist mirrors mine. It’s not for everyone. If it works for you, great! If it doesn’t, great! Keep going until something feels helpful.
My daughter definitely has some cptsd and has been through multiple therapists. She'd go to a session or two and either shut off and ride out the therapy until the clock ran out or she'd come home feeling worse. At best she'd try to describe her setback, as she felt like therapists were pitying or patronizing her. She was distraught at wanting help, but not clicking with the help school counselors and doctors recommended for her. I wanted to help her too, but nothing worked. Thank you for making this video, I think that her having to talk about and relieve what she'd experienced is what is setting her back. Now I have hope that maybe she just needs a different approach.
The handwriting thing finally makes sense! …and I concur with just about everything Anna said in her story. I too wish I had stopped talk therapy- EMDR ( got very distressed and broke down and was told I was doing the emdr wrong by the therapist) - CBT …Self help books stacked to the ceiling…If I share and allow myself to become vulnerable I end up walking away from that interaction feeling more vulnerable- Raw. Thanks Anna for all of the validation a guy could ask for - right here on youtube. 🙂👍
Taking responsibility for your own healing and doing what works for you. I love this. It wasn’t until I found ASMR that I really started to heal. It helped me become so much more self aware which brought peace into my life. It calmed the chaos and allowed me to think more clearly. I think (specifically art journaling) ASMR has been to me what your daily practice has been to you. I am so grateful there are different ways to heal because talk therapy made me incredibly dysregulated as well.
Talk therapy never worked for me, it always made things worse. Many years, many therapists and a whole lot of folks telling me that was the only way to fix myself. I felt worse and more traumatized and confused after every session. I couldn't function after the appointments but I forced myself to do it for the people around me for years. What a terrible cycle. Over a decade in this cycle and nobody EVER mentioned CPTSD but I had about a dozen of other unhelpful diagnoses and at least 25 different medications over the course which led to a whole host of other problems. Never heard of CPTSD until i came across your channel. Thank you for stating the obvious because this needs to be addressed. Your story about your sessions is word for word what I would experience. I had come to the conclusion it was not working but faced a lot of backlash when I quit going and started trying other things such as this channel and the daily practice. One of these videos was more helpful than 10 years of that rat race.
I have gone to many therapists and always felt let down..( they did nothing g but take my $$$ and made me feel worse) I ‘ve always believed repetition is the mother of retention..so why would I want to bring up all those awful feelings again in talk therapy.? 🤪🤪. And yes it weakened me because I felt like I was my problem and I can’t fix it. You are definately on the right track…please don’t let these ppl intimate you…you are onto something. I’m so glad I found you.
Thank you so much for expressing the same experiences I had have with "therapists and professionals". I always felt so traumatized emotionally following visits. I left feeling like a clumsy, awkward, zombie.I was raised by narcissists and besides being a CPSTD, I'm an empath. All I can compare it to is opening up a can of worms to hear yourself repeating the trauma. I just wanted to know why I was such a mess always feeling guilty, filled witth shame, wanting to get close to people, but pushing them away before they could reject me. I would leave feeling that there was no hope for me. I am very grateful to God that I was lead to your site! You are a treasure and the "professionals" who spoke so unkindly to you are very much off base! We are all in this together and because we CPTSD folks have been through the same pain, we can help each other. This reminds me of Alcoholics who were so helped by AA when they just used their Big Book, mentored each other, and prayed. Once AA became New Age and psychiatrists, psychologists, and therapists became involved less people were helped. I am saying that, because we like alcoholics understand what CPTSD FEELS like; similiar to alcoholics who understand the games, manipulation, blame shifting, etc., and can hold their fellow alcoholics accountable and there is much to be said for that. Like you, I am not throwing the "professionals" under the bus, but some of them need to understand that psychotherapy is not a proven science and in some cases does more harm than good. Bless you for your wonderful work.
I had some very good talk therapy both as a student and privately but that could only get me so far, talk therapy helped me identify what the problems were and the true range of the damage I had experienced, but despite a very good integrated therapist I paid for privately for two years I could not get beyond the trauma response. The first step I had in the right direction was DBT therapy for issues I had with food which we focused on doing and managing responses now not what happened in the past. Discovering I am Autistic and beginning to recognise the need to be in that way also made a huge difference to my ability to cope (never underestimate a good waited blanket and a pile of fidget toys), but finding this channel and learning the daily practice has become the next peace in my road to healing and learning to self regulate safely. The Daily practice is very much accessible to all nurotypes unlike talk therapies which can be inexcusable, especially to those who struggle to identify and name feelings for whom trying to talk in feelings can be traumatic. The concepts in the Daily Practice are not new the idea of externalising thoughts especially intrusive ones onto paper can be traced to monastic literature in the 4th century CE where they were then read to a monastic elder at the end of the day, this was combined with a meditative prayer practice. This form of close discipleship and prayer is still seen in the Orthodox monastic tradition and has proven helpful to many monastics over the centuries especially when they had troubled pasts (which has been common throughout history). It is a case of needing to rediscover ancient wisdom which had been discarded for the sake of new ideas, and while yes many of the new ideas helped some people what has proven over centuries to work should not be discounted as it does not have scientific studies to prove it.
It didn’t work for me either. Finally got a referral to a brilliant, trauma informed psychiatrist who prescribed low dose quetiapine for sleep, group yoga and mindfulness meditation which I did for 4 years. She taught us about the fight, flight, freeze reactions and role of the amygdala - basically how trauma affected us biologically and gave us tools to “quiet the mind.”. It was so helpful. I don’t see her any more but I know she would suggest Crappy Childhood Fairy as a resource for her patients. So glad this information is becoming widely available.
I tried talk therapy and it wasn’t helpful at all. What I find the most helpful are channels like yours, coaches, journaling and meditation. There is only one licensed therapist that I really like and her name is Susan Anderson. She specialized in abandonment trauma and is also on TH-cam. Thank you for this wonderful channel❤️It’s been very helpful.
I agree with you wholeheartedly Anna. Thank you for being one of the pioneers in having true and effective ways of healing from CPTSD. You’re a God send.
It’s a very thin delicate line we have to cross. I had therapies but Anna fairy is the icing on the cake . You’re the most relatable person, therapist, psychotherapist and all the titles for CPTSD. Whatever you put out is a goldmine to me and I’m sure to a lot of people. Thank you I was repeating all the wrong things due to CPTSD until I came across you in TH-cam. Now I share your channel to my two adult children and sometimes to a sibling who continued my mother’s abuse until she discovered therapy and 12steps. To you fairy I’m forever grateful ❤
Omg thank you. Thank you so so much. I thought I was just crazy that talk therapy was the worst idea I tried. My disregulation and anxiety was 10000 out of 10. Then I stopped and got better. I do CBT DBT and have found relief. Your site has been a Godsend. So thank you so much for sharing. It makes me feel strong and gives me faith.
Hi! It's taken me too long to thank you for your service. I think I found your channel via that first video regarding talk therapy. It gave me all the feels as after over four decades of intermittent, but intensive CBT, I was just *really* feeling the urge to step away. That was troubling because while I have had some truly WTF therapist experiences, most were helpful, and several were extraordinary. The two that stand out the most actually gave me some mental easter eggs suggesting that my biggest breakthroughs would be solo. That triggered a certain level of anticipatory abandonment confusion. It felt as though I was being told that they would help me just enough to be released back to the wolves. As I really got into the deep and dirty painful experiences, I can see how they were preparing me for the work that only I could do. On my own and with my inner child and inner self , for lack of a better description. True to what was hinted, much of my best work has been done on my own and guided by my inner counsel. I had a moment where I realized just how tired I was of repeating this "origin story" of my CT and CPTSD. I needed to move forward and it had to be alone. I needed to grow and experience under the agency of my own decisions and lenses of life. While I haven't had a proper session with my psych for a few years, in no way do I consider the work to be done or that I am "out of therapy". The therapy, the work is never done. For me, the therapists were short term guides and finally like training wheels that are removed. The challenges still exist, I'm simply more equipped and skilled as I take the helm. Where, when, and how we find support and guidance is going to change as we grow and heal. For me, this is a good thing. The whole of life should not be extended triage. At some point, I should get to experience the joy of having agency of my emotional and psychological freedom and health. A great deal of that involves leaving the therapist behind, just as a child, does dropping a parent's hand to join summer camp or perhaps school. Nothing disavowed or broken, simply stepping forward into one's own. To be fair, I've integrated a great deal of what they offered and conscientiously disregard what doesn't fit. I think a good therapist would expect nothing less. In no way do I mean to denigrate those who have a life long therapist, or even, life coach/guru; I believe that model works very well for some while others can find therapy as more of a course correction. Many of us fall somewhere between and all of our paths are unique. I think that all avenues are valid when approached with mindfulness and a willingness to do the hard work. Thank you, again, especially for your kindness, bravery, and openness!
