I am retired from Policing. I somehow made it a full 35 years. I mostly relate to what I did in my career as going to "war'. I detailed 25 typed pages of traumatic events I witnessed first hand when working as a police officer in a report for my pyschologist. Who I still am seeing today, but after 4 years of 'talking' with them, I feel I have made little progress forward i dealing with issues I and others have identified in me.
However, I do feel these sessions have helped me in some instances to understand this thing they label me as having which is: PTSD. Other than that I most often think nothing will help me regain the person I was before I put on the uniform. Kiss that life goodbye imo. This is me now and I know how broken I am and realize I am able to be honest and write this which I guess may be a step in the right direction. But I have no idea how to restore my life to my previous self. How to re-set my mind and improve my decision making is what bothers me the most. I think sometimes that I am fully beyond repair.
This is me:
Untrusting of anyone or anything
Feel ashamed (mostly from all the death and crap I witnessed and how so many people died and many of them who died very tragically)
Can't sleep. Up most nights "on patrol" in my own home
Every little thing is magnified a thousand times
Feeling agitated all the time
Anxiety, especially at night time, or when having to go somewhere anytime, especially functions involving a lot of people or crowds. At movies, concerts, I can't wait for the lights to be dimmed
Flashbacks that hit me out of the blue in weird and strange places and times
Talking with people who I relate to a traumatic event shuts me down and my mind just wanders
Seeing something that reminds me of something i witnessed or was involved in that ended tragically just shuts me down completely. I actuall have had episodes where I have frozen in fear with like this dark cloud over my head and then I have complete tunnelvision and can't see or hear anything around me
Fearful of everyone except some close friends and family (even they can be a problem for me sometimes)
Trusting no one. And I mean NO ONE!
Can't love how I want to love or to be loved
Fear of loss, pending doom, thoughts of worst case scenario
Any discussion, hard questions, interuptions, perceived wrong answer, different views, or incomplete answers, or poor understanding of the situation leads to me raising my voice and yelling
Secretive (overly secretive about even just simple things and doing secretive things makes me feel kind of euphoric, free, and outside of my body)
Desire to be left alone (insert huge and strong before Desire)
Obsessive pastimes that sometimes are not healthy and are really not important that I place too much emphasis and time on
Need to gamble and moreso having the need to win
Hypervigilant. Always aware of everything going on around me especialy in public places. So much so that often I cannot enjoy a simple conversation, dinner in a restaurant, a movie etc.
Always thinking the worst outcome will happen
Always thinking about danger, and the worst outcome for anything, especially people I know, trust, and love
Just wanting to die sometimes so it will all be over
I am afraid to confront anything but constantly put myself into situations of confrontation. My wife asked me one time after I had another road rage incident (I have to preface this by saying they are getting less and less often since going to a Psychologist); "did you want to fight them?" I answered "lets just say there is no flight"
Can't let things go. My kids tell me I just go on and on until they give in, give up, or walk away. I am now doing this with my wife also. Every problem, discussion, conversation, argument has to be finished to suit my needs and to have the correct answer or outcome
Make bad choices but try and rationalize them afterwards
Used everything (legally) I could to escape reality, or from myself, I guess...alcohol. marijuana, gambling, wash, rinse, repeat. Never any one of them to excess really but enough of each combined to mitigate reality, pain, thinking, memories, suffering...this problem is getting better, I think, and I no longer use marijuana as it made me only worse I believe and led to even more bad choices. Gambling is still problematic but fun and okay when I win of course
Believing I am invincible and acting very reckless at times
Believing I can't do anything wrong
Not processing what I am doing could be, or is wrong, but denying it to myself afterwrds that it is or was wrong
Cannot deal with death especially those I knew and loved. I cannot grieve normally if there is such a thing? I just get angry. And stay angry. Avoidance of thinking about it is best.
I am to the point after four years of therapy that even going to my Psychologist appointments triggers what I can only assume is anxiety. I am told and have read that PTSD is a short term thing. That it can be treated. That it eventually will go away or diminish. This terrifies me because I know I am not getting any better really and I do know and understand that and also that just makes me even more angry than I already am.
Like I mentioned I have made some small improvements and progress from seeing a psychologist, being more open about what I have been diagnised with, and I now I do understand some things better about the triggers that cause my daily PTSD problems. I also do have some coping mechanisms I have learned but I get really mad thinking someone, a writer, a doctor, a psychologist, anyone who chimes in thinking they know about how this thing called PTSD works and how it can be treated, even healed, and how they know how long it should last, or that they say to you it only lasts a short time, blah blah blah, I want to take them out back and have a few words with them.
No one knows how this affects me and how angry I am most of the time and how I suffer all of the symptoms ( I probably only listed half of them above ) that affect my life. Or how long it will last.
If anyone tells you this is a short term thing, or comments to you in an obvious condescending tone "oh you still have PTSD after four years of treatment?" then they truly have no idea what PTSD does to someone.
I am very sorry for who I have become, and at the same time I don't even know who I am. I just know I am not nice, not trustworthy, not honest, sometimes, not as much fun as I used to be, not as happy as I could be, and should be, and how I will always feel ashamed, sorry, sad, for those unfortunate people who I witnessed their deaths and wonder why it wasn't me who should be dead.
Will I ever get over this? Is there really any treatment that works. I am very doubtful about that. Maybe I am wrong but I have learned this behaviour over the course of 35 years, perhaps longer, and perhaps I even had the start of this in my childhood. I had a very PTSD disfunctional father, who never understood what his own problems were, or talked about anything (WWII Vet) so who knows maybe this thing has been a life long problem for me, one I learned from a young age, and then the career choice I made only amplified all these things, these issues I have, in me?
