Can't Take Other Sufferers Seriously?

[Ehare]

re judging the OP for judging.

That was meant to read NOT judging the OP for judging.

Anyone unfairly judged has a right to feel offended and angry, hurt, upset or whatever other emotions they do feel.

 

[Abe]

I think it's fair to say people judge others, sometimes positively, sometimes negatively. Neither are ideal because it is taking a pinch of fact with a whole lot of fiction. I see someone ginger and wearing a kilt I presume they're Scottish, they could be going to a fancy dress party - but if they are they're prejudging and stereotyping the Scots. I take preconceived notions and apply them to people and so do the majority of people whether it's harmful or not. Some are generic to society as whole; the Scots stereotype for example others are personal for example that people who are older or are in a position of power are likely to abuse that or I will be judged as capable as other people within my rank or social level, I also see anyone within a metre of me as a likely threat and many more. All of which means for me I see all people as a threat and in a position of (potentially abusive) authority to me personally so I see it from both sides.

I see why you're upset that the OP feels this way, but the OP is also upset they feel this way. That maybe unfair to you, but they're also saying they know it's unfair but they don't know how not to be that way and also that they want to actively change that. Telling him/her to just think better thoughts is like telling a person with depression just to be more positive or a person with PTSD to get over it, or at least in my opinion it is - because for me my thought processes have been reinforced with nearly a decade of childhood sexual abuse and gang rape, littered with psychological and physical abuse, alongside torture and more normal things like bullying at school - for me the idea that I should just not think bad things about others is not that easy because nearly everyone I have known has proven themselves to be exactly what I was taught to expect and none of it's nice.

Other people have said they feel the same or similar too and I don't think your rather abrasive words are actually helpful. They're your opinion, and your opinion might be right but the only piece of advice the OP has responded well too was to analyse their own behaviour and look for reasons to understand WHY they make these judgements and how that means they can help themselves, either now or in the future when they are well enough (or have the support enough) to try.

 

[Monuco]

Telling him/her to just think better thoughts

I haven't read anybody say this. I might have missed it, if so, perhaps you can quote where it was said, thanks.

I personally don't judge the posters here as being anything than people who have a mental condition because of trauma. Most people here have that same condition. And most people know that it is difficult to face up to the reality, and accept that all of us have those difficulties to face. Everyone needs support and everyone deserves to be taken seriously and spoken to with honesty, not pity.

This is an anonymous thread, and there are different people speaking, so it is impossible to know who the original poster is. It would be great if they have learned something, and if so perhaps they will leave the thread for dead. That's usually what I do when I've got what I need out of a thread.

 

[Ebis]

So you are saying that someone responding to something said is the same as judgement?

If someone with black hair abused me in the past and I have a work colleague with black hair who says to me "you look nice today" and I react to that and say, "I can't stand you abusive manipulative black haired people", then should he just stand there nodding in understanding?

If he said, "don't judge me when you know nothing about me" is that a judgement? No it isn't. It is merely a response and a defence.

If the OP had indicated that he/she felt bad for the the judgements they had or approached this in a way that showed they saw it as an opportunity for growth and new understanding then the responses would have been different.

The title is, "Can't Take Other Sufferers Seriously?". The people responding are those sufferers. It's fine asking if we are not alone but a little bit of sensitivity of others feelings goes a long way. There are many ways of expressing something that show we are still taking ownership rather just looking for support in our prejudices.

 

[Abe]

I might have missed it

Post 31: Now you are recognising the thoughts that are causing your problems, you can begin to change them.

Personally (and not as the OP) I don't have the knowledge of how to just change my thoughts. The assumption and as others may say "Judgement" that I am able to just change my thoughts is simply impossible. Otherwise I would choose not to think that I must be punished every time I experience happiness. I am not in a position of recovery or state where it is possible or of knowing how to do that - this advice is so unbelievably unhelpful and painful. I wish I knew how to change them so, so, so much I could cry.

