Taking A Person With Ptsd Seriously

[Tinyflame]

Maybe we all need new words, that don't have the same connotation?

 

[Tinyflame]

Oops, posted at same time.

 

[Tinyflame]

But maybe 'our' responses as people with ptsd make other people upset/ sad?

 

[p-no]

I advise to just stay away from the supporter forums. It's maddening to read about how sufferers are viewed.

Actually, I have not read into any threads there. That one thread's title just shows up on the FORUM page which is where I repeatedly see it (and that is totally okay). But thanks, ScaredOfLonely.

The thread that tipped the scales for me was the one about sufferers not being able to feel love.

I saw that once (also on the FORUM page) and just thought that I know I can feel love. Well, period.

However, I do think that it's important how YOUR carers view you, not how other people's carers view them. (I hope this makes sense). Its sort of along the lines of not being able to change everybody else, so just focus on those you associate with on a regular basis IRL. Yes, it would be nice if we could make everyone so accepting, but for now, just focus on the immediate.

I have no "carers" other than my therapist, my GP, and I'd say that's about it (in my sense of the term "carer") and I don't need any either, which does not mean that I don't need nor want people around me who care. I do have those. And love them. Yup, back to just focus on you.

 

[Tinyflame]

I certainly don't blame 'carers' for feeling frustrated or angry, but I have to wonder if that's how everyone feels around a person with ptsd? It certainly makes me question if insults leveled at me are accurate, I imagine they are to at least a proportion or degree. I am starting to wonder if it's more than I realized. Well, ok, not just 'starting', maybe confirmation? Especially if other 'facts' seem to confirm it. :(

 

[p-no]

But the fact is, not everyone with PTSD is the same and not everyone without it is the same. There are still scumbag people with PTSD, scumbag people without PTSD etc. There's nothing on this forum that will filter out 'not so respectful' people until they've posted some not so respectful crap and then get booted.

Absolutely.

I've read posts where supporters are being treated like shit by their partners, being used by their partners, being forced by their partners to take on a sort of 'parenting' role etc. Some people use PTSD as an excuse to 'get away' with shit. (I've done it, I've had people do it for me)

Yes, but: you can not be forced into something if you don't let yourself be forced into it. I am talking about myself here too. I was "forced" into that sort of thing too and then had to face it and think about if I wanted to keep doing what I did (it was really me who complied!) or not. I chose the latter. And know, I am not saying anyone has to be able to do this. Until age 35, I wasn't. When I write about myself, I write about myself.

Anyways, right, my point - Not everyone is as straight and forthcoming in relationships, it's not so black and white. Not everyone always means what they say. Not everyone can always trust what other people say. Not everyone has the self-esteem to be confident in their relationships. Actually, I'd say a reality is that everyone has doubts in a relationship, about a relationship, no matter how long or how strongly connected they are. You take a confident supporter, throw them into a situation they can't fully understand, and there will be doubts. They come here to express their doubts, to find people who can relate to them just like we do.

There are doubts and there are doubts. The problem with this is that I have been thinking what you are thinking all my life until I met my therapist. She is different (to all people I know so much about/from) that, yes, she would get doubts about situations that are overwhelming at first, but it's about how you deal with them. What I have learned about this from her so far is that the adjustments to those doubts take part in the tiny things. Oh gee, no clue how to say this right. Meaning, the shades of grey that I now know each have their own spectrum of shades of grey within them.

Yes, I too think that's what people are here for. I am not objecting to that. What I am asking is about being taken seriously. And if I (me personally) am not careful with wording what I want to say, I can not be taken seriously. Vice versa: I am taking people very seriously in what they say. If we (people in general) don't agree on a mutual and respectful way of addressing each other, how will we ever understand one another? How is a person with PTSD or a partner of a person with PTSD ever going to feel respected if they address each other as "sufferer" and "carer"? When I read those terms, the image in my head that I see is a patient in a hospital and a nurse. There is no equal in that picture.

Sometimes a word is just a word. Sufferer - yeah, that's me. Why? Because I suffer from this shit. It's easier to type than 'my PTSD partner', there is no confusion to who they're talking about. It's just an identifying word to me. Like, "Hey there's that white guy" I can't get pissed off that someone knows their colors.

Good for you that you see it that way. Thanks for replying!!

 

[p-no]

Maybe we all need new words, that don't have the same connotation?

The only way that I see, and I have come to find this during my time with my Asperger's men, is becoming literal. Saying what we mean the very best we can in the very most literal way we possibly can.

