Supporter I Have No One To Talk To About My Husband's Ptsd

[Agent_Ourange]

Not sure how to start, so here goes.

I can't talk to anyone (even my therapist) about my husband's trauma because he views it as a huge breach of trust. Also, he has never talked about his trauma to anyone but strangers and me. I think that's why he's terrified of me talking to anyone about it.

Without giving too many details, his entire life changed when he was in his early 20's. He was playing sports at a professional level in a foreign country where racism and violence was (and is) still very prevalent.

A few weeks before his wedding to his partner of 7+ years, his fiancee visited him and they were enjoying some local night life and made a decision to go a bit off the beaten path. They were attacked and she was killed, while he was beaten into a coma. His injuries ruined his career and he went back to his own home country where his fiancee's family openly blamed him for her death and excluded him from the funeral.

My husband pulled a disappearing act on his entire family and all of his friends and lived inside a bottle until one night he met a man who somehow convinced him that he was too young to die, that he had another shot at life.

That night he signed up for online dating and we had our first date a few weeks later.

He told me about half of what happened to him early in our dating relationship, I cried for him as I couldn't imagine going through all that and still wanting to live.

I didn't know about the friend abandonment until a couple of months ago. He's never been very open with his parents and brother, and has never told them anything. I don't even think they knew that he was engaged.

We've been together for a little over three years, married for one and a half. I love him to death and would do anything for him. Unfortunately I am really struggling to deal with his severe depression that he has done a great job of hiding from me until about six months ago.

At this point, he barely leaves the house to go to work, and really doesn't do anything but work or engage in escapism.

He enjoys spending time with me when he wants it, and I am pretty happy most of the time but I'm having a hard time not being able to talk to anyone. He is terrified of anyone in my family, his family, or his "friend" group finding out.

The only friends he has kept are his friends from elementary school. They all used to play Dungeons and Dragons on the weekends as kids and he has kept that up over the years. He doesn't really talk to his friends, we just get together every week or so to play Dungeons and Dragons.

I watch him retreat into escapism more and more. We've tried to talk and he is starting to open up but it is very very slow and the burden lies with me to bring it up for him. He point blank told me he wouldn't think or talk about it unless I drag it out of him.

It's really hard to work on my own problems and essentially be the driving force for him. After some rather bad fights he finally agreed to see a therapist but he's always backed out at the last minute. We have a joint session scheduled for February 12th but we'll see if he goes or not.

At this point I need help managing my anger over his behavior. I know it's not truly his fault but I'm struggling to support him with 100% love and don't know what to do about dragging his issues out for him. It feels absolutely awful to be the one to bring up such terrible and sad memories for him. Breaks my heart every time and I have to work up so much courage just to even ask things like "what was her favorite drink?"

 

[Sweetpea76]

Welcome to the forum.

It's going to be really hard to work on your relationship until he works on himself. Is he getting any kind of treatment for his PTSD?

 

[Nikie]

It really sounds like he trust you a lot .. :hug: ...

Sweetpea76 are right its going to be very difficult if he do not want to go for treatment or at least want to work with you.

Good luck for the 12 febr. I am looking forward to here from you again. I really hope something will make him change his mind !!

For you I might say sent ms Spock an inbox and ask her if you can join the self compassion brake .. 30 day chalange .. It might help with the anger and stuff
:hug:

 

[Michael B.]

Not sure how to start, so here goes.

I can't talk to anyone (even my therapist) about my husband'...

Welcome, this is the place. I just joined myself and I would suggest telling your therapist everything so you can continue to function. These professionals are not supposed to disclose information without your consent.

 

[Friday]

At this point I need help managing my anger over his behavior. I know it's not truly his fault but I'm struggling to support him with 100% love and don't know what to do about dragging his issues out for him. It feels absolutely awful to be the one to bring up such terrible and sad memories for him. Breaks my heart every time and I have to work up so much courage just to even ask things like "what was her favorite drink?"

Yikes. If someone was doing that to me, deliberately triggering me when I already wasn't doing well, I'd be a faaaaawking disaster. Or have walked already. ((From past experience.))

Welcome to the forums. :) 2 absolutely must-reads :

Link Removed

The Ptsd Cup Explanation

 

[Justmehere]

This is some huge stuff to be dealing with. I'm glad you have reached out for your own support in therapy and here.