If the OP had indicated that he/she felt bad for the the judgements they had or approached this in a way that showed they saw it as an opportunity for growth and new understanding then the responses would have been different.

Post #15 (OP) "I never said it was "ok" to think like this."

I think they did express in the above way and other ways within the same post, by which point the OP was so defensive that they were just trying to defend themselves. Including when they said that there judgements of others came not from this forum but from life experiences where they had encountered responses they found to be invalidating (for full details see post #10)

If someone with black hair abused me in the past and I have a work colleague with black hair who says to me "you look nice today" and I react to that and say, "I can't stand you abusive manipulative black haired people", then should he just stand there nodding in understanding?

Again the OP has spoken about people here on this forum and generalising all people in the world with PTSD - but all the people with PTSD they have met. They also stated they kept these thoughts entirely to themselves but wanted to know if other people felt anything similar.

If the first time I shared something (which I knew was wrong and I felt ashamed of myself about), with the notion of perhaps seeking the knowledge that I am not the only one and as such maybe a remedy or cure for the issue, or helpful discussion on the issue was met with such ferocity from those I asked, I would run for the hills. I would blame and hate my self further and I would be more likely to develop a deeper mistrust of those I asked. If I were the OP right now I would be feeling entirely misunderstood, alienated and hopeless over the whole thing, wishing I hadn't bothered and I was just a bad person. To be honest wrong or right, I do feel that for the OP and I feel it for myself in the areas where I do agree with the OP. Maybe that means I'm fighting a battle that's not mine, but I also believe I'm one of the few who is trying to help this person rather than berate them and I feel I've detracted from their perspective and made it about me. But it isn't about me and it isn't about you, it's about someone who is on a forum for advice and guidance, not because they like hurting other people, but because they don't.

I am not saying you're wrong or the OP is wrong. And I'm not saying you or the OP is right. There are elements both ways. In my opinion. I just think that we're all being alienating and missing the point. Though I may be being presumptuous, maybe I misread the OP and they didn't want any form of advice or help and they wanted to be berated or to find other people with similar strains of thoughts to just bash PTSD successes. And I think it's got too heated along the way because everyone here feels defensive. I just think that the reason we're here answering this thread is because we came to help this person, and that simply isn't being done.

 

[Monuco]

Post 31: Now you are recognising the thoughts that are causing your problems, you can begin to change them. Personally (and not as the OP) I don't have the knowledge of how to just change my thoughts. The assumption and as others may say "Judgement" that I am able to just change my thoughts is simply impossible.

Ok, so you have taken the words "you can begin to change them", and you have implanted your own meaning onto that, and imagined that someone is saying it is easy, when actually they've said no such thing.

Recognising and changing your thoughts, in order to then change harmful behaviours, is a process that exists in therapy. It is the primary purpose (if that's the right word), of cognitive bevioural therapy (CBT) techniques. Trauma focussed CBT is a treatment recommended for PTSD.

So to suggest that the person might be beginning a process of recovery, isn't a judgement at all. It is one PTSD sufferer offering support and encouragement to another PTSD sufferer.

The forum can either be a place to socialise and sympathise with not being able to help ourselves and how hard it is. Or it can be a place to support and encourage each other towards healthier management of symptoms or recovery.

 

[Jikec]

Firstly I explained exactly why I saw my own reasons aw being incoerect and a personal take on your (or these) words.

Secondly in a position of greater health or more recovered health (I have "judged that from your position of being able to do things I have no hope in hell of doing at this moment in time), do you honestly in no way see how the abrasiveness of these posts coupled with your position of superiority doesn't seem helpful rather than smug and bullying??! Your offer of a hand to pull the ptsd sufferer(s) up, is one that is on fire, why the hell would I touch it?

Thirdly it is judgement of Trauma. CBT is not recommended for those who have complex trauma as it is too abrasive and frequently retraumatising. Proved to me in real terms rather than statistics for the second time in my life by this. Every word you say is like a knife, it's always a constant attack, always on the offensive and completely lacking in compassion and it's horrible.

