General Can A Breakup Really Be This Overwhelming? Sheesh!

[felicia]

5 a.m. I woke up straight out of bed panting as if I had just ran a marathon, heart racing fast and all I can hear is my heart beating and the sound of my breath, tears start running down my face and all I can do is roll on my side and cry myself back to sleep. Is this what PTSD sufferers experience with night terrors? It's awful.

It's been 4 months since my now ex and I have spoken and I had text him on the 28th of last month to make a last attempt to see if he was ready to talk and to let him know that I am here for him, and yet to my disappointment no response. I had to come to my senses and decided I had to part ways with him emotionally even though the last thing he said to me was " I Love you!" and "You do have a place in my heart" and well a few bad texts after those ones about how its too much for him. I've come to find that I am suffering anxiety bad from this and in this I mean the fact that he really is gone:bawling:.

My mom had given me some anxiety pills and I stupidly had them in a bag in my jeans and washed them and I always check my pockets before I do laundry.:banghead: I panicked and opened the washer lid desperately looking through the soapy water for the bag with the pills as if they were going to be in good shape...found the bag but with dissolved pills now just a white goop. I broke down in tears.

I've lost 10 pounds as if I'm not small enough already; my skinny jeans are now baggy on me. I keep busy and have started volunteer work at the VA and Friday was my first day. SURPRISE! That too has caused me anxiety and I'm not sure if I can keep volunteering there. I thought it would be good for me but instead it made me panic. Some vet around his 60's kept screaming "Get out of my body!" and threw his chair while another vet kept saying "F*** You" over and over without his control and just so much emotion there .So I took a stroll...I saw the paintings these guys did and one stuck out for me. It was a painting of a field of grass and gravel and in this big empty field was just a pair of old black combat boots all worn out; the title: These Boots of Mine.

I don't know any more about anything. Everything has been causing anxiety, I've been isolating myself a bit and not to mention I've been lashing out at people. I don't even recognize myself and all of this over someone who doesn't even care. *sigh* just venting.:dead:

 

[nursenurse]

Oh Sister, do I hear you! It has nothing to do with PTSD, breaking up regardless sucks eggs and worse. My heart goes out to you. Time is the best balm, although it will not feel like it for awhile.

 

[felicia]

Nursenurse....this just flat out sucks. I hope it goes away soon because technically and this is going to sound like I'm absolutely the dumbest woman in the world but It's been a full year since the actual breakup but we've had our on again off again thing....I hope it doesn't take another full year to heal because I'm driving myself insane and making myself sick. Thanks for reading my nonsense.

 

[Lady of Longbourn]

Sufferer here. I am very sorry you are going through that. :(

 

[BewitchedBewildered]

I understand, more than I want to admit. It's been 4 months since my ex cut me out of life also. He didn't even break up with me, so for quite a while I believed he was isolating and would come back.

It's been horrible and, I think, because of the distancing that can happen with PTSD there is like this question left hanging- is it really over??? It seems like an added layer. It makes it harder to get a handle on it. I don't know if it feels the same to you, but it's like you feel deep down they do care, so how can they walk away? How can he stay away?

So, I'm where you are right now. Distraught and feeling destroyed. And wondering if what I am feeling is normal hearbreak or more. Some days I feel like I have lost my ability to cope. I've always prided myself on being a strong person and now I've lost that.

I am not handeling this in a healthy manner. I go to sleep thinking of him, sometimes scared to death for him, sometimes hating him, sometimes missing him so much I feel I might shatter. I wake up thinking about him. Ive started using sleeping pills in order to sleep. My diet is out of control. I've been bing drinking. I'm a smoker and my smoking has easily doubled.

And it's affected how I view myself. I have trouble trusting my own judgement. Maybe he never really cared. I don't know.

But, I understand your pain. I get it. Wish I could help, but know you are not alone.

 

[nursenurse]

The worst is when you keep on going back. You haven't cut it off for good, you have no peace one way or the other. Find the strength to either cut yourself off totally, or completely fight. From experience plus what you have been saying, use the machete, it will do you a world of good. Promise.

 

[nursenurse]

BandB, 4 months is a no brainer, please extricate yourself. You would never accept this treatment from a friend. The Christmas card sects are only acquaintances. He is too. I am so sorry, as you know, heartache has been mine. The nonsense you are being put through is not worth it. Self sacrifice is a given in any relationship, and indeed, we would like to think that we would die for our loved ones. I would need a burning house for that, or I would need to give up my left kidney. But straight ignorance beyond a few days is nothing short of emotional abuse, or, maybe he is just not that not you.

Anger and hatred are truly horrible emotions to bear, however, they do enable us to act. Free yourself from the burdens you have. Not only do you have to sever him from your mind, but also from your heart. Not everything worth fighting for, is worth the fight. Only you know what you can put up with. I am glad you are acknowledging your struggles, get thee to a counsellor. You have so much more left to give this world, why waste it on a dumbass?

 

[ashdawn8287]

Wow this really hit home for me ladies. I am SO sorry you are going through this felicia. Those things you mentioned sounded just like a really bad break up I had encountered a few years ago. It was like my ex was not capable of accepting love, always told me I could do so much better. I did not understand why he felt like this. He left and it was on again off again and it really f*ckED with my emotions, bad. It was such mental terror and I developed even more abandonment issues after this break up. It took me 2 years to completely heal my heart. Then, I had not been diagnosed with PTSD (just anxiety and depression), this relationship was so unhealthy as I think we were both suffered PTSD (it was like I went after men where I saw something in them, that I saw in myself-the ugly effects of PTSD, without even knowing what it was, but knowing something was not right), he was sexually abused as a child too and had lots of childhood trauma. I had never had someone understand me so much yet be so bad for me at the same time.

We of course spent our time getting blacked out drunk together to masks the effects of our f*cked up childhoods. We popped anxiety and pain pills, smoked weed, isolated together. That was our life. We fed off that, because that is all we knew how to do. he disappeared one night and never came back. I sat his belongings outside of my apartment, packed up all of his things even did his laundry. He did try to knock on the door and come inside but deep down I knew he was right about me doing so much better, so I blasted music and ignored the knocking at the door. It was a very empowering moment in my life and was the beginning of my healing process.

I had tried texting him a few times after that and no responses. It was very devastating. For the longest time every little noise I heard I thought it was him coming back, but it was not. It took me a long time and after I started healing to realize what exactly our relationship was and why he never came back. I use to get mad at myself for not answering the door when he came back, but now that I have my fiancee and I really do have such a great and healthy life now, I like to believe that he loved me so much he knew I could get better and it would have to be without him and with someone like my fiancee.

I couldn't watch tv, listen to music, every single little thing reminded me of him, and the guilt of what I did to myself in that relationship going from a straight A student to drinking, pills, pot. I had to fix and correct everything in my life. Now I am getting married, I have been going to school, I got 2 scholarships, I am going to Africa, I cope healthy, I am happier than I have ever been, and that is what I realized after years.

 

[nursenurse]

I think we all like to make our PTSD relationships special, and they are, but a break up is a break up. It is no more special than any other, except maybe we put more into it. How many non PTSD relationships can we say that about? Pretty much EVERY SINGLE ONE. In other words, it needs to be treated like any other break up you might incur. No more, and no less. Only then can you move on.

 

[bell]

Breakups blow all 'round, really. Having been with a sufferer and being a sufferer myself, I completely understand this. The waiting, the wondering.

Two things, besides time, helped me immensely, so I'm offering them here in case they do they same for you. 1) Read The Alchemist. It will remind you that if it is meant to be, it will happen, you just need to go live your life. 2) Signed up for online dating. This part, may sound stupid, but just try it. It will remind you that you are attractive and worthy of dating. You don't even have to respond to anyone, but it will remind you of what else is out there. And who knows, someone may pique your interest!

And not to pimp my own thread, but I wrote a post on the PTSD Relationship board yesterday about dating as a sufferer, which may be helpful in some regard. Dating is literally the first thing to go when I'm stressed and only comes back into my life when I am feeling stable enough to do it... and I'm wobbling on it now, even though I'm doing quite well!

Best of luck to you on this, @felicia. (And @BewitchedBewildered.)

 

[mamachick]

Break ups are hard and different for all of us and yet the same. I think its to what degree the pain exists, how long, how intense, how disappointed, if there is closure. But I do know the ones where the heart really does just ache. You are not obsessed, may know that it is best, but can feel a pit in your stomach that is all consuming for awhile. Little by little it does ease, but different for all.

My last hard break up was the right thing, it was 3 yrs ago. Sometimes I still think of him and feel the loss for a few hours or a day. Some of us tend to remember the good. By the end I was thinking "who is this man really". I even facebooked his ex wife of 20 yrs ago and ran something by her (needed validation of my thoughts). She described him as a pathological liar and said even though they were married only one year, toward the end he hit her and pushed her down. She left and never saw him again. Not the story he told. But I can still remember all the good, yet that is my distorted thinking. Not the right guy for me. So I just accept that little pain I have from time to time.

Four months is not so long-like I said, we were together 2 yrs and gone 3 yrs now. I am only now becoming open enough to consider a date if the right one came along-I have been so distrusting since. Be patient with yourself.

 

[felicia]

Thank you all for the responds and support! I am so happy to have found this forum as I am sure I've mentioned before. It's just so nice to have a place to vent and be heard and understood. What sucks is having had a short relationship and I fear it will take me twice as long as that to get over him. I don't know why I act like he's the greatest thing on earth. I'm trying really hard to cut those feelings off but it is easier said than done.