Other Do i have generalized anxiety or ptsd?

[Smile]

Hi all,

I became a member quite a few weeks ago but have only now gotten the courage to actually post :)

Long story as short as possible:

I am 32 & have had anxiety most of my life, without realizing it. In 3rd grade I refused to go to school for most of the year, claiming constant stomach aches (what I now assume was anxiety). I remember being filled with fear of having to go to school. I was always a "mommy's girl" but not this extent. My mom finally took me to a therapist who couldn't get me to talk and so he ended telling me that if I didn't go back to school a truancy officer would take me away from home. That's when I went back but throughout the rest of my schooling, I had attendance issues .

Since I was a young teenager I've always felt as though I had been sexually molested as a child but had no memory or evidence of such. My parents had a turbulent marriage and we moved around a lot but that's it.

Over the years, I forced myself to do things I wasn't comfortable with (such as socializing, sex, dates) with the aid of alcohol. When I realized the alcohol was becoming a problem I stopped.

I've had bulimia since I was about 19. At 21, I decided to see a therapist and for the first time in my life was diagnosed with generalized anxiety and put on meds. Stayed in them for a about a year, stopped and was pretty much fine (aside from random anxiety attacks).

6 yrs ago, my dad died. It was hard but I had to stay strong for my mom.

5 yrs ago, my mom had to have open heart surgery and I was busy nursing her. It was hard but manageable.

4 yrs ago a very close friends husband came down with cancer. I was with them throughout it all, there to talk, take care of their little children and be in the hospital for shifts. He died 2 yrs ago. About a week before he died I developed insomnia and it hasn't gone away since.

About 9 months ago ago I started seeing a psychiatrist an d am back on meds.

2 months ago I finally told my therapist, who I have been seeing for 3 yrs, my deepest darkest secret. I have been having a recurring themed dream/nightmare since I was about 8/9 yrs old. In general terms, the dream consists of a child being raped by their parents or some adults. I am either just watching or I am the one forcing it to happen. Don't ever see the faces. I told T that I believe (& always have) I must be evil, a danger to society, specifically kids bc of this dream. He explained that it sounds as though I had some sort of trauma as a child and that I am not evil bc I wake up hating the dream and I have never hurt anyone.

But I don't believe him. I asked him if there's any way of remembering but he said that unless it comes back naturally, there's nothing that can be done. I can't live with this bc if I don't remember anything conclusive then who is to say that I am not a monster?

Since I told him about my dream (first time I ever said it out loud) I have been having the shakes and the only thing that gets rid of it is xanax. I have always been easy to startle but recently I have become extremely on edge. A car honk, my cell ringing, someone tapping me in he shoulder all makes me jump, my heart starts racing, I get shaky and my head gets heavy.

My therapist and psychiatrist say I may have ptsd but there's no way to confirm without having that original memory.

I have read a a lot of your stories and they are so horrible. I feel like an imposter trying to associate myself with some "group" in order to get a grip on understanding me.

I guess I'm just asking if anyone has anything that can be useful to me k if you think this is ptsd or just anxiety?

Guess the story ended up being the longer version... Sorry :)

 

[HemlockGrove]

To me it sounds like it is definitely possible. I think that after you spoke about the dream out loud there was a part of you that became overly fearful that you said something that you shouldn't have and you may get hurt because of it. Or that saying it makes it more real which is always hard to face (My mom has DID and her main self doesn't want to believe anything that happened to her as a kid. She can't think about more than one person she loved so much and who were thought so highly of raping her multiple times over a couple years.)
Just always remember that it is in the past, and the past can never ever reach forward to hurt you now. It is safe to remember. You don't have to hide it anymore because you aren't in danger anymore.

I feel like an imposter trying to associate myself with some "group" in order to get a grip on understanding me.

How else are we supposed to get to really know ourselves? We need to know what other people are like first:) Don't feel bad - Feel glad that you are taking a step toward trying to understand. That can always be hard.

Anyways. Never forget that you don't have to hide anymore. The pain of the past is stuck in the past. You don't have to carry it around any longer than you want to.

