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I’ll start by saying this. There’s a lot. I can’t tell you because my PTSD protects me by doing what is called disassociating, disassociating is a symptom of severe PTSD. I have had PTSD my whole life not knowing what was gonna happen next there was no feeling of safety. there was no protection from the trauma ... there was no safe place. It’s my understanding that for me my only retreat was to completely detach from reality, detach from the emotions, detach from the reality, disassociating causes severe memory loss huge chunks of time forever. I’ll tell you this. I’m 45 years old this summer and I still cannot remember one single childhood Christmas. Christmas was a hard day for my mother. I’ll leave it at that. PTSD is so insanely complicated. I don’t know if I can help you to truly understand but I’m going to do my best.
I think I was 13 years old when I found out what PTSD was and that I had it. I was forced to see a pediatric trauma specialist therapist and she’s the one who helped me begin to understand the invisible forces working against me. Or that there was even anything going on with me that wasn’t somehow My fault or my mistake.
Quick note I want to tell you about that therapist. The first day I walked into her office. I was 12 or 13 years old and I was angry and I was suicidal and I didn’t wanna be there and I thought she was gonna ask all the questions they do at the hospital, who hurt you? When? how? I was becoming immune to repeating these traumatic incidents to these strangers. So, when I sat down, I asked her "what is it you wanna know do you wanna know who abused me?" and she stopped me. On a sidenote at that time, I was obsessed with the Pink Floyd The Pulse CD and had just found out my passion for the song comfortably numb! OK back to my conversation with the therapist she said no, no, I don’t want to hear any of that yet. I wanna know how you feel, I had nothing to say I don’t know if anybody even asked or cared about How I felt but I wanted to answer her and I was searching within for a word to connect to a feeling I couldn’t come up with anything. I don’t know how much time passed and she said "comfortably numb.?" That was it. She’s been in my life since that time in one form or another, but stayed my trauma therapist until I was 25 years old. I’ve had her talk to my current trauma therapist because I told them that I sometimes feel that she knows my trauma better than I do, OK back to The subject at hand.
As the years have gone by I have learned more about PTSD and how it affects me. And that has changed over the years I call it the invisible disability. you might say it’s all in my head, but I don’t think that anyone who hasn’t personally experienced It could truly comprehend how debilitating it can be.
Back to disassociation because this one is huge guys there’s been times where I’ve said I wish I didn’t disassociate, but I know something inside of me is protecting me from whatever memory so let me explain. I’ve explained how it begins how it started for me I had no safe place, my home was supposed to be my safe place but it felt like a war zone. I know my sisters see things different but looking back I saw my mom as a monster. I can’t change that. I’m sorry to anyone reading this who is bothered by that fact But this is my truth and I’m really trying to help anyone understand what this is like. So the way it was explained to me is when things got overwhelming and I needed a safe place but couldn’t find one I found a way to retreat within. I can’t remember the reasons why ive done it because you can’t remember disassociating you’re not in reality. You’re in some kind of auto pilot. Maybe. What happens is if something really traumatic or a lot of traumatic things happen in a period of time you disassociate. You don’t just forget that one memory, your mind protects you by taking out the truamatic moment but with that chunk comes all of those memories from that time I don’t know why I can’t remember any Christmas. I can’t remember, im almost 45 years old now. I’ve dissacociated a lot since my fiancé passed away three years ago. It seems to be out of my control , all I can do is my best to snap back into reality once I realize I can't remember a few days in a row, or sometimes time gets crazy. I've had my son go get something from the fridge and literally appear with it 1 second later, lose sense of reality, time is definitely something that becomes super abstract if you can understand that.
The problem with PTSD is the triggers. You don’t always see them and you can’t stop the possibility of being triggered by something. it could be a smell or a sound or a song that transport you back to the exact moment of terror, or pain, or fear, whatever the moment entails.
