General Ptsd And Self Esteem

[Sighs]

Would like to hear from anyone in relation to self esteem issues and PTSD. Supporters - how do you help build and support your sufferers self esteem? Sufferers - is there anything we can do to assist you in building and maintaining self esteem?

My combat PTSD sufferer seems in so many ways to be so confident. He is the most competent person I have ever met. He is good looking, athletic, is an amazing horseman, can fix/drive/ride anything etc etc. I often tell people he is a combination of The Man from Snowy River, Macgyver and James Bond. (Sorry - you may have to Google those terms depending on where in the world you are.)

Every time I tell him how wonderful he is, he answers "no I'm not. I'm useless." His wife and teenage kids left him during his last deployment and he was retired from the Army with PTSD shortly afterwards. He has told me that he feels like he was thrown out the window like last week's garbage by both his actual family and his military family. So I can understand why he feels useless sometimes.

I have tried to help by being almost over the top in praising him. If he cooks dinner he will ask over and over again whether it was ok even though I will have told him already that it was lovely. Even after I've told him over and over again how fabulous dinner was, he will apologise for serving a horrible dinner. I tell him constantly how much I love him and how wonderful and useful and worthwhile he is.

Anything else I could/should be doing?

 

[Calypso]

I'm scratching my head here because it sounds like you're talking about me I am the same way in that I portray myself as having it all together and having all the confidence in the world that way no one can really see how vulnerable I really am. I'm terrible at taking compliments because I'm so used to telling myself and believing that I pretty much fail at everything that I do. in reality if you asked me before PTSD what I'm really good at I would have a list to share with you after PTSD I consider everything I've done and do something that I can't possibly be good at. I'm kind of rambling on here so I hope you understand what I'm trying to say. the more compliments I get about something the worst that I feel because I've already convinced myself that the opposite is true. I'm constantly apologizing myself which I believe stems from constantly blaming myself. I don't know if that helps you have any better kind of understanding or not.

 

[scout86]

I wish I had a good answer for you! If someone starts paying me over the top compliments, I assume they're lying and they want something. :confused: A few years ago, a good friend actually finally TOLD me how to take a compliment. ("Say 'thank you' then shut up.")

I'm hoping you get some good replies here! My best suggestion would be honesty and persistence. (Which means maybe you don't want to go too far "over the top", I don't know.)

 

[Tinyflame]

Yes hard to say. Be genuine & persistent like @scout86 said. Mostly I find even the saying 'thank you' is just a process to get it over with. It's hard to internalize things.

 

[Sighs]

Lol - I have told him that the correct answer is "thank you darling" rather than "no I'm not"!

 

[GWhizz]

I can't specifically answer your question, though I know sometimes it seems to provide a better sense of control if we're harder on ourselves. That way we don't have to rely on anyone else and so don't have to be let down again if we don't have any expectations of others.

It sounds as though he felt a lot of rejection at a time when he probably most needed both those families.

I think you just need to be patient and assure him that you're there and wouldn't care even if his meal sucked! I don't know how long you're with this man but trust takes a long time to establish.

Hopefully (if he's in therapy) he can begin to work through some of his deeper issues when he feels ready to do so, and maybe be more able to communicate his reasons for his current thinking / self berating.

Hang in there

 

[Sighs]

@GWhizz - you make a good point - its important to express unconditional love as well as "cheerlead". He often says he's a grumpy old man - and he sure can be grumpy as my other posts make clear, but I always reassure him that I love him even when he is grumpy and no-one is perfect.

We've been together just over a year so yes, its early days and trust does take a long time. He has told me that part of why its hard for him to trust is that during his last deployment he felt closer to his wife of 20 years than he had for a very long time, but when he came home she and the kids were gone. So I think whenever he feels really close to me he then pulls back for fear of being betrayed and hurt again.

I'm in it for the long haul so hopefully if I just keep loving and supporting him then over time he will feel more comfortable in the relationship.

 

[Calypso]

That feeling of abandonment by the people he loved most at a time when he needed them most is going to make it so hard for him to become vulnerable in a relationship again. His berating himself is the wall he's built to save himself from pain and disappoinment. Stay patient and unconditional with him and he'll come around on his own time.

 

[singlegateunkept]

I agree about persistence and patience. I try to remind my sufferer accomplishments and of other supports as often as possible as well. She'll say she's awful, that she's waste of space, that she is a failure, whatever- and I'll try my best to remind her of a work accomplishment or how a friend mentioned just the other day how much she meant- things like that. It doesn't always work- sometimes she replies back to that anyone who says nice things just feels sorry for her- but sometimes if I can persist in pointing out something good that is hers, that she did, if I answer her doubts about it with positive elements of that story- sometimes it can get her smiling and feeling better and lead her to talking about how she really does feel good about that thing she accomplished or how we should have dinner with that friend or whatever?

