Hi, my daughter is struggling with mental health problems like depression, anxiety, ptsd, agrophobia and suicidal thoughts after being seriously assaulted by her ex-partner.
She just can't see any reason to keep on going or a reason to smile. This is heartbreaking for me and the family because in the short few months that he knew her, he caused irreparable damage.
I'm so sorry to hear about what has happened. It sounds so difficult.
After the incident, did you daugther go to hospital at all? I wonder if she needs to spend a little bit of time in an inpatient unit if she is not feeling safe (towards herself)?
I had a situation years back where I was unsafe and I was admitted for a short time for containment and for a 'situational crisis'. It helped in getting me back on my two feet, and then after discharge, I had support from a more intensive team for a few weeks where they would call and check in on me.
What supports does she have in place at the moment?
There is a really great audiobook called Unstuck by a female Australian clinical psychologist. The way it’s written and spoken is super gentle and helped me get out of a dark place lately.
The chapter on compassion was written so beautifully. It also doesn’t mention anything about assault that could possibly be triggering to your daughter’s situation.
I found that just having a soothing female voice to listen to at night or in the car, was a helpful distraction from my own anxious and dark thoughts.
The content also helped immensely as it feels like you have support - especially if you are waiting for other one on one counselling or treatment.
hey @Carolyn2 just wanted to pop in and share a forums tip around tagging: you can use the @ symbol and type out the username of the person you want to respond to, then select it so it turns blue like this @26March24
this way, the person tagged will be notified of your reply.
I am so sorry that your poor daughter has had to endure this assault. It really is not fair. I don't have much to say other than if your daughter is not safe then the right thing to do it to take her to the local Emergency Department to get help. I have been hospitalised many times for being suicidal. It is not fun to be hospitalised but it is far better than the alternative. It must be such a worrying time for you as well. I can understand why she doesn't want to smile. She is probably really self-conscious. I do hope that she gets the justice that she deserves. What happened was really horrible.
How awful, and how hard it will be for her to overcome the bad life punched into her. Only loving her away from the pain can hope to heal her from her pain, though the scars will remain.
i found that experiencing physical violence, especially when life threatening, can only be digested mentally when the victim keeps taking slow bites off the trauma while LOVINGLY re processes it.
Such trauma can be a very hard to process, but is essential to to stop the violence destroying her completely in the long run. i do know that almost happened to me!
