General Doing research; found something that rings true for me.

[LovingH]

My exhusband abandoned and divorced me when I was sick in the hospital from a drug reaction (after 3 yrs of a horrible panic disorder being treated the totally wrong way, and him forcing me into treatment, etc.)

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder of Abandonment, Part I: An Overview

I knew it was a fear of abandonment that made me break it off w my ex who has PTSD. I just didn't realize there was a specific sub-illness related to abandonment.

 

[shimmerz]

Technically, there is no such thing as PTSD of Abandonment. I think borderline personality disorder is related to a continual fear of abandonment.

 

[void]

@LovingH

In the kindest way possible, I would urge caution about the notion of "PTSD of abandonment".

That statement can give the impression that the above is an official, well-researched, scientifically sound connection that has been verified by careful research. Your statement "I just didn't realize there was a specific sub-illness related to abandonment." would seem to support what I'm saying.

There are many well-meaning individuals(professional and otherwise) trying to help. The official diagnosis of PTSD can be found in the DSM-V or DSM-5...DSM-5 Fact Sheets
There are also many threads on this site which give well-substantiated definitions of what is and is not included in PTSD.

Be well,
Void?

 

[EveHarrington]

They lost me when they referenced “abandonment” and “adulthood” in the same sentence.

To me this is just a way to stay a victim.

In adulthood it’s called getting dumped.....by friends, family, a partner. It happens. All. The. Time. Or you could say the person walked out of your life. Or ended the relationship.

I’d be a candidate for “adulthood abandonment” but I refuse to call what happened to me abandonment. My dad was one of my greatest supporters but one day he just walked out of my life. It totally sucks but it’s not abandonment. I think we really need to get away from screaming “abandonment” every time someone walks out of our lives. It creates victim culture.

You either have PTSD or you don’t. There is no such thing as PTSD of abandonment.

 

[LovingH]

In my case, my exhusband dumped me when i was in the hospital and almost died of a rare drug reaction..these were meds he forced me to take. So that was a pretty traumatic abandonment. Served me with divorce papers straight out of the hospital while I was recovering. I was suicidal and it took me 6 months and a lot of therapy to recover.

Right after that I rebounded with a sociopathic narcissist who verbally and emotionally abused me. I was in a vulnerable state and he knew it. Domestic abusers don't have a big D on their foreheads..i was like the frog in the boiling pot cuz he was very charming at first.

I got back into therapy and was able to get away from him after a year but felt severely damaged.

 

[Friday]

PTSD isn’t subcategoried out by trauma type. It’s simply PTSD.

 

[EveHarrington]

Wait, connecting the dots, are you saying that you have PTSD because of the douchebag way in which you were dumped?

You cannot get PTSD from being dumped, even if you call it abandonment.....it’s still being dumped.

I think we solved the mystery as to why so many people come here and say they have PTSD from a breakup. It’s that website that pushes the idea that breakup=abandonment and abandonment=PTSD.

 

[Hojay]

I think it’s important to differentiate between trauma and post traumatic stress @LovingH. The latter has defined causes and symptoms. BUT that’s not to say that your experience wasn’t traumatic. It sure as heck would have been for anyone. And it doesn’t mean that it hasn’t very much negatively affected your wellbeing and emotions. I’ve experienced some “traumatic” abandonments, and I also get “emotional flashbacks” when put in similar situations. But 1. These abandonments only affected me in such a way because of previous childhood experiences and 2. I can’t even remotely compare it to full blown PTSD or any other disorder. It’s simply a wound I carry that needs my attention.

Like someone else said up here, if these abandonments were early and serve enough to cause a disorder, it’d most likely mirror BPD (though some say there’s overlap with CPTSD there. I digress.)

None of this is to minimize what you’ve experienced!

 

[shimmerz]

If you haven't already, it would be in your best interests to find yourself a therapist who has a good understanding of trauma. They can determine whether this event has triggered off some earlier repressed stuff that is affecting you now - which we all hope is not true for you because it isn't a road anyone wants to travel, this PTSD thing. It is a horror.

Hopefully, what you are suffering from at this time is a reaction to having been treated like shit and a trauma therapist will be able to help you sort through that in a meaningful way that will minimize any potential further damage.

All the best to you.

 

[Ronin]

my exhusband dumped me when i was in the hospital and almost died of a rare drug reaction..these were meds he forced me to take. So that was a pretty traumatic abandonment

So it looks like you are focusing on the wrong thing...

The trauma would be near death, because med reaction.
& Likely the abuse before, from either of those relations / may be more to it than you are thinking of.

But back to qualifying thing... It is not that your exH left.
It is that your life was in danger, to medication.

 

[shimmerz]

It is that your life was in danger, to medication.

good get . I totally missed that one.

 

[Friday]

PTSD isn’t subcategoried out by trauma type. It’s simply PTSD.

Just to add onto this a bit...

The only diagnostic subtype of PTSD is Dissociative (not related to what kind of trauma someone experienced).

Unofficial subtypes still don’t micromanage down to individual traumas... but are shorthand for clinicians to help them recognize common trends amongst sufferers (victim related, natural disaster, survivors guilt, perpetrators guilt, single event, multiple event, mild moderate severe, chronic, complex -not to be confused with complex PSTD, complex trauma and complex treatment and complex PTSD are 3 different things).

***

Even the oft heard Combat PTSD isn’t a subtype, it’s just slang/ shorthand (from a population notorious for removing whole words and sentences and speaking in acronyms whenever the chance presents :cool:).

Ask yourself how often you hear someone say I have Rape PTSD, I have Kidnapping PTSD, Abuse PTSD, CSA PTSD, Starvation PTSD, Neglect PTSD, MVA PTSD, DV PTSD, Mauled By An Animal PTSD, Ice climbing PTSD, Terrorist Attack PTSD, Bridge Collapse PTSD, etc. You don’t. You hear people say I have PTSD from ____________ -or- from being ____________.


The only times you’ll usually run into <insert thing here> PTSD? (Outside of vets being lazy, and refusing to use extra words)

- People attempting to attach non-qualifying events to the disorder (for various reasons; validation, attention, money, ignorance, just to name a few common ones.)

- People running a scam. Take our seminar! Buy our book! Check out our webpage! (Scamming google for buzzwords to attract traffic or ad revenue? Is still a scam.)

Abandonment? Is very often a facet of life threatening trauma. Whether childhood abuse/neglect, or raped and abandoned on the side of the road to die, or abandoned under fire and left to die, or imprisoned and abandoned and left to die (note the theme here ;)) ... the abandoment piece can be a seriously difficult and complex part in a lot of different kinds of traumas... just like the betrayal piece can be a real motherf*cker in a lot of different kinds of trauma, or the helpless piece, etc... but abandonment itself isn’t a qualifying trauma. Much less it’s own subtype. Being left is different from being left to die.

Similar to being cheated on may be what hurt the most in an abusive relationship, but it was the abuse that was life threatening. PTSD isn’t caused by what hurts the most, nor even what f*cks you up the most.

if your ex abused you, and drugged you, and left you to die? That he left you may hurt the most, but the life threatening trauma would be the piece that makes PTSD a possibility.