Is It Possible That Ptsd Can Make A Person More Gullible?

[Philippa]

It seems like before I experienced all the traumas in my life, I was the sort of person who, whilst I may have been a bit gulllible at times, also questioned a lot of things and thought for myself and didn't so easily believe everything I was told. Since all this stuff happened and the trauma, I've found that my gullibility has increased...I believe what people tell me too much...and I hate it? Have I regressed as part of the trauma?

It's a rather embarrassing and annoying thing, and I can't work out why I seem to be so quick to believe people, rather then take it all in as I used to and discern whether it sounds right or not. You would think that after trauma I'd be less likely to believe and trust what people tell me, not more?

Does anyone else experience this, or have any sort of input that could help?

Is it possible that ptsd can cause our ability to discern information and things people tell us, to be kind of dwarfed or affected in some way?

 

[Tinyflame]

Hi Philipa, though it's somewhat (or can be) the same result I see it a little differently, for myself.

I know I can no longer 'define' myself, as it were, and I think when you also get worn-down and/ or your self-esteem keeps decreasing, information which seems to support what you do know or think of yourself ('your worst fears') is likely to be believed, reinforcing as it were.

Otherwise, I think because (again, knowing myself and own experiences, and limitations, and limitations of knowledge) I try not to be judgmental, well I try to give people the benefit of the doubt. That's their business (their true heart/ intentions), whether to tell the truth or not, and I might 'pay for it' to some degree in the long run if they don't but I never really afforded them any trust so that's just how it goes.

That being said however trust is difficult so as to actually 'believing' what someone says or trusting their opinion on anything of importance, well they would have to be very trustworthy.

I think too there are times when you can get so beaten down that you cling to whatever you're told, more like a lifeline. Hopefully it's from someone who should be believed.

So know, I don't think 'gullible' would be the word I'd use but 'vulnerable' sometimes might be.

 

[patrick]

Just the opposite for me, I think. I tend to be over the top cynical and to not believe anything, sometimes when it's right in front of my face. Untrusting, jaded, feeling that the world is always trying to pull a fast one on me. I've actually been working on being a little more trusting, a shade more willing to take things at face value.

I honestly can't remember when my cynicism started. My therapist makes a case that I had PTSD before I ever went to war, as the result of some of the hard knocks in my childhood. The shit that comes to mind...I'm just now flashing on how my dad used to say, "This is going to hurt me more than it hurts you." This when I was five or six years old. Didn't believe it then, don't believe it now.

I'm wondering if maybe we're all a little different in this regard. I try to the best of my ability to think critically. To weigh both sides of anything I hear before arriving at a conclusion, and then I say bullshit (wish I knew how to make those little smiley faces here.) If I had to choose between gullability and cynicism, I'm not sure how I'd choose. I do hate having the wool pulled over my eyes. Hopefully we can find some kind of balance as we heal.

 

[Tinyflame]

Yes, I agree Patrick. But I have surpringly found, it is easier to trust trustworthy people, it's just that they're not that common.

 

[Philippa]

Interesting replies. Thanks guys.

For me, I think it may be an extreme reaction to having been formerly so cynical and jaded...which on one hand I still am, but there's this other part of me which wants so badly to believe people and be able to trust them, even though the cynic in me knows that people are full of shit and not to believe anything? I just get so sick of the cynic in me. I know it has value to me, but I hate not being able to trust anyone or anything I hear or see. I think it is also as you said Junebug, that our ability to process information becomes almost stunted, so we cling to whatever we are told. I have felt so crumpled at times...like paper that's been scrunched up and thrown away. Sometimes it feels like I am a little girl again and I don't know how to think for myself, so I listen too much to others and place what they say above my own authority...which I find really upsetting, because I am such an independent soul who likes to think deeply about things and come to my own conclusions...but I didn't always. I was sent to Catholic schools and they don't really nurture in people the ability to think critically. School is mostly about telling people what to think IMO. I feel like I have reverted back to that person, and I don't like it one bit! I also get teased about it by friends, and they look at me like I'm stupid. Even a male friend I know, who claims to have ptsd himself and 'should' understand, makes fun of me for this??

