Thank you, thank you, Orglethorp. I tried to quote your 'I doubt you'll scare him, so to speak' but clearly I lack some technical skills.
I meant that I'm afraid I'll scare him away, that serious PTSD is a reason to back away. And it is a real reason to back away; we are really enjoying each other, and we got into this for a long term/potential marriage relationship, we've both got careers, and we've both got kids (his are grown). A partner that could relapse into a crisis stage is a big deal in terms of managing all this stuff. So I just said I'm afraid I'll scare him. It's true, if I found out he had diabetes, or MS, I wouldn't back away from him. But it's a real thing. BTW, normally I don't date men with children, as it's an additional complication potentially blending a family, and I think it's valuable to have deal breakers in a relationship. My goodness, after all the crap I've been through, I hope I've learned from it.
I think he has experience, or at least some familiarity, with PTSD. He freely admits that he doesn't have a lot of experience with psychological issues (this came up because he told me he went to a counselor 3 times, like in his whole life, and I told him that wasn't therapy......he wasn't offended).....sometimes I say things about perceptions or motivations that he says go over his head because he's never spent time considering psychological issues. He acts like he has experience with PTSD, and from his profession he could. I have to think he's going to need information even if he is aware...I like the cups description you mention, I read it. The only concern I have about that is I don't agree with everything, and it contradicts some of what my therapist says, and I'd rather not give him bad information. That said, it's probably the best explanation available under the circumstances.
I plan to have this conversation over Skype. We visit a lot on Skype......sometimes we work at our jobs half the day and have each other up on Skype on a laptop. It's sort of sweet and minimizes the distance between where we live. When I had the talk about the scars, I did write down an outline before I called him. I can still write things down and put them where he can't see them. I'm not ashamed to telling him I wrote down a few things to make sure I communicated everything I wanted to. And I have to think me being upset, or not entirely pulled together, discussing this over Skype has got to be a WAY BETTER choice than ignoring this and having symptoms and having to explain while we're on a date.
As for the anger.....this was interesting......when I told him about the CPS removal, and this was late on our first date weekend, he got really sad. Not overwhelmingly so, but he just was like, really, and you're here to tell me about that today. It sounds horrible. But I can't stand people who whine about things instead of facing them, so I admire that in you. The look on his face, his speech, his breathing pattern, his eye contact all reflected sadness, not anger. Which is very mature, and very kind, I think. I did mention that my sister had been attacked the same year the crackhead crawled through my window in the last couple of weeks, and he was visibly shaken, said he couldn't imagine that happening to one of his children, and how could a family deal with it happening to two in the same year? We had a little discussion, and then he did get angry, sort of, told me if this ever happened in his family what he would do......and it was very solid, very clear anger.
Should we take this conversation offline? I know you sent me a message welcoming me (thank you), and nobody appears to be reading this thread. I'm just thinking there are other things I could tell you if it wasn't public. And there's a few things I'd like to ask you if this wasn't public and you felt like answering. I have no idea how to do that.....(sorry, one techy failure on a website per day is my limit).....but if you think it's appropriate and want to use a different function, I'd be OK with that. I don't want to upset anyone that I'm off topic.
