An Explanation Of Ptsd I Wrote To A Friend Several Years Ago

[Spring]

Just Me Here, THANKS!! Those tools, that your wife uses, are the exact tools that I use in our relationship. When my sufferer begins to have an episode, I go down the list of "tried and true" methods to help calm the situation so that he may have a clear set of eyes and mind to assess what triggered him to begin with. One method or a combination will typically help. But when he goes into a very deep episode (currently), he will detach from everything and everyone - He does only the basics: eat, sleep, and work. He will convince himself that it's best that we are no longer together. I don't fight him on it, I don't try to convince him that he's wrong and that it isn't an "us" issue, I don't force any opinion at all. I listen carefully, allow him to speak his mind, and let him know that even though I don't agree with him, I will respect what he wants at the moment.... And I let go. I let him come back when he is ready. I don't know if this is the right thing to do, but it seems to work for us, and for him to have his time to process what he is going through.

I hope that I do the right thing, it's very difficult to let go of someone to battle something alone when you love them so much.
~Spring

 

[piratelady]

It sounds like the right thing to me, Spring :)

 

[Lost Pup]

it's very difficult to let go of someone to battle something alone when you love them so much.

Giving him the space to go into battle may be the greatest possible way to accompany him there. If he's really experiencing another time and place, there is no way for you to be there too. But allowing him to go there and to know he is loved and respected may be even more intimate than trying to hold onto him in the here and now.

 

[aka]

Accompanying this is the very deep need to be able to communicate your experience, as you may not have been able to when the traumatic event first occurred. It feels as though your survival depends on others recognizing and properly responding to that threat. Because this is so emotionally elevated, it can, certainly, add to the seemingly erratic quality of one's chosen words and communication. But that desperation and upset makes all the sense in the world to the person living through it.

I love this part of the letter. I sometimes want so badly to communicate whats going thru my head when I have been triggered. Though logical I know it is nonsense I still feel that there is danger and therefore react because of it. Most of the time no one is really interested in what I going thru and so they leave me to deal with it alone. Not saying that I don't sometimes need to be left alone when this happens. I just sometimes want to open up and talk about it so the experience will stop replaying in my head.

Depending on the extent of the now-triggering incident, it can take some time to settle and to gain enough calm and clarity to parse apart the old feelings from the new events.

This is so true, it is sometimes very hard for me to differentiate between feelings that occurred long time ago and present feelings. There are sometimes I get upset and take it out on the people around me even though that frustration I feel has nothing to do with them or the present. This usually brings feelings of guilt afterwards for taking my frustration out on someone who just happened to be there at the wrong time.

 

[Kiki lou]

The honesty and reality of these conversations give me hope that PTSD will become more understood. I also think it is important to acknowledge that we all suffer in different ways and have different ways of coping. Thank you in sharing your pain and suffering so that it might help others cope better and that it might spread the word about how complex PTSD really is.

 

[Spring]

I do have some news to report...

For the last two weeks, I hear from him every couple of days. It's nothing very deep, just very short text messages. I don't ask questions, or draw out my answers, I keep my responses short and simple.

 

[Deleted member 20280]

I have only just been diagnosed and this letter smacks me hard that this is exactly how I have been for the last twenty years since my first breakdown.

Thankyou for sharing. I am in a really dark place at the moment with every dark memory trying to hurt me constantly. I am shaking uncontrollably all the time, but again thankyou for letting me read this.

Laurie aged 42 UK

 

[BewitchedBewildered]

I am a supporter, I have been with this man for 3 years and have gone through fairly short episodes and one that last 7 weeks in which he still communicated every few days in text. We are long distance which makes these harder for me. During the 7 weeks episode, we talked on the phone only once and I believe what you said below is what he was trying to express.

inability to perceive other peoples reactions

He told me that he truely cared for me, but when things got dark he only did as much as he needed to survive and, that he was sorry, but he did not think about me. He ate, slept, and worked. He said, at the time, he could tell I was hurting, but unable to feel it. Now, he has been isolating for 3 weeks without any word. I could see he was having some issues and was worried that his closest friends (a married couple) were moving away and I was worrying about how he would handle that. But, I am having a much harder time this time because he won't answer calls or texts and I worry. I don't want to make it worse by just driving down and showing up. Would that be supportive or make it worse? I just do not know. But, I am worried, I worry. Not that he will hurt himself, but that something might have happened to him. I had a dream the other night that he was in an accident and I just didn't know. I have my own issues.

For better or worse, I've found I need to be with a partner (and, thankfully, am) who understands this is our shared problem and experience.

My sufferer doesn't like to talk about it. What is a non-threatening way to approach trying to do this? I want to be a support for him, as much as I can. I want him to know he is not alone. I did write him a letter that I was here and not going anywhere, that I would be here when he was ready. But I am not sure, in this episode, if he will even read it.

I know everyone is different, but the above makes so much sense of some of the few things my sufferer has tried to communicate, I was hoping just some opinions. How do your people approach you? Is it best to be left completely alone? Even if you are in a place where you cannot respond do texts help or hurt or have no effect? I want to let him know I am thinking of him, but do not want to add to his stress in any way.

I want him to talk to me more about it, but I do not want to push. Is it easier if you are asked about it or when you bring it up yourself? I know I have to wait this out, but when things are better for him, I want to discuss it. I love him and I will be here for him, but I am having a really hard time with worrying about his well-being without any contact.

If your loved one asks for some communication once a week or so, is that too much to be able to expect? Or does it depend on the episode?

Your input has already helped my understanding so much. Thank you so much for sharing so openly. Sorry if I am kind of all over the place.

 

[Meadowsweet]

Thank you for sharing this. I still find it difficult to relate to traumas that have happened, to the extent that I go into moments of simply not accepting that it has effected me.

But when I recognise myself so clearly in what is described in the letter, and other posts here, I can accept a little more that it does effect me, and that part of me needs help.

 

[just me here]

How do your people approach you? Is it best to be left completely alone? Even if you are in a place where you cannot respond do texts help or hurt or have no effect? I want to let him know I am thinking of him, but do not want to add to his stress in any way.

I don't know you or your friend well enough to have an opinion for you. I can speak for myself and my wife and our relationship if you want, but I shy away from anything more than being an example and a struggling one at that.

My wife and I have learned this little dance we do over a long period of time together. We went from 2 broke kids enjoying everything (everything!) we could get out of this life to 2 parents working so hard to make life work for us that we only looked up from our careers when the kids needed it, very little left for each other, to our current situation that finds us retooling the relationship for this last stretch of no kids double income and eventual retirement and the end game. We are so together that we can't imagine what it would be like to not have this life as it is.

She sends me notes in my lunches that I find and they help me. She sends me texts on occasion and it helps, sometimes I would say it is the reason I go to a meeting I dread or push a project I would rather shelve, sometimes I don't even have time to react to them and they go unread. Yes, a communication is nice and I appreciate them when I get them.

She is patient with me. She knows that my pendulem swings in big arcs that will always come back to center eventually. She knows that if she pushes at the wrong time I might swing farther out than she had hoped, if she waits she can guide me to center with pretty well established certainty. The biggest point that this thread has made for me so far is that if she reacts to my fears and adrenaline motivated near panic reactions to a perceived threat with an approach that I see as her becoming a part of the problem and not part of a team approach to a solution, I will fight her as strongly as the threat itself. Right or wrong, she knows when to patiently wait for me to start the swing back to center, she joins in and helps lessen the energy of the pendulum when the time is right.

Is this an answer? probably not, maybe yes. It is all I can give you.

 

[BewitchedBewildered]

I appreciate that, thank you.