Is it normal to ...? Remember deeds and forget details, like faces?

[GreySouled]

Yes, I do have a wonderful T. She doesn't lead or suggest anything. Everything so far has been organic. And yet, I doubt.

 

[Freddyt]

Trust those memories. Those bits and pieces are parts of the memory. It's part of the mindf*ck of PTSD. You need those memories to recover the bigger memory that your brain wants you to find (the nightmares say its there) but is hiding from you.

I sure as hell didn't want to believe mine but when the big part surfaced about a year ago I found those memories to be 100% true. The surrounding memories were true too. Amazing but it all came loose with three words....

 

[GreySouled]

Trust those memories. Those bits and pieces are parts of the memory. It's part of the mindf*ck of PTSD. You need those memories to recover the bigger memory that your brain wants you to find (the nightmares say its there) but is hiding from you.

I sure as hell didn't want to believe mine but when the big part surfaced about a year ago I found those memories to be 100% true. The surrounding memories were true too. Amazing but it all came loose with three words....

What were the three words, may I ask?

 

[Freddyt]

What were the three words, may I ask?

"Oh my god" From the nurse that found the nurse who ripped the bandage off my eye. It started the chain of events that caused me to loose sight in that eye.

 

[Friday]

It started the chain of events that caused me to loose sight in that eye.

Not what actually injured the eye?

<cough> avoidance, much? (From the queen of avoidance)

 

[BigLittle]

I remember the acts, penetrative ones. Used to think and be terrified I was pregnant at the age of seven, knowing how babies were made.
Is it possible to remember such heinous, horrendous deeds and struggle to bring the perpetrator's face into focus????
Please, if anyone can relate or has any insight, please let me know!

My body remembers so much more. My mind still blocks a lot of abuse and torment. Every night I'm reliving stuff from the past in the same or different setting. Last night I was having a nightmare and suddely feit a snakes between my legs and on my body. Whatever that means...

 

[Freddyt]

Not what actually injured the eye?

<cough> avoidance, much? (From the queen of avoidance)

The original injury was an accident. My best friend was the one on the other end of the stick. When I first talked with my T she said that had nothing we needed to work on. It was an accident. I was healing. I could still see out of the eye. It was injured, and about to be injured in a way the surgeon who did my keratoplasty had never seen with a blunt injury. What went on that night, days after the accident, was enough to shake the clot inside my eye loose.

Between being woken at 2 am when the bandage was ripped off, strangled to stop the screaming, screaming changing to puking, (I hit the privacy curtain - over the foot end of the bed) bleeding (cuts on eyelid , pissing myself, shivering, laying naked, the nurses sudden worry over aspiration, and the respiratory exam and x rays that followed (after being strangled minutes earlier).

The second bleed crushed the retina and macula, popped the lens, and had my eye swollen enough it pushed the fat from around my eye out. My bottom eyelid was about the size of your thumb. Both eyelids were so swollen it ripped the corners of my eyelids and tore the conjunctiva.

Of it all, that feeling of forced exhibitionism, (11 year old boys have their own version of a pop up) cold, shivering, scared, people running everywhere, blind, that feeling you only get with a head wound, likely in shock and everyone worried about the outside - while the real damage happened inside.

Still sound avoidy @Friday?

Back on topic, there was really only one nurse who's face I remember. Partly because she walked different as a result of having polio and partly because she was an angel of mercy who showed amazing compassion.

 

[Friday]

Still sound avoidy @Friday?

Yes & No.

IME.

The things that need no forgiveness, because they’re instantly/immediately/completely understood… can be so simple they’re simply a part of us, who we are or where we are (2 different things).And the things that follow CAN be so brutal that we never look at the point where things change, or so wonderfully perfect in all ways that having any kind of ghost feels like a betrayal, and everything in between.

IF (and only if) it is avoidy? That doesn’t mean you somehow need to stop understanding it was an accident, or that you’re harboring some deep seated whatever the f*ck against your friend, or yourself. It’s just that Cap T Trauma doesn’t give a f*ck if you were totally in the right, or no one was in the wrong. A hurricane and a Rape? Are different things. Both cause PTSD. Both log/register “wrong” so it’s present tense instead of past tense, regardless of whether you already have PTSD, or not. But one requires malicious intent, and the other doesn’t. Meanwhile mercy involves all good intent, as do beloved careers, but both CAN log/register wrong. It’s just brains, being wacky, and keeping some things close whilst directing attention anywhere else, but. Whether it’s a victim thing, or not. Whether it’s a perpetrator, or not.

Meanwhile (if & only if it’s avoidy)… if it’s your best friend, and a total accident, and not only do they need no forgiveness now or then, and neither do you? Because you completely grok what happened, why? CapT Trauma can still haunt. Which is one of the most completely and totally f*cked things about PTSD, that I know. Still happens. Whether the surgeon who cannot tolerate blood, or the cop who can’t help someone, or the storm, or killing the person trying to kill you, or the friend who needs no forgiveness. Not all things PTSD are all-things-wrong, nor all-things-victim. CapitalT Trauma just registers weird sometimes. Processing that trauma doesn’t magically make anyone an evildoer nor a helpless victim. It “just” puts it in the past tense, instead of the present tense.

Does that mean that’s what you’re doing? Pfft! Of course not! I’ve simply done that, is all. Hence the ask.

 

[Freddyt]

Of course not! I’ve simply done that, is all. Hence the ask.

I have wondered about it some in that I have had 45 years of exposure therapy in that it's unavoidable when you look like this: