I Want Back Into The World...

[Bosco2153]

My PTSD surfaced over 3 years ago. My traumas were multiple and long term. When it hit me in my late 50s, I also ended up with major depressive and anxiety disorders.

I have come quite a ways with the depression, and I am now off of anti-depressants for the first time in many years. I also weaned myself off of the Abilify I was given to enhance the effects of the anti-depressant. I am much more able to manage my PTSD than I was. I try to sit outside 10 minutes a day...in my yard near my door. I want the world...the sunshine and the sky, and all that goes with it in my sleepy little lake town.

When I fell 'ill', I went home from my last day at work...straight to my sofa with the curtains drawn and my back to the wall, and that's where I have stayed for over 3 years...after being a teacher for 25 years. I left mid-year, and never saw my co-workers, students, or some of my friends and extended family again. The world has not existed.

Now I see a glimmer of light of some sort, and I want some of it. I feel trapped in a tunnel that requires a huge leap over something treacherous before I can start walking back into the world. I need help maybe...maybe someone to actually go with me, or just to understand me. Maybe ride public transit with me, which I gave up completely. I don't know. I am terrified and don't know how to start. When I go outside, I feel like I've been in a dungeon and am suddenly on parade. Even my balance is off, and I feel dizzy. I am afraid of getting lost or abandoned...or just noticed or ridiculed maybe.

Would like to hear how anyone else has dealt with this phase...I want to grab on and pull out of here....

 

[The Albatross]

Small timed finite challenges. Goal setting got me a long way, the short ones at first. Tired, will come back in the morning and share more. But I understand.

 

[jmni]

You are very strong to chose to overcome your problems with your own will. I think that when a person stops using prescriptive drugs the body and mind have to readjust. So perhaps that could explain your dormant period. I understand exactly how you feel about being paranoia. I often worry about being harassed and threatened. Sometimes now I go out and just point out to myself over and over that I am not being harassed, followed, etc. I also feel like I am on display. This may be a side effect of being reclusive, as I am reclusive as well.

Once I was ridiculed by some people. When that happens it can feel like the world is collapsing around you. But if that were to happen, maybe you should consider that you don't have to react badly. It doesn't mean that they are going to hurt you or that they know your past. It is more likely to be as simple as they are stupid jerks or immature and you can ignore them and chose not to care, or to consider their behavior bad and not to respond to it because you are above that.

 

[Alfred.Greene]

I had my own kind of hermitage.

I was in middleschool, and they were very mean and rude to me, and I picked up some trauma, so I basicly blocked people out. If a girl so much as smiled at me i turned away. Some people tried befriending me, and most I locked out of my reality.

I remember the lonliness like a dark blanket, the pain like a thousand shards of glass cutting deeper and deeper. I ran from the world and buried myself so deeply into books, video games, homework, that only the hormones of approaching teenaged years awoke me. Then, PTSD awoke with me, and slowly it came more alive until it caused another trauma. I have been fighting ever since. Ever since.

But you have had it the other way around it seems. The PTSD put you to sleep, and now your awake to the world. You long for it again. Gently, go to it.

 

[Pencil]

Glad to see you @deedlerock - I often wondered how you were doing.

 

[Laura 2]

@deedlerock - gosh, you describe it so well :

I am terrified and don't know how to start. When I go outside, I feel like I've been in a dungeon and am suddenly on parade. Even my balance is off, and I feel dizzy. I am afraid of getting lost or abandoned...or just noticed or ridiculed maybe.

I escaped after c.5 years - with a lot of help from friends, a lot - and even now I depend on them. It's taken a year so far to even begin to feel sort of ok about being out in the world. I notice though I am no longer part of it, and I have been literally abandoned. (My terror was mostly about the stalker following/finding me because now I know that there is NO help from police etc, you're completely on your own with this crime).