OK the other big symptom of my PTSD that I have struggled with that is again debilitating is flashbacks . But honestly, as I am realizing, I think I disassociate my flashbacks so I honestly don’t have clear memories when my PTSD is triggered something in the retreat and I don’t know where but I check out that that little girl inside me anyway it all comes from that little girl I almost said she started it she did but she had no choice. Anyway I guess I was talking more about triggers. You know it could be a smell. It could be a sound. It could be anything and it’s usually unexpected for me. I avoid anything that I know will trigger me , but it still happens unexpectedly. I’m very aware of my symptoms and I do have coping skills now, but the reality is all I can do is cope with the aftermath of the trigger is no medicine. There is no therapy. There is nobody who has been able to tell me that I can live free from having my PTSD triggered and that’s OK. My PTSD isn’t my enemy. It’s been to protect me so I really didn’t explain flashbacks yet. The type of flashbacks I’ve had have changed over the years when I was really exploring my PTSD and my trauma at in my 20s. I was almost digging through my trauma, thinking that was the way to heal, but it was causing me to go places that I wasn’t ready, it’s like a movie. It just plays out in my mind like a memory but a very specific type memory and some say put elastic on your wrist and snap it when that starts to happen but the problem is that my flashbacks are so consuming. I’m absorbed in that moment. I’m in that moment. I don’t have an elastic on my wrist. I’m in whatever moment I’m reliving , but that doesn’t happen as much anymore, but I don’t pick at old wounds. Now I get what I call emotional flashbacks I don’t ever see it happening until it’s at least already begun. I can’t control what triggers me, but I have some trauma around myself as a mother and my children from being separated from my oldest two by my mother so when something happens with one of my children, it triggers some very painful, traumatic memories and emotions. I’m just as broken as I was the day of my trauma in the moment. That particular situation still gets me pretty bad sometimes when I feel like one of my children doesn’t want me or need me you might as well be taking my newborn baby out of my arms again another story for another day
So I’ve explained kind of how some of the symptoms started and now here they are and those things aren’t happening anymore but these symptoms still exist and now just appear to be absurd over reactions to daily social interactions. This applies to me mostly emotionally now, but it also applies to something as simple as seeing a serrated knife at a store. And the scary memory journey that trigger begins to take me on my onlyI find my only control lies in recognizing what’s happening and using my coping skills to come back to reality this makes me think of a quote that therapist told me one time she was asking about something that had happened in my 20s I was partying pretty hard and in a very dangerous way Still creating trauma for myself on a regular basis. This one day she was asking about something that had happened the weekend before I was being very cryptic about what had happened. I wanted her to know, but I didn’t want to say it out loud she realized I was avoiding , what actually happened. I told her I couldn’t say it if. I said it could just kill me and she told me I already lived through it. It can’t kill me now that concept made a huge impact on the rest of my life. And I guess my understanding and ability to cope with my PTSD
I mean there’s so much to this. I can’t begin to put a dent in the reality of all that PTSD is capable of being for different individuals. This is what it is for me. I said I’ve had this my entire life and the symptoms That come with my PTSD do not feel like some direct reaction to some profound event. I cannot remember a time these “” symptoms" weren't part of my every day life . So honestly, my symptoms really feel like part of my personality. I think I’ve accepted that and I am sure any therapist reading this can see. I have a ways to go. I’m spending this time trying to help you understand how It plays apart in my life now thank God the bed wetting stopped when I was young 😅
Wow, PTSD plays a significant role in my life I don’t even feel like there is time for sharing about sleeplessness, the inability to physically leave a spot that feels safe (why I’m in my bedroom a lot), the terror of being in crowded places (think that’s because I can’t know what to expect out of a CROWD of people). I don’t sleep because of the nightmares. I was told by someone along time ago, that You need to sleep at least five hours in a row to go into a deep dream state I assumed that’s where the nightmares were happening. I'll get to this more at another time. PTSD is a real and debilitating disability that I have lived with since the beginning of time. It has protected me, and clearly continues to protect me from whatever it is my heart and brain can't handle but it is hard for others to understand my overreactions once triggered. But this is who I am and have accepted that. I do continue to try to be the best, healthiest person, mentally and physically, that I can be every day.
I don't know how to end this. There is so much that I can't even find the words for. I'll get back to this but I'm sharing to help others understand and remind those who suffer that they are not alone.
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