I did talk therapy, ADHD coaching and meds, and anti-depressants.

I learned from talk therapy, but the best results I had were from a coach who used a combination of Somatic Experiencing, Internal Family Systems, and Polyvagal theory.

Over the decades I've worked with a lot of therapists and psychiatrists. Many of them were able to take me to a certain level of progress, but no further. Then I met a CPTSD coach who was able to move me past that point.

My interpretation is that my coach understood something that the others didn't. She understood that each step forward can reveal new threats and set off more alarms. For example, you may make progress by permitting yourself to replace some old clothes. Great, right? Well, for me, it could set off alarm bells of "who the hell do you think you are?" "Oh, are you a big shot now?," or it could cause me to freeze or dissociate.

When I was able to verbalize those messages, a therapist could help me work through them. But when my nervous system would go into freeze or dissociation, the therapists had no idea how to proceed or explain what was happening. They couldn't see the decades-long pattern of freezing or dissociating that occurred after making progress.

The critical piece for me was when my coach recognized that after progress, my nervous system would likely go into freeze or dissociation. Just the acknowledgement was an enormous relief. She understood. The lingering problem was my nervous system's responses when getting better.

To address this, she slowed everything way down, using tiny, incremental steps and re-regulating the nervous system after each baby step. The idea was to avoid putting the nervous system into any form of overwhelm which would trigger dissociation, freeze, etc.

So ultimately, what's made it feel easier is learning to listen to myself, including my body, through meditation, polyvagal exercises, walking, etc. and understanding how to work with my nervous system. It also really helped to understand that the nervous system operates automatically and much faster than my thoughts. My nervous system requires a different approach than talk therapists provided.

I hope that answers your questions.

This is where I have found Polyvagal theory so helpful.

It takes a different approach. It suggests going extremely slowly to avoid going back into reactive states such as shutdown, freeze, dissociation, etc. The idea is that once you go back into these overwhelm states you can no longer learn, grow, or be present.

I did a lot of talk therapy and meds that would improve things up to a point, but never any further. At some point, I always froze or avoided. When I found a coach who said "we're not doing any cliff jumping. We're going to go very, very slowly" things changed for me.

It's much slower than I'd like, but I can move into situations and challenges now that I would run from in the past.

For me it means dissociating, hiding, being afraid to connect with others, avoiding joy, and ignoring my needs. I took "trying to live" as meaning "trying to survive."

This perspective didn't work for me until I found a coach that understood that "getting sober" didn't feel better and I didn't know how to function while "sober." I didn't enjoy living sober.

I think, too often, people trying to help expect us to feel better when we're doing better. I didn't. Every time I improved I saw a new level of shit I had to deal with. Once I understood this, made accommodations for it, and used tools to help while sober, then I started to see genuine change. Until then, I didn't want to give up the tools of dissociation, hiding, shutting down, and hyper-vigilance.

That's so interesting. I don't want to equate my experience to yours in substance, but it does seem similar in strength. My main strategy, which I assume I took on very early, has been to dissociate, sleep, and be hyper-vigilant. It's most strong when I do things for myself and looks similar to ADHD.

I've had a few non-verbal parts that simply weren't willing to let go of using sleep and dissociation until I demonstrated, over time, that I was seriously, and consistently, taking charge of adult tasks. At some point I found myself "awake" at times I rarely was before, or for longer periods. I don't know if this will happen for you, but as I did my work, over time, some of my parts loosened their grip and lowered their reactivity. It does seem I may still have parts that I'm not directly hearing from though.

It seems this was the time when better design was just starting to come around. It reminds me of the Apple Newton.

IFS has changed the way I feel about inner conflict or contradictory feelings. It has also guided me to better understand what it means to be an adult.

It wouldn't be unreasonable to reach out to your therapist.

Also know that it's normal to have a series of emotions when awareness increases. The difference, which parts don't know yet, is that you are getting help and you are no longer in the same danger, even if it feels that way.

When I come to new awareness, I use breathing exercises, walking, meditation and polyvagal exercises to help me. I also write in a journal. Putting down the voices of parts helps them feel acknowledged. It also helps me to have my therapy appointments written somewhere I can see as a reminder I am taking the situation seriously and am putting energy into resolving it.

My first thought is to work with a trauma therapist as someone else mentioned. Someone to guide you through the most difficult parts can be very helpful and safer. This sounds like very heavy work.

I will say that when I worked on self-forgiveness, my Self needed to step up and basically, learn how to accept, grieve, process the anger, and let go. That was something I neither knew how, nor wanted, to do. So there were two levels of forgiveness I had to work on. My Self and my parts. That was a lot to process given how much I used fear, self-criticism, etc. to operate in the world.

My strongest fear response has been to sleep. And not so much when bad things are happening, but when I am doing personal-growth activities. So I have a strong resistance as things get better. My nervous system sends off all sorts of alarms and knocks me out, almost literally.

As I am able to watch the alarm bells go off, and use the exercises for calming the nervous system and listening to the body, I am gradually able to reduce my nervous system's reactivity.

But I still have parts that resist, create chaos, avoid, or get really angry. They are the second line of defense. So, I started by listening to those parts and accepting that doing better wasn't going to feel better. It's a frustrating because I wanted to feel better. It confused me for a long time and others cannot comprehend it so I've stopped explaining it.