 

[Tinyflame]

Yes, that's a thought. Like giving a number (1 to 10) on how one feels, even. I feel like Helen Keller, I 'get' what she meant. That can't be easy to be around. :(

I guess I don't feel very 'entitled' to having an opinion. But I can't help but be left feeing one way or another.

 

[Tinyflame]

So, I guess I have feelings, lol.

Good for you, p-n, that you have a voice. :)

 

[Springer80]

Hi, I'd agree that terminology is very important as it interprets how you feel about and how others relate to a situation. Personally, I don't like the term 'survivor', its backward looking, it makes me feel that to approach anything is through a prism of the past. But it's a question that puzzles me greatly. The 'battle scars' have galvanised my character and I am proud of myself for my stamina, yet I don't want to be defined in relation to something negative.

How do you name something you wish didn't exist yet don''t want to denounce? It's tricky, and its even trickier for 'our little helpers' (I just came up with that :smug: ;) , 'our little helpers' I think it's better than carer and I get to imagine my friends dressed like the seven dwarfs! :x3: :D )

I haven't come up with anything usable yet, 'SuperPants' possibly :rolleyes: but it's not topic specific!

 

[p-no]

I certainly don't blame 'carers' for feeling frustrated or angry, but I have to wonder if that's how everyone feels around a person with ptsd? It certainly makes me question if insults leveled at me are accurate, I imagine they are to at least a proportion or degree. I am starting to wonder if it's more than I realized. Well, ok, not just 'starting', maybe confirmation? Especially if other 'facts' seem to confirm it. :(

:hug::hug::hug:
Dear Junebug, big hugs!!!

It's never everyone. There's a nice little quote, I like (sorry, my brain is full of them): "All generalizations are false, including this one." Mark Twain.

The way I understand this quote is that most of the time (99 %) life, people, relationships, views, likes, etc. are not black and white. So, I am certain that not everyone feels frustrated or angry around people with PTSD.

There are so many things in that picture! There are two people, each of who has their own life's story, their experiences, their longings, hopes, wishes, dreams, thoughs, feelings, etc. etc. Those already clash big time, especially their expectations, I have come to find. So if my partner or friend for example has the expectation to go travel the world with me because I said at some stage that I love travelling (generally speaking) and because he or she wants to so go travel the world (his/her longing, hope, dream, etc.), and I will say no way because I am scared to death on a plane, he or she will be really disappointed. Then it's about to decide whether I as a person (and my personality includes PTSD and being scared do death on a plane so as to not go to travel the world anytime soon) am more important and he/she can find a way to deal with this or he or she may have to see if travelling the world is more important to them and thus, if he or she really "has to go", needs to do it without me or with another person. But in that process there are so many, many details that have to be sorted out for each individually and for both together.

Most of the times, dear Junebug, it's not even about you as a person or me as a person, it's about each one of us ourselves. I would maybe love to travel the world with the person but may not be able to go due to my panicking re planes. I might suffer even more than the person and he or she might be able to comfort me for not being able to go. I would be saying no although I'd like to go. So it's not because of anything that other person did or did not do, it would be solely because of me myself.

I have found that some people out there seem to have a radar for what I feel and seem to be caused to feel afraid of me, for example. I have found that that is often when I am holding my stress in (e.g. staying on the underground instead of doing some stress relief by getting out and taking the next not so crowded one). It happens then that they will go sit somewhere else. BTW, I'm 160 cm in height, not big and when feeling good and showing it getting a lot of smiles back. :) When someone does notice something about me they don't like, or so it seems, since I don't know for sure but listen to my instincts, I will focus on me telling me they have the right, and the duty for themselves, to do so. I too want to have the right and option at any time in any given circumstance to go sit somewhere where I feel safe (just to give one example).

I don't see it as being about me anymore. It can't be since they don't know me at all and they can not know what's going on inside of me. They can though get an impression of me, maybe, have a radar for my PTSD symptoms, for my not feeling well, for my being angry. And then it's important for them to act accordingly. Insulting a person is not acting accordingly!

Junebug, all I ever read from you is considerate, compassionate, caring, insightful, reflecting your search... :hug: I wish for you to dive more into the shades of grey as there is a lot of healing there.

 

[p-no]

I put it all down to the issue that you really cannot understand PTSD unless you have PTSD.

I fully agree. Also, I have found that when continuing to get better, I tend to be not able to understand some aspects of the PTSD of others anymore, which I find weird. But maybe it all sums up to we're all individuals at the end of the day.

From that experience with several of my soldiers going through this before it happened to me, I can honestly relate, and this is why that indifference exists IMHO... and will not change.

That will not change, but finding more of a common ground beginning with more self-awareness is an opportunity we could all take. That's work in progress, I know, and I am very well talking to myself here, too.