Relationship I Hate It When My Vet Has A Stiff Upper Lip

[I'll make tea]

There is another example of what I hate.

My Vet and me went to a cafe, everything fine. There was a construction side nearby, my hubby did not mind at all. It was not really loud.
Suddenly my Vet started hating the place, no idea why, nothing changed and he started gossiping about the owner ("How can they even open if there is a construction side nearby? I am not going to pay, their coffee taste like water, their sugar is brown"... well there is brown sugar and it is more expensive and better than white and really nothing to gossip about... besides he had the choice between brown and white sugar) and urging me to go. Okay, we went but we were not fast enough, we were standing in the door for a while while I was trying to explain to him that his opinion about sugar was uneducated and he pushed me out of the place and that is not the only time that has happened to me... and he hurried us to the car... when I later asked him "Why did you push me?", he said that I was slowly, there were people standing behind us, who wanted to leave and I was standing in their way discussing sugar.

Not sure if there were people, I cannot remember any... and the only reason why I discussed the sugar was because he brought the topic of it being brown (and therefore to his mind uneadable) up.

Whenever we later talked about that cafe he started gossiping how loud and unpleasant a place with watery coffee and brown sugar it is and wanted me to join in... and like I already mentioned: they did offer white sugar, my husband chose to be offended by the fact that he could have chosen brown sugar if he would have like to.

Oh... and by the way. I have seen him drink Caipirinha with brown sugar before and he did not mind it at all.

I do not know what to do.... next time he brings it up should I really say "Oh, the brown sugar was the horror. Happy I escaped from that place"?

 

[scout86]

My T frequently points out that "feelings" exist along a spectrum. In this case, all the way from "unaffected" to "slightly uneasy", to "impossible", with many possibilities in between. Where we "live" on that spectrum no doubt affects how we see the world. He tells me that I tend to live towards the higher end of that spectrum, and have for a long time. That no doubt affects how I see your husband's behavior.

Has it occurred to you that, if you live in a world where "life and death" are very real and present things, it might change your world view? For example, in a combat situation, you are always looking for danger. The cues may be subtle. You may not even know what they are. You ignore them at your peril. If you walk into a place and it makes you feel uncomfortable, you GET OUT, if you can. You also get people you care about OUT ASAP. You don't stop to ask stupid questions, you just get out. If you "have" to stay there, you might start looking for reasons for feeling as you do. (Like the wrong color sugar or construction noise). But you want to GET OUT and get those you care about out too. You might push them, if they weren't reacting with the urgency you felt was necessary. All this seems perfectly reasonable to me. You may or may not be aware of the reasons you're feeling and reacting as you do. Therapy, as I understand it, helps make you more aware (it has for me) and that helps. It's not a magic wand, though.

I know that restaurant wasn't dangerous. You know it. Your husband, at least on some level knows it too. That doesn't change how it makes him FEEL. What would YOU find helpful, if you were in his situation? Can you imagine BEING in his situation? None of this has anything to do with "sugar", no matter what he said. And that doesn't mean he's "lying".

 

[scout86]

BTW, wouldn't talking about his feelings and "feeling vulnerable" make him a "wuss"? It's hard to talk about your feelings when you think you might be judged that way for having them. I know. You're going to say that you don't judge him that way, I suppose. Maybe not. Doesn't matter if he THINKS you might judge him that way. Sometimes it's hard to get past that fear, even when it's perfectly obvious that the fear isn't based on reality. It's even harder if you care about how the other party sees you.

 

[I'll make tea]

Thanks for your answer.

I do not know if my hubby has ever been in a life-or-death-situation.

What would YOU find helpful, if you were in his situation?

I would find it helpful if my spouse said "I know you are a little bit afraid of crowded places... but do not worry I do not think that makes you crazy or less male and I am still very proud of you", in this case I would admit that I was afraid of crowds + be happy we talked about it. My husband seems to see that different.

Can you imagine BEING in his situation?

No.

 

[scout86]

You don't actually have to have been in a literal life and death situation to end up with PTSD. There's a pretty good chance that my mom wouldn't have literally killed me when I was a small child, I just took things that way. There's an equally good chance that the person who molested me wasn't ever planning to kill me, I just took things that way. Never the less, here I am.

If you live in a situation where, at any second, something could happen and your life could be taken, you can get PTSD. People don't have to actively be shooting at you, you just have to be in a situation, for a time, where you know there's a real possibility of people trying to kill you. The stress is pretty much the same. That's kind of the definition of "combat", isn't it?

