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What To Never Say To A Ptsd Sufferer

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"If you weren't actually raped (just attempted) at age 7 - why would that be so traumatic?" Hmmmm...maybe because a SEVEN YEAR OLD doesn't know anything about rape, but knows it's bad when someone shoves them on the ground and tells them to take their pants off... And the real trauma when your parents try to shove it under the carpet even though you're having nightmares about for years.
 
On the fighting "You are just as guilty, don't pick a fight with him and this wouldn't happen."

That's the mentality I had during my abuse... It didn't work and it's devastating to have someone say things such as "It takes two to cause a fight" and "Just stop trying to provoke them and they won't get angry at you." It just makes it seem as if you caused the abuse to happen, and that the abuser was only reacting to you- not abusing you. It's cruel, and sayings such as those just break my heart and allow abuse to continue- and give the abusers an easy way to minimize and shift blame onto you.
 
It's cruel, and sayings such as those just break my heart and allow abuse to continue- and give the abusers an easy way to minimize and shift blame onto you.

I lived with this for my entire childhood into my adulthood. If I fought back - ie. defended myself - then I just proved that I was equally responsible. If I didn't fight back I thought he would kill me.

I have often wanted to ask my parents how in the hell they could think that I somehow asked for black eyes, broken ribs, dislocated shouders, and concussions. How anything I could do would justify that kind of brutality? More importantly - how could they not protect me from that? Was saving face really so much more important than saving me?
 
Maternal grandparents: "Well, we saw that you weren't alright but we didn't want to make things worse for you." - Oh? And how much worse did you think things could get for me?

M*ther: "I could see that you were unhappy but I didn't know that it was that bad. You should have communicated better." - So it was okay for your child to be unhappy if it was only a little bit bad? And all my disordered behaviour still wasn't obvious enough for your psychologically trained eyes?

"Everybody has bad things happen to them."
"We both had bad childhoods. The difference is I fought back, and you didn't."
My paternal grandmother - the one person in my f*mily who starts to kind of get it - kind of said both those things.

She told me how she had a 'traumatic' childhood, too, because her p*rents were so overprotective and that she even ran away because of that. I couldn't get it through to her that, had her childhood actually been traumatic, she would suffer from PTSD now. Since she doesn't, per definitionem, her childhood wasn't traumatic.

Also she basically told me that I should have just cried more to get people's attention; she said that my aunt - who was abused by my f*ther, too - never stopped crying and that's why she was being protected. She doesn't get the fact that the likely reason I kept quiet was because crying did not get me the attention I would have needed and only made me feel even more helpless.
 
"When are you going to let go of the ball & chain?" Really, like I choose to have the crap in my head? Said to me by a therapist.

My ex-husband said to me "You have me now, you don't need to take all that medicine." Hello & good-bye, Mr ex-husband!

"Get over it" or "Get on with your life." I would if I could.

This really burns me - "Oh, it's your PTSD. We all know about your PTSD." said sarcastically to me. Real empathy there Mr. colleague. Yep, thats right stated to me by a colleague in the mental health field.

The list could go on & on. This is a great discussion & thread. :cool:
 
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