Grief in CPTSD: Navigating Complicated Loss

January 21, 2025

Grief is a universal experience, but in the U.S., it often feels misunderstood—even when it comes to “normal” losses. Add the complexities of CPTSD (complex post-traumatic stress disorder) to the mix, and grief can take on an entirely new dimension. When losses are tied to a person, place, or thing steeped in trauma, the grief process becomes anything but straightforward.

Why Grief Can Be Complicated

If you’ve lived in survival mode for much of your life, there’s a good chance you’ve lacked the capacity to process grief fully. Survival often demands putting one foot in front of the other, navigating crisis after crisis without the time, space, or support to acknowledge what’s been lost. Closure becomes a luxury rather than a given, leaving you with open loops that can feel impossible to close.

Grief in the context of CPTSD often stalls or delays until you have the safety and resources to address it. Once you do, you may find layers of hurt and unresolved wounds tied to the loss, especially if it’s final. Feelings of deep grief, anguish, longing, and abandonment hurt are common. Anger, bitterness, and resentment often interweave with the grief, creating a tangled emotional knot that needs to be unraveled before you can touch the tender truths beneath.

“Normal” Grief is a Relief in CPTSD

In my personal journey, my relationship with my dad exemplifies the shift from complicated to “normal” grief. For much of his life and after his passing, my grief was tangled with bitterness, resentment, and hurt. I’m grateful that I’ve since been able to move through those layers and find connection and peace.

Pure grief feels different. It’s love, connection, and acceptance—a tender acknowledgment of what was and wasn’t. Unlike the heavy, complicated grief, pure grief brings a sense of relief and peace. It’s a truth you can carry without feeling crushed.

The Role of Hurt, Harm, and Dark Energy

Many survivors of CPTSD have endured relationships characterized by “dark energy.” This term encompasses the behaviors and beliefs shaped by abuse, neglect, and generational trauma. These patterns, often dehumanizing and disempowering, lead to cycles of hurt and harm.

For years, I carried disgust, judgment, and shame toward my dad, who had that dark energy. These feelings served as protective mechanisms, helping me create the distance I needed from what I did NOT want to become. Paradoxically, CPTSD recovery often requires facing what you’ve resisted. When I began to see past my dad’s wounds to the larger story of hurt and harm in our lineage, I found a path toward healing.

Breaking Cycles and Reclaiming Power

A key milestone in CPTSD recovery is recognizing how generational trauma shapes us. Both of my parents carried legacies of disempowerment, passed down through their actions and choices. One parent overpowered; the other underpowered. Both dynamics left their mark on me.

A key piece of my own recovery was learning about the “flip flop” that happens in power struggles. Some victims try to flip the script to get power. Other victims collapse into helplessness and powerlessness. Both reactions are disempowering.

It also meant seeing my parents’ wounds not as defining truths, but as inherited burdens I could choose to heal. As a cycle breaker, I’ve come to see my family’s struggles as both a challenge and an opportunity to restore love, connection, and empowerment in my own lineage healing.

Softening the Separation

Healing trauma is about seeing both sides of the same coin: the burdens and the gifts. While we don’t choose the inheritance of hurt, we can reclaim the gifts buried beneath it. This duality—the bad news and the good news—has become a cornerstone of my recovery journey.

By softening the separation between myself and my dad, I’ve been able to reconnect with the gifts his lineage carries. Humor, strength, charisma, and a love of movement and nature are just a few. These qualities are part of my inheritance, alongside the burdens. Releasing the struggle and aligning my strengths with purpose and intention has allowed me to honor both the pain and the beauty of my lineage.

Reflection and Invitation

CPTSD recovery is a journey of generational healing. It involves releasing burdens, reconnecting to gifts, and reclaiming your seat of power. Processing complicated grief is a portal to this work. The reward? Peace, connection, and “pure” grief.

I invite you to reflect on your own lineage:

What have you inherited—both burdens and gifts?
How do these stories live within you?
What needs to be released and recovered?
What might you be resisting that could be a portal to healing?

You don’t have to carry your grief and burdens alone. It would be an honor to guide you. Together, we can alchemize what feels heavy into something true and freeing. Your grief holds the key to profound liberation. Let’s walk this path, one step at a time. Schedule your RESET session here.

Reply...