General Is This Ptsd Or Is He Being Rude?

[Tweety]

My husband was diagnosed with PTSD. He is a good husband and a good father but there is a problem.
Sometimes he is the nicest man on this planet and sometimes he is just so rude. I don't quite know how to deal with this.

* My husband calls my brothers "ladies" and "girls". When I confronted him about this he said he just wanted to toughen them because as someone with PTSD he knows life can be tough and he wanted to toughen them.
* My husband wanted to show my little brother how to climb. My brother sucks at sports and my husband knew before. Nevertheless he told him that his performance was the worst he has ever seen, that he could do better and that he did not do better was a sign he was plain lazy
* My husband does not accept anything not being done perfect. Today he nagged me and called me lazy because I put his keys in the wrong place

I have talked with him about this problem. He says that als someone with PTSD he has a different attitude about thingsand cannot snatch out of it.

How can I learn to deal with this?

 

[Virtues]

I went through a phase like this where I was a perfectionist about everything and exploited everyone's mistakes and weaknesses (I'm not condoning the behavior, this was when I was at the lowest lows of my PTSD). It spawned from the idea that if things aren't done perfectly than someone ends up dead (Is he a combat vet, police officer or firefighter???, this would explain a lot). I needed over a month of inpatient therapy before I started to come around and get my head on right, and it still didn't come after inpatient was over; it still took many many months of outpatient therapy in conjunction with that.

I also had what I referred to as "Batman syndrome". I would go through my everyday life looking for wrongs to right, looking for trouble to straighten out, not to pick a fight, but damn sure to finish one. I'm not sure if this applies to his situation... and the road rage forget about it!

 

[The Albatross]

Well right off hand I'd say that first off, I'd say pretty clearly YOU don't have to learn how to deal with this, your husband though does. Passing it off by saying he "has a different attitude about things and cannot snatch out of it" is just a way to avoid the issue or to in a veiled way say "this is the way I am". PTSD doesn't have all that much to do with being verbally abusive, opinionated and judgmental, critical or "not being able to accept anything not being done perfect".

Rudness on the boarder of verbally abusing and demeaning the people you profess to care about is a secondary issue and one that does need to be addressed because it is affecting his and your and your brothers relationships.

 

[EveHarrington]

PTSD doesn't make us insult people (calling men "ladies"), it doesn't make us put people down (saying their performance was the worst ever), nor does it make us demanding perfectionists.

PTSD does add to our stress levels overall and makes us react in certain ways, however this isn't an excuse to verbally abuse other people.

I suggest setting strong boundaries with him about what behavior is acceptable and what is not.

 

[Virtues]

Oh and to answer your question...

"How do I learn to deal with it?"

You don't, with time and therapy the hope is that he learns to change his perception of life. Not everything demands perfection or death (that was a hard lesson learned for me).

 

[Virtues]

nor does it make us demanding perfectionists. ...

I think this really depends on the cause of the trauma. I for one can testify that combat trauma did indeed turn me into a "demanding perfectionist". I micromanaged my squad to the point where I think they must have all felt like incapable little children. I didn't allow for mistakes, and when one was made stand by for the verbal barrage of curse words and insults to the core mentality of the person who made it. This may have been fine if I left it on the battle field, but it slowly started to spill over into garrison, and into my home and off duty life. Again, I'm not condoning the behavior, on the contrary, I am rather ashamed for the way I acted at the time, but I do recognize where the mentality came from and that helped me to fix the problem, and I'm proud to say I'm doing a lot better these days.

 

[The Albatross]

Verbal abuse is also known as "verbal bullying" and yeah rudeness is also known as effrontery and is a display of disrespect. The idea that your husband's tactic is assistive and will "toughen them up" was my father's style with us and I don't personally recommend it.

Do your brothers live with you? Why does he presume that he is charged with or is making it his job to school them on sport activities and mental tenacity, fortitude or "toughness"?

 

[The Albatross]

Good point too Florian, I was not combat, though military but I sort of zoomed in on her spouse's attitude about it when presented with her communicating that this is relationally an issue I guess.

 

[EveHarrington]

I think this really depends on the cause of the trauma.

I say what I did as its not a criterion of the DSM for PTSD.

Individual traumas may have specific effects but perfectionism isn't part of the PTSD diagnosis. It may be splitting hairs however I believe it's important to parcel out trauma effects from PTSD given that trauma can cause a myriad of issues and disorders, with PTSD being only one of those disorders.

 

[Sweetpea76]

Yep, yep, and yep... My vet is a perfectionist too. It's worse when he's stressed. He knows he does it and it stems from combat. He was also an officer and had been a combat platoon leader in Iraq, so he is used to making demands about performance and bossing people around. He still has that "orders get followed or people die" in the mix too... i.e. I need to be perfect AND do what he says when he says it.

He's working on it, but I can't really do anything about it. That's a "him" issue. My only recourse is to not stand there and take it if he is being an ass about it. It's rooted in PTSD, but it's his choice to act on it, and I don't have to listen to him berate me for letting my car get low on gas etc.

 

[Tweety]

No, my brothers do not live with us. He just likes them and feels responsible for them. It is part of his illness to feel responsible for everybody and everything. He sees people as idiotic sheeple who must be protected by him.

He told me that he realized that he should change his attitude about things but he just cannot snatch out of it. He suffers from hypervigilance badly and this hypervigilance drives him to act this way. It is like he lost his trust in the world. He tries very hard to relax. Contradictionary, isn't it?

So he is rude and also me and my friends had to get used to him barking orders at us.
He knows I see this as a problem and he knows others do too. He has asked me not to be mad at him if he treats me likes this.

So unfortunately it is something I will have to live with. I do not know if it is a good idea to tell him over and over to stop being rude. I am not sure if he can at least try to be less rude or if it will add additional Stress on him... and I don't know if he sometimes uses the PTSD excuse.

I'll have to find a way to deal with this because right now he treats me and other people in his life like they are lazy and irresponsible.

Like I said he likes to call my brothers and sometimes also other men "girls". He does bot want to insult them. He is just being a bit ironic and wants to toughen them a bit but I don't think they get this. I asked him to at least stop doing this because while he might not be able to snatch out of his hypervigilance but he must at least be able to not call a man a girl.

While this sounds so negative I am happy to be with him, because he is caring and selfless and so protective of our family.

 

[Virtues]

With terms like sheeple I'm once again guessing military? SNCO? I'm usually a good guesser. Again I'll say it sounds like he needs to get into therapy, I don't think you need to get use to that type of behavior as much as that type of behavior needs to change (and it can change). Before I went inpatient I was on the verge of killing someone; my behavior was out of control. I have come very far, but make no mistake, he has to want to change it; with the will one can make a transformation with therapy. Couples therapy may also be a good idea and if he's still active duty it is free on base.