How can I get the nightmares to stop?

by Anon
(London, England)

I am now 28 years old. I don't know whether what my mother did to me when I was smaller is considered abuse or if it was just a harsher way of disciplining me.

From the age of 3 until I was 14 my mum would beat me whenever I was bad. Sometimes it was with her hand and sometimes with her slipper. She would also yell at me while doing it.

Now I get flashbacks in my sleep; which have me in them and my mom beating me. Sometimes the person isn't me. It's someone else, almost like a fictional person. And every time I wake up after seeing these flashbacks, I get a bit scared. It takes forever for me to fall back to sleep again. How can I get these flashbacks to stop?

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