I've had lots of hard experiences in therapy too. This is so helpful because it can make you feel like you're the problem and even the big "solutions" won't work for you. Which is very scary!
What about when you get nowhere dealing with inexperienced ones after years of seeimg them and finally there is a need to go talk to somebody experienced and get a good assessment what went on? Not just for ongoing therapy purposes to mull over and keep rehashing the past but to gain better insight, more understanding to help heal and move forward. That is where I am at with it all right now and I am also not opposed to sharing past life experiences with others on down the line if it can help someone else heal and move on in their situation. I am really over it all to be quite honest but also feel a need for some clarification due to never properly gaining any to begin with.
Yes, this is my experience too. I went to talk therapy for years and it helped a little but what really helped was this channel, DBT and EMDR. I needed practical help, not just continued rehashing. Thanks for sharing this!
Another thing that has not caught on about Talk Therapy is that Clients/ Patients want feed back and Tools. They don’t wanna talk until they figure it out themselves. Why have they still not figured that out. I’ve been in and out of therapy for probably about 30 years. I couldn’t even fill a page on the tips and tools I’ve learned. Most of what I’ve learned have come from my own research 😢😢
This is why I quit talk therapy, I was doing all the talking from beginning to end but no strategies were coming my way to deal/cope. Nice that they charged my insurance company $150 to $250 an hour.
Thank you for all that you do, Anna, including being authentic and transparent. It warmed my heart when you said, "I know who I am..."!!! You said with grace, dignity, and self- respect. Keep doing what you're doing. The world needs more people like you.
I am so glad to hear that. Therapy or drugs never worked for me. A friend recommended it. I am 63, just trying to live my best as a widow. Just need a little support here and there. People who are willing to open their mouths not grunt in a chair and listen until the cows come home. billing you and waiting for you to figure out all the answers.
Thank you for this. I had a single talk therapy session that went so tits up, it led me to research my own knowledge of myself, and I landed on C-PTSD. I find it difficult to entrust my thoughts and emotions to someone who feels that they know me better than I know myself. I was diagnosed with OCD because I couldn't stop thinking and crying about being estranged from my son. I explained that I have a penchant for blowing up relationships because I feel rejected and abandoned. He still wrote OCD. I cried in the car and never went back. What DID help was Ketamine treatments that helped me to stop the repetitive thinking. With every treatment (6) I became calmer and new revelations just poured into me. It's been about 5 months and I've been dysregulated about five times. It was almost daily before. So, I agree.
Systemic Family Constellations, hypnosis and Thetahealing did way more for me than therapy ever did. Most counselors, coaches, nurses, doctors, policemen, etc. are not trauma informed. Even some therapists.
One of my therapists used to constantly look at her watch. I was sexually abused and one therapist said "well it wasn't as bad as some people I've met". I was furious. Stuck in a rubbish mental health system for 20 years. Taking my therapy into my own hands. Thanks CCF! I've just started doing the Daily Practice. It really helps. I even think I was misdiagnosed with schizophrenia. I believe I have CPTSD.
Anna, thank you for explaining all of this. I really appreciate the distinction between talking *about* the events vs. simply talking about how you're feeling because of the events. I have had "issues" as a kid, but I don't generally discuss them with people because the discussion makes others incredibly uncomfortable, and but when I have discussed, I *do* feel dis-regulated. I just never had a word for it.
I trained as a psychotherapist years ago and didn't go on to practice. Didn't enjoy it. I realise now I was too traumatised to be a therapist at that time. I got codependent with clients and felt overwhelmed and triggered.
We had to have weekly therapy as part of the 4 year training. After 4 years I can't say I felt better I just now knew why I felt so bad. The shift was a cognitive one at best. I now understand that it dysregulated me because I didn't have enough stability and safety in my life or somatically to be able to look at traumatising stuff from childhood. And not everyone will want to do that. Sometimes building safety is enough for some people.
I think building life safety and nervous system safety is very important before digging into traumatising and painful material. Most therapists seem to want to get to the deeper stuff straight away and don't understand the importance of building regulation and co-regulation with clients first so they can withstand the deeper trauma narrative if they chose to go there. This is lengthy work and expensive.
There are very few trauma-informed therapists around. Hopefully this will improve over the years and in line with the research.
Your work on this channel has helped me immensely, thank you for contributing so much time and energy to help people.
Thank you so much for sharing. Your insight from both sides -- trained in psychotherapy but also a trauma survivor -- yields an interesting perspective and critique.
Julie@TeamFairy
I just recently "fired" a therapist because I never got to a "lower" level. I always just kept everything "light". I learned "tapping" . That's it.
@@lindaevans4753 that's so frustrating! If you want to get stuck in then you should be able to. I think so many therapists haven't done their own trauma healing so avoid going there with clients. Honestly, I wouldn't want any of the people I trained with to be my therapist!
hey what career did you pursue after this realization? I want to help others heal emotionally and be free from suffering, but I too also don’t think this traditional path is for me
@Ad-nu4tk Honestly, although I like helping others, I found being exposed to the constant suffering of others too difficult. I wanted them all the engage and 'get better' but it doesn't really work like that. I went into gardening for years, which was lovely, but exhausting and it somehow felt less meaningful for me. It's not at all really. Now I feel that unless you've faced all your s*it, I wouldn't work with others dealing with theirs, I think this is the issue with most therapists. They think they're healed and they aren't. But that's just my experience, you may be ready to work in this way and be resilient enough to weather the difficulties you're faced with.
I keep cancelling therapy because I don’t need my feelings to be validated. I already know they’re valid. I need to know how to change my patterns. In my experience, my therapists just keep “validating” me.
There are also different specializations in therapy. Talk therapy isn't the only way. Have you tried behavioral therapy? They are specifically supposed to help you create habits and routines that become healthy behaviors. Sadly, private insurance hasn't caught up yet in terms of covering all of these different therapies (at least in the US, if that's where you are), but it's worth a shot of you have the resources to give it one.
Exactly my experience. Spot on.
I can’t tell you how many times I said those exact words to my therapists: I know why I do this, I just need to know how to stop doing it.
I tried to get my parents into talk therapy and it was a disaster. I then tried a 12 step program for children of dysfunctional parents. The group sat around whining about their childhood for the five weeks I went. I couldn't take it anymore so I started reading books about trauma, anger, boundaries etc it ultimately led to other things that helped including this channel.
I quit talk therapy. I didn't feel we were connected. I felt we were just talking about everyday occurrences, which isn't what I wanted. I wanted help in positive thinking, dealing with childhood trauma. After listening to your podcast, I was motivated to declutter my kitchen cabinets. I plan to keep going so I can feel free from the whole clutter state of mind.
As a therapist myself I DO NOT have my clients relive memories. I discuss HOW your traumas changed you which cause current dysfunction and issues. And I found that this is what really helps my CPTSD clients.
@@brian5001 "the worst animal be more productive" 🤔 can you expand on that?
I am a bundle of trauma responses but I’ve yet to figure out what my trauma really is. It’s clear to me and my therapist that my family isn’t emotionally healthy but whenever she asks me about my childhood my answer is usually “I don’t remember” or “was that supposed to happen? Because that didn’t happen.” So I feel this NEED to unpack my childhood and she is agreeable to try to help me but so far nothing has helped me remember things.
I know you aren’t my therapist but your comment really got my attention… should I stop trying so hard to figure out what/where/when my trauma was? There’s a part of me that does worry what might happen in my brain if I ever find it.
@@brian5001or we were made in God’s image to live in a world where there is no death, no sorrow, no pain and no tears, but we blew it. Now we live in a fallen world, experiencing good and evil and we don’t like it. .. but it’s temporary. God has made a way out through Jesus, and given us an instruction manual, with some basic information to help us. The fairy’s daily practice reminds me of, “Cast your burdens upon the Lord and he shall sustain thee.”
I agree with you! Therapy has really helped me so much on my journey! I’m like a totally different person now!
@@sharonthompson672just so you know, there are a couple of antinatalist trolls in the combox right now trying to stir up trouble, accounts with no subscribers and no content 🤨
I am not saying that there aren't therapists out there who really care about healing their patients. But the primary goal of many professionals, and more broadly, the care system that's giving them protocols and guidelines, is profit. They don't want you to heal and move on. A completely healed patient doesn't bring any more money. They want you to keep returning and writing your check again and again, for as long as possible.
You taking matters in your own hands, and, even worse, helping others turn away from 'therapy' that doesn't really heal anything, is 'dangerous' because it 'steals' customers and lowers their profit.
Money, not people, is all that matters for the system and the many who benefit from it.