All of this is only marginally about what's "real". A lot is about "perception". It's possible your husband isn't exactly AFRAID of crowds, they just make him anxious, nervous, uncomfortable, or some other "thing", in his way of experiencing it. I'm not "afraid" of my mom, she just makes me nervous because I never feel like I know what's going to happen next. I'm perfectly aware that she can't hurt me, but that doesn't change the reflexive anxiety I feel when I have to deal with her. It helps a LOT that I now understand what's going on, but it doesn't really stop it from going on. It's also possible that your husband is way more than "a little" afraid of crowded places. He could be utterly terrified, who knows? (other than him, of course).

As far as "being happy we talked about it" goes, lots of times that's not the way someone with PTSD experiences "talking about things". For example, what I said in that first sentence is as much as I've ever said about those early events. And I've been in therapy for a year. And I like and trust my therapist. (At least, I trust him about as much as I ever trust anyone.) Why is that? Well, because there's something that seems, somehow, "dangerous" about revisiting those events. That's part of the difference between traumatic memories and regular memories. They really, truly ARE different. I find that hard to believe myself. I can only imagine how hard it would be to believe from the outside. The impulse to "avoid" the subject can be really strong and hard to get past, no matter how much you love or trust the other person.

Becoming "aware" of how this all works in your own head is a process. I have no idea where your husband is at in his journey, but he is where he is. No amount of "wanting things to be different" on the part of either of you will magically make it different. Only time and hard, effective work can do that. If what originally attracted you to him was partly that he was pretty stoic, he's going to bring that personality with him through all this, which probably makes it harder to talk about stuff. Unfortunate, maybe, but probably true.

My therapist says that we all have our own "road map of reality". They are all different. That's the way it is. But he says to remember that none of them are "reality" they are only road maps. I suspect that part of the reason this is so hard for the 2 of you is that your road maps are pretty different. And, maybe you both have a little trouble accepting that, and accepting, that, after all, neither of them are ":reality" they are both just "road maps". My T goes on to say that we should probably all try to make sure that we are forming our maps from the most up to date, accurate information we can. Not always easy! (But probably part of the reason you're here & he's in therapy.) Even with up to date, accurate information, they are still road maps, not "reality",

Thanks for listening!

 

[Sweetpea76]

Okay, we went but we were not fast enough, we were standing in the door for a while while I was trying to explain to him that his opinion about sugar was uneducated and he pushed me out of the place and that is not the only time that has happened to me... and he hurried us to the car...

Suddenly my Vet started hating the place, no idea why, nothing changed and he started gossiping about the owner ("How can they even open if there is a construction side nearby? I am not going to pay, their coffee taste like water, their sugar is brown"...

The way he pushed you out and hurried you, it sounds like he might have been ramping up to a panic attack or something... or felt like he was going to have one. Of course, I don't know your husband at all, but I have seen similar behavior. Their brain tells them to "get out get out get out," and all they can do is make that happen using any means necessary.

I do not know what to do.... next time he brings it up should I really say "Oh, the brown sugar was the horror. Happy I escaped from that place"?

I'm willing to bet my bottom dollar that it didn't have a doggone thing to do with sugar, and when you tried to logically discuss his excuse, he just got more and more aggravated and argumentative because he just wanted out. Bringing up the sugar anymore is just going to start a fight, and learning to just let the little stuff like that go will help you a lot. You know you are right about the different varieties of sugar, you know he was just making an excuse to get out of there, you don't need him to confirm it really. Just think of letting it go as a gift to yourself. No sugar discussion = no fight = more peace.

It would make things a whole lot easier if he were communicating to you that he was feeling so uneasy. You have to realize that he probably doesn't want to act like this, the PTSD makes him act like this. He can't control it, and may not know how to communicate with you about it. He just may not be capable of it right now.

As far as advice, all I can offer is learn his "tells." Does he consistently act a certain way before he starts in? I can recognize when my vet is getting uneasy or panicky by his facial expressions, the way he sighs and breathes, and certain ticks (he looks around a lot and flexes/ cracks his knuckles on his right hand). If I can see he is ramping up, I can either try to calm him or recognize it and let him beat a hasty retreat to the car while I wrap things up wherever we are at ( gather our belongings, get the kids out, get the food to go,pay the check etc.).