Any thoughts would be helpful and appreciative.
Thank-you.
However, I do feel these sessions have helped me in some instances to understand this thing they label me as having which is: PTSD. Other than that I most often think nothing will help me regain the person I was before I put on the uniform. Kiss that life goodbye imo. This is me now and I know how broken I am and realize I am able to be honest and write this which I guess may be a step in the right direction. But I have no idea how to restore my life to my previous self. How to re-set my mind and improve my decision making is what bothers me the most. I think sometimes that I am fully beyond repair.
This is me:
Untrusting of anyone or anything
Feel ashamed (mostly from all the death and crap I witnessed and how so many people died and many of them who died very tragically)
Can't sleep. Up most nights "on patrol" in my own home
Every little thing is magnified a thousand times
Feeling agitated all the time
Anxiety, especially at night time, or when having to go somewhere anytime, especially functions involving a lot of people or crowds. At movies, concerts, I can't wait for the lights to be dimmed
Flashbacks that hit me out of the blue in weird and strange places and times
Talking with people who I relate to a traumatic event shuts me down and my mind just wanders
Seeing something that reminds me of something i witnessed or was involved in that ended tragically just shuts me down completely. I actuall have had episodes where I have frozen in fear with like this dark cloud over my head and then I have complete tunnelvision and can't see or hear anything around me
Fearful of everyone except some close friends and family (even they can be a problem for me sometimes)
Trusting no one. And I mean NO ONE!
Can't love how I want to love or to be loved
Fear of loss, pending doom, thoughts of worst case scenario
Any discussion, hard questions, interuptions, perceived wrong answer, different views, or incomplete answers, or poor understanding of the situation leads to me raising my voice and yelling
Secretive (overly secretive about even just simple things and doing secretive things makes me feel kind of euphoric, free, and outside of my body)
Desire to be left alone (insert huge and strong before Desire)
Obsessive pastimes that sometimes are not healthy and are really not important that I place too much emphasis and time on
Need to gamble and moreso having the need to win
Hypervigilant. Always aware of everything going on around me especialy in public places. So much so that often I cannot enjoy a simple conversation, dinner in a restaurant, a movie etc.
Always thinking the worst outcome will happen
Always thinking about danger, and the worst outcome for anything, especially people I know, trust, and love
Just wanting to die sometimes so it will all be over
I am afraid to confront anything but constantly put myself into situations of confrontation. My wife asked me one time after I had another road rage incident (I have to preface this by saying they are getting less and less often since going to a Psychologist); "did you want to fight them?" I answered "lets just say there is no flight"
Can't let things go. My kids tell me I just go on and on until they give in, give up, or walk away. I am now doing this with my wife also. Every problem, discussion, conversation, argument has to be finished to suit my needs and to have the correct answer or outcome
Make bad choices but try and rationalize them afterwards
Used everything (legally) I could to escape reality, or from myself, I guess...alcohol. marijuana, gambling, wash, rinse, repeat. Never any one of them to excess really but enough of each combined to mitigate reality, pain, thinking, memories, suffering...this problem is getting better, I think, and I no longer use marijuana as it made me only worse I believe and led to even more bad choices. Gambling is still problematic but fun and okay when I win of course
Believing I am invincible and acting very reckless at times
Believing I can't do anything wrong
Not processing what I am doing could be, or is wrong, but denying it to myself afterwrds that it is or was wrong
Cannot deal with death especially those I knew and loved. I cannot grieve normally if there is such a thing? I just get angry. And stay angry. Avoidance of thinking about it is best.
I am to the point after four years of therapy that even going to my Psychologist appointments triggers what I can only assume is anxiety. I am told and have read that PTSD is a short term thing. That it can be treated. That it eventually will go away or diminish. This terrifies me because I know I am not getting any better really and I do know and understand that and also that just makes me even more angry than I already am.
Like I mentioned I have made some small improvements and progress from seeing a psychologist, being more open about what I have been diagnised with, and I now I do understand some things better about the triggers that cause my daily PTSD problems. I also do have some coping mechanisms I have learned but I get really mad thinking someone, a writer, a doctor, a psychologist, anyone who chimes in thinking they know about how this thing called PTSD works and how it can be treated, even healed, and how they know how long it should last, or that they say to you it only lasts a short time, blah blah blah, I want to take them out back and have a few words with them.
No one knows how this affects me and how angry I am most of the time and how I suffer all of the symptoms ( I probably only listed half of them above ) that affect my life. Or how long it will last.
If anyone tells you this is a short term thing, or comments to you in an obvious condescending tone "oh you still have PTSD after four years of treatment?" then they truly have no idea what PTSD does to someone.
I am very sorry for who I have become, and at the same time I don't even know who I am. I just know I am not nice, not trustworthy, not honest, sometimes, not as much fun as I used to be, not as happy as I could be, and should be, and how I will always feel ashamed, sorry, sad, for those unfortunate people who I witnessed their deaths and wonder why it wasn't me who should be dead.
Will I ever get over this? Is there really any treatment that works. I am very doubtful about that. Maybe I am wrong but I have learned this behaviour over the course of 35 years, perhaps longer, and perhaps I even had the start of this in my childhood. I had a very PTSD disfunctional father, who never understood what his own problems were, or talked about anything (WWII Vet) so who knows maybe this thing has been a life long problem for me, one I learned from a young age, and then the career choice I made only amplified all these things, these issues I have, in me?
Any thoughts would be helpful and appreciative.
Thank-you.