Betrayed Wives Being Diagnosed With Ptsd

[lostforgottensoul]

There is still trauma outside of war.

I never said there wasn't. Actually I said trauma was still happening.

My point was that society heard a lot about PTSD due to troops coming back having PTSD. It was all over media outlets. So PTSD is talked about all the time during war times.

That is the main reason society is uneducated about PTSD being diagnosed to non-veterans, in my opinion.

With no war, people are left with bad stuff = PTSD which may or may not be the case. There is a criteria for PTSD in respect to trauma. However, society that doesn't have PTSD isn't educated on that. So when war stops and troops with PTSD aren't all over the media, people do not know how to classify bad things. The last thing they heard about was PTSD and it causes *these* symptoms. And I got cheated on and I am having some of *these* symptoms. OMG, I must have PTSD.

In my opinion, that is how it starts with people. With therapists it seems to be advised more for non-criteria A trauma. I didn't say diagnosed as that requires the DSM code but if a therapist advises me that PTSD has *these* sumptoms and I have some of *these* symptoms then I make the conclusion that I have PTSD without being diagnosed. There have been people on here before advising of this very thing. Why do some therapist do that now? I don't know, maybe needing more clients? Not all therapists are good. I know that first hand but it is something I have seen not just here but several forums I am on.

I never said or meant less other trauma was happening. I just simply mean that troops coming back with PTSD isn't all over media outlets anymore.

 

[Deleted member 35429]

Going back to my own train of thought here about the possible legitimacy of betrayal causing PTSD... it is pretty well documented that trauma from a person seems to cause more severe PTSD than trauma from a natural disaster or any other non-human cause. Is that possibly the element of betrayal causing PTSD?

My very worst PTSD symptoms come from a very brazen semi-public rape where no one helped me. Everything that happened in the moments where I realized people were leaving me there alone are frozen in my mind. The sound of my screaming, the feeling that they are within ear shot and deciding not to help, the look of the room when I realized no one was coming...none of these things were life threatening like what happened later. I am truly more traumatized by being left than by the things that happened that made me think I could be killed. The betrayal of people leaving me is deeply frozen in my mind. Of course that betrayal could have left me to die whereas the cheating spouse is just betraying you without the risk of death. I'm just noticing how much betrayal has a factor for me and thought I'd share.

 

[mamachick]

@0101-very good point and analogy. Even though you feel that later trauma's were more life threatening, I don't think our brain always processes that at the time...as in the rape...what is next to come? When humans do nothing to help, we loose what we thought we could predict (for lack of better word at moment). We may doubt and question everything and it may change our perception of the world and humans.

lostforgottensoul-therapists can only be as good as the training they are provided and the tools they have. The DSM criteria dictates how person is diagnosed, at times, maybe against common sense. If a client has symptoms and doesn't have a recall of trauma, and therapist goes on fishing expedition, they are likely to find something in the clients history that "could" be viewed as pre verbal trauma, or the client is not remembering. They have been taught this. May or may not be correct.

 

[Gs172003]

I never said there wasn't. Actually I said trauma was still happening.

My point was that so...

I still hear about it all the time because of the damn suicides. But as I said earlier it could be because I'm not far from ft Knox. Who knows.

That said I have no idea why counselors do what they do. I don't even know if THEY know. It's all new to me.

 

[joeylittle]

it is pretty well documented that trauma from a person seems to cause more severe PTSD than trauma from a natural disaster or any other non-human cause. Is that possibly the element of betrayal causing PTSD?

Could be. But the thing that differentiates PTSD-qualifying trauma (Criterion A trauma), is that it puts the individual in a direct relationship with mortality. The majority of qualifying incidents are focused on a person who is put into a violent situation that creates intense fear of extreme injury or death, or is exposed themselves repeatedly to situations laden with intense fear, extreme injury, and death. The one outlier is that a person can develop PTSD from experiencing the shock of the news of a sudden and violent unexpected death of a loved one.

Betrayal does not result in death. There is no actual fear of death. There is enormous amounts of pain, and sometimes a desire to die - but that is not the same thing.

So, that's why it would take some major revising of the current diagnostic guidelines to accept marital betrayal as a criterion A trauma.

I'm also curious - I really don't know - if the thought that trauma caused by a person can create more severe PTSD than an event-trauma, would hold true when the event-based trauma causes a direct near-death situation. I suspect it's not so much about people as it is about they kinds of things that occur. The guy who had his arm caught in a rock while hiking and eventually had to do his own amputation...I'd imagine that the prolonged and physical nature of the trauma could create a PTSD that would be equal in severity to PTSD from sexual assault. And that there could be a difference between those examples, and PTSD resulting from being trapped below ground in a tornado disaster and being rescued within a few hours, with minor injuries.

It's hard to sort trauma in order of magnitude without accounting for intensity, duration, severity, potential lethality, and the psychology of the individual.

I think this is also why combat PTSD is a bit easier for people to grasp - lethality is a given, and it's in a sanctioned context. You are at war, there is fighting, there are weapons, you will be engaged with possible near-death experiences. From an outsider's perspective (someone without PTSD who has not seen combat), that can seem very straightforward. Being raped quietly in a corner by an acquaintance...it is not as simple to 'see' how that could cause PTSD.

indeed - we also have to always remember that not every person who experiences crit A trauma will even develop PTSD. The majority, in fact, will not. This also informs my own skepticism about betrayal PTSD.

