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Sufferer I'm New. Been Fighting Ptsd For 2 Years Now. (and It's Probably Because Of A Stupid Reason.)

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Loorelle

New Here
Hello,

Please let me introduce myself. My name is Elle but you can call me Loor here.
For the past 2 years, I've been fighting PTSD. Not because someone died, not because I saw a warzone or witnessed murder, not because I was raped, assaulted or kidnapped.
The reason I'm here is because of one person and one person alone. Her name.... was... Well, I'm not gonna call out her name because that wouldn't do any good. But she was my best friend for 20 years of my life. I am about to turn 26, so that was almost 95% of my life now.
We met walking home from elementary school one day. She asked to come over to my house because she happened to live a block away from me at the time. Me not having really any friends at that time, (really no one would ever talk to me because I was "weird") I stupidly let her into my life- I let her get close to me. She inevitably became like my sister, the only one person I ever truly had growing up through middle and high school. The only person who ever stayed for me. We became very close and laughed, made many memories together. When it came time for college, she moved away- but we kept in touch and still stayed best friends. During the time she was away, she met her future husband, who I honestly had no problem with. She came back for a period of time after dropping out, and actually lived with me for half a year. We made many memories during that time too. Then she got engaged, and soon moved back down south with my supporting her the entire way. I was the ONLY friend of hers who came to her small wedding ceremony. I SIGNED the marriage certificate as a witness. I truly was happy for her and was glad to see her happy.

However, while she was having her moment to shine, I soon developed a serious depression when I myself kept having failed romantic relationships. I suddenly did not see myself as a beautiful person anymore, and there were many times I wished I were dead because every guy I ever tried to date would never care for me in the same way. All I could see were other people's happiness, and I could not seem to muster up my own with what little I had. She definitely noticed this in me-but did she try to understand why I felt this way and tried to be there for me as a friend like I've been there for her? Not at all.

One day I messaged her on FB and asked her to come visit me, she only lived 3 hours away and I've came to see her several times already so I figured it was her turn to drive, and I truly wanted to see her because I valued her friendship and I felt I needed her presence to lift my spirits a bit. You know what she said to that?
"I don't want to see someone like you, you've always been a burden to me and I don't want anything to do with you anymore." Then she blocked me, wouldn't even give me a chance to explain, or a chance to say goodbye for closure.

I tried reaching out several times, I even drove the 3 hours to her with another person and had that person talk to her and ask her to see me. She refused. I ended up so heartbroken, how could someone who's been there for so long suddenly just stop caring about someone like that? Every time I tried to get something from her, there would be nothing but the emotionally abusing silent treatment. My depression of course, just got worse from that... I had this overwhelming feeling of wanting to die. I attempted suicide a number of times, and I know she knew that I did too. But never did she once talk to me or let me at least say goodbye.She was there for 20 years, as soon as she got married- she completely abandoned me. I started having nightmares. I had to drop out of school for a semester, I wanted to die so badly. I was informed that she was 'watching' me do this to myself...but did she say or do anything to try to keep me from dying? It's like she wanted me to die, she was expecting it actually- the fact that she didn't say a word is what kept traumatizing me.

That was 2 years ago. To this day, I never got an answer on why she did what she did to another human being who was already struggling. I never got closure, I never got to see her or hear her voice again.

I did make other friends, and there were people there around me who helped me get through the worst of it. I try not to think about it so much. I even have a boyfriend now, someone who loves me very much. But even he says he can see it in my face, I fight that feeling of hopelessness and worthlessness she gave to me every second of every day. My therapist diagnosed me with PTSD a while back. Normally a person can "get over" things like this within a year. But not me, I just cared about her too much and I didn't have anyone else to go to but her, and she gave up on me when I needed her the most.

She has completely ruined my life and any chance for me to ever be happy with myself. Even when I have new friends, even though I had a supportive family and boyfriend. I feel I can never truly be happy because of what she said and didn't say to me. I didn't realize I was so worthless to her... and I'm so afraid of being hurt again like that- I can't even really truly be close to anyone again.

So, why am I here? I am here because I fight PTSD from her actions, every second of every day- for the past two years. I have to fight that horrible word she branded me with, I have to fight that horrible feeling of worthlessness she gave. I have to fight the 20 years of tainted memories we made. I have to fight to be happy with myself, my life without her in it. I have to fight it, knowing it's just not the same without her.

I know it might seem silly to some of you, that I developed PTSD from something like this- but I'm hoping that I'm not the only person who this has happened to. I'm hoping to find some relatable people here who have to fight it just like I do.

So, this is my story- It's been two years of non-stop fighting and it's still not over, and sometimes I wonder if it ever will be.
 
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Hello and welcome!

I'm sorry for your loss. This is similar to grieving, in that it is a death of a friendship. I'm sorry you never got closure, and I hope your therapist can help you resolve the feelings you are experiencing. Good luck.
 
Sometimes people are terrible like that. Best friend from high school for almost a decade later decided to more or less turn a girl against me I was dating and they got together and kicked me out of their lives. One of the reasons I am very careful who I let be a close friend. Someone like that, you can't convince them to be reasonable because if they were reasonable at any point, they wouldn't have done that.

Trust issues suck. There are two choices though. Give up trusting anyone, or trust people on multiple gray levels of "I trust you more than murderer" through "I trust you as much as I would a murderer". That is my trust scale at least. Come to realize that most everyone lies and is selfish more than they let on.

There are some awesome people though and you just have to try them all out and figure out which ones are going to be worth your time and which ones will not be. Start watching how they treat others and give them little things to trust them with and see if they do well with it and work your way up to bigger things. In the end, if it won't destroy your life kind of secrets, then they are good secrets to test people with. Some secrets though, I'll go to my grave with those because sometimes, there are secrets you can't trust even your grandma with.

Adults are just old children that have learned a "few" things to mature but most won't mature to where you think an adult should be at even at 80. Them grannies can be crafty gossipers. Life is hard that way. Don't give up because giving up is one step lower than trying. When there are only bad choices, pick the least bad choice there is. Sometimes bad choices are all we have to work with.
 
I am sorry you are so hurt. You don't deserve that, at all. Have you been officially diagnosed with PTSD? Or looked it up in the DSM 5? The situation you describe doesn't meet the diagnostic criteria for PTSD. Your suffering is very real, and it's not better or easier than if you had PTSD. I would recommend finding a therapist who can help you work through this. You deserve kindness and help.
 
I want to make a suggestion here, something to talk about with a therapist.

What you describe does indeed sound very sad, but I agree that it doesn't meet the criteria for causing PTSD. However, that doesn't mean you don't have it. I would look into delayed onset PTSD. That can happen when events later in life trigger earlier trauma that we might not have been aware of or haven't looked at seriously. Was there some kind of abandonment in your early childhood that this event could be triggering for you? For a small child abandonment, whether physical or emotional, is very traumatizing. If you had that experience and it wasn't resolved at the time, it is possible that this later event triggered that past trauma.

I can't know this for sure, but it's an idea I want to offer in case it is helpful.
 
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