Hope this helped and I hope you get answers soon!!
Wishing you luck
Hemlock

 

[jd9900]

HI! Thanks for being willing to post. It took me a while to feel comfortable enough to switch from "lurker" mode to "poster" mode, and I was very nervous as well. I figured this would just be another venue where I was misunderstood once more. I could not have been more wrong.

You are not evil. You are not a monster. Evil Monsters wouldn't be here trying to comprehend something like this, much less find it disturbing. And they certainly wouldn't be actively seeking help the way you are. I try to remind myself of that all the time.

From your description it sounds like you suffered some severe trauma at an early age and blocked it out as a defense mechanism to keep yourself functional (as best you could at that age). The symptoms you describe strike a common chord with me, and I have seen many of your behaviors and tendencies you listed above from other PTSD sufferers as well.

When it comes to suppressed memories, I don't have a lot of experience there. But it sounds like you are reaching a tipping point in your life regarding this. I get the feeling that there is something there you are ready to recall, but you just don't know how. I wish I had more advice in this area, it's just not something that I have really had to deal with.

I am certain there are people here that can assist more with this, mostly I wanted to let you know you're not a bad person because of this, however you diagnose it. Thanks again for posting!

 

[HemlockGrove]

who is to say that I am not a monster?

(Forgot about this part - meant to add it in my first response)

Often times when we experience a severe trauma we, especially as young children who don't understand how things work or why someone would do something like that, believe that it must be our fault. And if it's our fault then we must be bad because it wouldn't have happened if we weren't.

There is just one problem.
It was never our fault. And it will never be our fault.

Also - Monsters aren't concerned whether they are monsters or not - They just are. If you fear being a monster - I very highly doubt you are a monster (And this is coming from someone who has a monster within!)

I'm not saying you won't fight to do the right thing, but I genuinely think you are a more inherently good person who had a bad thing happen.

 

[Abstract]

I think you will gain a lot from being here. Keep reading and speaking and doing therapy.

You are very brave to start discussing what you have resisted discussing for so long.

Dreams often express concepts rather than anything exact. Little girls don't have these types of recurring nightmares for no reason in my opinion. Keep an open mind about what did or did not happen and take it slowly. Your reactions to discussing your dreams says a lot.

 

[jd9900]

You may also want to keep a dream journal if you aren't already (sorry if you said you were and I missed it.)

 

[Tolkienian]

You are not evil. You are not a monster. Evil Monsters wouldn't be here trying to comprehend something like this, much less find it disturbing. And they certainly wouldn't be actively seeking help the way you are.

I second this. You sound like a person genuinely trying to do the best you can, and that includes doing as little harm as possible. If you hate this dream, then it's very unlikely that it's a) a repressed memory of something you did or b) a repressed urge of your monstrous dark side. It's much more likely that it's a fear or repressed memory of something that happened to you. I'm inclined to *guess* that being in control of it in your dream could be a way for your subconscious to gain some control over your fear. Because that's really all dreams are, as terrifying as they can be. They're our subconscious minds trying to process what's happened/is happening in our waking lives.

And it absolutely doesn't matter to me whether you remember your trauma or are even sure if you have one. If you need support while you figure stuff out, this is a place where I am happy to welcome you. I started out not remembering anything except fearing rape as a six-year-old who didn't understand sex, but understood violation. Then I moved to a denial that anything that had happened to me was wrong. I'm still in the process of regaining memories. (If you have questions about that, feel free to ask.)

Short version: You're welcome here. You're doing some hard work and dealing with some hard things. I admire you for that and consider you as very very far from a monster indeed.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

You can start to heal without remembering the original trauma. Be patient. When you are ready, your memory may resurface.

 

[macca]

Hi Smile - welcome to the forum! I too lurked for a while before I decided to post. I can really identify with a lot of your symptoms. I also had a lot of school refusal and now I look back, a lot of anxiety symptoms. Only I didn't know it was anxiety, which sounds bizarre I know. I'm 43 and I've only recently been diagnosed with PTSD, but I don't have a proper memory to go with it - so you're not alone there! After the last several years of high stress levels - my husband grabbed me unexpectedly one night and I totally flipped out and had a flashback. Then came the hyperarousal, intrusive memories, nightmares, and all the other stuff. I'd been depressed on and off my whole life, and had thought that was my main problem.

