Ptsd Setting In 20 Years After The Fact - Anyone Have This?

[Tinyflame]

That's kind Scott.

 

[gms1976]

Sorry I haven't posted to this thread in a while but my email didn't notify me there were most posts - will have to check my settings on that one. It is just so wonderful to hear that I'm not alone - not that I would wish this on my worse enemy.

Scott you had some wonderful words and thoughts to share and I am with you on why it feels like we're being punished so severely on a daily basis for something we didn't do. It is so insanely and monumentally unfair that sometimes I believe (as crazy as this sounds) that the universe is actually out to get me or playing some cruel cosmic joke to see how much more I can take.

I feel stupid and alone and I blew up at my husband about his parents this weekend and now I feel like a heel. I can't seem to do anything right. I can't seem to control my knee-jerk anger reaction and hypervigilance seems mild according to what I experience. Sometimes I'm so hypervigilant my skin tingles and is sensitive. I can feel people looking and judging me. Even though, logically, this seems ridiculous, my brain has other ideas.

My hostility radar never, ever turns off and truthfully I'm burnt out. I get triggered so many times a day that sometimes I float through in a dissociative haze. I'm in a job I hate and a body I destest. Had a test done a month or so ago and my DHEA levels are low which is generally a sign of adrenal fatigue. So beyond tired today, it isn't funny. Sorry. I'm just having a tough day. Could do with less Mondays actually because this one has truly sucked so far.

 

[Mercy]

Dear Christian,
I understand your question. I was a child prostitute with a lot of trauma, seeing children die, torture. I had had a few strange reactions over the years but didn't think much about it. I think I was hypervigilant but lived where that was a good idea. Since my survival depended on my never revealing anything that would get the organization caught, everything that happened was well separated by many walls of amnesia and buried deep within.

I was in my late thirties when I began to seek help. One thing that changed was our moving to a safe place. Hypervigalence didn't fit.

I was sitting with my baby sleeping peacefully in my arms on a sun-snow sparkle February afternoon having tea with my gentle pastor. I felt that at any moment someone could throw a Molotov cocktail bomb through our picture window and we would all be blown away.

Then, I knew something was wrong with me. I think that being safe allowed the other things, stuffed down for so long, to push their way up slowly.

 

[NDKnight]

Yes, I think looking back that my PTSD came to a head in 2008, when my step daughter was placed in a terrible position to do unmentionable things to herself. Since then I quit my job as I couldn't handle people anymore. (worked in customer service for 7 yrs).

I am now 42 and I had a day a couple of months ago that everything went dark. It made the world look like it was in black and white. The hatred for myself became so great that I just had to end it. For whatever reason I survived and now I am again doing fine. If you call not being able to touch your wife in any sexual way because your terrified that you will hurt her. I am extremely paranoid and as always I have never trusted anyone.

My life story compared to others may not be as bad, I dunno. Each of us have gone through some horrible things in our lives.

I believe that if I were to cease to hate myself I would not exist. what happened to me was one main event followed by many small events, before I can even remember.

For the things that were done to me I wish I could die, for the things I was made to do for years I wish I could be sent to the worst blackest dungeon to rot forever.

So yes PTSD seems to bring back whatever happened to the forefront, even if it was more than 20 yrs ago.

 

[Heidi07]

I can also relate to what has been written in this thread. I am 43 years old and have been diagnosed with Complex PTSD for 3 years now. Before that, the diagnosis was just depression. However, I realized now that I have been dealing with PTSD all my life.
I can only remember bits of my childhood (due to emotional and physical abuse) but I can see now that I was having symptoms back then already. I also used alcohol and sometimes drugs to cope. I have been sober for 4 1/2 years now and since then the symptoms, flashbacks, etc have gotten worse. Or maybe I have started to notice them since then, because I have consciously started to work on myself and pay more attention to my feelings.

I always knew that there was "something wrong with me", but I had no clue what it was. I also had several other traumas throughout my life and after the last blackout I had (when I was drunk), I decided that I needed to quit drinking. I was drunk, accepted a ride home from a stranger, thought I said good bye to him and went in the house. This was my initial memory. However, I came through from my blackout on my couch, naked with this stranger on top of me. I was shocked and kicked him out. This horrible experience was the kick I needed to quit drinking. So many people told me before that I had a drinking problem but I always denied it. I did not want to give up "my friend" that helped me to forget, helped me with my depression, etc. All illusions, because I did not want to face the facts.

I don't have many friends and in general prefer the company of my dog. I have met some "dog people" since I got my dog last year and I do associate with them (two women). I told them about my PTSD and it turns out that one of them has PTSD herself.

It's a still a struggle for me and I wish that I did not have this but I cannot change it. Trying to take one day at a time.

Sending cyber love from Germany to all of you

 

[Mercy]

I am now 42 and I had a day a couple of months ago that everything went dark. It made the world look like it was in black and white. The hatred for myself became so great that I just had to end it. For whatever reason I survived and now I am again doing fine. If you call not being able to touch your wife in any sexual way because your terrified that you will hurt her. I am extremely paranoid and as always I have never trusted anyone.

I am a wife terrified to be touched in any sexual way by my husband because I'm afraid I'll be overwhelmed with flashbacks. We have been friends for 20 years.

I believe that if I were to cease to hate myself I would not exist. what happened to me was one main event followed by many small events, before I can even remember.

For the things that were done to me I wish I could die, for the things I was made to do for years I wish I could be sent to the worst blackest dungeon to rot forever.

Learning to begin to let myself even think about forgiving myself was one of the hardest things in PTSD therapy. Only when I could take an adult perspective about a child's world and the acting out years that followed could I stand understanding that it wasn't my fault. Mostly now that is head knowledge not heart knowledge.

It seems to me that there is a way out of the worst dungeon where you are now and feel like rotting. The evils of that form PTSD can be broken down and become more handleable. Self Hatred seems to be your cover on the pressure cooker inside. Mine was guilt. Same pressure cooker different name.

KDKnight, there is a point to working out the crap we have lived through and done. We support you here. I very much doubt that anything you feel ready to post would shock folks here. We've all been through and heard enough to respond with caring.

 

[NDKnight]

Thank you Mercy. I guess I am having a hard time wanting to write this out. I am scared of going back that time voluntarily. Yes your right, my self hatred is starting to physically wear my body out. In one sense I am happy that I have heard of PTSD and that it may be a chance at controlling my fear and anger, but that on the other hand I don't know if I can be fixed. I have lived this way so long, that I don't know any other way.

 

[Mercy]

I honor your courage. It is hard to write out the truth as far as we see it, from where we are. I hope you will want to write more. Take your time. It's perfectly OK to go slowly as you feel the time is right.

on the other hand I don't know if I can be fixed. I have lived this way so long, that I don't know any other way.

I don't know how long you have lived this way but you have hit on a very important point in common with most all PTSD sufferers- limited coping skills. I had only one coping mechanism. That was dissociation. I didn't know anger or self protection or that I could leave the room.

I think that anyone who has PTSD doesn't know if they will change for the better or not. The good news is that we do change, slowly, and gradually as we can get therapy. I didn't used to believe in talk therapy. But having to find the words that fit what I was trying to tell was strange and helpful. It made me put some of the trauma in another verbal part of my brain so it could be sorted out over time. Writing things out can do that too. It is good to put whatever is paining you on the outside. Ultimately, it is less likely to wear your body out. I do have to say though the therapy process is exhausting.

I guess I am having a hard time wanting to write this out. I am scared of going back that time voluntarily.

Many of us are afraid of looking back at the past, afraid we will be struck there, trapped. The fear is real. Staying trapped in an incident is most unlikely. You are a survivor. Your survivor brain won't let you stay stuck there for long.

Thank you for sharing what you have. You were able to be vulnerable with us. Congradulations on making footprints of truth in your own life.

gentle hugs if that's OK. If not pass them on to a pillow, maybe even throw it across the room....

 

[NDKnight]

Thank you Mercy, for the hugs and the words of encouragement.

 

[bob buskirk]

I have complex PTSD from multiple childhood traumas, growing up in Africa with violence and rioting, Rhodesian Bush war at age 4, molested by my grandfather, rejected by my father when I told him. My father had a heart attack in front of me and I was the only one who knew CPR - I was 16 and couldn't save him. The list goes on.

I too have long lasting ptsd.....served in the USMC in Beirut in 1983..................sucks

 

[Mercy]

Yes it 'sucks' Bob. I have the sometimes forlorn hope that my complex PTSD will just quiet down.

I had a funny thing happen in Jan. I had surgery to place plates and screws on a badly broken ankle. I was in bed on a morphine drip and asleep. Someone must have been watching a war movie like saving Private Ryan because I heard the command,"HIT THE DIRT!" Well, darned if I didn't do just that. I stood up on my bed iv, cast and all and dove/slid on the floor as far as I could. Clearly some part of me was awake and ready for action. I broke my wrist obeying orders from a movie while zoned out on morphine. The PTSD stuff is strong ; )

 

[Traumagirl]

My PTSD did not come out fully until after my abuser died. I agree with those who said that it did not surface until my mind knew it was safe. I guess you have to deal with it eventually and as a child, I was not capable of dealing with the horror that I lived in. It does make you feel weak, but after a while, you see it's not weakness, but strength. Dealing with all of this is so hard. It takes strength to take it on and deal with it one day at a time. It's a normal reaction to really abnormal circumstances. It does get better. I promise.
Hugs to you. We're here when you need us.