Your channel helped me a lot. Thank you.
EMDR made me burst into tears when I tried it, and that happened every time. My "therapist" got very "eye-rolly" with me and she was just very bad over all. It's hard for me to find a therapist I can trust, and you have to be careful who you let into your head.
What a painfully invalidating experience! I agree with your comment on taking care on who is let in. A therapist who can't keep the tentative trust you've invested in her or him and can't develop increasing trust doesn't deserve more of your time or resources. For what it's worth, I apologize in behalf of the mental health profession . . . and the educational institutions that continue to turn out professionalswho aren't trauma-ready. You, and all other survivors, deserve better care.
Jared Powell, LCSW
@@re-embodyingemotionalexper5040EMDR worked for me, I had a few sessions that I burst into tears, then the next time I laughed my sorry backside off instead. At that point, the issues I was having ‘just went away’. A couple more sessions and I got no reaction at all.
I've had a moment in my life where 2 psychiatrists together who told me that, despite having CPTSD because of an unsafe youth, child abuse, loss of family, depression, social isolation, debts even homelessness, they were amazed to still see me functioning properly. Yes I was very angry. And I needed to talk about it. But at the end of my rage, they were praising my resilience at a moment I was getting off the street, and rid myself of a relationship that made me feel miserable and getting away from anything that made feel miserable in general. Also the realisation that keeping talking about the things you've been through, keeps pulling you back in the past. At some point, I started to feel.strong enough to just live with it and give it a place.
I agree that Talk Therapy is a waste of time; I never found any therapist who even understood anything I was dealing with and they certainly lacked empathy. I dealt with my own issues by reading a lot of self-help books and one of best books I read was on Self-love by Robert H. Schuller. However, the most helpful activity I did was to write Ten Gratitude's each day for one whole year. When you are raised in a negative environment and nothing you do is good enough, you become a perfectionist in an imperfect world. Your thinking patterns automatically default to the negatives in life, in people and about yourself. Writing a Gratitude Journal daily for one year help me to retrain my thinking patterns to focus on the positive of all situations and to accept that there is no perfection in life, in people, or in the world.
OMG! Thank you for writing this! This resonates so much with me. I am a perfectionist too which holds me back from doing many things, or taking way too long and doing it. Your comment made so much sense to me. I was never good enough for my mom even though I was an A-B student. 😢 I will try writing 10 gratitudes a day. That sounds beautiful. Thank you!
This is gold
After 25 years of talk therapy, I realized the wound came back and haunted me. I could not move forward until I used your tools for healing! Thank you!!
I have to admit, I've had good and crappy therapists. My therapist who helped me as I was exiting an abusive relationship was wonderful. My current one that I just check in with on zoom is great. But in between? Oy! 🤦
Only her videos about my symptoms make sense and have been helpful. I am extremely disregulated.
@@happygoalucky ❤️🌹😔
Talk therapy is like picking at a wound for me. I've been stuck for almost 9 years. Talk therapy brought everything back.
Therapy has its place. The problem I had was finding a "good" therapist. But even the good ones did not give practical advice on how to live instead of survive.
Yes! Excellent point! 👍
the point of therapy is to protect the capitalist system by placing blame of systemic problems on individuals who don't actually have the power to do anything. Job done! good job therapists
@@davidcrawford9026well said! Couldn't have put it more succinctly. A lot of therapists, incredibly, don't seem to see this that but many are simply living in cognitive dissonance. Plus it's an industry. It's in their financial interest to make the individual feel they just need to "work on themselves" in order for them to keep coming back.
@@davidcrawford9026 this genuinely seems the case. Have you read "We've had a hundred years of psychotherapy & the world's getting worse"?
Agreed the therapist is everything
12 yrs didn’t help me either. TH-cam and a couple of good books was what I needed.
which books?
I went to a life coach who was a total disaster....utterly retraumatizing ! Be careful ❤
While I do get your disappointment, please reconsider if generalizations is a good thing to do. Coaching might be a huge industry iat the moment and easier to attain then a phd, doctor’s degree, or becoming a therapist… But there are just as many humans with phd, a doctor or therapist that went to university, that are very bad at what their doing and harm more than help… My point is, no matter the industry, class, ethnicity, religion and etc. pp. - the whole world is full of egoistic, toxic people, they are everywhere! But there are also coaches, accredited studied professionals and also lay people who heal by their sheer ability to be present with all their conscious and being, with a person in pain, who’s work is gold.
The key is, to connect to your inner guidance and feel whats/whos the right one for you, as opposed to falling for claims on a cognitive level. Easier said then done, l know… But it’s possible! I went x times barefoot to the borders of madness because I tried to follow “professional help” from several dr. and therapists, of which all the talking made me more dysregulated, then depressed and as if I had lost all my intelligence and ability to live my life like I desired - for several years. A decade to be precise, from the start of trying to “do everything right, as therapists suggested” till now. Some of them ment well, some where just downright disgusting in their approaches, which I then didn’t notice being in all the emotional pain in the situations… I’m still a work in progress, but I’m back in my body and start to get hope again. I’m through the process of grieving the ten years now I think, which really felt like stolen time because I was more like in a waking coma then alive .
I feel the key is to work on reshaping the nervous system, because it’s normal for people with c ptsd to be stuck in fight, flight or freeze mode and attached to that, bad thought patterns that are often originated from conditioning in childhood or other bad experiences, and in fight, flight, freeze are almost impossible to exit. Also look into working on the relationship to yourself and look into, how you got related to when you where little and how you relate to yourself (attachment theory… ) .. I can, additional to Annas work here, highly recommend you the following channels: Personal Development School & Heidi Priebe (Attachment Theory), Suki Baxter (Nervous system reshaping)
So, may you also regain your power and feel what’s right for YOU in the future, instead of going after what sounds right ❤
Theres an enormous difference between life coach with a cert and a licensed therapist who is trauma informed with a masters degree.
I had one that was so stupid she couldn’t even keep track,of her appointments. Got her out quick.
I had a therapist who is an excellent life coach. She was excellent but she admitted she was not trauma trained. I made a lot of progress in my personal growth, but the trauma remained. She quit therapy to coach full time. When I asked her if I could continue with her with coaching she gently said that I still need therapy, coaching was not a good option for me at the time. They are two completely different things. Coaching is amazing, I've received so much from it myself that I plan on becoming certified myself someday and if I get any clients who clearly need therapy, one I think I'll be able to easily sus that out, and two I will readily refer them to therapy or Anna Runkle here ☺
OMG. This comment. Yes, it was actually an awful life coaching experience that catapulted me right into discovering CPTSD and the Crappy Childhood Fairy channel. I still write about it in my daily practice - how I felt completely unheard, re-traumatized , and scammed out of $1,200, just to have a man tell me that I was a basket case and needed his help. He wanted me to go into another program he offered, and when I told him I felt it wasn't the right fit for me, he made it clear I was a waste of his time. What I learned from that is, as scary as it is, real change happens when we take responsibility for ourselves and find the strength from within (& IMO, with help from God). Relying on someone else to fix or save me is a recurring theme in my life that I've taken great strides to overcome.
Once I looked at myself and saw the control I have for my own emotions and behavior, it completely changed my way of thinking. Even though it wasn’t my fault that other people treated me poorly, I do have to take accountabilty in my role and what I tolerated from others.
I have been out of college about 15 years. I wrote lots of papers on Children of Alcoholics and trauma. In 15 years there is so much more help and understanding.
Talk therapy for me opened all my wounds again and made me hemorrhage emotionally. I blamed myself. Anna’s experience is so validating and healing for me.
I think talking about past wounds is like picking a scab and making the wound bleed again. I have found it best to not talk about the past and not allow myself to think about the past because I then start to wallow and get depressed. I find it best to remind myself to move on to the present and future.
Drowning in the angry stories because there is nothing new to be learned from them is probably the best objective description of where I lived in my heart and mind for nearly 30 years. It took owning my actions, apologizing to those I hurt, and building up trust with them again before I was able to be happy, healthy, and move on.
Thank you for sharing. Julie@TeamFairy
I go to Art Therapy and it's amazing. It helps me so much more than just talking and I had so many aha-moments. It really helped me a lot to understand my feelings and to make little steps towards a better life 😊
Glad that worked for you. It was a disaster for me. But as always, stick with what work. Congratulations on your progress.
Art therapy is something that I'm hoping to start ASAP here in the UK. Apparently it is very useful for expressing ourselves.
Anna, I watch a lot of your videos and I find you very interesting and down to earth.
I've been having therapy for 6months now and like others 'can't remember' things from my past, is this 'normal' for trauma?
