Loss Of Self

[outlawstar555]

So, I guess I should give a little background. I was diagnosed with PTSD about 5 years ago. 7 years ago I was injured at work. Not too crazy an injury, bulging disc, but I was/am usually in constant pain. From what various Pdocs have told me, I developed "atypical" PTSD from frustration and feeling helpless battling workcomp for so long before anything was ever done. (Took over a year to get an MRI approved...)

Anyway, what I'm talking about now is that I feel I've lost something. Me. Like whoever I was, wanted, dreamt, planned has just faded away.
Does anyone else experience similar?

 

[outlawstar555]

I was diagnosed with a sprain and workcomp wouldn't approve anything ever without an AME report or court order. Turned out the company I worked for had a choice when I was injured. Pay 100k deductible or be responsible for my treatment through workcomp. They chose not to pay destructible and I eventually found out that my claims adjuster (if he even approved anything) would send a bill to my employer for whatever was proposed. And the answer was ALWAYS no. Made things even worse than workcomp usually is. Surgeons don't want to touch me since they feel the potential for making things worse is higher than success from surgery. So many epidurals that didn't work. And nerve ablation. Now I have more bulging discs (condition is degenerative), spinal arthritis, and all kinds of nerve problems... You wouldn't know it to look at me. Which is a double edged sword... I'm only 27...
Back to my main topic, I feel like I lost a part of myself somewhere, if that makes sense...

 

[Britt.f7]

Yes, I understand this. I was a worker who went on disability due to a chronic illness. I don't feel pain, thankfully. Not physical pain. I wish I would have gotten therapy when I was first diagnosed with my illness, instead of trying to fight it and work. Many tearful moments at work that I regret. It took me seven years on disability and some deaths in my family, to get me into treatment not just for the chronic illness but for the PTSD it triggered(from other traumatic events). Don't wait as long as I did to get help. I'm still lost, but I am trying to find my way and acknowledge how much impact this illness is having on me.

I'm sorry you are experiencing this. I was in my 20's when I was diagnosed with PTSD. I got help then and I benefited from that help. Then in my late thirties, my illness took it's hold on me and by 40 I was disabled. BTW the older you get the younger the ages seem. ;)

 

[Tympre]

I definitely feel like I have lost part of me to this. Some days I feel I merely a shadow of who I was before, and some days I dont feel so far from myself. Unfortunately for me Its more of the shadow feeling than the other.

 

[franciemarnie]

Yes, I consciously felt beginning when I was 16 that a part of me was missing. And I have felt other parts missing too. I can see them in my minds eye when I meditate. I missed them so much that I went to a shaman who theoretically can return parts that flee in trauma. Something happened when I did that. Something pretty wonderful that is still being integrated.

I know the parts that left and I asked what could I do to bring them back now that it is safe. It really made me think about what kind of internal world I have and would anyone want to live there. I didn't blame them for leaving! It hasn't been a nice place to live.

 

[idiosyncratic]

I feel you on the being lost part. I'm the same age, got injured at work, on workers comp. I feel lost and a huge sense of lost because everything I wanted to do, I feel that it's not possible anymore.

People think I'm young, that I should be at the prime of my life and yet I'm not. It's frustrating as heck.