People who need to believe they got PTSD from their betrayal, are needing there to be an external cause for their internal devastation. They also want there to be accountability - so, it's someone's fault that they have had their life irrevocably altered. But it's really possible to attribute depression and anxiety to an external stressor - like a major betrayal - and to understand that it's not because you are weak that you are feeling this way, but because you just had a shit-ton of stress dropped on your head - without needing to call it PTSD.

 

[mamachick]

@joeylittle-Im not sure that there is evidence that event caused trauma is less traumatizing than person caused trauma (could be-not disagreeing), but I do understand that people who suffer trauma at the hand of another person/persons have more severe problems related to lack of trust.

I think the severity is very hard to measure or predict because of so many factors. I would think that things such as resiliency and supports at time of trauma may play a big role as well as all the things you already mentioned above. I know people who have had car accidents that were not that bad who developed ptsd afterwards. Again, that is the diagnosis even though they report no previous history of trauma.

Since I did not have ptsd, or symptoms of ptsd until age 50, I can relate to some protective factors in my life. I can also now see many things that were traumatic that precipitated the actual ptsd over time. I think the mind can only manage so damn much.

 

[joeylittle]

@joeylittle-Im not sure that there is evidence that event caused trauma is less trauma...

Neither am I. I was speaking of it more conceptually; @0101 brought up the notion first, perhaps they have some supportive research to add to the conversation.

 

[Gs172003]

@joeylittle-Im not sure that there is evidence that event caused trauma is less trauma...

From the post traumatic stress disorder source book (Glenn R. Schiraldi)

Of the three categories of stressors in Figure 1.1 , intentional human traumas, involving deliberate and malicious intent and/ or betrayal, are usually the worst.
PTSD symptoms resulting from such traumas are usually more complex, are of longer duration,and are more difficult to treat for a number of reasons. Such traumas are typically the most degrading and cause the most shame. They often involve feelings of being stigmatized, devalued, violated , different, or an outcast (as in rape). Manmade traumas also are most likely to cause people to lose faith and trust in humanity, in love, and in themselves. By contrast, natural disasters are typically less difficult to recover from.

 

[mamachick]

Thanks googol-thats what I thought I read somewhere but didn't remember where.

 

[joeylittle]

From the post traumatic stress disorder source book (Glenn R. Schiraldi)

This was tugging at my brain, and I followed up on it - just FYI, for @brat17 and other readers of the thread - the statement that intentional human traumas are perhaps more difficult to recover from than natural disasters, is one that is generally assumed to be true; in the PTSD sourcebook cited, it is not connected to any empirical study - it's an opinion of the author, based on other similar conjectures.

I do feel like there's study data on this, but don't have the wherewithal to search it out right now - and it's kind of a tangent from the OP, anyway, so I'm going to leave it be (though someone else is free to do the digging if they'd like)

 

[J'qel]

I can see where they'd be more difficult because they're complex to treat. It's easier to pinpoint when it's something severely physically traumatic. I'll use myself as an example so as not to minimize anyone else's specific issues:

It is much easier to pinpoint my traumas at being kicked down flights of stairs and being dragged down a hall by my hair or the neck of something while I choked, then it would be to look at being told that I am useless and having my parent tell me they hated me and wish I had never been born when I was very young.

The first is a case of: that's not going to happen again-you're out of the situation and they can't hurt you.

Can anyone say that a person will never be told again that they are hated? That someone they love in their life won't ever again tell them "I hate you and I wish you were never born" ? You can't really say that. You can say it's unlikely and that it wasn't meant, but how do you *prove* something like that?

You can prove a situation or event that is a natural disaster or a gruesome death isn't going to happen again-you can avoid places where the natural forces are that way, you can step away from combat situations where such deaths are more likely.

How do you get away from psychotic narcissists? It's not like it's painted on their foreheads. They could be anyone. Anyone could have a day when they just snap in anger.

It isn't that trauma from incidents is less traumatic by any means whatsoever. It's merely that it's easier to treat because it's a defined event that can be avoided (most often). It's black and white with a predefined area. You know exactly what you're aiming at.

With traumas from personal relations, it's like throwing a knife in the dark with a blindfold with your feet. It could be anywhere, it could be anything and it can appear in a number of ways, some of them completely unrecognizable until someone comes in, pulls off the blindfold, and turns on the light.

I won't comment on wife betrayal because I honestly don't feel adequate to give any input. My personal issues make me look at it with skepticism, but I suspect that's just my inner demon being resentful about people who had safe upbringings followed by safe lives. It's not a pleasant demon, even for a demon. :P

 

[mamachick]

@joeylittle-Thank you for clarifying that. Im glad it was tugging at your brain and not mine this time. lol
If I recall, I think I mentioned the severity being greater in an earlier post, then clarified that it may not be a fact. (not in DSM-other description and not criteria). Sometimes I find myself loose with words and having a background in mental health and a brain injury, there is a lot of stuff that I know but forget where I know it from. Plus, there is always new information out there that I may not be up to date on. I have been challenged (nothing personal) and unless I am willing to research and prove, I tend to let it go as its not that important to me I guess. Just want to say thank you for all you do as administrator.