@@mysocalledmidlifecrisisvlo7521can I ask why it was a disaster? Just curious ☺️
@@artwithmamafairybreadd I worked on a therapy box and the whole exercise was just frustrating for me. I am an artist and can draw or paint quite easily but trying to incorporate therapy into it was a nightmare.
@@mysocalledmidlifecrisisvlo7521 I draw and paint too…I don’t think I could stand someone telling me what to do and organising a project that had to done their way maybe….I need let me creativity run wild….if the therapy has structure maybe that would drive me mad…I’m automatically in my happy place when on my art desk…I can’t wait to draw and paint…it helps me so much just being there….
I am entering therapy now because I need guidance I can’t do this on my own anymore I’m ruining my own life, but at the same time I respect what you say in a lot of your videos including this one so far. One size doesn’t fit all I’ve learned in many ways ❤
I think if youve never been to therapy, and you’re super lost and need help, therapy is a good place to start. i think anna is just saying it’s not the end all be all and it was something that didn’t work for her. But she gave therapy a legitimate try over several years before making that decision and she is giving you a heads up so you dont have to struggle for years like she did.
make sure you don't get a cold fish, I have done not much of this and had one amazing man I saw only once he looked like Judd Hirsh in Taxi and helped so much just one visit, but went again years later and got some people who were super clueless. And they can make it worse! So, be picky!
I had major childhood trauma, I was depressed and had a lot of issues. The only thing that got me healed was God, praying and reading the bible. I am on no meds now, I'm happier, I have no more fears and I am truly living a full and happy life now. I was never real religious and really had no clue what Jesus and the bible were about. It took years (since 2008) for me to study, pray and watch God move in my life for me to honestly say it works and I'm not the only one it works for. He loves all of us, even us broken ones. I pray for everyone to get to know him and seek his face. He is in every sense of the word, my Saviour. Good luck @lovelygirl4031 , remember you are loved. (PS I am 61 now).
Oh yes, my best friend just told me few hours ago that her therapist released her bc her therapist themselves said they're not capable to treat trauma. My friend was devastated, but I said don't worry and sent her your links for your courses and your pages✨ thanks so much for your work Anna The Fairy!
I have had multiple therapists abruptly abandon me using the same excuse. Hence, "you have tooo much trauma"...
@@happygoalucky I'm sorry to hear, hope you're ok
@@happygoaluckyYou need to be specially trained as a trauma therapist in order to help traumatised people. It's a very different ball game. And trauma informed is not the same as trauma therapist.
Like for example: I am a creative arts therapist in training and in my entire studies I had one trauma unit and CPTSD hasn't even been mentioned. I'm a trauma survivor myself and can affirm that most people I am getting educated with would also refer deeply traumatised people to a specialist. Seeing a psychologist is a bit like seeing a GP who then sends you somewhere else if they think you need special treatment.
THANK YOU SO MUCH for your strength against the “nay sayers” and all the hate mail. God lead me to YOU!!! Before I found you I was beyond lost and broken!!
I had similar experience with therapists, and felt I was wrong. All they wanted from me was talking again and again about my horrible childhood, which is gone. They kinda made me feel guilty and belittled me for being more interested in the experiences I was living at the time, that were traumatising me. I'm happy I quit talk therapy but I wish I were able to benefit from someones help.
Maybe a different form of therapy would have helped you better.
Wow. We have a very similar experience right down to EMDR. Fast and effective. Talking took so much out of me it took 3 days to recover after my visit with the therapist. Did it for years. Now, what works for me is to reframe the memory. Thank you.
After twenty years following short therapies. Some destroyed me. Some did some good jobs. I had to quit two of them. I got desregulated. I use writing and I pray. I did progress. I understand your anger. Thank you for sharing.❤
Therapy can help us get through crisis but it is "historically" focused so combining it with a daily recovery practice helps. My therapist is a Buddhist, she taught me to practice self compassion. I've used this skill to move forward in areas I was stuck. The skills taught here are essential to fill in the "Swiss cheese holes" or gaps in learning we have from our upbringing. These "self skills" fill in a gap within the therapy world too because they provide the "how to" that's rarely offered. So I got recovery skills, compassion & support, all positive, I'm grateful. Thank you
Love that term self compassion, instead of self love which sounds narcissistic. Self care is good, but that different. Thanks!
Talk therapy was destructive to me time and time again. So many therapists took it as a personal/ego failure when they couldn't alter my thinking. It was as though technique made them pursue unlocking a certain cognitive door, and the door I needed opened was a different, perhaps atypical one. A few things that helped me: Your videos and the epiphany of learning what dysregulation is, DBT workbooks, integrating radical acceptance and value-neutrality when it comes to my many chronic illnesses, and the right medication.
My ex female trauma therapist said to me, " I've worked with hundreds and hundreds of male clients and they all understood me!" Your all the same,"men".
Well, I guess I'm not a man just stupid.
@@stevensawyer5924that is really werid that she made it about herself. What a bad therapist.
I went to four sessions with a therapist. After the first one, I came home and was totally disfunctional for the rest of the day. I found it to be frustrating and really didn’t find any help going. Your discussions has been 1000% better for me!Thank you 💕
My 2 eldest siblings are therapists. I have been in and out of therapy in my now dead marriage and I would play the game like cat and mouse hoping someone could help, it didn't until I tried EMDR Therapy it was amazing but I can't afford it, expensive here. I have a degree in Mental Health and Addictions and not once in College did anything ever connect to me.....now I found you and find it very soothing to know someone on the planet can understand me. Thank you
I feel like getting a degree in counseling really helped my cptsd. Not every program is the same. A lot of the professors worked with a lot of trauma survivors. Sorry to here that didn't help but this channel was able to help.
I'm working with a therapist for the first time in decades. My dental phobia was so bad that when I had an old filling come loose I was waking up with panic attacks just like I had after I was sexually assaulted 25 years ago. I felt completely at loose ends. She doesn't lecture me and lets me take the lead as far as how much I want to tell. She also doesn't have the attitude that she's better than I am. We're just two people.
I tried "talk therapy" on and off for a few years with different practitioners but they were all the same. It seemed that they let me talk on and on about my "issues" but I never got any feedback, positive or negative. I finally gave up when I realized that talking to a wall would be just as effective. As I got older, I became more spiritual and I worked on forgiving the people who had wronged me. That has helped me but there will always be scars. Accepting that has been liberating and I can now enjoy life as it is not as I wished it was.
I've questioned treatment modalities for several decades, and stumbled on CPTSD myself, not because professionals figured it out. My academic studies weren't psychology but did leave me with serious questions that went unanswered, while not making significant progress therapeutically. NOW I understand, it all makes perfect sense to me, and I am so done with trying to explain it to most therapists, and feel no need for their well-intentioned "help" that left me feeling miserable. I want to expand on this in another format later. Once I found this channel I have made progress in leaps and bounds. THANK YOU.
I love you! I suffer from childhood PTSD as well, and I don’t go to a therapist because I can’t afford it. So I’m happy that I found you, and therapist doesn’t really help anyway, they just take your money. Just because you went to school and got a degree doesn’t qualify you as a therapist. In my book. you actually experience it and that’s more experience enough for me.
This is a huge problem. Right when I would get to making progress , insurance would run out. Then it’s out the door.
U r right dear. Most psychologists today fail to address deep rooted issues. Quoting some steps mentioned in psychology books in the name of healing is pure crap. But yes there are some really good psychologists who are able to help you deeply.
You're so right about therapists. Few of them are any good.
Also they expensive. The best therapy is self-therapy, with the use of a few tools, usually inexpensive such as the Fairy or books. I'm not surprised that therapists are threatened by the Fairy, she is better than them, much better and much cheaper.
Talk therapy worked in the beginning. But, it felt like all's they wanted to do is keep me stuck in the past. More money for them right? I did 3 years and it was enough. Your videos and Dr Ramani have done wonders for me.
That's how I felt about mine
I'm not discussing the past anymore its ridiculous.
EFT .. Emotional freedom technique helped me a lot actually
Not to take anything away from this platform but Dr. Ramani has really ramped up the public awareness around CPTSD and Narcissistic abuse with her celebrity guests and their frank talk about their childhood and lack of support they faced. I found a certain validation that even the most successful people have had this happen and the happiness they managed to find afterwards.
Saying this respectfully, Dr Ramani is NOT a huge champion of CPTSD. Maybe PTSD…her platform is 99% about narcissism.
These are all different things. Ramani’s titles about CPTSD are far and few between and date back 3 years ago.
Anna has been putting out content for a longer time and bases her work on an LMFT named Pete Walker. She also cites her sources and Ramani and others do not.
CPTSD is not recognized in American DSM so I’m guessing this is why Ramani doesn’t talk about it much.
