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News Can Ptsd Be Linked To Violence?

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anthony

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What do you think?

http://www.psmag.com/health-and-beh...d-eddie-ray-routh-for-the-death-of-chris-kyle

Whilst this is purely an example story based on the recent trial for Chris Kyle... do you think PTSD is attributable to violence?

Here is my example for why I do believe PTSD has a correlation to violence.

Before the military I hated fighting. Despised it. If I could talk my way out of it, or get away, I would. Fighting was an absolutely last resort.

In the military I got into fights when out, but not very often. A handful at best, and was purely in a mate style backup because they got themselves into it, more often than not.

After combat / operational exposure I got into more fights immediately after returning home, during the decompression stage, and hurt and hospitalised people, though come good again to the above level.

Once PTSD fully kicked in, I wanted to kill. I would have killed if someone upset me. I isolated myself to avoid what my brain wanted to do, to try and get the rage out of me. I certainly hurt people physically, as in put them in hospital.

After a year of time and therapy, removing alcohol as much as possible if going outside the house, I got the desire to kill out of my system again, though if upset I was still highly aggressive.

Many years later again, I no longer want to kill or go and fight, but its taken a lot of self work combined with time to reach that level again.

Military training + operational deployment + PTSD = a volatile, unpredictable trained killer.

So... can PTSD be linked to violence? IMO, yes... but it was not the only contributing factor, military training and putting that training into action in operational zones, combined, was the overall problem.

PTSD by itself? I don't believe so, no.
 
I think it can be absolutely related to violence.
And yeah, I think PTSD in and by itself can be the cause of violent urges -the late defense reaction. I have had plenty of episodes where I wanted to beat people up (I never did, because I wouldn't see the end of it and it would be bad for me -I'm thin and a chick).

I've had fantasies about people coming up to me so I could stick a knife into them. Maybe it's a reenactment thing, and it's probably different from your type of trauma, because in my case I was a child back then and I couldn't do anything back.

It wouldn't surprise me if a lot of aggressors had unresolved trauma.
Though I am not saying it would be a good excuse. It never is.
 
Having been savagely abused by numerous perpetrators as a small child right through into late teenage years I grew up in fear of nearly everyone.

After joining the Military aged 18 I was taught to stand up for myself, taught to fight. Taught to hurt others with my hands.
When I first came home on leave from training my eldest brother decided he would "put little brother in his place!'. BIG mistake, I snapped and vaguely remember pounding his head with my fists into the lounge floor. My father sitting there on-looking and telling (A) *brother* to "suck it up" as he deserved every punch I pounded into his head.

I have throttled him more times that I care to admit when he tries to get one over me over the last 2 decades which culminated in last may. Me stood behind him, my hands ready in a choke hold strong enough to snap his neck in one swift movement. Had out mother not walked in when she did, I would be serving a Life sentence by now for murder.

So YES, I do believe this questions of borne out, Violence is linked with PTSD and vice versa.

Laurie
 
I believe there is a link between combat PTSD specifically and violence. I don't think the same link exists for non-combat related PTSD. There are a specific set of circumstances as described by @anthony in terms of training and operational experience that result in a predisposition towards violence. While someone suffering from, say, childhood trauma, may experience flashbacks where they freeze and cower, a person with combat PTSD would likely experience a much different sort of flashback similar to their trauma (i.e. war). I could see how someone with combat PTSD could commit a violent crime during a flashback, when they are not mentally cognizant. I am not recusing those with PTSD from violent crimes, but it just seems there are a lot of unanswered questions. Also, with regards to Eddie Routh, I thought I had read that he suffered from additional mental health illnesses such as schizophrenia that could have contributed to his psychotic break. I wish some of these nuances had entered into the public discourse on the Chris Kyle case. We have gone a long way in general in terms of PTSD awareness, but from my (admittedly new) standpoint I think more needs to go into examining the subsets of PTSD.
 
I can't say for military, but as a non military person, my experience says it is self defense urges that were repressed at the time of the trauma needing to come out. Especially if you froze or restrained your self. You didn't act on the need to protect yourself because you couldn't for any given reason, so you are kind of stuck, needing an outlet for that. Hope that makes sense.

