PTSD and Trauma recovery

[Nadeest]

Apocalistic, thank you for putting out that list of possible symptoms. I've never been diagnosed except by a general practitioner in the VA system. She suspected that I had it, but wasn't certain. Mine stems from a single event caused by a family member and my reactions to his actions.
Sometimes I think that it would have been easier on me, emotionally, had I had to deal with the aftermath of an extremely severe mortar attack on my company; one that either killed or wounded most of the company. I'd have been better prepared to deal with that, in a lot of ways, as that was part of the job, in the first place.

[Girl Friday]

Originally Posted by Nadeest

Apocalistic, thank you for putting out that list of possible symptoms. I've never been diagnosed except by a general practitioner in the VA system. She suspected that I had it, but wasn't certain. Mine stems from a single event caused by a family member and my reactions to his actions.
Sometimes I think that it would have been easier on me, emotionally, had I had to deal with the aftermath of an extremely severe mortar attack on my company; one that either killed or wounded most of the company. I'd have been better prepared to deal with that, in a lot of ways, as that was part of the job, in the first place.

Because you understand (in a way others may not) the deep seated pain and horror that comes from attacks and losses in the course of one's work, I have the utmost respect for what you've said about a loss of trust from a source closer to home. Thank you for minimizing neither. I've heard people (elsewhere) say one is worse than the other. I think that the abusers of the world enjoy that sort of debate. It always serves to negate certain of their behaviors.

My father (also military) used to tell me that things like patriotism and honor weren't the sole possession of those in the military. I think it was his way of acknowledging that people who didn't choose service to a country as their work or as their method of expressing support for their community/culture were just as likely to feel and experience things typically attributed to military folk. I know that he felt some of my childhood experiences and the resultant PTSD rivaled some of the things he'd seen in more than 2 decades of service. His opinions were validating and that's a requirement in my life, even now. The need for external validation is one of the more debilitating (and humiliating) scars left on me. I am fortunate to know how to work inside that need in a healthy manner --- most of the time. Years later, I still experience periods of panic if I cannot find that input from the people that matter to me. I can think of a particular instance that is present, every day, in my mind right now. It's like a gaping wound that no amount of therapy can heal. Perhaps it is worse because I have had a hand in creating my current circumstances myself.

Your post made me go searching through my mementos for something my father wrote to me when I was in my mid-20s. I'd been engaged in a bout of masochistic, self-destructive behavior after my mum died and I'd been sexually assaulted and he chose to come to my rescue again. In one of his prolific letters, written a month or so after the dust settled, he said,

"Some of the things you've experienced are worse than many men I work with could comprehend. I can't understand it sometimes and I'm the person that saw you as a child, understood what was happening and put a stop to it. The first doctor we took you to was the one that explained it to your mother and I in terms we understood. He told us that shell shocked soldiers go through phases that dictate when they can and cannot tolerate input from the world. He warned us that the triggers come from obvious places or even from nothing obvious at all and that men who were effected would sometimes behave in ways their families did not recognize in order to get away from the pain. He called it "building mazes in the mind". (You have to remember that no one had given PTSD a name yet and it certainly wasn't talked about in children. Even your mother's boss didn't want to hear her reasons for needing time from work because it wasn't "polite".) I was ready for a phase when your mother died and ready too in November. I thought we handled it all pretty well, you and I. If the only further price to pay for all that was lost is a failed term at school, a lost job and a totaled car then I count us lucky. The other costs have been high enough for one small girl. You're alive and that's all I asked God for. That brings us to now. Now you've gone someplac [sic] I won't follow. You're the force behind this phase. This is not PTSD acting alone. This is you and I get to be bloody damned angry at you for abusing my child. Being hurt by others doesn't provide you license to perpetuate the damage that's been done but that's exactly what you're doing. You're abusing yourself by continuing the abuse someone else started and you need to stop it. I don't care for your opinion or how you see it, as long as you do see it. I didn't work hard to save you when you were 6 or 15 or 23 so you could take up the reins and pull against me now at 25. We've been through nearly twenty years of effort together. You and your mother and I, we did good work. You're a better person because of your hard work and I'm a better person because of you. Come home for a tick and find north again. It will take nothing from you to be by me. Choose to stop hurting yourself now. Just stop what you're doing and come home."

