What To Never Say To A Ptsd Sufferer

[Deleted member 487]

But.... there is nothing worse than when a counselor tells you to "put it behind you". Even when I asked her repeatedly, "how? I don't understand?" and she'd keep repeating "you just do! You just put it behind you!".
Some counselor.

 

[2quilt]

October903 and CJ, those are the kinds of people that we all should stay away from. They are either uneducated about PTSD, careless and cruel, or all of the above in a bundle.

 

[Deleted member 487]

2quilt, I have fired BOTH counselors that did that. I've already talked about those two.

In fact, leaving in the AM for a doctors' appt. 120 miles, one way. We'll see how good she is....

 

[Marlene]

My first therapist (and the one that sent me to a psychiatrist for a diagnosis) told me, when I gave her my PTSD results, that my trauma wasn't 'bad enough' for PTSD. OK...why send me to a specialist and then not believe what they say? And heaven forbid she should try to find out if there was more to the story And if that wasn't bad enough, for the rest of the session when I would start a sentence with 'I feel like...' she would counter with 'No, you just think you feel that way.'

Needless to say, I never went back.

JMO, the worst thing you can say to someone with PTSD, be it from friends, family or the medical community, is something that degrades their feelings, experiences or their recovery. A whole lot of what I've read here falls into that category.

Lisa

 

[2quilt]

CJ, let us know if this new counselor was worth the gasoline. That visit took your whole day.

Marlene you summed it all up right there!

 

[Deleted member 487]

So far she seems ok.

 

[2quilt]

I am glad to hear that your new T is working out, Cactus. Take care of you!

 

[Olly]

Top 3 i've had over the past 5 months:

"You need to stop feeling sorry for yourself, and get over it"

I said to my mum something along the lines of "i'm having a bad day", in which she replied in a sarcastic tone " I suppose its your PTSD"

And

Mum - "You don't have PTSD, i watched a tv program and you don't fit the criteria" (despite my doctors diagnosis)

 

[dedic8edmum]

For almost a year I have been estranged from my Mom and Dad. They were a fabulous tag team, she the efficient demoralizer, and my Dad provided all the muscle. I've been emotional/Phsyically and sexually abused throughout my whole life. Last year my husband physically attacked my in front of our children, and out of honest fear from me life I called 911. Of course my Mother rushed to my side to left me know she would take my 2 young girls for one week so that I could get my self together, because you know "The didn't ask to be born!" Later that same day while driving in my car she found a Tylenol that must have fallen out of my purse and was in between the front seets. She looked right at me and said "I can't beleive you kids are still alive" Needless to say I spent the next week alone, hopless, and and most of the time in a total fog.

Even a year later I just can't reason why anyone would say those things...PTSD or not!

Thanks for the opportunity to vent my frustration :>)

 

[hodge]

I've gotten a lot of the remarks already mentioned here. I've also gotten:

"You're too sensitive."

It's how I'm made. I didn't ask to be "too sensitive." And, "too sensitive" for what?? Anyway, I'd rather be too sensitive than be so insensitive that I would say something like that.

 

[linasmom]

I had a therapist who I saw once, tell me "It's a miracle you haven't committed suicide".

Talk about horrified - I just wanted to say "ya know, you're right, let me get right on that!"

 

[goingonhope]

I remember being in such a thourough state of depression, isolated and unable to hope of ever helping myself, yet desiring of some help, ......and so in this despair I had meekly asked my mom to help me find help for myself, and her reply to me was: "Your only problem is that you have too high of expectations for yourself."

OMG, I had been re-living traumas and unable to sleep nights til 5am, and then in bed til til 1pm, and then didn't have any reason or purpose to ever budge from that spot, and so I'd lay there still, spacing-totally-out, and trying to force enough strength to perhaps reach over and change the knob on the fuzzy tv station and couldn't manage. And, so one day when I got up enough courage in my desperation to ask her for help, she says, "Your only problem is that you have too high of expectations for yourself." I couldn't believe then what I was hearing, omg made me want to violently heave; However, then that would've taken to much energy, and the pain of doing so and having her and family go on about their business immed. around me, and with not even a remark such as, Is everything going to be ok?, or any remark of concern whatsoever was too much;

Ignorance and blantant indifference remain two of my triggers.

Hope