Poll Do You Feel PTSD-Related Guilt?

[Deleted member 12723]

I wish I could change my vote. I have so much survivers guilt. I am just getting in touch with how this has messed up my life. It makes me rescue and enable my sister. I have to change and get stronger and set limits and boundries on her. I am sure it will change things between us and I am willing to take that risk. My sister is an abuser and she is an adult and not a little girl anymore that needs my protection. Although I have many good boundries with her I only have phone contact with her. I have to take some control in the conversations that do not allow her to run off at the mouth. I have been in denial about this and just coming out of it. I have alot of survivers guilt from my ptsd or my parents who gave it to me.

 

[Chrissyy]

I said sometimes, because I feel guilty, but not usually for having PTSD more for stuff directly related to what happened.

 

[aka]

Hell yeah. Guilt for not protecting younger sibling and friends, guilt for not telling my parents, guilt for not remembering much, guilt for making my parents feel guilty because they did not protect me, guilt because I get nervous about trivial things. etc etc etc :arghh;

 

[Ayasha]

I feel guilty for not telling someone when the abuse was happening, for not telling someone after it happened. Heck, now that I have told people I feel guilty because they are having to help me through this.
I feel guilty because I couldn't protect myself, even though I was just a little kid I still feel guilty.

 

[Changing4Best]

I blasted my family on Facebook for being super unsupportive. Later I felt kind of like an idiot for doing it, even though they are quite unsupportive. I feel guilt because I upset a bunch of my friends there and even lost some of them as friends, but then, if they unfriended me for that, maybe they weren't friends to begin with (thinking now anyway, once I view the whole thing!).

 

[ericaboo]

I feel guilty all the time because my PTSD affects my behavior toward the people I love in a negative way.

I know they try to be as supportive as they can, but it's really not their burden to bear, so I try to keep that in mind :notworthy:

 

[Darkly Detached]

When I'm going through an episode - or fearing that one is coming on, I have a tendency to feel guilty and close up. I avoid talking/thinking about it and refuse to mention it to my partner for fear of becoming a burden on her. But unfortunately, that ends up making things worse because when the anxiety gets too much to bear - I become even more over-whelming for her. I'm trying to work up to talking to her about it before it gets too bad. She's been extremely understanding of me and I really respect her for it. She understands me when I do close up and helps me through it patiently when it does get really bad.

I can go through periods (about 3-4 weeks) without anything triggering a major episode - but there are minor ones that are consistently there (due to the sheer volume of traumas). I try to assign a quantifiable value to how bad I feel and then decide whether it's worth bringing up or not. This process doesn't always work either, but in the case of really minor ones, I can get through without needing to express / explore the feelings.

 

[Changing4Best]

D.D., hang on to that woman, she's a gem!!!

 

[DCP]

I feel guilt for making the wrong choice when driving my car. I had three choices when trying to avoid a collision with another car entering an intersection. I could bear to the right, go straight, bear to the left. I chose wrong. My choice resulted in the worst result. Colliding head on with a on coming car. It resulted in two dead people. I feel guilt for their deaths and feel guilty for surviving as the perpetrator while the victims perished. I feel guilty for causing pain for the victim friends and family.

It never the guilt and images never go away.

 

[4gtfl1]

Yes, I've let a lot of people down because I can't do the things I used to be able to. Avoidance is a big problem for me right now. I don't get out much. That takes a lot of activities off the table, even birthday parties.

 

[Deleted member 25333]

Yes and all the time. I just feel like I could have done so much things to prevent the trauma from ever having happened at all.

 

[Deleted member 12723]

Not anymore thank goodness. I used to be plagued with guilt for so many years and am now free of it. Healing is possible, it just takes time and hard work on your healing process.