Living with Complex PTSD

Hi @-Liz- , no questions, just wanted to say its a great idea and good on you. 🙂

How much of your memoir have you written?

Hi @-Liz- we haven't met before. I live with complex PTSD (and Bipolar 1) and have done for most of my life (56 now). I wish many things - just one of them is that I'd heard of EMDR sooner and found my trauma-informed psychologist sooner.

You might be interested in the book Traumata by Meera Atkinson. I did a writing trauma workshop with her early this year. She's a person with lived experience too and an amazing author.

Best wishes with your memoir. I have many short stories, poems and prose that might turn into some sort of publication at some stage.

Just a reminder @-Liz- that if you want to talk to a particular person (e.g. talk some more with me) use the @ symbol and then type the name you want - you will see a drop down box where you can click on the name you want @eth (for short names sometimes you need to type it slowly),

Hi @-Liz- if you go into your settings you can set them to send you a notification every time someone responds on a thread you are in, and even to let you know when someone supports a post by you (which they will usually do when they read your post). Mine are set to only tell me when I am tagged so bear that in mind if you want to chat with me.

I'm not into putting my work on instagram or other forms of social media esp fb. I like going into competitions and doing live readings and with both of them the work often needs not to have been published anywhere including online.

Good question re what I'd want in a CPTSD memoir - don't really know. I guess all I can say is it would need to be a good read and I know how general that sounds. Some sort of journey of recovery - which has different meanings to different people - the definition here Recovery Model works for me - or process of realization and learning to manage it .... just thinking out loud here. I guess what I have asked myself is 1. why am I writing it? and 2. who is my chosen audience? What's in it for them?

@Silenus is a brilliant writer who might have some tips for you. There's a thread he started called Writing As A Form Of Therapy that you might find interesting and worth a look where lots of people on the forums put pieces they've written and feedback/responses. Just remember to keep it all anonymous and non-identifying.

Hi again @-Liz- the challenge for me with writing about cPTSD and my experience of it (with bipolar 1 and how they interact) is to feel like I am 'contributing something to the body of knowledge' that's already out there (which is quite considerable these days). And trying to put a humourous spin on some of the extremes I've lived, which I believe will widen the audience. At least that's where my thinking is at the moment! Also what I've found when doing the live readings.

I do feel that my writing is limited by not having studied literature at an academic level, even my vocabulary. Can't help comparing my output to those with tertiary level knowledge - I was raised by academics and am not one myself. But I try to balance that by accepting that I can only write in my own authentic voice. Sometimes a good exercise is to re-write a piece in the 2nd or 3rd person and see how that changes it.

Hi again @-Liz- I'm not sure but perhaps you meant to tag me in your last post as it seems like a response to what I had said.

I have a busy day today and again tomorrow but am happy to keep chatting if you can be patient about timing of replies. Should be around a fair bit on Saturday. There's a social thread called Saturday Soiree - all welcome!! where I hang out on Saturdays which you might like to join to meet more people on the forums. It's a thread where it's also quite ok to post a rave about what's going on for you, and possibly find more people with common ground with you. We also share music and virtual yummies there. I'll tag you when I kick it off on the day.