Is my trauma valid and bad enough?

[weiss]

Hello, so this may be an odd post, which I apologize for in advance. While I have been professionally diagnosed with PTSD and definitely have the symptoms, I often wonder if I am intruding in a on space I don't belong in as my trauma is more odd and isn't ever included in the usual trauma narrative or experiences.

Basically, what happened to me was that I was in the troubled teen industry. You can look it up for more details of what exactly it is. But it started for me when I was sixteen. I was fast asleep one night, when at 4 am two strangers burst into my room, restrained me, and forced me to get into a car and fly across the country. I had no knowledge that I was going anywhere until the moment they entered my room and didn't have time to say goodbye to anyone. I tried to escape at the airport but they wouldn't let me, and assured me that if I tried anything else we would instead drive to Utah, but with me handcuffed the entire time. I would like to mention that I had done no crimes, and the reason this happened to me was because of a particularly bad major depressive episode that I was struggling with.

I spent ten months at the treatment center my transporters brought me to. We were quite literally locked in there and had no way to escape other than to complete the program, which was incredibly complicated and difficult and took a long period of time. We were not allowed to leave. Nothing was our own, we had less rights than a convicted murderer. We were denied medical care and food frequently--stealing food to eat was very normal. The program functioned off of a elaborate reward-punishment system in which you began the program unable to even go to the bathroom by yourself. The right to speak was often taken away as a punishment, and if staff disliked you you were not even allowed to go up the stairs by yourself. It's hard to describe how profound and all-encompassing the helplessness was.

The therapy was often psychological mind games and gaslighting, and the building and facilities (and consequently, us) were often neglected. I could go into more detail about this. I left the program in a condition that could only be described as brainwashed. The program ideologies still often overwhelm my own thoughts and control me.

While I had symptoms right away, my full-blown PTSD reaction only came ten months after leaving, after I had turned 18. I had subconsciously tricked myself into fully believing in and loving the program as a way to survive, as I could not leave and had no idea when I would be able to.

I ask about this because I know that the condition for a traumatic event requires the threat or actuality of physical danger or death. I was never in any actual physical danger. Does this still count as PTSD? Was it even bad enough? Sometimes I wonder if I'm being melodramatic about the whole thing.

Please be honest. I'm not here to get my back patted.

 

[anonymous]

I would rather go through physical trauma of any kind than the brainwashing that you've described. I've been through both and from my experience the brainwashing is far more detrimental. You're not being melodramatic, from my experience it's the worst kind of PTSD there is...Mind games are the worst torture. Logically you can leave, mentally you are completely stuck.

 

[Deadman]

Please be honest. I'm not here to get my back patted.

I'll do that. First and most important question is have you been diagnosed with PTSD? Second, are you getting help beyond this forum?

 

[ladee]

You do belong here, and welcome...It is understandable to minimize your trauma... I still do the same thing, as mine was more emotional abuse, serious head games and constant gaslighting and the prime target for being the scapegoat... So I do understand why you are questioning the seriousness of your issues...

You said you have been diagnosed... the criteria is a guide line... and not having food, or being allowed to speak, are very threatening and being hungry, by itself, food being withheld.... is life threatening....especially to a young person... feeling trapped with no way out? That would feel so hopeless and life threatening to me...

So yes, and welcome to this wonderful healing community. If you read around, you will see many things you identify with and that resonate with you... if not the facts of the situation, the feelings involved.....

I am glad you found us, hate the reason you are here, but am very glad you have found others who do understand and will be supportive....

 

[EveHarrington]

Do you realize that you were KIDNAPPED and held against your will?

Who cares if it was "legal" because your parents/guardian/powers that be signed off on it! Really, just a technicality. You were "legally" kidnapped!

 

[theshadowoftheliving]

@weiss

I know exactly what program you are talking about. Overshadowed by Mormonism and fundamental religious beliefs, and a promise to parents that it couldn't deliver, but they weren't therebs how would they know? I wasn't in it, but I knew people who were, and it was hell. You are right to think that was a trauma that could induce ptsd. I'm so sorry you had to go through that.

 

[Kodah]

I would get help sooner than later. I should have went sooner. When a co-worker confronted me about suicide, I was given the option to self refer or not. I picked self refer, don't wait that long.

Bottom line, find a therapist and let them figure this out with you. The forums are not an official guide.