Escaping was in desperation. It took every atom of courage I had. I would certainly have ended my life if I'd stayed. So my survival instinct propelled me to get out. Being out and away from the stalking I am still in hiding to some extent but safely away from the stalker. It is preferable to be out and with that freedom although it is still scary. It feels like it will always be that way now.

It took the best part of a year also to physically be able to walk without falling over, tripping over my feet etc (I have a physical disability anyway which doesn't help matters). But I know that balance/dizziness issue - like the outside world is too big and bright and uncontrollably in-your-face.

The fear of ridicule also - but I rationalised that as my projection: there was/is no justification for strangers/casual acquaintances (or anyone indeed!) to mock me, and I was putting my own (completely unwarranted) guilt and shame onto them.

What I also noticed very acutely after being trapped for so many years is that almost everyone out there in the world ACTS, just about everyone has a game face, a mask. That strongly suggests that most people are anxious about being seen for who they really are. So really we're all in it together, so to speak, and they're mostly too busy maintaining their acts to be bothered about me!

Yes, friendly, patient help is necessary to get you over those first few terrors. If you have someone who can help it may be good to sit down and plan with them a program of short outings, step-by-step building up to lengthier and independent trips? Don't push yourself though, be kind to yourself - treat yourself just as you would had you been felled by a severe physical illness...

 

[The Albatross]

Up and more rested. I wanted to share that I could recognize the tendency to want someone to go with me in myself. But other than occasional assistance from others for challenges, I placed and kept the process squarely on my own shoulders. It would have been easy for me to rationalize, "I rode the bus because I was with someone."

Taking actions independently from others for me cultivated new experiences of self reliance. Challenges were sometimes fun, sometimes serious, sometimes a half hour to an hour, with the proviso that I could re-evaluate after the initial goal every 15 minutes and bug out/stop the challenge when I chose. Then I started mixing up goals to longer periods, stretching them to 14 day, 30 day, 90 days.

I kept it up until the mechanics of setting goals, making a strategy, taking the actions necessary to achieve or sometimes just attempt the goal... and basically relearning self reliance. It became a habit, and then ultimately a new behavior in the longer term. It is an internal process for me mostly now.

 

[Bosco2153]

Thanks to all of you for responding. Your advise and recollections of your own experiences is very helpful and comforting. I think the next thing I need to do is plan on who to get to help me that will truly understand. My family members are wonderful people, but not always understanding of how 'it is'. They are still full of wonderful suggestions of things I 'should' be doing...like attending large family functions, going to small local cafes full of familiar faces, etc....which are both impossible for me at this time. What I need is to be able to walk across the street to my mailbox...and I can't do it. I feel 'watched'. I need much smaller steps than people realize. Thank you so much for understanding.[DOUBLEPOST=1401375452,1401375367][/DOUBLEPOST]I forgot to mention that yesterday evening...for the first time in over 3 years....I put on some music as I was cooking dinner...and I sang a bit...and I felt a small amount of joy. It was amazing.

 

[Laura 2]

@deedlerock
It brought a smile to my face to read about your musical evening! Good for you!
I wasn't able to listen to music for years and years - I was so numb and needed to stay numb, music makes me feel and a lot of the time I still can't bear feeling.. Just getting back into a bit of Mozart from time to time now though.

The other thing is same as you, I've found that people really don't get how badly affected I am. Not even the 'professionals'. You can explain til you're blue in the face but they don't listen.

 

[jmni]

I described my paranoia once to someone (not a professional) and while i was different than yours (I felt fear of stalkers), he said that if you don't like it you should do something about it so that you don't have to live with it. That is very oversimplified and not that helpful, but if you understand that this is basically in your mind, it means that you can do something about it and if you want to you will, although it may take time.

 

[Laura 2]

@jmni - did you do anything about the stalkers as he advised?

 

[jmni]

@jmni - did you do anything about the stalkers as he advised?

At that point I no longer had stalkers, but more like paranoia and ptsd from previously being stalked. So no, I did not really need to.

Also, I actually meant paranoia not stalkers.