Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving

by Pete Walker

As we move out of early recovery, we begin to observe that internal triggers are even more common than external ones. Such triggers are commonly the nasty spawn of the inner critic. Typically they are thoughts and visualizations about endangerment or the need for perfection. The survivor may, seemingly without reason, visualize someone being abusive. Moreover he can also, seemingly out of the blue, worry himself into a flashback by simply thinking he is not perfectly executing a task that he is undertaking. He can also frighten himself by enumerating the many ways that he might mess up any upcoming task. When internal triggering is at its worst, small potato miscues and peccadilloes trigger us into a full blown emotional flashback. We then devolve into a polarized process of negative-noticing – an incessant preoccupation with defects and hazards. We perseverate about everything that has gone or could go wrong. As recovery progresses, many survivors are shocked to discover that the majority of their flashbacks are triggered internally by these types of inner critic programs. We will explore below and in the next two chapters the ways we can rescue ourselves from the critic’s internal triggering processes.