The thing I hate the absolute most about PTSD is no longer being able to trust my own judgement/rely on my own instincts.
Not being able to read people? And rely on what I’m reading? Is no different / very little different from flattening to the sidewalk when a car backfires, or when a chips bag blows in the wind. Ditto panic attacks in grocery stores, or crowds, when anything and everything is reading as a threat... yet nothing is. And the more there’s no threat? The more things pop, until it’s all an electric kaleidoscope acid trip of badness, and I just need to get the f*ck out until I can clear my head and see clearly, again.
The no different... is it’s just a series of symptoms colliding creating a f*cked up end result. I can manage those symptoms down to nil -both over time & in the moment, depending on whether it’s a sudden flare or something that’s been existing for some time- and I can retrain those skills and instincts back into functional working order by doing the whole thing manually (f*cking exhausting, having to assess and dismiss on purpose, rather than simply allowing the program to run in the background and “highlight” anything that should stand out... but also very doable).
The very little different... Most people lie, almost constantly. Their faces & bodies say one thing, their mouths and actions say another (or several other things). Allowing someone the
privacy to have the courage to face a bad day with a smile & concern for others? Whilst having the discrimination to be able to differentiate between none-of-my-business & concerning-me-in-some-way? Is just one shade of complicated that I don’t have to worry about, when my instincts and reason are ticking along. AND just one of hundreds of things that get f*cked up... when everything else is all f*cked up.
So, whilst things, are just things? Backfire / weapons fire, pigeon on the roof / sniper on the roof, bag blowing under a car / grenade rolling under a car... and the threat is either there or it isn’t? PEOPLE are far more complicated. They’re never this -or- that... UNLESS... it’s a life or death situation. Unless their world, and mine, have both narrowed to this instant in time. The more normal an interaction is? The more complicated -and less important- the background music of their lives is. But just like my freaking the f*ck out in a grocery store, or in a crowd, or on the street? I will start freaking out about the complicated things I’m reading, as my instincts try and narrow those things to here&now, life&death, cause&effect, black&white. <<< When I catch myself start doing that? 1) I know that 90-99% of what I’m “reading” is total bullshit. 2) I ignore the hell out of myself until I can get myself squared away.
To use the example above... Someone having a bad day, but sucking it up, to go about their life? Is a very common thing. People have bad days. And then they pull on the big girl pants, tie their shoes, and stride out into the day... not being broken by it, nor treating other people like shit, just because they’re having a hard time. If my head is f*cked sideways so I’m misreading people? Instead of even
allowing for that possibility (much less the dozens of others that are also quite possibly in play) what will leap out at me is that they’re hiding something AND THEN lickety split ALSO DECIDE that it’s being hidden for nefarious/malicious reasons... and then wham-bam-thankyou-ma’am either slingshot that back on them coloring them as someone is is not to be trusted, or richochet it to the conclusion it’s about aaaaall aboooooout me. Roll. Eyes. & FFS. 2+2 = 64 much???
Drives me absolutely crazy when my discrimination & common goddamn sense just flys out the window like that. That I know it happens let’s me work around it, but it’s like being blinded or deafened, suddenly no longer able to depend on a sense I USE almost constantly.
Maybe my intuition was never really a thing? I’m just picking out facial expressions and actions and applying past behaviors of completely unrelated situations to my thoughts.
Maybe.
I’ve known a helluva lot of people who THINK they can read people, or are totally empathic, when all they’re really doing is projecting their own stuff on others.
I’ve also known a helluva lot of people who are just incredibly skilled at reading people.
So are you having an epiphany where you’re realizing that you’ve just been projecting your own stuff onto others & are starting to see others clearly (for maybe even the first time); or are you struggling because a sense that’s always been reliable to you in the past has deserted you (and maybe worse, wondering how often that’s happened that you that you didn’t catch it)? I couldn’t say.
Your therapist would probably be a good person to TrueNorth that for you, if you can trust them to be honest, rather than to spare your feelings. As it’s really easy to tell when we’re misread STUFF, but it gets harder when it’s people. Having someone who coddles our feelings makes it impossible to know if we’re misreading people, the same way as if someone next to us when we hear the car backfiring starts shouting that there’s an active shooter doesn’t let us realize we’ve made a mistake & correct it.