 

[Changing4Best]

Sounds awful and like trauma to me. I am no expert, but surely this was NOT OK and detrimental to you. I would seek mental health treatment to overcome the bad affects of it. Let your professionals diagnose you if you have not been properly diagnosed. But it sounds to me like it is PTSD and some other possible things too.

 

[Muttly]

For those asking, the OP says in the first sentence they were diagnosed.

I am so sorry you went through that and agree with everything @ladee said. Many of the things you experienced would have created a fear of physical harm or death even if it wasn't conscious. Especially in someone so young. Part of why kids/minors are vulnerable to abuse is because the adult caretakers are what keeps them alive and as a kid, you know this. You know that this adult who is mistreating you and denying the basics of life, like food, is the person who makes your life survivable.

I'm sorry you went through that horrible experience. You definitely belong and your trauma is real and very painful.

 

[kerrielou]

Are you or were you Mormon? If you were or still are, that could contribute to trying to cope and minimize the experience from something other than kidnapping. I assume your parents ordered this abuse and so that would be another reason to not want to believe it was actually kidnapping.

It's funny the title of your post was "is my trauma bad enough," because I was literally about to ask the same question. For me, it was simply the experience of being Mormon. From researching a bit I know my experience does not qualify as PTSD even if there are times it really feels similar to symptoms described. I was officially diagnosed as Bipolar I with psychotic features shortly after leaving Mormonism when I was 32. I don't doubt my diagnosis and oddly enough I ended up here, because I found out they've started off-label prescribing Prazosin in high doses for PTSD. I've been trying to get my pdoc to up my dose to try to lower my blood pressure, but that's another long store that has nothing to do with the OP.

I guess I would just say to the OP, if you were or are Mormon I can 110% guarantee you, that's part of the brainwashing that the problem is you, not them. The problems is ALWAYS you, even when they're hooking you up to electrodes and shocking you to cure homosexuality at BYU. Even if you weren't or aren't Mormon, the staff probably was and the program itself was likely heavily influenced by Mormon cult-like thinking and indoctrination.

From your description, it sounds a lot like long term captivity where the victim develops Stockholm Syndrome and their captors convince them everything is not only THEIR fault, but they're actually making huge sacrifices to do all this FOR the victim, to HELP the victim. That no one cares about them except the captor, in this case aided and abetted by parents who's love is conditional on you completing this program they have so lovingly signed you up for and probably paid thousands of dollars for. They thought they were doing it for all the right reasons. It was tough love to save you from yourself. If they still don't accept any responsibility or openly admit it was a very bad decision that has had devastating consequences, that could also easily make it still very hard to believe This was not normal. This was kidnapping. This was severe and prolonged abuse. This was not love.

I tend to think trauma should be defined by the person who experienced it and not some arbitrary external list of what is really trauma and what isn't. If two people can go through a horrific experience and one person gets PTSD, but the other person doesn't, then doesn't that point to PTSD also being something inside the sufferer? If that is the case, would there not be individuals who experience PTSD at lower levels of trauma that might not be up to snuff? Who decides what's traumatic and what isn't for any given individual?

I don't believe that's the case with the OP. She was kidnapped, held against her will, and brainwashed. That her parents not only consented, but I assume actually sought out and paid large sums of money for such a program, has nothing to do with what it actually was. Just because you were a minor and they were legally allowed to do it (Are there still programs doing this???) in no way changes what it actually was.

Just a very uninformed opinion of a crazy drive by bipolar who thinks Mormonism is a psychologically damaging cult and ended up down a side road while looking for information to back up a desire to increase one of her 7 meds :)

 

[Leighlee87]

I made a comment to my therapist one time along the lines of, I felt weak for developing PTSD and that my story wasn't severe enough. I successfully managed to make her a bit angry with me. Her response was, "Where did that idea come from? You're not allowed to have a breaking point? If people aren't allowed breaking points then I would be out of a job."
In the end, I promise you deserve to be here, your story is "severe enough", and I promise you weren't the only kid to leave that place with PTSD. There is even a documentary out there about places like this for kids and the trauma it causes.
I've experienced both physical and psychological abuse. The psychological abuse was significantly worse to handle. It was the psychological abuse that caused my ptsd, not the physical abuse I endured earlier in life. I'm not sure why we doubt if our stories are "bad enough", but it seems that enough people do it. Possibly because we don't hear enough about pyschological abuse and the impact it has.

 

[Leighlee87]

oh and @kerrielou there are A LOT of programs out there still doing this. Sadly.