SOMEBODY SEDATE ME: CPTSD & RESENTMENT

With the spectrum of people which populate this earth, I have noticed differences in behavioral patterns between those who are considered addicts and those who are not. There is no right or wrong way to go about living life as I believe we each do the best we can with what we have, however with that, comes differences between completely giving up on and losing oneself and fighting to better oneself, depending how you choose to use your free will. There can be two different individuals (put in a vacuum - so equal all things considered) who experience the same set of traumatic events can come out of it experiencing two different realities and existing on two separate paths after the fact, all based on the concept of choice. It does not signify one is necessarily more resilient than the other based on action after the fact, but we are each born with our own unique perspective on the world and develop different attitudes. When it comes to those who develop addiction, the anger typically feels like it has not had a chance to breathe, leading to other, self harming behaviors. 

On the CPTSD addict’s recovery journey, there are times where the feeling of anger can get enmeshed with resentment. For those who are healing from addiction, it is imperative that the addict acknowledges and learns to distinguish the feeling of anger and resentment to reach a higher level of transformation in the spirit. When it comes to the concept of addiction, Alcoholic Anonymous (AA) views it as a spiritual sickness, so spiritual terminology is necessary, and with that, a personalized healing journey needs to be created to reach each individual’s needs for a higher power. Anger can be thought of as a justified feeling when done wrong, but resentment is what keeps an addict sick. Resentment is anger muted and  transformed to the point where it engulfs the individual and possesses them to do out of character, self-deprecating acts such as poisoning your body to somehow get back at that person or to curse the universe for your existence in other ways. Unprocessed anger can morph into resentment, sabotaging recovery efforts. Here I will unpack the difference between these emotions and explore trauma-informed tools for metabolizing anger before it festers.

First I want to take a moment to step back and reflect on how valid anger is as a feeling. In early research, I noticed many ‘old heads’ in the AA program believed how anger is an unnatural feeling and should not be felt aloud. These are the same types that do not research outside literature to expand their spiritual knowledge on the journey which resonates best with them, although the AA literature encourages this behavior. The same types also have emotional outbursts and are not in control of their feelings. Over time, as I observed the community more, I noticed the patterns of those who were considered the ‘winners’ of the program, or those who experienced a spiritual transformation with the program and went on to lead successful lives, had a grasp on how to healthily feel each emotion, anger included. It didn’t involve seething recycled emotions simmering right below the surface, ready to jump up at anyone at any given time if triggered, like those who choose to not acknowledge the emotion. Feeling anger in recovery often does not mean a relapse is on its way, although it feels that way sometimes, instead it shows you are a human and are experiencing emotions. We cannot control what emotions come to the surface, but we are able to control what we do with it. Anger often indicates a boundary is being violated, not necessarily a moral failure. And that is the body protecting itself from perceived danger. 

Addicts typically find themselves in prolonged survival mode and can develop complex PTSD, or CPTSD, which is a chronic, developmental trauma and is often invisible. These experiences include emotional flashbacks, difficulty with boundaries, people-pleasing, chronic guilt and shame. CPTSD survivors often appear ‘calm’ but are in a chronic shutdown mode. With this group of addicts, resentment is prevalent. Resentment in CPTSD is a slow burn inside a nervous system that never learned safe confrontation, which makes this segment of addicts more susceptible to self harming behaviors for feeling management reasons. 

When it comes to feelings, there seems to always be some sort of connection to neurobiological aspects of self. With CPTSD, comes emotional suppression. This involves an amygdala hijack which results in intense sensitivity to perceived threats. When combined with the hippocampal disorientation and dorsal vagal shut down, the sensitivity is coupled with difficulty separating the ‘then’ and ‘now’, which then results in an emotional muting. This natural inclination to shut down, often leads to a bypass effect on the feeling of anger and jumps the individual to a shame cycle, or cycle of collapse, and then simmers into a ruminative resentment. CPTSD is associated with hyperactivity in the Default Mode Network, which contributes to persistent rumination and trauma-based narrative cycling. This can include their body telling them: “They always do this”, “No one listens to me”, and more. Where substances play a role in this chemical warfare are when they are used as an off-switch to these persistent loops. It quiets the voices temporarily and it becomes a crutch to remain functional when the insides are dysfunctional. The journey of sobriety for these folks involves learning how to emotionally process events of the past, present, and future as taking away the substance naturally intensifies the voices of the repressed anger and resentment cycles they have been stuck in for however long the addiction has taken place and even before the physical addiction. 