My therapist and psychiatrist say I may have ptsd but there's no way to confirm without having that original memory.

Hmm maybe. Mine has been diagnosed without an original memory, but I've had a couple of flashbacks in front of my therapist, and had erupted into all the symptoms of full-blown PTSD. But no memory. Only recollections of what looks like trauma re-enactment play, and sexual knowledge beyond my age (starting about 4 years old). Looking back on my life now this has happened, I now recognise that I had many symptoms of trauma, just didn't realise it.

2 months ago I finally told my therapist, who I have been seeing for 3 yrs, my deepest darkest secret.

Since I told him about my dream (first time I ever said it out loud) I have been having the shakes and the only thing that gets rid of it is xanax. I have always been easy to startle but recently I have become extremely on edge. A car honk, my cell ringing, someone tapping me in he shoulder all makes me jump, my heart starts racing, I get shaky and my head gets heavy.

I had never told a soul about the trauma re-enactment stuff, thought I would take it to my grave because there was so much shame attached to it and I thought it was something wrong with me. When I told my T, I too had very strong reactions.

I told T that I believe (& always have) I must be evil, a danger to society, specifically kids bc of this dream

Well - how could you know what rape was at 8 years old? I too thought I was bad, and still feel very yuck about certain things. Just typing that has made me feel quite horrible. But we were innocent children. Not inherently evil.

I hope you stay here, most certainly you do belong. I too have felt like a fraud at times, but this forum has been so very helpful for me to try and understand myself and my symptoms. I hope you get the same benefit!

 

[Hashi]

I'm glad your therapist is saying that you can't force memories. Trying to do that is never a good idea, and is very unreliable.

If you have suppressed memories, then they'll come back when your subconscious judges you're ready to deal with them. ie when you have enough tools, skills and resources in place. So the thing you can do is work on increasing your resources. Seeing a therapist and joining the forum are examples of that.

I'd also recommend keeping a dream diary and learning to interpret your dreams. Not this particular dream, but developing the general skill of recording and working with dreams. For me, recovering memories started originally through dreams and if you already have that kind of connection I think it's worth building on. I spent some time learning how to interpret dreams - for it's own sake, not trying to recover memories - and that has turned out to be fundamental to dealing with memories when they came later. Dreams have given me a great deal of awareness, support and guidance through this struggle.

In my case, I'd also started writing poems, journalling and expressing my feelings through art. Again, I wasn't doing these things with the intention of recovering or working on memories - I didn't know I had any that I was suppressing. They were things that I was doing because I was suffering from depression, and they also turned out to be things that would support me through recovering and processing memories.

In my case it was when all these things were in place, and I started seeing someone for depression, that the memories began to come back. And I needed the dream interpretation, art, writing and journalling to get me through.

So my suggestion would be to work on self care, things than anchor you in everyday life and ways to both express and manage your feelings. They don't have to be the ways I've mentioned. For other people it might be different things like music, attending church, joining a community group, spending more time in nature or anything that sustains you. Two things that I'd always recommend are something creative and grounding/stress management skills. Whether you have suppressed memories or not, these are all things that will help improve your life anyway.

 

[Smile]

Wow, I'm blown away by your kindles, each and every one of you. It took me until now to build up my courage to come back on here... I was afraid of pple's reactions or that someone would call the cops on me :)

Thank you so much for your kind words of validation. Although I don't believe them, it helps to know that others disagree with me on that :)

And I specifically appreciate the advice. It means the world to me to know that there may be something I can physically do to help myself.

So I will begin to keep a dream journal. Quick question: if you have a dream and wake up right after, ur supposed to write it down right away, correct? I don't love that bc as it is it takes me forever to fall asleep. Writing in middle of the night will prob cut whatever sleep I do get in 1/2. Any suggestions?

Again, thank you does not Sufi e to describe my gratitude...

 

[Smile]

You can start to heal without remembering the original trauma. Be patient. When you are ready, your memory may resurface.

How can I heal without knowing what I'm healing from??