When Did You First Seek Help And What Symptoms Did You Have?

[jjh29]

New to this and just curious to hear others experiences. How long after your trauma did you seek help and what kind of symptoms were you having that caused you to seek help? Just want to hear everyone's experiences since I know everyone is different.

 

[Deleted member 1860]

Parents threw me into therapy 5 years post trauma for bad behavior. I wasn't properly diagnosed until 25 years post trauma when my symptoms became severe and I started having "typical" flashbacks. I blame psychiatry for the delay in diagnosis. If they (ie the 15+ psych professionals I saw before diagnosis) knew (and explained) the broad scope of what a flashback can be, I would have been diagnosed a long time ago. I was so young that I didn't mentally/cognitively know my trauma was trauma. Sorry for babbling, I'm not sure if this is what you're looking for or not!

 

[jjh29]

Yes I'm just curious to see what led people into therapy and to be diagnosed. Like the types of symptoms, etc. I started having flashbacks and nightmares that's part of what prompted me to seek help. Oh and recently under stress I think I blacked out. Thank you for sharing your experience.

 

[Bosco2153]

I had a late onset 'breakdown' suddenly and without warning many years after my traumas (my entire childhood) took place. After 25 years of teaching, I went home and fell to pieces out of the blue, ending up in the fetal position...and I never could go back to work. I went to my general practitioner and he told me to 'go home and rest'. My sister got a list of psychologists and I picked one that was close and went. The therapist diagnosed me with PTSD. That was over 2 years ago.

 

[Chincho]

One day, out of the blue, memories of being abused as a child came back to me. I was in shock, I went through my days on auto-pilot, because I couldn't think, and I couldn't sleep.

A friend recomended an excelent therapist about two month after the memories came back and I've seen her for almost 4 years. My therapist recommended my psychiatrist who has been treating and medicating me for 3 years.

I had to stop working and even stopped taking care of my house and teenage boys. I've come a long way, but I don't know if I'll ever be able to work again, because 4 years after, new chilhood traumas are still popping into my memory.

 

[DharmaGirl]

I was diagnosed late in life for childhood abuse. I had back surgery and a car accident about 2 months later. I was unable to go to work and I was convinced I had conversion disorder since I still had a lot of pain and numbness down my legs. I asked to see a Psychologist(T) and was referred to a pain program. Work was my coping mechanism and when I lost my job I was bereft. I quit the pain program and continued with the T, who had 26 years of experience in trauma and still takes a few trauma patients. I asked him if I had PTSD 2 months later. My brother had been diagnosed with PTSD 2 years prior. I got flooded with memories and had many hospitalizations. I can't work now, but I am shooting for next year.

This therapy I'm doing is the hardest thing I've ever done except live through it the first time.

 

[Kas_Can_Fly]

I was put into therapy by my Mum less than a year after the abuse stopped and it was threatened for years before while it was going on. One of my abusers (my father) attended the therapy with her and myself and controlled and dominated the sessions - even to the point of the psych-professional noting this, however no one thought to ask me anything and I was diagnosed with an Autistic Spectrum Disorder, presumed Aspergers. To be honest everything I was and wasn't saying screamed PTSD or at least traumatic stress, no one heard or saw what I was screaming, they were more worried about my dad, mum and school.

Nearly ten years later (and 5 years after first going to my GP asking for help - again my Dad managed to weasel his way into the several of those as well - I've been re-diagnosed with PTSD, A Dissociative disorder (no final diagnosis yet but suspected DDNOS-1), General Anxiety (GAD), Panic Disorder, Social Anxiety, Avoidant Personality Disorder, Depression, OCD.

My fear of being noticed or seemingly like I need help/ have a problem (even if I do, desperately), means I hide my problems even now, even from myself. Sometimes it seems as if my whole world comes crashing down when I realise I wasn't doing anywhere near as well as I thought, even more so when it's someone else who notices first. And even then in a horrific state, I still pretend that they aren't really that problematic.

So now, bravely I'm seeking therapy and I'm scared shitless over the idea, yet I seem to be having to fight and chase for that too, which goes against every fiber of my being.