I aspire to live as though the world is just, but in truth, we occupy a kind of existential purgatory - caught between the memory of a central, unifying love and the daily reality of a species still driven by unintegrated, primal shadow forces. We are spiritual beings haunted by evolutionary reflexes, struggling to remember the light while surviving in the dark. This darkness of rewarding suppressed anger, especially with women and people pleasers, makes the individual feel as if they are mature to the external world, however it creates an unhealthy loop of bypassing the feeling as a whole instead of learning to truly manage it from a state of truth. When it comes to prospering resiliently after existing in not so ideal environments, ‘rules’ become internalized within the self. These can include patterns such as having the voices say “My needs aren’t valid unless I’m suffering silently”, or “If I get angry, I’ll be abandoned”. Thoughts such as these lock individuals into a state of fawn-response resentment, or chronic martyrdom. This can be dangerous for someone in recovery as people mistake this silent state for serenity. However, trauma survivors may be rehearsing entire arguments that are never voiced. This loop over time erodes authenticity and builds the foundation for a physical relapse. 

With such a destructive force anger can be, I can understand why some in recovery choose to avoid the feeling altogether, but to reach true emotional sobriety, reclaiming anger can be seen as a healing force. According to Dr. Janina Fisher, the anger experienced in CPTSD is often the young self energy, or the part of you that needed protection but never got it and when expressed safely, it can reboot the nervous system and restore dignity in the sufferer. Awareness is the first step to recovery, whether emotional or physical. It is important to ask if the anger is current or familiar and then ask where the boundary was crossed and acknowledge that aspect over searching for someone to blame for it. Focusing the experience inward helps validate and surface the true emotion beneath and pinpoint where it is coming from. But that anger still needs an outlet. To achieve this, there have been many practices which can redirect and heal the trigger point. This can include somatic expression, which is any kind of movement activity, screaming in the car, punching pillows, or shaking. This allows expression with no true consequences. Others include parts work, timed-box range, and embodied language. These involve speaking to the inner part of yourself who was not allowed to get angry and allowing them to express it, using timers to safely discharge the emotion without escalation, for example allowing yourself five minutes to feel it and move on with your day, and lastly, taking ownership without projecting that emotion onto the external world. Taking ownership can look like “I feel angry” versus pushing it onto someone else such as the narrative of “YOU made me angry”. These actions take the power back from the emotion and can prevent an episode from occurring. In the research of Harriet Lerner and Resmaa Menakem, there is a distinction between clean anger and resentment. Clean anger is direct, time-limited, and connected to the present moment, while resentment feels stale, silent, and stuck in the past. Expressing clean anger while in the present moment versus allowing it to stew in resentment opens the individual up to a flow state and gives them the experience to change their actions in future scenarios. 

Unfortunately, you and I don’t have the capability to fast forward to the point of full recovery (if that is even a thing) and must struggle with the two wolves in our brain, so daily tasks can assist in this transformational spiritual journey. In AA, there are tools such as the nightly to reflect on your day, however, with addicts who have CPTSD, it is important to focus on tools such as reflecting specifically on what made you angry that day, nervous system check ins before and after hard conversations, and listing where you have held back your truth as a resentment hygiene check. If you are a ritual girlie, things such as speaking circles, therapy, rage writing, and fire rituals seem to assist in the healthy expression of such a strong feeling. In AA, they express what is said in the rooms, remains in the rooms, so why not normalize the expression of anger in community spaces such as this. It feels good to express frustrations in rooms where people understand, and can even laugh along with you. It helps with that isolating feeling of not belonging as well. For addicts, resentment is inevitable, which is why step 4 and 5 exist, so it is important to recognize that resentment itself is not the enemy, but a cue to listen in more deeply and meet the anger beneath the surface with love. 

Anger is never a ‘wrong’ feeling, you were just taught to not feel it. For trauma survivors, especially those in any type of substance abuse program, anger is seen as a life-giving force when it is welcomed into the individual’s energetic field, and resentment is that trauma echoed when it is left unexamined. Welcoming your anger, instead of repressing it, can guide you back to a life rooted in truth and vitality while maintaining healthy boundaries during the path you take during physical sobriety.