What PTSD is.
Mar. 20th, 2013 11:15 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
drcuriosityA friend of mine posted this article by Myke Cole on Facebook. An excellent piece, and I'm only 25% of the way through it so far. That's enough for now.
I sometimes feel a bit embarrassed about my PTSD, since it came about from "only" bullying, rather than the kind of thing that we usually see as life threatening. Then I remember that I did die briefly when I was in high school and got slammed into a wall, and spent the next three months concussed and with memory problems.
But that wasn't what did it. Nor the time I got concussed when I was deliberately dropped during a trust exercise, or any of the most obvious traumatic events. It was the years of feeling under threat of violence, each and every school day. It was an environment that made that threat feel "normal" over time, that made me feel like I couldn't rely on my friends for help because that would spread the violence around. The feeling that sometimes it was best to take the violence now, so it was over and done with and wasn't going to land at random and without warning later, either on me or someone else who I cared about. That maybe I did deserve it. That maybe it was simply the price of not being able to fit as well as the others. That embarrassment never entirely goes away, but I recognise that it's a deep-down, burned-in visceral reaction. Maybe about the only thing I feel genuine shame about, even though my intellect tells me that it's not my fault.
I'll say one thing, though - while yes, it dredged up more historical stuff to eventually deal with in the process, and messed up a couple of romantic relationships with its fallout, it helped me when the quakes happened, too. No hesitation: I just collected all the things that I needed in the emergency from around my room and my flat, and got it all together in case I needed to go within around 10 minutes. "Cope mode" just kicked in and kept me functioning.
In some ways, it's also given me the strength to look at some of the unfairness and injustice in the world, big or small, and seriously ask myself: "What can I do about it?" While I can't solve every problem, I can pursue work that helps people. I can make personal decisions that help. I can strive to be aware of my actions and how they affect others; be responsible for them, and do better. Even if it's as simple as a few words of encouragement, or shutting up when the situation's not about me, or listening, or apologising (without following it up with a reason or excuse), or letting someone see something in a different light that helps us along the path to Getting It, and then Getting On With It. It all matters.
I can't say for certain who I would be now if I hadn't gone through it. At the core, hopefully we'd have the same principles and values and appreciation and passions. Those things that somehow never managed to erode under fist and boot and wood and metal. But I feel like I'm starting to become more at peace with that experience, now. That even if my energy is sometimes limited, I'm growing more capable to deal with what life throws at me, and at those who I love and care about.
PTSD may follow me, but I won't allow it to haunt me.
I sometimes feel a bit embarrassed about my PTSD, since it came about from "only" bullying, rather than the kind of thing that we usually see as life threatening. Then I remember that I did die briefly when I was in high school and got slammed into a wall, and spent the next three months concussed and with memory problems.
But that wasn't what did it. Nor the time I got concussed when I was deliberately dropped during a trust exercise, or any of the most obvious traumatic events. It was the years of feeling under threat of violence, each and every school day. It was an environment that made that threat feel "normal" over time, that made me feel like I couldn't rely on my friends for help because that would spread the violence around. The feeling that sometimes it was best to take the violence now, so it was over and done with and wasn't going to land at random and without warning later, either on me or someone else who I cared about. That maybe I did deserve it. That maybe it was simply the price of not being able to fit as well as the others. That embarrassment never entirely goes away, but I recognise that it's a deep-down, burned-in visceral reaction. Maybe about the only thing I feel genuine shame about, even though my intellect tells me that it's not my fault.
I'll say one thing, though - while yes, it dredged up more historical stuff to eventually deal with in the process, and messed up a couple of romantic relationships with its fallout, it helped me when the quakes happened, too. No hesitation: I just collected all the things that I needed in the emergency from around my room and my flat, and got it all together in case I needed to go within around 10 minutes. "Cope mode" just kicked in and kept me functioning.
In some ways, it's also given me the strength to look at some of the unfairness and injustice in the world, big or small, and seriously ask myself: "What can I do about it?" While I can't solve every problem, I can pursue work that helps people. I can make personal decisions that help. I can strive to be aware of my actions and how they affect others; be responsible for them, and do better. Even if it's as simple as a few words of encouragement, or shutting up when the situation's not about me, or listening, or apologising (without following it up with a reason or excuse), or letting someone see something in a different light that helps us along the path to Getting It, and then Getting On With It. It all matters.
I can't say for certain who I would be now if I hadn't gone through it. At the core, hopefully we'd have the same principles and values and appreciation and passions. Those things that somehow never managed to erode under fist and boot and wood and metal. But I feel like I'm starting to become more at peace with that experience, now. That even if my energy is sometimes limited, I'm growing more capable to deal with what life throws at me, and at those who I love and care about.
PTSD may follow me, but I won't allow it to haunt me.
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no subject
Date: 2013-03-20 10:28 am (UTC)Always thinking of and missing you.
-Cyg
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Date: 2013-03-20 10:49 am (UTC)Facebook events never show up for me, so I can't follow that link - it'll just be blank.
What's PostSecret, and what's the event?
no subject
Date: 2013-03-20 10:56 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-03-20 12:46 pm (UTC)I think that feeling like you maybe didn't experience enough to *legitimately* have PTSD is pretty common actually. I feel like that sometimes, and yet objectively several years of childhood sexual abuse is totally "sufficient". I've read things from veterans and similar with the same feelings. I don't think I've ever met anyone with PTSD who didn't feel awkward about it in some way. It's hard to fight that voice.
A lot of that article really resonated with me, especially the part about the curtain ripped away, and the not feeling safe, and the dark knowledge of the place randomness and cruelty has in the world.
The thing I've found hardest to deal with was the resurgence of my symptoms post-quakes. I thought I'd dealt with it all well long ago, and had triggers under control. No-one had ever told me that PTSD can return under entirely different circumstances. I think I would have coped better if I hadn't simultaneously been under the whole homeless/relocation debacle pressure. To be back in a hyper-vigilant state, with the nightmares and all the rest of it was horrible a decade after I finished my initial therapy.
I had a good childhood in lots of ways, but that wasn't enough to make it not horrific. The quakes were a reminder of that childhood helplessness for me, I think. Not just the quakes, but the loss of everything and everyone all at once in that context. I remember walking around a mall in New Jersey, just me and Dan, before we even got to Cleveland, feeling completely outside the world. Three weeks after the quake, no home yet, very little knowledge of where we going and what we were doing, half a world away from our family and friends, our belongings left behind in chaos, with very little support, an unexpected and undeserved financial crisis and almost no cope left after all the ups and downs of the process.I wondered if I would ever feel 'normal' again, ever be able to live life unaware of the complete lack of control we actually have over a lot of it. Answer: maybe not, not yet. But it's not as severe as it was then.
And the coping skills I learnt originally have helped to make me mostly asymptomatic again, much quicker than before.
And even though our lives have once again sort of descended into chaos, I'm doing much better this time.
And I'm getting better at finding meaning in all sorts of things. Because the darkness is real, but it's only one side of the coin.
This isn't actually making as much sense as I wanted it to.
Mostly I just wanted to say: thanks for posting this. I identify and sympathise.
C.
no subject
Date: 2013-03-20 08:52 pm (UTC)Yep.
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Date: 2013-03-21 07:29 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-03-25 09:11 am (UTC)no subject
Date: 2013-04-07 09:44 pm (UTC)