The therapeutic space is completely yours. I hope that in time you can claim it as your space, and really own it as that. His attempts to control what you do in your therapy that is for you - this strikes me as a failure for both of you to have appropriate boundaries. Therapy is the perfect place to begin to learn how to have healthy boundaries. And it is a place where good work can be done even if you don't share about his trauma in great detail anyhow. It's your place. You don't have to share it all with him, and it may not be healthy for him or you for you to do so. I hope you talk about and share what you need to there, but not always include him in the process.

I have been a supporter and a sufferer. I have a supporter now who had to go to therapy, she needed the support in order to handle her own stuff, and because she needed the support to not be traumatized by my own stuff. I was glad she went. It didn't help me to know what they did or didn't talk about there though. It would have not helped her if I told her to not share certain things there. In every way, it was her space. Not mine.She held the boundary that it was her space, and I didn't encroach on it. You too have the choice to have therapy be your own space.

It's really hard to work on my own problems and essentially be the driving force for him.

You can tell him your limits, set boundaries, and this may motivate him to change, but trying to be his driving force may set you both up for a lot of frustration. I also understand how much doing nothing while things get worse for him is madding too. His behaviors do affect you, and that's where you can set boundaries aprons them, but that's very different than trying to change him or getting him to face his issues by dragging them out.

Dragging out his issues for him to deal with is going to self-destruct this relationship pretty fast, and perhaps leave you mad as hell.

Time to let go. This doesn't mean tolerate and do nothing about his actions. Set your limits, set your boundaries, and focus on what you can control: you.

If you keep trying to control him, you will keep failing, and this will lead no where good for either of you.

feels absolutely awful to be the one to bring up such terrible and sad memories for him.

I appreciate your heart behind this. Your love and care for him is clear. Try to give the responsibility for his recovery back to him, and give the blame for the trauma symptoms back to the perpetrator. Even if you were not in his life, someone or something else would remind him of the trauma. You don't need to remind him, or carry any guilt that something in his life, maybe you, maybe others, will remind him. It's important to give back these things not just for your sake, but his.

Breaks my heart every time and I have to work up so much courage just to even ask things like "what was her favorite drink?"

I'm not sure why you are asking about what his dead fiancé's favorite drink was. If people asked about my dead loved ones favorite things, or about them in general, especially with intent to drag up my issues, I would lose it. It's not that I want to be left in denial, and it's not that I don't ever want to talk about it - it would just undo me.

It's one thing to listen when he is ready to share, and to ask questions about subjects he would already bring up, but to intentionally bring up his trauma without him getting help is like lighting a match near gasoline and hoping it doesn't explode. Not even a well trained trauma therapist would bring these subjects up in the beginning of therapy. They would take a long time working in foundation coping skills (it is clear he doesn't have this) before ever diving into the trauma, especially doing it prior to when the client was really ready for it. It is normal for talking about these things even in therapy to make a trauma sufferer have increased symptoms for awhile, and even trained professionals have to handle this with great care. If your therapist is encouraging you to do this, I might reconsider or consult with a therapist who specializes in trauma.

It sounds like he may have learned helplessness - this can develop with trauma. He could also be really scared to change a very long standing pattern of secret keeping and begin to face what he has been trying to cope with by hiding for so long.

His frustrating behaviors are all are attempts to cope with the pain. This doesn't excuse the behavior, and especially the lack of getting help on his part, but it is likely why he does it.If you take away those defense mechanisms prior to him gaining better skills to cope, then he could melt down even more, and struggle to cope more, and dive deeper into the behaviors all the more.

Better way to help him to face his own pain: set boundaries about what you and will not tolerate in terms of his behavior. Leave the responsibility for him to face his issues up to him. If his behavior means that he keeps running into your boundaries over and over, then he will be more motivated to find solutions. If you keep arguing with him about it, he will pour his efforts into winning the argument, not facing his stuff. Instead, work with your therapist on how to handle boundary setting in the marriage, and I think this will motivate him to deal with his own stuff faster.

Anger is a common part of grief, and there is some significant loss here for you to face. It's also a very understandable reaction to somebody who isn't doing more for their own recovery, and to facing helplessness - your own or his. I hope that you are able to connect to support and set boundaries that you need to endure this season with him.

Try looking up things like DBT skills to begin to manage the anger in other ways other than by trying to change him. Also work on boundaries and communicating your limits with him, and this might help reduce your anger as well.

