I know they are there, because once when triggered by an assault in adulthood I was hit with the onslaught of them. I do not remember them, stuffed them in the back of my mind as quickly as I could, though I recall parts of telling my roommate about it as I bawled continuously for over 4 hours...just brief flashes, really. Do I have to bring them up to heal? Everytime I try to access the worse traumas I fall to pieces. Can I just leave that junk buried and move on?

I would have said yes, and have. Hell, days ago! Still not all has to be brought up but the emotions behind it do. If you have had a recall you most likely will again and you will have to deal with them. It blows but a need. And most importantly the emotions behind them need to be coped with. If we could just forget and move on then we would not be in this boat. don't worry you have plenty of company.

after you have bought them up try loocking them in the bottom of a bag in your head then as you add your past experiances into the bag everything gets deeper and harder to bring up.
just see how it goes,its worth a try.

There is a difference between not remembering them, and ignoring them. You just said, when triggered they come back, so you do remember them then, but you stuffed them back down again, ignored them. What your doing is creating more issues for yourself, and whilst you will get away with this for a little while, they will come out whether you like it or not, and take you down. You have a choice, bring them out yourself and deal with them, or suffer the consequences later, your choice either way.
Yes, you do have to bring them all up in order to heal. You must turn every stone in your past. If nothing comes out from under that stone, then no issue exists, if something does, it must be dealt with. You are in denial, simple as that. Denial is a wonderful thing, and it helps a person so far, then not even denial can control what will come. Your trauma is coming out whether you like it or not, its not if, but when. You can do it atleast under some control, or you can have no control. Again, the choice is yours.

Nobody said healing trauma was going to be easy, because its not. If you though living through trauma was hard, well... its nothing compared to having to face it, pull it apart and reason with it, put it all back once dealt with so it no longer bothers you... that is tough, but you must do it if you want to heal.

I understand the feeling of just wanting to 'leave the junk buried and move on'. Actually did it for a number of years. But every time your mind tries to deal with things and you push it back down, it just comes back later...and it comes back harder. I learned this the hard way.

Like Anthony said, the healing is hard. There have been so many times I've cried, kicked, screamed and wondered why the hell I'm doing this to myself when it was so much easier when everything was neatly tucked away. Then I remind myself (or more likely I'm reminded by someone who's in my support system) that I'm doing this to heal myself and get 'me' back and my life and to find all those things that I lost (hopefully temporarily) when my symptoms got too bad to ignore anymore.

Marlene that was wonderfully said.

Hello new Mex, welcome. I'm another "repressor" here. It sucks a big one to have them all come back. Nice thing for you that you can retrieve them when you wish to deal with them. For many of us, it came back like a flood with no warning and no coping mechanism in place. It was deal or die. That was me, deal or die. So I dealt with it as best I could. Not every memory or issue of mine is to the surface either, but it's hard to retrieve what I don't remember.

What worked for me was a memory log and diary and a very good therapist. A good support system is very, very nice to have also. Drugs also helped along the way. Hang in there, it does get better. And life is much better when the past is dealt with and in it's rightful place.

stuffing them away won't work forever. some day they will come marching out and beat you half to death before you know what hits you.
cathy