Trying to give my husband a concrete sense of my mental health.

[Ellabella44]

He doesn't understand how I suppressed the things I went through. My therapists explanation to me about that is that the brain was trying to protect itself from damage. Was good enough for me but sometimes it seems not enough for him to fully understand where I've been and how I lived. Where I go durring flashbacks. How to shove it home to him that these places and events aren't just real to me. They happened. I have landmarks of where these things happened. Maybe its wrong or a bad idea but I'm thinking of taking him on the tour tomorrow. I feel ill be ok for it. Over the years I've driven back to my first childhood home. I've sat there wanting to get my brother and I out of the window where we stood while our father chased our mother with a hammer because his car battery died and she drove it last.

He's part of a big family. Had way happier childhood. He doesn't fully understand how I held this all back for so long. I don't know if this will do it for him. I don't want to hurt him somehow but he has to somehow get what I'm dealing with. Right now its like I'm a scared cat and being a silly human he can't understand all the hiding, hissing, scratching because he doesn't speak cat.

 

[shishi]

HI! I experienced something quite similar to this with my husband. To him it was me being "overly emotional" or "irrational". He didn't understand where I was coming from and because of that, was unable to empathize and barely able to sympathize. It wasn't until I started going back to counseling (I have been a lot off and on through the years) and said "c-ptsd is my diagnosis" and made him read about it that he finally had the light bulb moment and actually got it. It was only one article but it was just that one little bit of education that helped him so immensely! Sometimes, I guess maybe a 3rd party, in this case, self-education is what seemed to help.

 

[Teasel]

Hope it helps :)

My PTSD treatment on the nhs included a very short but helpful class for friends and family to help them understand PTSD better. It helped. Is hard to explain to someone who doesn't get it hey.

I think I once bought a book for him to read though he never read it.

 

[Friday]

I don't want to hurt him somehow but he has to somehow get what I'm dealing with.

Understanding your childhood probably won’t help him understand how you’re doing, now.

I get the feeling like the cause & effect should/would be obvious... except? You had the exact same childhood the entire time he’s known you. Unless you’ve been this symptomatic from day 1? Knowing where your trauma history began, and how bad it was, is probably only going to cause more confusion. Because it’s not simple cause and effect. The cause existed when you were “fine”, too. So why now? Why like this? Why haven’t you always been furious with them, why are you scared now when they’re not in your life, why didn’t you tell me from day 1, why didn’t you trust me, why did you lie to me, why can’t you let me go rip his head off, why would you endanger our children (if you already have kids) by keeping this from me, why, why why why....

When you LIVE the effects? Sourcing the cause is soooooo helpful. Like tumblers in a lock clicking into place. But from the outside? It’s a different equation. IME It’s far more helpful to learn about the effects than the cause.

It MIGHT help for him to know all the details? But as for giving him a concrete sense of your mental health? That just hasn’t been my experience.

 

[Ellabella44]

Ok probably not the best idea then. Thank you. I talked about things years ago when all of this came back to bite me. If I was symptomatic at all it was nothing like this and 5 years ago. I had a guy ask me out when I was 18. He'd come back from being in war. I said no because of the look on his face was sometimes on mine. I've been deeply depressed when younger because of events at the time.

Since I stopped getting beaten at home I guess I ended up blocking because things got better. They used words instead from that point on, but it was better. I moved on not knowing all of this would come at me all at once and be constant. I thought I was fine from then on.

I don't know if I'd have even gotten married if knew this was going to happen. It feels irresponsible to have to share everything I've experienced with someone else this way. I never had flashbacks before and the first year I had so many. That brought on my terror of my parents and why and I'd see events over and over again.

Sometimes he brushes stuff off. Thinking I'm just holding a grudge against my parents for treating me bad. And he's seen them do it verbally.

 

[ladee]

To some great degree, it is his responsibility to educate himself. It is your responsibility to ask him to do this. Because he will never understand as he only has his own frame of references to go by.

But he CAN learn how to be supportive and present for you if he is so inclined. We don't understand how Cancer works, the fears and obstacles they have to endure, but it doesn't stop us from being present for loved ones who have it.

As we have to educate ourselves about this ugly stuff we deal with, the people in our lives can help by educating themselves on how to help.

He really doesn't have to understand to be supportive. I wish you both progress and less stress about this.

 

[Friday]

But he CAN learn how to be supportive and present for you if he is so inclined. We don't understand how Cancer works, the fears and obstacles they have to endure, but it doesn't stop us from being present for loved ones who have it.

This.

@Ellabella44 ... Jist to be clear, cause I’m super tired and probably clear as mud right now? My point isn’t to not tell him about your past. How much you choose to is entirely up to you, and there no inherent right/wrong of it. Some share none to people who could easily handle all of it, some barely share any with people who can’t even handle that much, and everything in between. What’s right/wrong for any 2 individuals is unique to them.

My point is really that if you pull out the 600 some odd disorders in the DSM? Child abuse causes about a third of them.

Since you have PTSD? There’s undoubtedly a really clear link in your mind about the cause and effect. But from the outside? That link either doesn’t exist, or already exists tied to other things. The worse the abuse is the more likely you are to become a psychopath, but every other disorder on the books is pretty much even money. It makes as much sense for someone to develop PTSD from child abuse as a phobia, or eating disorder, or borderline personality disorder, or OCD, or, or, or, + a couple hundred times ;)

So if you want him to understand what you’re going through right now? That answer isn’t in the past. It’s in the present.

I’d reeeeeally suggest working with your therapist to lay out a game plan / outline of what you want him to know, how to go about sharing that, what expectations you have for his reactions, and how to handle his likely questions and reactions.

