Dear Lisa,

I haven’t been on the forums when you first started writing, but got some understanding of your story by reading anita’s summary earlier on this thread. I am sorry you’ve been through all that trauma and that it is still affecting you, making you live in the survival mode.

I will never be successful if the people around me do not want to see success.

It seems you’re hoping that people would help you, but the kind of people you’re expecting help from aren’t really good and safe people? Perhaps you need to stop hoping to get anything from them, and start believing that you can make it without them? And instead of them, surround yourself with good, supportive people? Which are out there, no doubt about that.

You have been through a lot as a child and experienced more than one Adverse Childhood Experience (ACE). That’s why you are probably suffering from Complex PTSD (C-PTSD), like many children who have been emotionally abused or neglected (I suffered from it too).

I was thinking if perhaps you would benefit from support programs offered at places such as the CPTSD Foundation (cptsd foundation dot org), where there are programs like Daily recovery support calls, Daily encouraging mails, Healing book club etc – all for survivors of childhood trauma. There is a small fee to pay for those programs, but maybe you can browse through the website, read some articles and see if you want to learn more about C-PTSD and recovery.

Of course, there are numerous other resources on the net about C-PTSD. Let me know if it is something that interests you, and I can give you some more pointers…