@@armyofone13 I was offering an alternative for the viewership to check out because my childhood trauma was ar the hands of a narc and her discussions it helped me. Since as you say healing and help isn't exactly readily available and it's up to us to spread the gospel where we have found success. Just like I make sure to mention Anna's Crappy childhood fairy videos in Dr. Ramani's video comment section.
@@villaineramatriarchy I guess I haven't gotten that far in her video catalog. When that happens and if I see something harmful I shall proceed with caution.
@villaineramatriarchy Yeah claiming that parents are victims of children is completely absurd in most cases. The only exception I might make is if the child is an adult or almost an adult and physically attacks the parent.
However your children are acting, you bear a large portion of the responsibility for that! Calling yourself a victim is ridiculous.
Also children inherently have a certain level of narcissism because they haven't completely learned empathy yet. That's totally normal!
I listened to a presentation by a marriage counselor from my religion, and he said he doesn't support therapy very much because of the narcissism trend.
He said he dealt with a few couples where one person had something like schizophrenia or EXTREMELY severe depression, and you could say that this person's mental illness was *the problem.*
However such cases are very rare. Most often one person comes in and accuses the other of being "a narcissist." Everyone is inherently narcissistic to a certain degree. And it's easier to label the other person a narcissist than examine your own level of responsibility in the situation. He claimed that he has seen many marriages that were actually salvageable get ruined by this trend. I believe him honestly.
The wounds keep coming back in therapy, I’m so sick of it! I’m looking for the tools to arrest my past so I can make my future not like my past… a haunting open wound . Thank you Anna ⭐️❤️ You make so much sense!
Thank you so much for persevering. I’m glad you’re here and that you created this community and channel. My sister is a therapist and she’s told me once on a discussion about our family, ‘well, I am the one who’s a trained therapist!’, so I stopped telling her what’s going on with me. I haven’t shared this channel with her becos I’m afraid her judgement would spoil it for me. Perhaps I will one day - when I no longer need her approval. Which I didn’t know I needed until I typed that sentence!. I’m keeping crappy childhood fairy to myself for now. I’ve benefitted so much from your content. Thank you Anna. Many blessings to you
Your sister sounds arrogant 😉
Smart move, keep this for your healing
It worked for me. I think it’s different for everyone. It helped me figure out what was going on inside of me. I feel my therapist helps me figure out things I can’t see it. I think you have to find the right therapist
I'm planning on studying to become a therapist soon and I just wanted to thank you for your wisdom. Your channel is one of the best I've found and I totally support your mission!
I'm also a survivor with cptsd and I want to help others who have trauma because like you I found therapy to be largely ineffective until recently.
Keep making videos please! They are invaluable.
Thank for watching & sharing! We definitely need more healed survivors among the "professionals." Julie@TeamFairy
Congrats we need more therapist who have been through trauma to help people that are stuck in CPTSD.
I’m a medical professional that frequently refers patients to your channel. What you do is amazing. It is raw and honest. It is healing. It is empathetic. It is an eye opener for so much chaos tied to CPTSD that so many couldn’t make the connection. You may not have the “formal” certification but essentially what that is is lots of book reading, doing research about the subject matter and staying abreast the updated treatments. You, Ana, ARE a therapist because you’ve done all that too. Love how you have helped me, how you help so many and how we can help others because of you. A most heartfelt THANK YOU!!
Thanks for this encouragement and for the love. I'll make sure Anna sees this comment!
-Cara@TeamFairy
I just had a therapy session again today and I feel a lot worse than I did before. She’s a very nice lady. I’ve been seeing her for months but I don’t feel like I’m going anywhere. I feel like I’m spinning my wheels in quicksand.
There’s been more than a few times I feel I need to change chairs with her. I honestly don’t feel like she cares. I think she has too many patients and her plate is overflowing.
I have panic and anxiety disorder since since the age of 15. I also have PTSD Manic depressive and I don’t know what else I can’t keep up lol but in all seriousness, a friend of mine told me about your channel so I’m here and I’m listening. Praying for a miracle. I’m a 57 year old woman .
God bless you.
Here's my take on talk therapy, which I spent many years doing with several therapists. Full disclosure: I also trained as a therapist, although I don't work in the field. I saw my first therapist around the time I turned 14 (like you Anna) and my last therapist last year at 50. The therapy I have done has been mostly psychodynamic, but has also included EMDR (very helpful), CBT/DBT (somewhat helpful), and mindfulness training (somewhat helpful). The therapeutic relationships I have had with MH practitioners has ranged from warm and supportive to impatient and even punitive (the saddest thing is that the most "punitive" treatment I received happened when I was at my most vulnerable-severely depressed and suicidal). The most helpful thing for me about therapy was learning that what happened to me as a child was not my fault and that I am not "bad." The therapist who did EMDR (this was three decades ago when EMDR was in its infancy) also taught me about some PTSD symptoms. Unfortunately, this same therapist later befriended my covert narcissist mother even though she KNEW what my mother had put me through as a child. Talk about terribly violated boundaries!
One thing that therapy could never give me is the tools to stop sabotaging my own life. I think you are right Anna that most therapists won't help you with this because it could look like "blaming the victim." In other words, knowing the trauma you survived at a young age makes them loath to ever make you take responsibility for your own life.
Luckily, I found your channel and some other ones (Heidi Priebe is one of my favorites). I am really geared toward learning tools to help with self-regulation and keeping myself safe as well as learning how to not stand in my own way. And it has only taken me a half century to get here (LOL)!
Thank you for all that you do.
I have been so ashamed for always quitting talk therapy-I’ve tried about 5 separate times with 5 separate therapists and every single time I have felt exactly what you described-and I just couldn’t keep doing it to myself-but it always made me feel like I was quitting at seeking help. Thank you for posting this.
I love your teachings and the way it is explained. I have trauma from so many types of abuse and I have done a lot of traditional and non-traditional therapy and you have helped me the best. Someone who hasn't experienced trauma doesn't really get it. They can be empathetic but unless you've been in the trenches you don't understand. Thank you for all you do and keep up the great work!
I find it often has to do with dynamics a normal therapist isn't aware of. I personally already know that I will try and refuse to be working in drug and alcohol abuse. It's too far away from my lived experience (I don't drink at all nor has my family any drug or alcohol issues). But when it comes to narcissistic abuse I can pick up on all the nuances and thinking patterns of a survivor because I lived through it. Sometimes it helped to look up what the therapist is specifically trained in - because that's usually telling of the therapists personal lived experience.
My first therapist wasn't very helpful because she was very woowoo new age with listing gratitudes and chanting positive affirmations that made me feel silly.
The second one was too pushy. Our first session was about building a healthy routine, then on our second session she wanted me to do more with my circumstances. Her advice was good but her wording was tactless. She assumed that I'm wealthy because my family owns two businesses, and that I do nothing in my house. She said I'm wasting away my youth, and if I don't make a change I'd still be miserable years later.
I can't go shopping for anymore therapists because it's expensive in my country. If anything, it taught me that I already have the tools to manage my depression and trust myself.
When we have CPTS….why?…where do we get the perfect childhood story we never knew existed to compare to and develop trauma it takes a lifetime to get over…how do we KNOW our not perfect childhood story is devastating that makes us so nutty…when we never had the positive to compare to…I must hope in the next life I do not have to be around and process my mother…she needs to be a zero eternally
My therapist teaches a technique to me on how to sit with my emotions without pushing into isolation, staying in contact, being here and now, with respect to my own and boundaries of the other. I go to him and feel seen, present and safe to face my darkness. I trust him, and that is my 8th therapist in 10 years. So, yea, journey was long. I also do daily practice by CCF and join some social event that includes dance every week. These activities are basically my minimum mental maintenance protocol at this point in my life. It’s like brushing teeth, i do it, to keep being here on Earth. I believe I will at some point stop therapy, but now it gives me that extra cushioning, where I have an objective and compassionate witness to my states, not stories . I think therapy does work for most people, when you find the right one, but it does drain when you’re with the wrong one, and sometimes they can give you extra trauma. I had one like that, I suspect she wasn’t very sane. Btw, daily practice is really something, do it, it’s so empowering.
I tried Better Help twice and both experiences were ineffective and I felt exposed speaking with them. I also felt unsafe speaking with the therapists because they attempted to find something to diagnose me first meeting. I didn't get the opportunity to talk, they asked me a list of questions to label me and talked about themselves and one lady was clearly occupied every time we spoke, not to mention late to both meetings.
I saw a therapist who was well-meaning, but poorly trained in the situation I was facing. Her advice would have thrown more gasoline on the fire if I’d tried it, and in the end she wanted to put me on antidepressants. In other words, to anesthetize me to a completely bizarre situation.
In the end I found help with online support groups and spiritual direction. Also telling my testimony to people in the Real World.