It's not perfect obviously, and mostly I just do a lot of what you say, reassuring I love her, that's she wonderful and smart and kind and amazing and that i'm not going anywhere. But I think sometimes being really specific and talking about things she has done- since she broke away from her abusive family- can really help? Just a concrete tie to not only now, but to things she has accomplished on her own.

 

[Laura 2]

@Sighs I have a great friend who is brilliant with my PTSD stuff 99% of the time. The key seems to be that she treats me completely normally as she used to many years ago (way Before Trauma). She quietly recognises my shortcomings/limitations and just takes them in her stride - she doesn't make it all about PTSD and how nutty I am! It's like she treats me as me and the PTSD as she would if I'd got a broken leg...a significant and real difficulty but it'll heal and meanwhile we'll find a way round it...

But then she knew me for years before all the nightmare. And somehow holds that vision of who I was and who I could still be when I'm completely out of touch with that used-to-be-me.

I would absolutely hate frequent praise and encouragement - and 'unconditional love' (realistically, I don't believe there is unconditional love between adults, yes, for one's children but not between partners...would you still be unconditional if he had an affair with the neighbour, or strangled your dog, or cleaned out your bank account and ran off leaving you with a pile of debts...?). I'm still an adult and I still have to be accountable - being accountable is also about self-respect and self-esteem. If you let adults get away with things then you're treating them rather like a child, which is a bit demeaning no matter how well meant.

I'm not sure my hatred of copious praise and encouragement is because of low self-esteem, though my self-esteem has certainly dropped a lot. I think it's more about other people and me being real, authentic and being treated normally. I too find it difficult now to take compliments - but what I'd say about that is that it's entirely a decision that I have to make. Put another way, no amount of praise will touch me unless I decide, unless I feel safe enough to take it in and unless the praise is 'clean': It's quite a burden for me at least when someone is praising me in the expectations that somehow their praise is going to help me feel better about myself - partly because I feel the burden of even slight pressure to 'be better' and partly because I know they need me to 'be better' not just for myself but for them as well.

Despite low self-esteem, I also know how good I am at some things. Like your partner has, I have lots of previous external verifications of these competencies. The things I'm not so good at now are in the category of minimum song-and-dance 'meanwhile, we'll find a way round it'.

I guess what I'm saying @Sighs, maybe your man has to get there on his own with much of this. Maybe you don't have to strew his path with rose petals, but just lightly invite him to enjoy the roses with you...

 

[silkleaves]

Yeah, I don't know how one can make it happen. I mean, my close friend here is very sensitive to it when she pays me a compliment and I respond negatively, even in jest (well, I always make a joke out of it) she will tell me very seriously that she means it. With people I don't know very well, if they pay me a compliment, I take on overly fake confidence, "I know" or "you're so perceptive" also always in jest. But I come off as very confident, when inside I am wondering why the heck they are telling me this, what do they want from me, what are they buttering me up for? A compliment is not just a compliment...to me, it means they are about to do something really crappy and don't want me to see it coming. So I go on high alert or just avoid them and whatever they have in store for me.

Because deep down, ehhhh not even deep down....because basically, I don't feel it. If looks, intelligence and personality mattered, if I actually had all those things, then every guy I've been with wouldn't have decided they are better off without me. Heck, not just guys, general people in my life. If I was such a great mom, I wouldn't feel so guilty all the time for the stuff that comes so hard for me to do that comes so easily for everyone else. I'm not really that great a person, I avoid the people I care about so that I don't end up hurting them, and even then, that avoidance hurts them. Can't win for losing.

So yeah...it makes me very uncomfortable..and the more someone tries to convince me otherwise, the more I distrust their intentions, because why is it so important for them to make me feel a certain way? What's in it for them? Wall up, on guard and more likely than not, eventually I will just avoid them altogether because the anxiety of trying to figure out what the ploy is gets to be too much for me.

 

[scout86]

We're not a very helpful bunch, are we?

What's obvious from your post is that you love him and think the world of him. Maybe that's enough? After all, how could YOU be wrong about him? You love him and think he's wonderful, right now, the way he is. Pretty cool, when you think about it! And it sounds like you want him to heal and grow, and have a good life, because you care about HIM, not because you see him as some kind of project. (At least I hope I'm right about that.) What more could anyone ask of a partner?

Think of the self esteem issue as a "symptom". It will get better, more than likely, as the whole picture gets better. You didn't say, I don't think, is he getting any professional help with all this?