General How Much Does Your Family Know About Their Ptsd?

[Tabitha]

The only person in my family that knows about N having PTSD is my younger sister, which is also my best friend. She doesn't completely understand but then again neither do I sometimes!

I'm wondering, as Carer's, how much do you divulge to your family? How supportive are they towards you and your sufferer?

 

[Fender]

I told my mom over the phone the other day that my husband moved out. The first thing she said was "does he have a girlfriend? because that's how your dad was treating me when he was fooling around." Well, that sent me into other modes of panic until I realized I had already dealt with that issue, several times. Then she said it was because we hadn't included God in our lives. I know that she meant well, but it wasn't terribly helpful. My dad and stepmom were more understanding, and even though they realize that this is a complicated issue, they still want to pound him to protect me. My stepdaughter is also ready to tear him apart, and she's coming to spend Thanksgiving with me, but I'm going to have to have a long talk with her about the need to show support, not make him feel more guilty.

So I think there's going to be a lot of misunderstanding about PTSD when you share the issue with your family. But we also need our loved ones around us for support, so I think its worth it to share and to help them understand.

 

[Srain]

My Son knows, my mother, my older brother suffers from it but he will only admit that it "might be from the long years in the Military" ..Special Forces in the Middle East, my younger brother thinks I should "let the past go" (as does my older brother and the rest of my family).

I'm on my own family wise. They now are pretending now remember anything from the past or are rewriting it.

 

[Eleanor]

Haven't told anyone except my grown up daughter and my two best friends. (No good trying to keep anything from any of them anyway!) My parents: definite no. Siblings - maybe my sister in law - but maybe not my brothers - though my husband would likely talk about it with one of my brothers if he got the chance.

Its a tricky thing. After all, he's fine when he's fine. And when he's not... well, he's prickly around other people - (kind of like an impending thunderstorm or tornado or something) but generally just puts himself someplace else. (which is our strategy lately - we always have an "errand" he needs to go do urgently.) more to say here.... later.

Oh, and how does one get the nifty pictures to post as avatars? Can you just use a regular old picture out of one's photo library?

 

[amethist]

[DLMURL]https://www.ptsdforum.org/c/threads/how-to-upload-an-avatar.14314/[/DLMURL]

Just watch the above video link Eleanor, it will show you how to upload an avatar. Do like a lot of us do, search for images off Google then save it to you own PC then up load to here.

 

[ISupportHer]

Daughters and their families know. My Mom knows and that is pretty much it. Have hid it all from her family pretty much, except 1 brother. That's a long story.

ISH