To jump into Ladee’s parallel of having cancer? A person doesn’t have to know why their beloved’s hair is falling out and they’re throwing up, to learn that it’s a) normal, b) temporary c) okay to joke about being Uncle Fester but not to call you Pukemeister (or vice versa) because one is CLEARLY funny but the other is just mean and hurts your feelings (what’s obvious to us, is often not obvious to others) d) which foods are the least bad & please please please buy more but don’t push this other one e) when anything is not normal anymore & how/where to seek help from f) etc. AND xyz) what their own hopes/fears/needs/wants are to start working on compromises that make both of you happy (instead of both of you miserable). <<<< All those things and much more? Have nothing to do with cancer, and everything to do with supporting someone who has cancer. Ditto PTSD. Hence working with your T for an outline

 

[Ellabella44]

I know I have complex ptsd from diagnosis a few years ago. Its this other set of things that has my head a mess and I can't figure out what to do with his " but why?" A lot to think about and figure out. And some times its as if he forgot we talked about all of this before. And now something else is added to it.

 

[Tinyflame]

JMHO probably not worth much..

I agree with @Friday and @ladee .

After a lifetime I recommend too: stick with the present, 'today': it includes both of you, where you're at, your histories, and future. Otherwise it could become using the past to justify your choices in the present (not saying you're doing that). Get some distance, and pick and choose what and how much you can communicate. It can be short and clear. For eg. "when I saw (x, an object), my mind went back to a bad situation that (x, eg threatened my/ our lives, (or) made me feel hopeless, (or) felt terrifying to me). Could we do (x) instead, (or, eg, could we come late/ leave early if I give you a sign)?", etc. Or "could (x- you stay with me/ give me alone time" (etc) ). And however, because it's no one's responsibility but ourselves to manage, maybe say, " I will try but it may be difficult, so if I'm not 100% please know it has nothing to do with you". Then go, and have as good a time as possible- focusing on today, the fact you have an H/ family, your needs and his needs in the present. and when the past rears it's head, think of how much gloriously better the details of your life are now. Or even one detail. Or even think, ~'whew, who would have thought there could be such contrasts? , etc'.

Because otherwise, you will lose your whole present, to the past, every day.

You are defined by who you are today.. what most upsets you or makes you feel he needs to be aware of the details? Because it still doesn't give us license to not try to show up fully now. He didn't exist in your past, now he does. And vice versa. Obviously who it made you, is who he fell in love with. He doesn't have to understand the recipe or all the ingredients to love you. I don't even think 2 people can ever grasp all of that about each other in a lifetime. And maybe get to know him better, maybe things weren't all quite as happy as you think (since everyone has wounds, and categorizing good/ bad or happy/ sad etc, is pretty bl-and-wh thinking. Not saying you've stopped listening to him, but maybe his seeming lack of empathy for example is because he himself received little, or something else). Tbh honest, men try to make things right-and I am more like a man's way of thinking. (But it usually often includes for most men more humour, less words, and less self-pity. By which in no way am I suggesting you don't deserve empthy or it wasn't horrific). Making things right can look different to different people of course, but sticking by you and trying seems pretty self-explanatory to me. Even if you think he doesn't get it.

And remember confusion and ptsd are pretty much hitched along together for the ride, especially with one's own internal mind games, inner critic, cognitive distortions, fears, elevated and heightened sense of danger, and sabotage of self.

Maybe talk it out with him, open-mindedly. See if there could be some truth for example that you are overly sensitive at times, and at the same time explain you are gun shy, or some details can't be overcome for you (yet).

Best wishes to you. :hug:

 

[Mee]

My husband loved the Gift of Fear. A book I think was tremendously insightful and useful.

One of the great things about this book is it’s not a ‘ptsd book’ but it clearly references ‘traumatic experiences’ and things that those of us with trauma are jumpy about and ( over) sensitive too. Without ever mentioning triggers (that I saw) it explains how people can be safe from s security aspect. My experience is my husband ( who is quite feminist) felt quite ‘macho’ and ‘spy like’ being informed in this way rather than something more about trauma. He was able to extrapolate from this how my experiences in the past and more recently have impacted me to form my character and cause my trauma reaction.

A benefit of this is he now is less inclined to dismiss my reaction to stressors. If I feel ‘boundary violated’ or ‘unsafe’ while out in particular he hears me and doesn’t delay but helps Make a polite but expedited departure.

He is able to assess stressors through my eyes with the benefit of this book and he has come to realise I am less alarmist than presumed but very observant. ( like many trauma victims). This is reassuring and I am often then able to perform a risk analysis having felt ‘validated’ in my risk identification. Often just having the safety valve of ‘knowing’ and not feeling ‘like the only one who knows’ is enough.

I highly recommend this book especially for those who find the trauma writers too ‘touchy feely’

 

[Ellabella44]

@Tinyflame I'm the same way , got to fix things etc. Maybe my sense of disaster control is way over where it should be here. I get worried he will reject me. Possibly based on how my parents treated me. I'm not giving him credit or much information expecting the worst outcome when I finally come out and tell him somethings wrong.

I'm not the emotionally needy girl. I isolate and try to hide the worst of it from him. I'm seeing now from this conversation I should calm down and be confident he will be there even when I do something he hasn't known me to do. I thought he'd leave when my symptoms were a full blown thing partly because almost overnight I was up all hours after they went to bed drinking till I passed out. He's still here and I'm looking at all the stuff on the inside saying why.

 

[Ellabella44]

@Mee ill see if I can get that for him. I told him if he had questions that this site had a lot of info and a supporters section when I was here years ago. He's never gone here though.