And keep venting if you need to and if it helps. Glad you are here and so thankful for people who do try and work so hard to support sufferers, even when it's so hard to know what to do. :hug:

 

[lostforgottensoul]

After reading, waiting, reading, waiting, reading...im left w/ my first thought. You are not a therapist nor should you allow him to put you there.

I agree w/ both @FridayJones & @Justmehere, that would both be triggering for me and it describes very poor boundries.

Me, i tell my therapist EVERYTHING, whether or not someone tells me not to, he's MY therapist plus its confidential (i cant even get my records, they will only transfer it to another therapist) so what i say is held in the top most confidence.

Second, id support him the best id can but i would not step in the role of a therapist and would very much urge him to go seek therapy. But thats just me.

Welcome to the forum! :hug:

 

[Agent_Ourange]

This is some huge stuff to be dealing with. I'm glad you have reached out for your own support in the...

Thank you for taking the time to write all that out. You confirmed a few things in my mind that I have been struggling with. He told me I'd have to drag things out of him a couple of weeks ago. I've been too terrified to take any action in this area. I have told my therapist that he suffered some really bad trauma and we are just beginning to go into that (other things were more pressing in my life). I don't want to tell her the story because my husband would not be willing to talk to her if she knew that about him. That was the limitation with the therapist.

Honestly I am relieved to hear that it's a terrible idea for me to bring up things for him. I've been heartsick debating on whether I needed to do that or not. He is currently on a citalopram/xanax program through our primary care physician. All it does is take the edge off at times and allow him some occasional sleep.

 

[Sweetpea76]

Primary care physicians are great at treating a lot of things, but PTSD isn't one of them. Medicine alone isn't going to help much either. A trained trauma therapist would be his best bet.

You as a supporter need to be mindful of your own mental well-being. You can't take on his trauma. It won't help him, and it can hurt you. Triggering him by trying to talk about his trauma is going to blow up in your face. It's not a situation where "talking it out" or "getting it off his chest" helps. It will take a long time and a lot of therapy. Meanwhile, you will have an untreated, triggered PTSD sufferer to deal with, and that's no good for either of you.

Right now, as much as you want to, you can't help him. You just can't. He has to help himself and seek treatment.

All you can do is look after yourself. You personally having a therapist is a great first step. Life as a supporter can be stressful and confusing, and your husband doesn't have a right to censor what you tell your therapist. Your sessions are for YOUR mental health, not his. Self care is also important. Your feelings, needs, and boundaries are just as important as his.

It's a learning process. None of us know what to do in the beginning,

 

[Agent_Ourange]

Right now, as much as you want to, you can't help him. You just can't. He has to help himself and seek treatment.

That's the core of the problem. He won't seek help. He has actively resisted seeking any kind of help. His family's way of dealing with problems is to stuff things down and never speak of them again. He told me point blank he wouldn't seek any kind of help ever and that if he ever did, it would be because of me. I pushed him since before we got married to find a therapist, to talk to his best friend, to talk to me, anything. He refused until I broke down. One day the fight got so bad I was curled up in a ball sobbing in the corner where he screamed at me and threatened to call my abusive narcissist parents about me. I snapped and demanded that he see a therapist.

He agreed, but has backed out on every appointment since, but did go see our PCP as a compromise. I'm still trying to get him to at least sit down with my therapist and see how it goes. He refuses to agree to anything else.

I wouldn't have demanded anything of him normally, but the way we were going...our relationship wouldn't have lasted with what we were living.

 

[Sweetpea76]

At this point in time, your best bet may be just setting your boundaries and letting go of his issues, especially if he won't get help.

Boundaries aren't demands made of another person, rather they are limits you set for yourself. For example, it's not "you can't do XYZ", it's "I cannot tolerate XYZ, and I will remove myself from the situation if it happens." If he is displaying behavior that hurts you, it is OK to not tolerate being hurt.

Learning to set boundaries with my sufferer was one of the best things I ever learned to do. For example, he lashes out and gets aggressive verbally. I don't tolerate that garbage treatment, even though he may be doing it because he is having a stress reaction. If he yells, I don't engage. I leave. If he wants to talk he can talk when he calms down. He knows that my boundary, and there is no exceptions, unless he is in full blown trigger/flashback mode.

 

[intothelight]

@Agent_Ourange Welcome!

You have received some wise counsel from other members. At this point, take care of yourself and your deal with your own struggles as the best you can do is be as healthy as you can.