You say it yourself in your last words this is a forum for people who want to know they aren't alone and for support - In an unneeded explanation of what this forum is. How are you being supportive to the OP and the other people who have agreed they've felt this (and there have been a several dotted throughout)? You're not and that last paragraph serves as a double edged knife of patronising malice and threat to leave or that I/we don't belong in the forum.

 

[Monuco]

Not at all, I think it is you that is in the majority. I've left a couple of times recently because I can't get the practical support I need here.

I offered the kind of advice I'd really like to recieve.

You don't see it that way, so I'll get off the forum. After all I'm just a f*cking joke to the real sufferers like youself? Which is what the title of this thread says.

 

[Jikec]

I never said you were a joke and I definitely didn't swear and I didn't say that you weren't a real sufferer. The closest I came was saying that if I had your abilities (whether horrific for you or not), I would consider myself more healed than I am. I also said that due to my personal trauma issues I fear people who I deem to be better than me. That means the majority of people including you. I also said, that I can't understand how people with PTSD can work because in my understanding of how _I_ personally am with PTSD I cannot, but I hope that someday I'll be in a better (or different) place and therefore you may be already therefore I don't judge, but I see and fear and don't understand but I'm making the effort to. You are scaring me more however making it difficult and making me want to distrust you more and more.

Please note I am not being sarcastic or anything other than entirely sincere. You are scaring me. Deeply. I want to understand you but I can't because everything you say feels like a brutal attack.

My interpretation of your words may be making more than what you've said but they are exactly that my interpretation and that interpretation is coming from a disturbed and defensive point of view. I feel bullied and I am simply not saying what you're saying.

I am NOT judging you or others. I fear others but not loudly or to their face and NEVER maliciously. I am not attacking others. I am defending aspects of the OPs point of view because I sympathise with aspects of it. I am NOT of the opinion that my own flaws are anyone's fault other than my own. I am not saying you should leave this forum.

I AM repeatedly trying to apologise for thinking in a way that obviously upsets you and to resolve the bitterness. I AM being defensive but I DO feel attacked. I AM trying to be reasonable but I feel you are not and I feel that you are not trying to understand from my point of view. I don't know what else to do or say. I am being entirely honest and probably shouldn't be here because I'm finding this so intensely distressing but I never defend myself and one of the only times I try has backfired. I'm am sorry and deeply ashamed for the aspects of this that have upset you and others. I don't understand this but I am trying to be clear. I don't have anything against you only against me. The one thing we both certainly have is we both think I am in the wrong.

 

[Monuco]

Ok, so take everything you've just said about how you feel, about the paranoia, and the feeling bullied and judged etc.and imagine that I am allowed to feel that way too. Imagine that perhaps your words have that effect on me too?

Then perhaps there can be a PTSD forum where people simply have PTSD and have a common aim to get better. Not where people are comparing how bad or good trauma or symptoms of PTSD are. And certainly not where people join together to divide people into those who can be taken seriously and those who can't.

 

[Jikec]

I do understand that. That's why I keep trying to back down and apologise,. I understand that e feeling judged is horribly unpleasant.

I see it from your perspective too and I would appreciate it if you could see it from my side - not from a position of judgement, just you can do something I can't and that inspires and scares me and on some levels I don't understand how to achieve or how you have achieved. You want to be taken seriously, so do I.

I don't believe symptoms are better or worse but different. I also believe that some techniques work better than others and that some people get on better with or relate to others more easily and that the same things apply to ptsd symptoms. Not better or worse, just different. Childhood abuse is different to adult trauma. Sexual abuse is different to combat trauma.

But for me personally other issues are at play here too a personality disorder and dissociative disorder and they need to be taken into account because even if they don't justify my feelings they explain and contribute to them.

But I repeat again I am not not taking anyone seriously and I am sorry for offense caused and attack given. Defensive or not it's not ok.

 

[Monuco]

I have not made a single judgement about you not working. None at all. I have simply defended myself from you constantly assuming things.

The fact is that you don't know what trauma I've experienced, nor anything else about me.