DOJ case, + counselor flips out

[doubleAries]

Just need to vent--feedback/comments questions welcome.

Bear with me, it's of course a long story (that feels all mashed together) and I'm trying to summarize.

I grew up with a sadistic PD mother who was divorced from my diagnosed NPD father. The abuse at mom's house was extreme. Life at dad's house was like a syrupy Disney flick every other weekend...until the sexual abuse started.

I assumed once I grew up and escaped, everything would be "fine", LOL.

Well into my 3rd dysfunctional marriage, I started counseling (which also led to leaving that marriage). I got very lucky and found a VERY good counselor right away. 5 years later though, he took an administrative job at a college and stopped doing counseling. I thought I'd be ok--I made a lot of progress in those 5 years.

But after about a year, and being more connected with my inner turmoil, I started having severe panic attacks. I emailed Pete Walker (author of "Complex PTSD: from surviving to thriving") and asked if he had any online openings. He didn't and gave me 2 names of other therapists to try.

Somehow I combined the 2 names and found a counselor in Georgia by the name of the names I had inadvertently combined. Took a bit to figure out the confusion, but I went along with it when she said "I don't think there are any accidents". Her credentials were impressive--PhD, teaches a masters class, 40 years experience. I didn't feel like I was making anywhere near as much progress, but was willing to give it time and was especially grateful to have a counselor a year in when a very bizarre and very traumatizing event occurred.

In 2017, my best friend of 30 years was diagnosed stage 4 cancer. When it got really bad, I brought her to my house to take care of her with the help of hospice until she died while I held her hands. I was her POA and estate executor. This of course was a very intense and stressful event, but nothing compared to what came next--in 2018, the FBI called me and asked me come to a meeting with an agent. At that meeting, the agent told me that the funeral home the hospice had recommended had not only NOT cremated my friend, they stole her body as soon as they got it, chopped her up and sold her body parts to a body broker. This same funeral home had apparently been doing this for 10 years, and there were somewhere between 800 and 2000 victims (google Sunset Mesa Funeral Home if you want to make yourself sick).

I've experienced a lot of trauma in my life, but this really sent me down a massive rabbit hole--especially since no one was under arrest yet for this horrifying situation. I spent several days in extreme anxiety like I've never experienced before, including a new-to-me full blown social anxiety. I wallowed on my floor freaking out for days. I had to force myself to function, as I have an international wholesale business and had 14 employees at the time.

The FBI dropped a bomb in my lap and then clammed up--there are actual studies about how the judicial system revictimizes victims in cases, and I'll certainly attest to that. Their investigation went on for another 2 years before the finally made arrests--right at the beginning of the pandemic last year. I spent 2 years in the worst limbo of my life (it's not over), trying to get information about the case. This led to even deeper traumatic rabbit holes, learning about the body broker industry worldwide. I joined an online group for victims in the case which was both helpful and even more traumatizing--we compared stories we were told by the FBI and it became a swirling nightmare for all of us, but also helpful to understand what we were (are) involved in. These creepy body snatcher scumbags still haven't gone to trial. It's currently scheduled for February next year, but will probably be delayed yet again. There are many, many details of this rabbit hole, of course, and all are extremely traumatizing--the hits just keep coming.

Now fast forward to this past week. My counselor has always shown sympathy/empathy, but hasn't really wanted to delve very deeply into issues. She's been an ear, which I thought was enough, but in hindsight that's what friends are for, not therapists. I needed more from her--I needed her to help me get grounded, to cope with intense anxiety and depression. Instead, she validated my poor 4F coping skills. The pandemic has made me justify complete social isolation, which has sharpened my emotional flashbacks and anxiety. She didn't see a problem with that.

Then last week, I started slipping into a lengthy panic attack again. In my session with her, I opened up, crying and venting anger, and she was clearly very irritated with this, much to my puzzlement. During the session, she told me she thought I was bipolar. Funny--for the past 5 1/2 years she didn't think I was bipolar.

[doubleAries]

Continued...

 Funny--for the past 5 1/2 years she didn't think I was bipolar.  The next day she sent me an email and told me that I was just wallowing in self pity and needed to stop it and go get some exercise  When I replied that I didn't think this was appropriate therapeutic advice, especially when I'm in really bad shape and need her help more than ever, she told me that she only does CBT therapy and that I need to find another therapist  (and I guess I was only bipolar for a day--then I just became a sniveling lazy neurotic).

It's my tendency to ruminate on things, and especially what I did wrong, why everything is my fault (inner critic/terrorist). But I know I can't afford that right now. I got out my audiobook of Pete Walkers book and am on the 4th listen in a row right now, which has helped a lot. I'm still pretty shaky though. I'm trying to confront my flight/freeze anxiety with some of the tips in the book (which are awkward and unfamiliar) instead of my usual hyper busy-ness distraction techniques (which aren't as available anyway--the pandemic has decimated my business, which is almost completely dead from supply chain problems and labor shortages). But I can't help but review the last 5 1/2 years of counseling, seeing it quite differently. I'm trying not to be obsessive about it. I've been putting puzzles together, which is sort of soothing, and better than many of the things I see going on in the world, the global problem of dealing with stress.

One of the things I notice now, is that I thought for some reason that the march forward in healing would be different than it is. The intensity of the anxiety and cptsd is commensurate with the childhood abuse. I assumed it would lessen overall (like each "episode" would be lesser in intensity than the last). But it seems to be just as intense, but not as frequent. It's frustrating to me--when I'm doing well, I'm doing better than I ever have in my life--I've finally learned good boundaries and have a pretty decent amount of practice enforcing them, I have better insight into myself, I have a more solid grasp on my values and goals. But when an "episode" comes along, it feels like all that is washed away like it never existed, like I'm worse than ever, worse than when I was a kid being shredded physically, emotionally, psychologically by my witch mother.

Maybe the episodes don't last as long? Maybe their further apart? I'm having a hard time objectively seeing the patterns.

Anyone else experience this?

[Methuen]

DoubleAries, I’m out of my league to offer much here.

But I would say dump that therapist.  I get the sense that therapist isn’t working for you.  Trust your instinct, not just the credentials.  Maybe she’s burned out.  What about going back to the two names Pete Walker gave you via email?  Do you still have those names?

[doubleAries]

DoubleAries, I’m out of my league to offer much here.

But I would say dump that therapist.  I get the sense that therapist isn’t working for you.  Trust your instinct, not just the credentials.  Maybe she’s burned out.  What about going back to the two names Pete Walker gave you via email?  Do you still have those names?

Well, the therapist dumped me, so that's taken care of. I can't really afford another one at the moment, and I'm not seeing any around for less than $100 an hour. I did contact Pete Walker again to see if he had any openings--he doesn't, but gave me a couple more referrals--both over $150 an hour. I think I'm just going to have to use the tools I've learned in 10 years of counseling (most of those from the 1st 5 years) to use and buckle up my seat belt. My business is about to go under. And every time there is miniscule movement in this creepy DOJ case, I get really agitated--I can only imagine when the trial actually finally takes place