~Yes, Anna, you have indeed started a movement!!!~Traditional therapy left much to be desired, at least for me!!!~I rarely got any practical advice, and i spent years of my time, and loads of money on it~You are a true revolutionary & its an exciting honor for me to be a part of it, not just seeing it happen, finally, but benefiting from it myself~Thank you!!!~♡~
I've had some useless therapy experiences and later two good ones. The two good ones helped me a lot. However, the most useful was the women's group therapy I went to. Learned so much doing that.
Thank you for talking honestly about this very important part of healing
You give us a real choice Anna, your work is a game changer for me, thank you 💐 xx
I first started off with therapy. My therapist is amazing, she really helped me, because a lot of my acute symptoms were because of narcissistic abuse (which is an area she is really knowledgable and has a lot of experience). And after I managed to change my life circumstances (ended relationships, moved away, etc), I still noticed I was having flashbacks, anxiety attacks... and then I discovered your channel and what dissregulation is. I was shocked how much the writing technique helped my anxiety and panic attacks. I should also point out that my therapist never forced me to talk about my trauma more than it was necessary for her to understand some of my thinking/patterns. I suppose what I'm trying to say is, that the combination of talking therapy (specifically cognitive behavioral therapy) AND your techniques really made the biggest difference, and I encourage everyone who is currently in therapy but needs something that will help them self-soothe and stabilize their mood - do try the technique Anna teaches. It's incredibly helpful if you can work on yourself and work through things with a calm a clear mind.
Thank you so much for sharing! Here is the technique, it's a free course: bit.ly/CCF_DailyPractice
Julie@TeamFairy
@@villaineramatriarchy I have no data about that, but I do know that it helped me at that point on time. But I did notice that it wasn't helping with anxiety and disregulation, so I sought out others forms and thankfully found this channel.
Thanks very much Fairy for reproducing the video that helped me so much. I've found my own way to heal. I have video session with a coach (not a therapist or a psychologist!) specialized in healing victims of narcissism which is my case. I practice yoga and mindfulness but I can't make the daily practice because I get paralyzed. but I still follow your videos and listen to you. My experience with trauma and therapists was like yours. thanks to you I've progressed a lot and I'm very near to healing. Thanks very much❤❤❤
Amen! I refused to rely on external factors and went inward.....it is working a million times better. Exercise, good food, good sleep, great community, mind observation, writing, running, reading, cycling, walking......and more than anything....listening to the inner stillness. Less talk, more listening to the inner awareness. Being ok with the journey as it is, appreciating the is-ness of life. No regret.
Part of the problem is therapists aren’t really supposed to give advice so much as to guide us to find the answers. Which sounds good on patper, but if the client has gone to the trouble of seeking a therapist, spending the time and money, they probably just need some advice.
As a former psychotherapist, I have come to the conclusion that talk therapy is not very effective for most conditions and people. Talking about our problems only works if the therapist can offer insight, guidance, or solutions. PTSD and CPTSD can not be resolved through talk therapy, and as a matter-of-fact, most likely will actually re-traumatize the person. If you go to a therapist and you leave feeling drained, confused, angry or triggered, that's usually a warning sign that something's not right. Don't ignore it and don't keep going back hoping things will get better. Try art therapy or sand play therapy instead. And ALWAYS listen to your intuition and inner voice and don't second guess yourself.
❤😊 THANK YOU!!!!!!! THANK YOU!!!!!!THANK YOU!!!! YOU ARE THE PIONEER SCOUT LEADER!!!!!! SORRY NOT SORRY! I KNOW ITS SOMETIMES A BIT OF A PAIN. BUT YOU ARE SO FUCKING WONDERFUL AND HONEST AND TRULY A SPIRIT WHO EMBODIES SERVICE ABOVE SELF! STILL TRAVELLING THIS ROAD ...STUMBLING ALONG. SO GLAD I FOUND YOUR VIDEOS AND WAS ABLE TO KEEP WATCHING AND LEARNING❤❤❤❤❤ YOU ARE AMAZING.
Funny I just got back home from a therapy session where I mentioned how helpful these videos have been for me, how watching these videos have helped me feel more SEEN and understood than ever and how these videos have been genuinely saving my life, but then one of my family members called it a poor tool in a toolbox and that got latched on for the rest of the session. I also kept getting a heavy feeling like somehow, after seeing this therapist twice, I was seen as some kind of powder keg, like I haven't put up with my parents getting physically violent with me for most of my life and only just within the past couple of years started to have my own outbursts at 31. Funny enough, it's because I started therapy and realized more and more how bad they treat me and they get louder and angrier when I stand up for myself. I think I have also handled being asked about how often I go outside for the last time. I have mobility issues from an injury and clearly a cane isn't even enough to get people to realize a jaunty little walk in the sun isn't possible for me unless I want to snap my ankle. I used to love going outside, it feels like therapists see me as some cave dwelling nobody and THAT'S why I am depressed.
I'm really quickly realizing that therapy is not for me. I know myself better than anyone else so I can look into the issues I know I have and tackle them one at a time at an easy pace, instead of splitting up all these conversations for one specific visit on one specific day for a few hours, and on top of that I won't judge myself as harsh as I feel judged by therapists so I'm definitely more receptive to the input.
@FlyingMonkies325 I'm really glad you commented, I even added a couple notes from your comment for the next time I go in because I decided I will give this person one last visit to discuss how the one I just went to affected me. Honestly I was still angry over that last session even after going to sleep and even after being up for a few hours I am still thinking about how that therapist agreed with my parents (very poor observation) that my tools are poor. Especially because I have been browsing through my usual music, videos such as this one, and using other mindful techniques to not let this hit me even harder. I can't help but fear for anyone else going there who doesn't has as solid as a toolbox as I have because I had to bring out the big gun Jee Veerey tonight. (Fantastic song by the way. Bloodywood is VERY wholesome, I'm a huge fan. Metal has always been very healing for me.)
Comparing to an artist or an actor is wonderful because it actually fits me pretty well. I am an artist anyways, and in general I prefer to show my work rather than be judged for however it was that I got there. I know my truth better than anyone else could, even if they are someone who has stuck with me for years. I know what helps me, and that I am going by the direction of my last therapist because she was the best I have found in the past decade until I had to move and couldn't stay with her. Just because this new one hears "youtube" and thinks "bad tool" without even hearing the contents, or acknowledging that the diagnosis I spoke of came from that therapist and not a self-diagnosis pulled out of the depths of my backside on wild theories. She can invalidate me with whatever she thought after only two visits, but I know my truth and how long my path in therapy has been.
I don't think talk therapy was for me. Something happens in therapy for people who have high sensitivity to the changes of the vibes in a room. When someone NEEDS to air how they feel to another person, talk therapy makes a difference, but when you are sensitive to how other people feel to the extent that even slight changes in other people's moods will set you off, sometimes talking about things that upset you can just spiral. My last therapist was a very sweet old lady, but she would freeze up when I would talk about certain things, and I could tell that what I was talking about was triggering for her, and that at some points in our conversations, she would be placating me rather than really challenging me to better myself. She was very kind, but I think emotional sensitivity and ctpsd tend to produce someone who can't really talk to another person about what's going on, because it just ends up either a performance or the person with CPTSD trying to placate the therapist with what they think someone in therapy should sound like. What works for me at this point is just exercise and eating better. Talking about my past is so dysregulating that I only refer to it vaguely at this point.
Well said.
Thank you!!!! I always felt like I wanted to die after a talk therapy session and said that once and ended up in a hospital ward for a week under lock and key... never went near a therapist after they let me out "healed" your vlogs have been life changing, of course it's far too late for me, but I try to watch until the end of your posts and this one was such a relief....piling all my trauma on the doctors desk verbally each week destroyed me for days and then after he locked me up for telling the truth, sigh , years and years of new trauma.
Trying to feel beter before I get to eighty. Thanks again
couldbetrue9929, it's never too late! And sweetheart, you are worth it! ❤️
This is helpful I’m really tired of retelling everything it’s reopening wounds. I feel stuck and I know I’d gravitate towards approval seining instead of fixing the problem
Keep talking about trauma brings no sense of relief, no greater understanding from others or yourself. Occasionally sharig brings moments of clarity that are useful in a practical way. But mainly it brings shame, hatred even agressive actions from others. Talking about how trauma made you a better person or maybe just even the person you are can be useful for others but usually it's not. Those who love unconditionally love...well, unconditionally. We just attract more abuse, physical symptoms with no resolve. Love happens not because people understand but because they've simply chosen to love. ❤
"I am in charge of my healing" AMEN When I took my healing into my own hands I started on the right path. I learned that just because something works for others doesn't mean it has to work for you. Keep looking until you find what does. Reading books on healing, EmDR, neurotherapy and prayer worked for me. I found this channel and it is helping me put names to things. I can now see those moments in my life when I lost it for what it was "disregulation". I also understand that I am third generation cptsd on both sides of the family so I can look at my family with compassion and admiration for what they were able to accomplish given the struggles and inner battles they were fighting . Glad I found you.
the way you're describing dysregulation @ around 6 minutes, is exactly how i feel when i go onto twitter! i call it "noisy" without sound. maybe it's like that for everyone? makes me feel the way i felt having dinner with my malignant narc brother and parents, too. can't be heard, can't escape and overwhelmed by the "noise", which, in real life, was my brother's obnoxiously loud talking/over-talking, and on twitter, is the chaos, everyone up in arms about something, complaining, shouting, all talking at once. i probably sound insane right now!
