Flashbacks of childhood abuse

[wherehaveallthegoodfolkgone]

I'm in my 50s, decades of therapy. I was beaten regularly as a child. I don't watch the news but have caught wind of what's happened with the Sara Sharif case and her abuse /death has been very frightening for me + triggering of old memories.
Therapy has never really helped other than making me feel held. I'm a super anxious person. Known for my emotional rollercoasters. Probably have some sort of pd.
Do you just live with this all your life? Is there any real healing? If so , what and how? I responded badly to medication.
Thank you

It is possible to break the emotional ties with trauma, you don't forget it but you can think about what happened without any feelings - it happened but it was nothing to do with who you were and are. To explain...

When something bad happens, a part of our mind gets the job of working out why it happened specifically so we can work out how to avoid a similar event in the future. However, when we suffer a traumatic event in our lives (especially early trauma) there isn’t always an answer to that question. Trauma can be so unexpected and undeserved that in truth we didn’t do anything wrong to cause it and certainly couldn’t easily avoid it. The need to make some sort of sense of the experience can often lock us into that moment. A part of our subconscious becomes unable to move on until we can fully understand it and put it to rest in our minds.

However our mind only engages with things it thinks it has the possibility of achieving. Once the subconscious mind knows that this traumatic event was never meant to make sense (because not everything in life is going to make sense), and anything we were going to learn from it was learned at the time. It’s now time to give that part of the mind permission to file it away and move on.

Eyesopenwideawake thank you for this very clear and helpful explanation. If only the last part about giving permission to file it away were a bit easier...
I think it's the aftermath that's the worst part, what it's made me into. A giant crybaby!

I know, it's not easy but it is possible. There's lots of info on my AMA that might be of interest.

Be kind to yourself.

@Eyesopenwideawake this explanation is exactly the way I feel about flashbacks to abuse and severe emotional trauma. My brain is trying to understand it so wants to keep showing it to me.
I understand you are saying not everything in life makes sense but I search and search for the abusive persons motivation. As all involved are dead I will never know but make suppositions and guesses to try and understand and always have the thought that something must have been wrong with me to make them behave like that, even though logically I know that is not the case.
It is much easier to be objective about others but not about yourself.
OP I am 57 and it has never got any easier. Decades of meds, years of various types of therapy. Am sorry to say but nothing has made any significant difference at all. More understanding of the effects it had on me but this understanding has not enabled me to change from the strategies I had to use to survive as a child and which are not so helpful to me as an adult.
I think I am as I am and that is it.

Eyesopenwideawake thanks I'll definitely check out your thread. Mittens67 I'm so sorry that's been your experience and there's no real breakthrough. I hope there's something that offers hope in the future 🙏

@Mittens67 - your mind can learn to let it go, it needs to know how. Someone I worked with described it as if the traumatic events were covered in oil; she could still reach for them but they slipped harmlessly out of her grasp.

Have you ever had a professional diagnosis from a psychiatrist?

Do you know about CPTSD? You might find it resonates. There's a book by Pete Walker called CPTSD from Surviving to Thriving which you might find helpful.

DBT might help with your emotional dysregulation.

Mind has lots of information on trauma and flashbacks you might find helpful. NAPAC is a charity for survivors of childhood abuse you could contact for support.

You might find inner child work useful. You can buy workbooks that you can go through at your own pace on Amazon.

username299 a massive thank you. Super helpful suggestions

I have found EMDR to be immensely helpful with getting through unresolved trauma. It helped me so.much.