Reflections on a Road Trip with Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (CPTSD)
I recently went on a 15-day road trip with my daughter. We traveled about 5500kms through British Columbia to visit family and have some fun. While the trip overall was a success with great times, great food, and connection, I still struggled daily with crippling self-doubt and catastrophic thinking. Of course, none of the complications I imagined happened; however, that type of thinking repeatedly made me feel like giving up and returning home early.
Throughout my recent tribulations, as described in my book Being Broken, these harmful ways of thinking, self-doubt and catastrophizing, have been in the forefront of my battle to heal myself. Both ways of thinking are intricately tied to my CPTSD from years of being told I would never be good enough or successful in life. Being told you will never succeed, or amount to anything for your entire childhood, teen years, and into adulthood, takes a toll on your self-esteem and self-worth. But let’s dive into what the terms ‘self-doubt’ and ‘catastrophizing’ really mean.
Self-doubt is rather self-explanatory. A child who is told that they are not capable, whether it is in action or thought, for their entire lives will often develop crippling self-doubt later in life. Self-doubt can be related to thoughts about our ability to plan or execute the things in our lives that we enjoy, or want to enjoy. In turn, we may give up entirely on projects or hobbies, or even holidays that we have to plan in advance. Like a lurking shadow over everything I do, such as woodworking, painting and art, writing, or caring for my child, self-doubt seeps into everything I want to do. This can also lead to Impostor Syndrome, where even if I’m successful and receive praise for something I have done, I can not believe or accept it and instead believe that it is fraudulent and I’m an impostor.
This self-doubt leads to catastrophizing, or catastrophic thinking. When you doubt yourself and your ability to carry out plans or engage in projects, this can lead to beliefs telling us that everything is headed for a disaster anyway. This is catastrophizing — the intrusive belief that everything is doomed to fail or thinking of the worst outcome; that it, or you, will never be good enough. When your mind is telling you that you will fail, that you are not good enough, and that you shouldn’t even try, it can be self-fulfilling if we let it take over our thoughts and guide us to inaction. During our trip, I was always thinking that our hotel bookings would not work, or that I would get into some horrible accident, or that my daughter would hate the experiences I was trying to give her. I would wake every morning with horrible anxiety about the day ahead and repeated thoughts of not being good enough to continue.
Of course, none of these catastrophic ideations came to fruition. We did a similar road trip last year to great success, yet the self-doubt and catastrophic thinking seemed even stronger this year. Despite this kind of thinking, I pushed through; to ‘lean into it’ as my therapist said. I have learned to identify this voice in my head as not my own, but my abusers’ voice. To fight their voices, I have put in some practices that I go through every morning so that I am able to get out of bed and face the day ahead. Every morning I settle in bed and work through a guided meditation focused on the topics of anxiety and self-doubt. I breathe deeply and stretch while lying in bed. I practice this for at least 15 minutes, and can go as long as an hour should I need it. By the time I complete this practice, I will have wrestled the voice in my head, calmed my mind and nervous system, and worked out the aches and pains of the previous day. I regularly feel much better, energized, and ready to tackle what the day will throw at me. I have done this for 493 days now, 147 of them consecutively. Routine and repetition are key to my success in defeating these intrusive ways of thinking.
There was a time in my life when traveling was fun and there was no anxiety associated with it. Jumping in a car for a road trip, or on a plane to another city, was easy. However, this was also a time when drugs and alcohol were dominant in my life. Managing emotions and thoughts with substances is easy; learning to enjoy life after 30 years of substance use is hard. Fighting the voices in my head telling me I’m not good enough, that I am not loved, or that I can’t be happy, is exhausting. Sometimes I just want to give up, but I keep fighting, for her, for myself. I think I am winning this fight, but I am unsure if there will be a day that I won’t have to fight at all. All I can do is keep putting one foot in front of the other, believe that I am capable and that I am worthy of love, and hope that one day I will just be who I am supposed to be – someone who can do anything, and do it well. I am worthy.