Actually I personally agree with you about Twitter. -Julie@TeamFairy
@@CrappyChildhoodFairy i'd be over my trauma if it wasn't still happening or rather accellerating exponentially. thanks to my previously-mentioned brother. he has a very VERY long history of projecting, which hit me like a ton of lead in 2018 when he a) accused me of slandering him (after he'd obviously/publicly slandered me; b) called me delusional and historically psychotic and has been stalking me among other very creepy, sick things. and he unfortunately has help from someone who's even more insane than he is!
Half a mil is subscribed to you; you are helping people ❤
You, Patrick Teahan & Byron Katie Mitchell are Godsends along my healing journey. The struggle I had was finding a therapist who understands the dynamics of abuse. I am & have been passionate about personal responsibility in my healing path & have slowly navigated that path for 20 years. The fact that all 3 of you focus on empowering people by taking personal responsibility for their part, no matter how small or large, is what has helped me more than any of the 5 therapists I spent time with. Thank you for your courage to speak your truth & for continue doing so in the face of negative backlash. Blessings, Kellie 😊❤
Patrick Teahan is amazing... I personally get more out of his videos than anyone's and damn he is funny and likable too! But I'll check out the other u mention!
We love Patrick too. :) Julie@TeamFairy
It’s very hard but absolutely critical to find the *right* therapist. Not every therapist is good, not every therapist is a good fit, and even fewer therapists actually understand trauma. So, it takes time to find the right person. That being said, the only reason therapy has worked for me at all is because I’ve supplemented it with psychedelic journeys. I’m not sure I’d even be here if it wasn’t for that; it’s been a game changer.
But the goal is to find a setting where we feel safe and “held” enough to get into the vulnerable places necessary to deeply explore what happened to us and how it’s impacted us. It’s the only way to untangle it. ❤
Sometimes the “flip the narrative” or having a “different perspective” just doesn’t work. If there’s a real problem, that’s not being addressed. I went back to therapy to work on my shadow self. However, it hasn’t worked for me either.
I love my therapist. She lets me take the lead. I feel like I am talked out, so we are working towards EMDR. Thank you for this. It also made me think of other directions I want to explore in my trauma.
Hi everyone! So glad to hear these techniques are helpful. I am a Psychologist and in my experience, a type of therapy for C-PTSD for those who would like to work with a therapist would be DBT - especially comprehensive DBT! It is very present based, positive coping skills, improving our lives starting today. ✨
I’ve pretty much abandoned therapy too. Had a couple of great ones years ago who weren’t afraid to dig in and get their hands dirty - - I still go back and review the notes I took in those sessions when I get in a crisis mode. Really helps, those therapists who took the time to explore my early family history and enlighten me and how and why I was behaving a certain way in the present. But pretty much every shrink I’ve tried over the last few difficult years have been what I call Shell Answer Man therapists. They wait for you to ask them questions and then they answer rather generally/superficially/whatever because they’re too lazy to do the deep dive. They just want to keep you coming back and don’t seem to care about knowing you or a deeper level. I just decided all that money I was spending and getting nothing from could be put to better use. And I won’t even go into 😂 shrinks who were actually nasty covert narcissists. No thank you. I get more insight from you tube.
I think I know what you mean by "Shell Answer Man" ... stock & standard responses, as if from a manual, workbook or answer key, without the human connection needed to co-regulate. - Julie@TeamFairy
Talk theraphy had helped me but i cant understand why anyone would judge someone who finds a different healing path that works for themselves. Like meditatuon Journaling ways to message the vegus nerve. We are all on the same team seeking a life less suffering. I can say that therapists are like dating its necessary to see different ones until finding the one that can help. I have had therapists that did not help but they also taught me more about what i needed to find.
I’ve been to therapy since childhood. Your experience seeing a therapist mirrors mine. It’s not for everyone. If it works for you, great! If it doesn’t, great! Keep going until something feels helpful.
My daughter definitely has some cptsd and has been through multiple therapists. She'd go to a session or two and either shut off and ride out the therapy until the clock ran out or she'd come home feeling worse. At best she'd try to describe her setback, as she felt like therapists were pitying or patronizing her. She was distraught at wanting help, but not clicking with the help school counselors and doctors recommended for her. I wanted to help her too, but nothing worked. Thank you for making this video, I think that her having to talk about and relieve what she'd experienced is what is setting her back. Now I have hope that maybe she just needs a different approach.
The handwriting thing finally makes sense! …and I concur with just about everything Anna said in her story. I too wish I had stopped talk therapy- EMDR ( got very distressed and broke down and was told I was doing the emdr wrong by the therapist) - CBT …Self help books stacked to the ceiling…If I share and allow myself to become vulnerable I end up walking away from that interaction feeling more vulnerable- Raw. Thanks Anna for all of the validation a guy could ask for - right here on youtube. 🙂👍
Taking responsibility for your own healing and doing what works for you. I love this. It wasn’t until I found ASMR that I really started to heal. It helped me become so much more self aware which brought peace into my life. It calmed the chaos and allowed me to think more clearly. I think (specifically art journaling) ASMR has been to me what your daily practice has been to you. I am so grateful there are different ways to heal because talk therapy made me incredibly dysregulated as well.
Talk therapy never worked for me, it always made things worse. Many years, many therapists and a whole lot of folks telling me that was the only way to fix myself. I felt worse and more traumatized and confused after every session. I couldn't function after the appointments but I forced myself to do it for the people around me for years. What a terrible cycle. Over a decade in this cycle and nobody EVER mentioned CPTSD but I had about a dozen of other unhelpful diagnoses and at least 25 different medications over the course which led to a whole host of other problems. Never heard of CPTSD until i came across your channel. Thank you for stating the obvious because this needs to be addressed. Your story about your sessions is word for word what I would experience. I had come to the conclusion it was not working but faced a lot of backlash when I quit going and started trying other things such as this channel and the daily practice. One of these videos was more helpful than 10 years of that rat race.
I have gone to many therapists and always felt let down..( they did nothing g but take my $$$ and made me feel worse) I ‘ve always believed repetition is the mother of retention..so why would I want to bring up all those awful feelings again in talk therapy.? 🤪🤪. And yes it weakened me because I felt like I was my problem and I can’t fix it.
You are definately on the right track…please don’t let these ppl intimate you…you are onto something. I’m so glad I found you.
Thank you so much for expressing the same experiences I had have with "therapists and professionals". I always felt so traumatized emotionally following visits. I left feeling like a clumsy, awkward, zombie.I was raised by narcissists and besides being a CPSTD, I'm an empath. All I can compare it to is opening up a can of worms to hear yourself repeating the trauma. I just wanted to know why I was such a mess always feeling guilty, filled witth shame, wanting to get close to people, but pushing them away before they could reject me. I would leave feeling that there was no hope for me. I am very grateful to God that I was lead to your site! You are a treasure and the "professionals" who spoke so unkindly to you are very much off base! We are all in this together and because we CPTSD folks have been through the same pain, we can help each other. This reminds me of Alcoholics who were so helped by AA when they just used their Big Book, mentored each other, and prayed. Once AA became New Age and psychiatrists, psychologists, and therapists became involved less people were helped. I am saying that, because we like alcoholics understand what CPTSD FEELS like; similiar to alcoholics who understand the games, manipulation, blame shifting, etc., and can hold their fellow alcoholics accountable and there is much to be said for that. Like you, I am not throwing the "professionals" under the bus, but some of them need to understand that psychotherapy is not a proven science and in some cases does more harm than good. Bless you for your wonderful work.