This 'vulnerable' aspect of me, I think she pretends that everything she hears is reliable, because the thought that I am being deceived is just too much for me, I have literally been in agony by the thought that I cannot trust anyone. My father used to play tricks on me and play on my gullibility when I was younger...telling me tall stories, which for the most part were harmless, I think...though one day he actually video taped me approaching a fig netting which he'd told me was the web of a giant spider that lived under the house:rolleyes:. Now, to my defense, I knew he was making it up straight away, but it really did look like a real spiders web, and I just HAD to check it out...so I took a closer look. I didn't know that dad was filming me from my bedroom and laughing at me. I don't know if that is just a harmless joke on his part, or if he is just twisted?:D

I want to find a healthy balance, and I guess stumbling through the dark trying to find that healthy discernment, where I trust myself to trust those who I feel are reliable and know what they are talking about and have researched the subject (whatever it may be)...and just be logical about it, instead of almost automatically reacting in a gullible way, so I don't have to face the possibility that I am being lied to or that even though the person sounds like they know what they are talking about (doesn't everyone like to sound like they know what they are talking about...even if they don't)

Trusting myself is a really huge thing for me to re-learn, since I lost that important part of me when I made some bad decisions and choices, and went with a person who then sexually assaulted me, while I was on anti depressive medication. I was vulnerable, and he took advantage of that vulnerability instead of leaving me alone. He was selfish and self-serving...and he has no idea of the damage his selfishness caused me, nor does he care to know.

 

[Philippa]

I've spoken to a therapist in the past about this. I think I had some sort of "regression" back to childhood when I was at a festival one time?

I had this massage and afterwards, I got off the table and it truly felt like I was newborn into the world, and to the point where I felt like I was learning to walk and use my legs for the first time? Back at the social tent where I was lying down with friends, I sort of drifted off into a daydream and when I came back to reality I realized I'd been sucking my thumb?

Luckily I was with people who had been through all sorts of therapies, gestalt and regressive therapies, so they re assured me and didn't judge me or make fun of me. If I'd been around my family or people I knew in my past, they'd have just laughed their asses off at me and left me there.

I didn't really know what to make of it, but I have noticed that, at times my voice seems to change to that of a young girl...which I find a bit disturbing, and it was around that time that I noticed my propensity for gullible reactions started to increase.

Do you think maybe these are linked to something that was released or triggered when I had that massage? I know that massages can really unlock stuff in a persons emotional realm...and he was speaking to me at the time about some behavior I had mentioned, to do with having the impulse to bang my head against walls and throw myself hard against the shower wall one evening? I told him that when I was younger I had hit my head a few times from stupidly diving in the shallow end of pools or diving too far and hitting the wall at the other end of the pool. This happened about 5 times (that I can remember) and he said that it was my way of getting my parents attention (which I actually questioned, but did not dismiss alltogether)...then I got up and started walking like a baby, and the thumb sucking started...I was about 32-33 at the time, so you can imagine it was a bit disturbing for me.

 

[Philippa]

I think I'm just confused basically, on how much to let myself trust and how much to let my cynic take charge? I want to find a healthy balance between both aspects, so that I don't believe too much but also don't cut myself off from possibly learning new stuff from people who actually are trustworthy...though I know there aren't many of them.

 

[patrick]

The more progress I make in recovery the more I run into people who feel trustworthy to me. My tendency is to expect the worst until I'm proven wrong, which I'm not proud of, but I'm starting to get better about that lately.

Just trying to figure out how to be in the world and be around people is a constant challenge with PTSD. Protect myself if I can, but try not to stay in a bunker with a machine gun screaming "Halt, who goes there?" every time somebody tries to engage me.

Tell ya what. I'll trade you some cynicism for some gullibility. How would that be?

 

[Philippa]

hehe... maybe we can balance each other out that way?;)

Your post helped me understand a friend of mine who also has ptsd. He teases me a lot for being too gullible, though I think that secretly he isn't all that happy being the way he is either. Maybe he makes himself feel better having me for a 'friend'?...I sound untrusting of his motives don't I...see...cynicism! Aaargh!

 

[patrick]

It's like a f**king teeter-totter sometimes, isn't it.

 

[Philippa]

Yes, and I for one am over it!

 

[Gloria]

Dear Philippa,
I am wrote a thread on Ugly Duckling Turns Into Swan but it's about how gullible we are and how people who have been abused, neglected and abandoned are actually more at risk for staying in a relationship because this terrible hurt not being loved by the ones that were supposed to love you. I hope you look up her book and look into the Lesson of the Black Swan. It's helping me tremendously. I see you have been on the forum for a year. In my gullibility, I assumed that everyone on this forum was safe because they understood what it was like to be traumatized. What a big mistake. I almost did something very illegal (without just a few protests and questions) because I trusted this person on the forum. But I didn't do it. Had I been caught I could have gone to prison. After too long, everything started to become clear to me that there were contradictions everywhere and so I am meeting people in person on this forum or talking to them on the phone before I message and give out intimate information (and give my heart to someone).

So the long and short is that i do believe that we are much more gullible. We feel unsafe and we crave that person that makes us feel safe and secure. In my instance, I was totally blind so many times because I wanted that person to be good so I would not see anything that was right in front of my face!
Many blessings,
Gloria