Dealing with hypervigilance

[Chin Strapped]

I've got worse this year, however I can manage restaurants easy, so I have it ok, just certain crowds are more influencing on me. Example: dense crowds, certain cultural make up, anything over 50 people in size! Starts to blow my mind.

We do alright though guys, still here.

 

[JarHed]

OK, now I don't want this thread to make a left turn and perhaps I should just start a new thread. The question is to me, at least, is this; isn't hypervigilence a form of anxiety? Even if it's driven by our sense that something is, let's say, out of our control. Isn't it still anxiety? We feel anxious because; there are too many people, we're unsure about who's in the crowd, we're not in control, we feel that we might get hurt/killed.

If that's the case, it would seem like we could learn the warning signs an perhaps do things which would help us to not feel quite so anxious. Not that I'm unaffected by these thing, I am. But I have learned to be able to control, at least to some degree, my own anxiety.

Understand, these are things that I too struggle with daily and all I'm doing is looking for answers as well. Feed back would be appreciated.

 

[Fargo1]

Jar,

It absolutely is anxiety. Tied with training. My therapist has taught me what she calls "orientation techniques" a rigid way of looking around the room, slowly noticing everything with slow, controlled breathing. Not scanning the room. Two years ago, I could not, and would not go out in public unless it was the most dire circumstances. I can now do it with little trouble, except when they have the music on 11, and the place is a sardine can.

As for the crowds, I still can't really do it. I have done it to be sure. But I am always a wreck afterward.

Just my $.02

 

[JarHed]

Hey Fargo

Thanks for the response. I view it that way as well. I've also learned some ways that help me with anxiety in general that's been good for me. Like anything, we have triggers and that will always be hard. But knowing that you can actually do something about it, at least for me, can prevent a full blown panic attack meltdown.

 

[Sarg]

Yeah, well, our little friend made me flunk "Helping Veterans 101". My most recent attempt to serve my fellows. The damn thing just mushroomed and people were talking fund raisers (I'm always leery for folks wanting donations for Vets), meetings, forming non-profits.

The lead guy e-mailed me yesterday and wanted me at another meeting today and I e-mailed him back, said this was ripping up my PTSD and I was done.

So, (picking myself up, dusting myself off), I'm looking for ways I can help, somehow, some way.

I would like to think, after all these years, I had moved the goal post further back against the beast. Apparently not. And the damnedest thing of all, I'm beginning to enjoy isolation.

ruffled Sarg

 

[Zipperhead]

Sarg, I have been forcing myself outside my comfort zone for awhile now. First it was just joining a pipe band after not even playing for 4 years, then public performances, then a more vocal involvement in the band. Each step was hard, but eventually I adapted and found techniques to deal. One step at a time Sarg. Don't give up the ground you have already made. Just don't take the next step until you're comfortable where your already at. Don't lose the involvement you have already achieved. Just set your limits and ensure others involved respect your limits.

 

[Fargo1]

Jar and Sarg, you know it's revelations like this from you old crusty guys that really give me hope!

Seriously, this isn't curable (that we know of yet) it just a gift that keeps on giving that I would love to give it back...
I can remember life pre-PTSD and I frequently forget that back then I had good days, but some days I just woke up on the wrong side of the bed. Then enter the Beast. With the Beast, all the bad stuff is amplified. Bad moods are Worse Moods and it takes me a lot of work to keep aware of what is happening with me at any given moment.

In the book Outliers, Malcolm Gladwell postulates that it takes 10,000 hours of practice to become a master of a task. At 2,080 hours in a U.S. work year, that's 4.8 years — of practicing a task eight hours a day — It didn’t feel like that to me when learning a sport as a kid. That stuff seemed to just come naturally to me. Of course there was practice, but certainly I certainly didn’t rack up 10,000 hours each in baseball, basketball, and football by the end of high school.
However, I certainly racked up those hours in the military and I don’t think it is coincidence that it takes 3-5 years to complete the apprenticeship of my other chosen career, architecture.

So, what I’m trying to say is that we all have a heaping shitton of practice to do in dealing with the beast. For me it also puts it into perspective: I’m not dealing with the Beast eight hours a day, every day. He comes and goes. Sometimes, I catch him and tell him to get lost. Sometimes he sneaks up kicks me in the cahoolies…

Bastard

 

[vikingr12]

Unfortunately, taking benzos does contribute to rather than help the anxiety when taken long term. Word to the wise.......

 

[Sarg]

I've never heard of that before, Viking, I'll have to do some research on it. All I know now is it has increased ten fold my quality of life. Then it becomes a value judgement as to whether I want to live longer and suffer or have a half-way human existence for a shorter period.

But as you know we've been exposed to so many drugs and chemicals in Nam, this CPU could go down at any time.

Sarg

 

[vikingr12]

Google -- Ativan cause anxiety depression. That should bring up what you are looking for. It's pretty much well known by doctors. That's why they don't (most of them) are reticent to prescribe benzos long term.

 

[Sarg]

I respectfully submit that given efficacy versus side effects, Benzos are no worse than SSRIs, which the VA is so fast to prescribe. SSRIs are not supposed to be prescribed for anxiety and cause a disorder called tartive dysphoria, or permanent depression.

Link Removed

And there are growing questions as to the efficacy of SSRIs at all..

60 Minutes, The SSRIs, and The Dirty Little Secret | Mad In America

When the VA kicked me off of medical treatment, I was fortunate enough to have private insurance to fall back on. I headed for a REAL shrink, one that was actually licensed to practice in the State of Arizona, and we discussed Benzos. I went into it eyes wide open and accepted the potential side effects as less deleterious if there is quality of life.

Quality of life is everything for me after forty years of the VA. If I pay for it downstream, so be it. I'd rather die with a half-assed grin on my face than live on cursing the VA.

Sarg

 

[vikingr12]

Here, here, Sarge.
I lost a good friend to suicide. She was given heavy duty SSRI's and I think they misdiagnosed her. Still kills me to think of her shooting herself. Talented, smart.