I had some very good talk therapy both as a student and privately but that could only get me so far, talk therapy helped me identify what the problems were and the true range of the damage I had experienced, but despite a very good integrated therapist I paid for privately for two years I could not get beyond the trauma response. The first step I had in the right direction was DBT therapy for issues I had with food which we focused on doing and managing responses now not what happened in the past. Discovering I am Autistic and beginning to recognise the need to be in that way also made a huge difference to my ability to cope (never underestimate a good waited blanket and a pile of fidget toys), but finding this channel and learning the daily practice has become the next peace in my road to healing and learning to self regulate safely. The Daily practice is very much accessible to all nurotypes unlike talk therapies which can be inexcusable, especially to those who struggle to identify and name feelings for whom trying to talk in feelings can be traumatic.
The concepts in the Daily Practice are not new the idea of externalising thoughts especially intrusive ones onto paper can be traced to monastic literature in the 4th century CE where they were then read to a monastic elder at the end of the day, this was combined with a meditative prayer practice. This form of close discipleship and prayer is still seen in the Orthodox monastic tradition and has proven helpful to many monastics over the centuries especially when they had troubled pasts (which has been common throughout history). It is a case of needing to rediscover ancient wisdom which had been discarded for the sake of new ideas, and while yes many of the new ideas helped some people what has proven over centuries to work should not be discounted as it does not have scientific studies to prove it.
I totally believe in you and the dramatic teaching you do. Thank you.
It didn’t work for me either. Finally got a referral to a brilliant, trauma informed psychiatrist who prescribed low dose quetiapine for sleep, group yoga and mindfulness meditation which I did for 4 years. She taught us about the fight, flight, freeze reactions and role of the amygdala - basically how trauma affected us biologically and gave us tools to “quiet the mind.”. It was so helpful. I don’t see her any more but I know she would suggest Crappy Childhood Fairy as a resource for her patients. So glad this information is becoming widely available.
Thank you for sharing what worked for you! Julie@TeamFairy
You are more effective than any therapist or doctor I have gone to - when you speak I make sense to myself and feel hopeful and empowered.
I tried talk therapy and it wasn’t helpful at all. What I find the most helpful are channels like yours, coaches, journaling and meditation. There is only one licensed therapist that I really like and her name is Susan Anderson. She specialized in abandonment trauma and is also on TH-cam. Thank you for this wonderful channel❤️It’s been very helpful.
I agree with you wholeheartedly Anna. Thank you for being one of the pioneers in having true and effective ways of healing from CPTSD. You’re a God send.
It’s a very thin delicate line we have to cross. I had therapies but Anna fairy is the icing on the cake . You’re the most relatable person, therapist, psychotherapist and all the titles for CPTSD. Whatever you put out is a goldmine to me and I’m sure to a lot of people. Thank you I was repeating all the wrong things due to CPTSD until I came across you in TH-cam. Now I share your channel to my two adult children and sometimes to a sibling who continued my mother’s abuse until she discovered therapy and 12steps. To you fairy I’m forever grateful ❤
Omg thank you. Thank you so so much. I thought I was just crazy that talk therapy was the worst idea I tried. My disregulation and anxiety was 10000 out of 10. Then I stopped and got better. I do CBT DBT and have found relief. Your site has been a Godsend. So thank you so much for sharing. It makes me feel strong and gives me faith.
Hi! It's taken me too long to thank you for your service. I think I found your channel via that first video regarding talk therapy. It gave me all the feels as after over four decades of intermittent, but intensive CBT, I was just *really* feeling the urge to step away. That was troubling because while I have had some truly WTF therapist experiences, most were helpful, and several were extraordinary.
The two that stand out the most actually gave me some mental easter eggs suggesting that my biggest breakthroughs would be solo. That triggered a certain level of anticipatory abandonment confusion. It felt as though I was being told that they would help me just enough to be released back to the wolves. As I really got into the deep and dirty painful experiences, I can see how they were preparing me for the work that only I could do. On my own and with my inner child and inner self , for lack of a better description.
True to what was hinted, much of my best work has been done on my own and guided by my inner counsel. I had a moment where I realized just how tired I was of repeating this "origin story" of my CT and CPTSD. I needed to move forward and it had to be alone. I needed to grow and experience under the agency of my own decisions and lenses of life.
While I haven't had a proper session with my psych for a few years, in no way do I consider the work to be done or that I am "out of therapy". The therapy, the work is never done. For me, the therapists were short term guides and finally like training wheels that are removed. The challenges still exist, I'm simply more equipped and skilled as I take the helm.
Where, when, and how we find support and guidance is going to change as we grow and heal. For me, this is a good thing. The whole of life should not be extended triage. At some point, I should get to experience the joy of having agency of my emotional and psychological freedom and health. A great deal of that involves leaving the therapist behind, just as a child, does dropping a parent's hand to join summer camp or perhaps school. Nothing disavowed or broken, simply stepping forward into one's own.
To be fair, I've integrated a great deal of what they offered and conscientiously disregard what doesn't fit. I think a good therapist would expect nothing less. In no way do I mean to denigrate those who have a life long therapist, or even, life coach/guru; I believe that model works very well for some while others can find therapy as more of a course correction. Many of us fall somewhere between and all of our paths are unique. I think that all avenues are valid when approached with mindfulness and a willingness to do the hard work.
Thank you, again, especially for your kindness, bravery, and openness!
I've had lots of hard experiences in therapy too. This is so helpful because it can make you feel like you're the problem and even the big "solutions" won't work for you. Which is very scary!
What about when you get nowhere dealing with inexperienced ones after years of seeimg them and finally there is a need to go talk to somebody experienced and get a good assessment what went on?
Not just for ongoing therapy purposes to mull over and keep rehashing the past but to gain better insight, more understanding to help heal and move forward. That is where I am at with it all right now and I am also not opposed to sharing past life experiences with others on down the line if it can help someone else heal and move on in their situation.
I am really over it all to be quite honest but also feel a need for some clarification due to never properly gaining any to begin with.
Yes, this is my experience too. I went to talk therapy for years and it helped a little but what really helped was this channel, DBT and EMDR. I needed practical help, not just continued rehashing. Thanks for sharing this!
You are making a HUGE difference in our lives. Keep it up. Thank you for all you do. You are saving spirits and saving lives.
Thank you for your kind words! I'm sure Anna will appreciate this. -Calista@TeamFairy
Another thing that has not caught on about Talk Therapy is that Clients/ Patients want feed back and Tools. They don’t wanna talk until they figure it out themselves. Why have they still not figured that out.
I’ve been in and out of therapy for probably about 30 years. I couldn’t even fill a page on the tips and tools I’ve learned. Most of what I’ve learned have come from my own research 😢😢
This is why I quit talk therapy, I was doing all the talking from beginning to end but no strategies were coming my way to deal/cope. Nice that they charged my insurance company $150 to $250 an hour.
Thank you for all that you do, Anna, including being authentic and transparent. It warmed my heart when you said, "I know who I am..."!!! You said with grace, dignity, and self- respect. Keep doing what you're doing. The world needs more people like you.
When a therapist falls asleep while you're opening up is way traumatic. I feel safe and not so alone just watching your videos 🎉
Going to ACA local support groups helped me way more than therapy
I am so glad to hear that. Therapy or drugs never worked for me. A friend recommended it. I am 63, just trying to live my best as a widow. Just need a little support here and there. People who are willing to open their mouths not grunt in a chair and listen until the cows come home. billing you and waiting for you to figure out all the answers.
Thank you for this. I had a single talk therapy session that went so tits up, it led me to research my own knowledge of myself, and I landed on C-PTSD. I find it difficult to entrust my thoughts and emotions to someone who feels that they know me better than I know myself. I was diagnosed with OCD because I couldn't stop thinking and crying about being estranged from my son. I explained that I have a penchant for blowing up relationships because I feel rejected and abandoned. He still wrote OCD. I cried in the car and never went back. What DID help was Ketamine treatments that helped me to stop the repetitive thinking. With every treatment (6) I became calmer and new revelations just poured into me. It's been about 5 months and I've been dysregulated about five times. It was almost daily before. So, I agree.
Systemic Family Constellations, hypnosis and Thetahealing did way more for me than therapy ever did.
Most counselors, coaches, nurses, doctors, policemen, etc. are not trauma informed. Even some therapists.
One of my therapists used to constantly look at her watch. I was sexually abused and one therapist said "well it wasn't as bad as some people I've met". I was furious. Stuck in a rubbish mental health system for 20 years. Taking my therapy into my own hands. Thanks CCF! I've just started doing the Daily Practice. It really helps. I even think I was misdiagnosed with schizophrenia. I believe I have CPTSD.
So glad to hear the Daily Method helps you! Keep up the great work!
Nika@TeamFairy
Anna, thank you for explaining all of this. I really appreciate the distinction between talking *about* the events vs. simply talking about how you're feeling because of the events. I have had "issues" as a kid, but I don't generally discuss them with people because the discussion makes others incredibly uncomfortable, and but when I have discussed, I *do* feel dis-regulated. I just never had a word for it.