I've also noticed that sitting beside him in a restaurant is better than sitting across from him. Sometimes just having a hand on his leg or slowly rubbing his back can kind o calm him, or keep him more in the present.

 

[I'll make tea]

Thanks for your answer; scout. Is discussing your symptoms for you just as bad as discussing what your mom did?

Sweatpea, does your Vet also avoid discussing if he is feeling uneasy? Like your Vet mine has certain behaviours by which you can tells he is feeling stessed, one is chewing his lips... and there is a little success story I can tell. Hubby has admitted to me that chewing his lips helps him deal with stress... and I provided him with chewing gum, which is even better... and now I sometimes notice my Vet is stressed, then starts chewing gum and relaxes again.

There is another behaviour I noticed. If he is stressed my guy starts acting OCD'ish, for example he has the need to clean our coffee maker every evening because "lights out" stresses him. Cleaning it helps him relax, he admitted that too me.
When we are out and there is nothing to clean and polish for my Vet + he feels stressed out he starts checking if his cell phone, keys and wallet are still there. I can tell he has reached his point of maximum stress if he keeps his hand on the wallet all of the time. Two times I tried to keep him from doing it. Both times he started to tremble really badly.

I told my hubby that I can tell his stress level by the way he has his hand on his wallet and he said that I was being ridiculous.:(

"Sometimes just having a hand on his leg [...] can kind o calm him"

The opposit is the case with my hubby, if he is stressed you may not touch his legs, because he will turn pale, tremble, sweat. While I do not understand it, it is something I learned to live with.

Like your Vet mine likes sitting besides somebody better than sitting face to face. He also does not like standing face to face. What he likes better is standing besides me / or other people he does not stand face to face with his friends and "watching the horizon".

Re "brown sugar": I do not bring that topic up again and again, he does. Whenever we talk about that little town were that cafe is he starts gossiping about it / the watery coffe / the construction side / the brown sugar and wants me to join in.
Have been thinking about that again, he does not like to drive by construction sides (or bridges), but I never saw him having a negative reaction to a construction side or bridge when not sitting in a car. Wonder if still the construction side could be to blame. Well... I know the brown sugar is not.

 

[scout86]

Thanks for your answer; scout. Is discussing your symptoms for you just as bad as discussing what your mom did?

It kind of depends. After I posted that 1st paragraph yesterday, logged out of here and went on with what I needed to do, I kept thinking "I don't believe I said THAT? WHY did I say that??????" I think what I said was pretty vague and no big deal, but it bothered me a lot that I'd said it and there was a reaction like "fear" that there were going to be repercussions of some sort.

Actual "symptoms..... Kind of depends on the context. When there's "nothing going on" I can sit down and calmly discuss all of this. When I'm "triggered" (kind of hate to use that word, but it's the only thing I can think of that works), I have to work at "calmly" discussing anything. The more pressure I feel, the harder it is to stay calm. Ironically, sometimes the harder someone else works at "fixing" things, the worse the experience might get for me. For example, a whole bunch of questions about what's going on or well meant suggestions on what I should be doing can be experienced as being too much to deal with. I don't know how to exactly describe that, because it's not something I experience in any other context. It's kind of like the psychological version of having someone turn a fire hose on you.

It's been rare that I've had anyone in my life who knew about any of this. I've always had to work through things on my own. I can see, now, that there are pluses and minuses to that. Once upon a time, I had a friend (who was the first person to suggest that I might have PTSD) who DID know what was going on. He was actually a lot of help. We talked about this stuff BEFORE there was some kind of acute issue, so we were on the same page and were looking at the situation the same way. (That map of reality deal again. We both agreed that some of the "landscape" was affected by PTSD and what I was experiencing wasn't based on the present reality.) If, for example, I was having a flashback, he predictably noticed, stayed calm, and then would begin by asking me what was going on (or where I "was"), and waiting for an answer. He didn't always get one right away, because sometimes I couldn't answer, I pretty much always heard him, at least eventually. So, he'd keep quietly talking to me, reminding me where & when I was until I recognized it myself and rejoined him in the present (don't do that much these days, BTW, and I think it's partly because of this). Then we'd talk about what just happened.

There are so MANY things that can complicate this! In what I just described, for a start, we both had to be willing to deal with things directly. He had to be very patient, because nothing was going to happen any faster than it did, no matter how much he might have wanted it too. I had to really know and believe I could trust him and that he 100% had my back. That was really hard and took a lot of time. To this day, I'm amazed that he was willing to work as hard as he did.