 

[safenow]

The police rescued me when I was about 5 years old. I had been a feral child, living outside for about a year previously. I was in and out of the hospital for many years. I never really got much mental health help as a youngster, because no one knew how to help. There are not many children in America like me.

However, when a young adult, my home was broken into and I was held captive for 3-4 days and nights being tortured for the entire time. I did seek out help at that point, after I was rescued. However, all they wanted to do was drug me. I became pregnant during that horrible time, and struggled just to survive and care for that child in between operations to put me back together again. Then, I found out I had cancer, so ended up having to deal with that on top of everything else. It was actually years before I finally got some quality mental health help.

Once I got a good therapist, it helped a lot. He taught me skills that allowed me to cope with life and work around my dissociation episodes. I am old now, and it has not been an easy life, but I am still here. IN fact, I was just in touch with my therapist this morning. I ask him how to handle a certain situation I'm having, and he responded on his first break. Bless his little pointed head. His job for me, is to help me stay safe. Not an easy job, for sure.

I just realized I didn't tell you symptoms. Sorry. After the break-in, I couldn't sleep. I had flashbacks when I'd smell a certain type of aftershave, or if someone touched me and I didn't know they were there. Certain sounds would set me into a flight or fight mode. There are times in recent years when certain things are done that make me fear for my life, I freak out. I get very paranoid and hear things that sound like other things. It's nuts. But then, I have multiple traumas, dating back to a very early age. Not sure they will every be completely healed. You know?

I hope this helped answer your question.
safenow

 

[Ettina]

One year after the trauma ended.

My parents became kinship foster carers to my teenage cousins when I was 10 months old. Over the next several years, both cousins sexually abused me. One of them ran away permanently when I was 3, and the other one my parents sent to another home when he sexually assaulted a classmate and they became afraid for my safety. Then, a year after he left us, he confessed, and I corroborated it, and I was put into therapy soon after.

 

[Spiderallis]

My most recent decision to try therapy was a little over a year ago, I was diagnosed with PTSD by that T. I went in because anxiety was getting out of hand, and I'd spent two weeks being furiously angry because I didn't know how to calm down. That was about two years after the final traumatic event, I'm dealing with multiple traumas going back to childhood. Right after the last round a few friends asked if I wanted to talk to someone about Stockholm or PTSD, but I thought I was fine. I've been in and out of treatment for depression since I was an adolescent, including several hospitalizations, a couple trips to a crisis intervention shelter and a substance abuse program. I'm baffled that a couple dozen T's and P-docs didn't catch that I was still being traumatized while they were treating me, but depression is the easiest symptom to see.

 

[Abstract]

I had therapy for various issues over the years but looked "past" specific PTSD symptoms - never acknowledging them to myself or telling others. I had almost zero self awareness so it is hard to know what that looked like for most of my life and it seems I unintentionally hid most of what I was dealing with and struggled to ask for help. I adamantly refused to believe that anything had affected me. I was certain of it and very angry with my last pre diagnoses therapist who tried to say that it would have.

Then just when the rest of my life had improved enormously (recovery from eating disorder, body dysmorphia and multiple breakdowns and much improved depression and self awareness/self development) my intrusive symptoms and sleep issues got totally out of control (straight after a life event that I now suspect was a trigger). With much support and input from others, trauma was brought up as a possibility and that led me to see the first trauma therapist I had ever seen and go to the first trauma facility that I had ever been to.

Accepting this is where I am is still incredibly difficult for me and I battle to know what is real and what is not. I am struggling to get myself back into therapy for various reasons.

How long after the trauma did I seek help for it specifically? Minimum 31 years but possibly around 39. But who knows when symptoms started and what they were.

My fear of being noticed or seemingly like I need help/ have a problem (even if I do, desperately), means I hide my problems even now, even from myself. Sometimes it seems as if my whole world comes crashing down when I realise I wasn't doing anywhere near as well as I thought.... I still pretend that they aren't really that problematic.

Kas, I could have written that myself and for a moment I thought I had! Thank you for sharing. It really helps me enormously when I see things I relate to so strongly. I have changed a lot and thank goodness am much better at speaking.

 

[jjh29]

Does everyone experience blackouts from ptsd?

I'm trying to figure out if the ptsd caused my blackout or the medication I just started