I felt respected by him in that moment. He held me capable when I was so willing to believe that I wasn't, so willing to believe that I was worthless and therefore deserved abuse even at my own hand. At a time when I was spiraling out of control my father made me feel like everything I "knew" about my life was real, rather than not, and that I didn't have to be a prisoner to it. I suppose it's the particular curse of survivors -- the way they often struggle to believe that something that's happened to them is real enough to matter, no matter how well it is documented, no matter how many witnesses exist. No matter the proof of internal and (more obvious) external scars, we fight tooth and nail with our own credulity. Why we should doubt ourselves is a peculiar kind of hell and aptly named at that. Doubt makes all things worse. He also reminded me that coming home would "take nothing from [me]" which was a coping "game" he taught me when I was young. To be reminded of that game as an adult was one of the best things that could have happened to me, then and now. I've already played the game in my head today and, though I'd forgotten it (again) some time ago, I'm going to try and play it every day.

I don't know why I'm writing. I've forgotten my point. Sorry.

[Ms. Meander]

My current Diagnosis is “PTSD in Remission” – which annoys me because that term makes it sound like it could be lurking around the corner ready to pounce at any moment. Why can’t it simply be “healed” or “overcome”? Then I remember that I don’t give a fuck what they call it because I am better and THAT is a freaking miracle – a miracle for which I have worked my ass off. But I digress. This is not at all my point.

My PTSD was a result of abuse that was ongoing throughout childhood and teen years. By the time I reached adulthood I was a serious mess. I have spent my entire adult life in every kind of therapy I could get my hands on. For a large portion of that time I was just lost in the mental health system and often overmedicated. I was so sick and sad, I had no ability to advocate for myself and just took whatever treatment was offered (or not). But I kept at it. Every time I fell down, I got back up --- eventually. Even though it felt like I was not making any progress, I was. Even if it was imperceptibly small. Eventually it accumulated and I started to become able to seek out different treatments to take me through the next steps of the journey. And so now I can say I have tried almost everything and all of it helped a little bit. The main point was to keep going, not give up, holding some small flicker of hope somewhere and faking it until it came back when I lost sight.

So finally, I have some lasting relief from my nightmare. Yet, these recent years I have been sort of stuck – unable to move forward. Upon closer analysis, the theory is this: I must now recover from my recovery. Are you kidding me?! For real. While healing from PTSD I developed many coping skills/mechanisms which I needed to replace older, more harmful mechanisms. But now those are no longer serving me either. For example: I became very reclusive to protect myself from being triggered. Now I wish to be a part of community but it is challenging for me because I’ve never really done it on a meaningful, long-lasting level. I’m lucky to be in a supportive environment now which gives me opportunity for community and space when I want it, so it’s a gentle transition.

Also, I’ve missed out on a lot of “regular” life because my entire life has been engulfed by trauma and recovery. While most people were going to school, starting families/communities, choosing careers etc, I was --- surviving. So I’m kind of starting fresh. Now. Which is very exciting.

Another thing I’ve been working on has to do with how trauma is held in the body and how to release it. Even though my mind is mostly cleared of PTSD symptoms, my body still holds it and the places where it’s holding that trauma create blockages so that no matter how much good stuff I put through, it all gets clogged up in those places - stuck. This feels like my final frontier. I have been working on it and am already experiencing success. It IS possible to release the body memories and heal fully. I’ll keep you posted.

The truth is, I’ll never be normal. Because, even though I am no longer defined by my trauma, it had everything to do with every stage of my development. That can’t be changed. But I think it has made me a better person. I was forced to look at myself, other people, and the world with a depth that I would not have otherwise. I am awake, I am aware. Now I am a strong, wise, compassionate woman of integrity. I have lived through too much suffering to accept anything less ever again. So even if this is just remission, I will never experience my past trauma as I used to. I simply know too much to go back.

Remain hopeful! And don’t ever give up. I promise it gets better.