One of my very first jobs was working for a married couple, on a horse farm. The husband had grown up around horses, the wife had not, but wanted to learn. The husband was an excellent teacher, the wife was a great student. No way could he teach her how to ride a horse! I ended up giving her riding lessons. Why? I guess because the "teacher/student" dynamic didn't combine well with the rest of the dynamics of their marriage. That isn't either good or bad, it just is. You may be facing some of the same thing with your husband.

I'd better get moving or I'm going to be late! (again)

 

[Sweetpea76]

Sweatpea, does your Vet also avoid discussing if he is feeling uneasy?

I'm pretty lucky in that he is quite open with me a lot of the time. He has had years of therapy and was in an impatient treatment center for vets with Combat PTSD for about 6 months, so he has become accustomed to talking things out. It took some time, and I had to learn to communicate better with him and be more patient.

There are still times, however, when I will get a random, non-logical blow up from him. I once got ripped a new one because I circled my car around because I though some guy was dumping a dog. He lost his mind, told me I cared more about stupid f*ing dogs than people, etc. ... it was totally idiotic to me, but it made perfect sense to him because he has bad associations with the packs of Iraqi dogs that roam wild over there. What solved our issue is that I could tell by the way he was ranting he was in the midst of a PTSD thing. I left him to rant and removed myself from the situation, then later he calmed down and apologized. He also explained the dog thing to me, which I'm sure he would not have been able to do if he wasn't treated.

If I would have let my temper get the best of me, we would have been nose to nose arguing, and no good would have come of it. I'll admit, that part is really hard for me. I'm not the type of woman to take any garbage off of anybody without sticking up for myself. I had to learn to slow my roll with him though. I will set my boundary with him by saying "I can't talk to you if you are acting like this to me. Call me when you calm down," then I leave and go cool down myself. He knows that I will not tolerate him acting horribly to me, and I know that if he acts like a huge jerk that it is more than likely the PTSD, because he is a pretty calm and loving guy by nature.

 

[I'll make tea]

Thanks for your answers,

Scout, thank you so much for sharing. So you really do not realize where you are if you have a flashback?

Sweetpea, thanks a lot. It sounds like the both of you have worked a lot on your relationship and have a great marriage now. I think my Vet is a little bit different than yours. He does not rage, like I said he "has a stiff upper lip". What he does is treating me like I am crazy... giving me orders "We are leaving, this place is to expensive" and treating me like I am insane if I do not agree with his pseudo-reason + want to stay in the place after we spend an hour traveling there.

Like I said (wrote): he told me we are going places... and I began doubting my own memory... but I am pretty sure we are not. I can recount a gazillion of times when he promised me to go somewhere and changed his plans five minutes before we were about to depart / we had to leave a place.

Guess I just have to live with that and see the good sides about our marriage, whcih are there. He can be a really sweet guy... but this sucks so much and makes me really unhappy.

BTW you said you have read a lot. Do you know a book that offers some practical advice on which places to visit with your Vet?

 

[scout86]

So you really do not realize where you are if you have a flashback?

This is only my experience, but, no, not exactly. What I call a "flashback" is an episode when I re-experience a past event, or part of it. I might be dimly aware of my actual surroundings, but I also might be so caught up in the "re-experience" that IT is all I'm aware of. What ends a flashback, for me, is to recognize it for what it is, first, then reconnect with my actual surrounding. Because the experience is very vivid (and usually unpleasant) it REALLY helps if anyone who's with my stays calm and deals with things gently. Kind of like I've been told you deal with a sleepwalker? So, if someone says something to me, there's a good chance I won't hear them the first time. I've actually only in experienced this in the presence of the one person I mentioned. He, either through luck or understanding, never did anything like touch me, until I acknowledged his existence. If he had touched me, I'm pretty sure I'd have been aware of the touch, but would have experienced it like it was someone else doing the touching. THAT probably wouldn't have been a "good" thing.

You mentioned books. My personal favorite is called "Once a Warrior Always a Warrior". The author is a soldier and a psychiatrist. The way he explained PTSD made more sense to me, personally, than anything else I've read. It's mostly focused on combat related PTSD, but he talks about it in general too. He has lots of specifics for vets and their families, and has info on navigating the system too, for the US. The author has a very positive "you can do this" attitude, that I appreciated, but, at the same time, doesn't sugar coat anything. I like the book so much, I've probably turned in to something of an evangelist for it! LOL