Adrenalin also needs an outlet, and that is the most primal way to release adrenalin.
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This is just my personal experience by the way.
 
I don't know really. I have a worse temper now than I did before I became this way. But I have less desire to do harm. I have seen the horrible things violence does to people. The terrible suffering it causes.

This might be hard for some to read but. I attended a call once, where I had to sit and listen to a four year old boy screaming in pain after his father "punished" him by twisting his leg untill it broke. I wanted to vomit. I still want to vomit. That wasn't even a call that stuck with me too badly.

I get angry sure. But when I think about, and I mean really think about what it is, to enact violence on someone. I can can only think of how much pain it would cause. I would feel like a monster for doing it. Then I can't bring myself to do it. Even if they deserve it.

Not that I am some saintly monk. Nor am I trying to be condescending to anyone else. I just prefer to turn the violence inward. I can take the pain I dish out. I don't want to do it to anyone else.
 
I totally agree that the possibility is there. Even when the basis is non-combat related.

I know, beyond any doubt, that I don't always accurately assess the threat level of a situation and I know that if I think I'm about to get hurt, or that someone tried to hurt me, I can lose my temper badly. I broke a broom on a horse's back one day, because he had been messing around and finally tried to kick me and I KNEW that HE knew what was expected of him. He had some discipline coming, but normally I'd have stopped a lot sooner than I did. I came within a hair of throwing a shoeing hammer at a guy one day, because he'd done something stupid while I was shoeing his girl friend's horse. I have occasional flights of paranoia that can get pretty out of hand. Not out of nowhere, mind you, but they still aren't real sane. I can easily imagine hurting someone, or trying to, in the right combination of circumstances. After nearly 2 years of therapy, I have a much better idea of what's going on and am better able to get a handle on it before things run too far off the rails. But I still have a healthy respect for the potential.

I also heard that the defendant in that case may have had some other mental health issues. There's a lot about that case I know I don't know. I hope the jury got it right. But, in answer to the original question, Oh yeah I think it can be linked to violence.
 
My firsthand stuff is like yours. Just got lost in my memories, like yours. And I just got way too f*cking relaxed. Not good.

There's something else I wanted to say about 2nd hand stuff; watching and interacting with people who aren't trained, and haven't killed or gotten comfortable with simple solutions, and those who have... But I need to go get out of this headspace. In short, however, I disagree. I do think there is a correlation with violence and plain-PTSD sans military training & operational status. Maybe even more than a correlation. I could be wrong, often am, but I've really gotta go kick myself in the head for a minute. Only posting this now, cause I know myself well enough to know otherwise I won't touch it, no matter how interesting it is.
 
I believe there is a link between combat PTSD specifically and violence. I don't think the same link exists for non-combat related PTSD.
I'm not sure I agree with that; plenty street kids, and not necessarily from war areas, I've known as grown ups had similar set of reactions.
So I'd be personally more inclined to look toward previously faced experiences, what is the person's look on fighting, where are their limits, what are their preferences, than specifically employment.
 
Am I more than my circumstances, my training, my instinct, my PTSD and is it linked to violence?
I made choices...survival. It wasn't always packaged pretty, nor opened for inner dialog or my lofty idealism within the frame work of my self protection, but I am still standing.

As I fought to live, my life was connected to violence, the PTSD followed, but then I have never been good at the question of which came first...the chicken or the egg. Just my story...no judgement for anyone else.
 
It occurred to me that I left out something relevant to this in my earlier post.

I did work with (more like alongside) the army here for a bit during training. I was actually thinking of joining as a med-tech. I never got that far into it before I couldn't do that anymore.

I have no idea what combat is, or how army life works. I was however around it long enough to know that it is a different way of doing things, a different way of life. One which I definitely cannot speak for.
 
I have not been and can never see myself being violent. I'm no saint, but physical violence is just not in me. I assume it's from my childhood, but I will always choose hiding and cowering in a corner over asserting myself.
 
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