[Apocalipstic]

Spinning, searing with anxiety when I started reading I am reminded that as long as things are improving and progress is being made, I will someday be okay. Thank you! Truly. Deeply. Thank you.

Decisions I am making and need to make are heavy and hard and sad, but I can't stop. I keep getting up and keep on going. I have these little frenzies of self improvement and move forward, then the darkness creaps in, for a while...but each time I see that there is improvement overall. Really slow progress...

On another note..

I get the struggle between different factions in the PTSD community...as it were, but agree....What happened to whom to cause PTSD should not be the focus. Understanding around the symptoms we share helps us all with healing. The symptoms are the same basically, no matter how they got there.

They are always there, just beneath the surface.

[DMW]

Originally Posted by Apocalipstic

Decisions I am making and need to make are heavy and hard and sad, but I can't stop. I keep getting up and keep on going. I have these little frenzies of self improvement and move forward, then the darkness creaps in, for a while...but each time I see that there is improvement overall. Really slow progress...

On another note..

I get the struggle between different factions in the PTSD community...as it were, but agree....What happened to whom to cause PTSD should not be the focus. Understanding around the symptoms we share helps us all with healing. The symptoms are the same basically, no matter how they got there.

They are always there, just beneath the surface.

Good on YOU to get back up and take steps even when they are hard.
I wish i were so brave sometimes. Sometimes... i forget to breathe like you said. and sometimes i have a hellovah time moving in the right direction!
you said self improvement and moving forward and progress...that is good stuff right there.


And another thing...(on the other note)...i know i don't have a history nearly as bad as others.
So, i don't want anyone here feeling sorry for me or worrying about me. I haven't been diagnosed with PTSD...but, it sure feels like it. i got some of those symptoms...that is for sure. God bless everyone here that feels them and let him take em away.
i know that those symptoms can get better. i have seen it happen.

thanks for the thread and being so brave Apocalipstic.
and thanks for everyone else on the thread.

[Ms. Meander]

Trauma is trauma. Whether you were traumatized for 2 seconds or 20 years, no matter the form of the trauma. There is no value judgement. And there is no need for pity -- only empathy and compassion. We all have to use the same tools to get through the moment and that is what counts.

[Apocalipstic]

One of the things that most helps me is the love of pets. They never question me, or tell me I should chill or that I am being ridiculous. They love me no matter what.

They know when I am upset. They lick my tears away.

[Girl Friday]

Originally Posted by DMW

Good on YOU to get back up and take steps even when they are hard.
I wish i were so brave sometimes. Sometimes... i forget to breathe like you said. and sometimes i have a hellovah time moving in the right direction!
you said self improvement and moving forward and progress...that is good stuff right there.


And another thing...(on the other note)...i know i don't have a history nearly as bad as others.
So, i don't want anyone here feeling sorry for me or worrying about me. I haven't been diagnosed with PTSD...but, it sure feels like it. i got some of those symptoms...that is for sure. God bless everyone here that feels them and let him take em away.
i know that those symptoms can get better. i have seen it happen.

thanks for the thread and being so brave Apocalipstic.
and thanks for everyone else on the thread.

I don't think you should focus on having a diagnosis. I think you should focus on how you feel. That's more important. Really, it is. Chances are you'll have an experience one day that will trigger your feelings and someone will say "aren't you over that yet? it happened so long ago."

Feel free to laugh in their faces. (It makes it easier not to slap them.)

And don't forget to breathe.

[DMW]

Trying to breathe...needing to put this somewhere. Shock and trauma and incoming information ...again...wouldn't have believed it...if i had not seen it with my own eyes.
So sad. Liars. So sad. you know my chest gets so tight and it cramps up. i feel like an animal in a cage . And a betrayed animal in a cage, at that.
Why do i insist on always seeing the good in people...even, i guess, to my own
detriment. My own sacrifice. No more lamb chops for me. no more
Let the lion out of the cage man.




I agree about the pets Apocalipstic...i just lost 2 and that sucks. i wish i had em now.
ok, you can feel sorry for me on that note.