Signs and symptoms may include:

1. Emotional dysregulation: Intense and unstable emotions, including feelings of worthlessness, shame, guilt, and difficulty managing anger or sadness.

2. Flashbacks and dissociation: Recurrent intrusive memories, nightmares, or flashbacks to traumatic events, as well as dissociative episodes where one feels disconnected from reality.

3. Avoidance behaviors: Efforts to avoid reminders of the trauma, such as avoiding certain places, people, or activities, and emotional numbing.

4. Hyperarousal: Persistent feelings of being on edge, hypervigilance, difficulty concentrating, and exaggerated startle responses.

5. Negative self-concept: Persistent negative beliefs about oneself, feelings of shame or guilt, and a distorted self-image.

6. Impaired relationships: Difficulty in forming and maintaining healthy relationships, including issues with trust, intimacy, and boundary setting.

7. Somatic symptoms: Physical complaints such as headaches, stomachaches, and other unexplained physical ailments that may have no clear medical cause.

C-PTSD differs from PTSD because it often results from prolonged exposure to traumatic events, such as childhood abuse, neglect, or an abusive relationship. It can have a profound impact on various aspects of one’s life. The “C” or “complex” part refers to trauma being ongoing and prolonged. For example, someone who gets into a car accident may be traumatized from it. A woman in an abusive relationship endures repeated trauma and stress on an ongoing basis, for however long she remains in the relationship. Her body is in constant fight, flight or fawn mode. The person in the car accident had the traumatic event happen and then it was over. (This does not take away from the experience.) Whereas the woman in the abusive relationships brain never has a chance to disengage or heal from the trauma because it’s ongoing.