Here's mine with these issues. Sibling abuse is often ignored because "kids fight," but it's goes beyond "rivalry" when one is always the aggressor and the other is always in fear and goes way out of their way to avoid that sibling (and when the parents act like that's ok or just don't care that it isn't). It took me a very long time to piece together what now feels obvious because it's almost never talked about beyond the sexual forms.
Another thing is misdiagnosis with mood disorders. I went around for years thinking "well, it's just a chemical imbalance in my brain causing poor emotional regulation, nothing I can actually do about it but take my meds and do a lil CBT!" while ingesting some heavy and infertility causing chemicals since 17. Eventually (after \~4 years of therapy) I finally started opening up about trauma stuff and my therapist told me he didn't think I was bipolar. My psychiatrist actually dropped me as a patient because she didn't want the liability of me going off my meds under her care, since it's assumed that once bipolar always bipolar (esp bc I was labelled type I due to some psychotic breaks). Things like learning to articulate emotions, say no, and eye movement therapy have been infinitely more helpful in healing (though in some ways harder) than believing it was all completely out of my control. From what I can tell this misdiagnosis is quite common. And of course, one can be both bipolar and have cptsd.
I believe the two (hidden trauma and misdiagnosis) are tied as well. Because the trauma I experienced as a kid was more hidden in the form of emotional neglect and sibling abuse, I never thought of it as trauma for years. It took being more obviously abused as a adult and connecting those feelings to how I felt as a kid for me to make the connection (hey, I should feel safe and loved in my home and not scared all the time???) So for years my erratic moods and behavior were labeled as a mood disorder, and treated as such for better or worse.
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CPTSD - Finding Yourself | Loving Yourself
Non-FictionRaising awareness for Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD or Complex PTSD). Including real life stories and what people with the condition wish you knew. Read on to find heart wrenching, heart warming and tear jerking stories. Full of s...