One other aspect is that parts needed time to trust my adult Self. For some parts, acknowledgement was enough. Other parts, like teenagers, have been very skeptical and need proof over time. As I dissociated less and took on things I didn't really want to do, but needed to, they reduced their hyper vigilance.

I often catch myself in a state of discomfort and then realize that it's because I am genuinely safe. It can be challenging for me to be in a place of safety.

One of my coaches themes is to go very, very slowly as to not put myself into overwhelm because that stops growth. Very, very slow is better than freeze. Another was to create a level of safety for the nervous system. This was critical for me because I had fast, unconscious fear reactions. But, creating safety...that meant my adult Self had to manage times of safety responsibly so my childish parts didn't take over - which they were very skilled at doing.

The first difficulty was finding the right help. I worked with a lot of good people who, for a variety of reasons were unable to help me. The work is still difficult and painful but it also includes growth and improvements.

One of the greatest feelings in my life was the knowing I had found something that was working. It was like coming upon a helpful sign post when you're lost, hungry, frustrated, and angry.

I was surprised by how much the body and nervous system are involved. I thought I only had to change my thinking. I am less cynical but also more skeptical.

I'm no expert, but it seems there's a real shortage, and high demand for people practicing IFS, especially in the context of trauma. I believe that's partly why the large classes and seminars offered by coaches on YouTube is a viable model right now.

If you're relatively easy to find on the internet via google and a few IFS directories it shouldn't take long to be busy. Also google any local therapists you know to see where they're listed and how they're getting their name out. When I am looking for help outside my insurance, I generally use google and check out directories and individual web sites.

That's great where it can work. It can especially work when a shop is more an extension of a hobbyist owner with big pockets, is a non-profit operation, or where the demographics are aligned.

But "community" often doesn't lead to revenue and profit. Especially in the age of the internet. Long-time, loyal customers often stop in the shop to excitedly tell the shop owner what a great internet deal they got on their bike and need some oil and advice.

The shop does free support for several tri's and discounted repair service for local schools but this doesn't translate into sales like it did before the internet.

Watching my nervous system react and separating it from my cognitive process has been very helpful. Sometimes it's my body responding to perceived threats and they are much quicker, operate just under the radar, and don't respond to logic.

This aligns with the suggestions to start small and go slowly, step by step. But it also suggests using some breathing exercises, simple meditations, and walking. My lack of motivation isn't in my brain.

Perhaps in some spots. But most small hometown bike shops are competing with people doing the same thing out of their garage using YouTube videos. You can't keep the lights on rent and insurance paid competing with a guy who says "Those guys at 'Home-Time Bike Shop' are rip-off artists. I can do it for half that."

Bike shop owners have seen this decline since the early 2000's. Online sales, lower overall ridership, younger ridership declining, and the shrinking number of bike shops has been discussed in Bicycle Retailer Magazine for a long time.

It also saw a shrinking its subscription and number of pages.

There is some truth to that, but the shops that primarily sell the entry level Giants are competing with Wal-Mart and the Wal-Mart mindset that bike shops are just ripping people off.

Even selling a selection of used, bike-store grade bikes, fully inspected and tuned is viewed as too expensive because of what a person can find in a dumpster, on the side of the road, from a neighbor or on Craigslist.

This is right. But one difference is that their isn't a clear model for the local shop to remain viable. Competing with online competition, lower margins, aging population of riders, and the unsuccessful attempt at incorporating online-selling with shops means their is no clear path for profitability - at least in the U.S.

Very few lb's were "riding the profits." Bike shops are disappearing at a pretty good clip and a lot of shops couldn't even get bikes during COVID because they weren't paying the higher container rates and because the Giant factories slowed production way down with bikes on the factory line because of a worker shutdown and then because parts weren't available to complete the bikes.

This is true. In my area, some additional people picked up cycling during COVID, but young people are not taking up riding. They drive and use electric scooters.

I did decades of talk therapy which was helpful for issues on periphery of my CPTSD, but it didn't address the core issues. I had the same problem with ADHD coaching and meds. Even on a very high dose of ritalin and coaching, I was only able to make small changes.

Dr. Aimie, in one-on-one coaching, helped me make fundamental changes using SE, IFS, and Polyvagal theory. I doubt that the course would have been as helpful if I hadn't seen her first, but I believe it can be valuable to many.

I don't know why her IFS, SE, Polyvagal approach worked for me, or what's likely to work for others, to be honest. I just know I worked with a lot of licensed therapists and a handful of psychiatrists. None of them looked outside their lane to suggest another path or practices - which I get. But it makes it difficult to find the right help. When my insurance provider finally had trauma-informed therapists, they dismissed my symptoms out of hand. Dr. Aimie has completely changed the trajectory of my healing and I am very grateful for that.

Wide divisions in wealth is a problem regardless of where the bottom is. Even primates can react strongly to unfairness. Capitalism and greed have prevented the young from having any power or say in their futures. Just consider the age and make up of our three branches.

Capitalism and power refuses to budge or give an inch. That has them looking for other systems.

Hell, I've got lots of ideas!

This confused the hell out of me and was what stopped me from moving forward so often. Other people, and I, were confused that getting better didn't feel better.

Now, when I prepare to do things genuinely for myself, I give myself some time because I know I may need to grieve or work back to an equilibrium.

It doesn't always happen, but I am going through a long list of simple things to get done this weekend and after every two or three, my nervous system starts to go into mild overwhelm. It should be reducing my stress and feel rewarding, but that's not how it works for me...at least not yet.