Hi, and wondering what my problem is!

[Andy88]

Hi all, 

I'm 25 and a Police Officer. I've been in the job for only four years and can't say I've every really thought the job has had an impact on me in a psychological sense. In saying that there's obviously been good days and bad days however I see that as being just like any other job, although I guess the difference is a bad day in a normal job might be getting the shits with your boss or a customer or a client, or being late, or sending an email to the wrong person, whereas a bad day in the cops might be a fatal accident or a suicide or anything. I get to see the best and worst in people and society as a whole which is special and a part of my job I love. 

I would say that I am an old head on young shoulders and I often get told I should really be a 50 or 60 year old! Perhaps this is because I am already looking forward to retirement at my ripe old age haha!

The reason I am here is to try and perhaps understand what is wrong with me, if anything, I think I may have some of the symptoms of anxiety and/or PTSD. In saying that I feel like I am making a big deal of nothing or blowing it out of proportion making how I feel something more dramatic than it is, as when I think about the term 'PTSD' I associate it with someone who's been in the job a lot longer than I have and has seen and done more. 

The guts of my situation is that just about every night when I goto bed, unless I am very tired I often take a long time to get to sleep. In that time (and some nights are worse than others) if I hear a noise, a creek, anything, or the dog barks at something outside, or I hear a car driving down my street which is pretty quiet and in a small town, I panic, lots. I can feel my chest thumping and automatically think someone is up to no good, or is going to break in, or do something, anything! I stare out the window, stare at the shadows on the wall from the light coming in just incase I see movement, or a torch, but hope that I see nothing. I hate the physical feeling of my chest thumping, I hate the panic and I hate the worry. 

The next morning I always think "well that was ridiculous". I don't know why I'm like this, I've never been broken into or had anything 'bad' happen to me, I can only assume that perhaps it might be associated with work in some way, or perhaps I'm just the worrying type… I don't know.

If you got this far thanks for reading and let me know what you think as I'd really appreciate some feedback. 

[Jo3]

Hi Chris & Andy

I did see an EAP counsellor end of last year when I was made redundant.  They were very professional, confident and very helpful.

I saw this psych for about a month and no one at work knew I was going. So it is kept confidential.

Jo

[Andy88]

Hi there CB, 

Thanks for that, might be worth a phone call then. 

Andrew. 

[Stephen123]

Hi Andy, I must say that my experience with EAP was excellent, and they were very annonymous. One of my issues is paranoid delusions so I reckon that is saying something. I think you are going about this exactly the right way, you are just testing the waters. I don,t think I can really help you much, I,m not ex police for one even though I worked in police stations, gaols and courts for many years, I was a prison officer. So I have some insight into your world. If you want to read about the worse case scenario for police officers there are few very interesting police pieces at the injured workers support network website I think the worst story I read there about an ex police officer famous from the cronulla riots developed severe PTSD lost his marriage, home and ended up bunking up with a mate on $400  a week from workers comp and he nearly lost that because of the nsw workers comp law changes. Very sad. Another article stated this was quite a common story. I,m sorry to be so doom and gloom.  I think what you,re after is an ex police person that can identify with your signs and confirm or deny wether you are experiencing PTSD. Even if you did find such a person I don,t think it would help much, I mean I don,t think it would make the symptoms go away. I honestly think your only option is to get this checked out as confidentially as possible, Christopher's advice is on the money I think. I think advances are being made in the services but I think it is very important that people that want to keep an eye on their mental health are afforded the utmost confidentiality. For me it's like seeing a dentist the more lollies you eat the more you are going to need the dentist, the more trauma one witnesses the more they are eventually going to need a psych. I know you are resilient at the moment but do you really want to let witnessing all that trauma get bottled up inside you without going to get your teeth. I hope I haven,t made this issue seem worse for you I,ve tried to explain myself as best as possible. Whatever you decide Andy good luck with everything. And I still think its a good idea to check out that income protection thing.

[mum]

Dear Andy 88,

concerning your night time problems, I have anxiety and if I hear a car slow down near my house or rev etc I can feel my heart and anxiousness start. Then you cant get to sleep cos your waiting to hear what will happen next, you cannot relax till the sound of that rev or screech is out of ear shot, you tremble all over. I have only quite recently bought a bottle of RESCUE REMEDY 20 dollars fm the chemist all natural, put 4 drops on your tongue just before bed, its amazing. I refuse to take sleeping pills. When I saw a psychologist she suggested I count backwards or look around the room at the objects and while you do this your mind isn't flying. You didn't say if your thoughts keep you awake my mind is always busy lol. good luck young man, Mum

[Mary89]

Hi Andy, 

well I have experienced the exact same problems at night that you have. And in the morning I would think "okay that was ridiculous". Because of this problem I would put off  going to bed until I could no longer keep my eyes open and this led to me being chronically sleep deprived. 

I had these problems getting to sleep and getting scared/anxious at night for quite a while. And this wasn't a major issue in itself. However I think this anxiety at night was a warning sign because in the past few months I have developed full blown panic attacks and severe anxiety. And I can see now those feelings I was getting at night were the beginning of my anxiety. Maybe if I I had realised that earlier I could have prevented my anxiety from becoming as severe as it did.

Hence I would suggest seeking help before it gets worse. I didn't think much of the difficulties getting to sleep but then my anxiety snowballed and became very severe.