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PTSD and trauma

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A_Tech PTSD for Medical and First Responders
  • replies: 275

Hi, Well obviously this my situation. I was hoping to find others here that might have a similar background to chat with, it can be so hard to talk about this stuff with non-med people (and I mean no disrespect, it's just often graffic or upsetting t... View more

Hi, Well obviously this my situation. I was hoping to find others here that might have a similar background to chat with, it can be so hard to talk about this stuff with non-med people (and I mean no disrespect, it's just often graffic or upsetting to others). Im a 40 year old female that has spent the last 10years in the State Trauma Hospital as an Anaesthetic Technician. My PTSD was brought about after years of exposure to shocking traumas, deaths, and no support from management. I would love to hear from anyone that has a similar story, or just wants to chat. Cheers

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ElyseH Childhood sexual abuse
  • replies: 7

I have spoken on here a couple of times, this time I think i'm seeking reassurance I guess. I have been seeing a psychologist for years so i have the support, i just saw him this week and i wont be due in for another month or more so here i am. Last ... View more

I have spoken on here a couple of times, this time I think i'm seeking reassurance I guess. I have been seeing a psychologist for years so i have the support, i just saw him this week and i wont be due in for another month or more so here i am. Last night got me thinking of how behind i am in life compared to friends, slow with learning and understanding things most people even younger than me seem to have taken on board. Then this time it struck me that I repeated year 2 due to math learning difficulties. I was never able to pin point how old I was when a brother of mine abused me for his own experimenting. I am starting to wonder if that happened at age 7ish which would line up with learning troubles in school. I've always wanted to understand the reason behind so many issues I struggle with but my Dr or psych has never specifically said that my experience as a child is the thing that contributes to my problems. I would have to be about 7 years and my brother is 2 years older than me, one day he did stuff to me . Although at that time I didn't know what any of it meant and I don't feel traumatised by it now but I wonder if there is underlying affects it had on me.

Moose17 What is the difference between CPTSD/PTSD and anxiety?
  • replies: 1

I was abandoned in childhood and now I suffer from emotional flashbacks whenever I’m triggered by anything that remotely suggests to me that I’m about to be abandoned by someone I care about. When it’s really bad, I simply can’t function and fall int... View more

I was abandoned in childhood and now I suffer from emotional flashbacks whenever I’m triggered by anything that remotely suggests to me that I’m about to be abandoned by someone I care about. When it’s really bad, I simply can’t function and fall into a type of depression. I avoid relationships altogether (have done so since I was abandoned), and generally find people triggering because of this fear of letting others get close to me. I also know I have social anxiety (have had this since I was very young), and I struggle with focusing and I also worry a lot about the future. I’ve been going to therapy for a while now, and my therapist has mentioned anxiety and attachment trauma, but has never raised CPTSD/PTSD. I’m not sure why, maybe because being told I have CPTSD/PTSD seems more validating to me than just being told I have anxiety, but I’m desperate to know what I actually have. Which brings me to my question - what is the difference between anxiety and CPTSD/PTSD? Does is sound like I have either of these? Or is it possible that all I have is anxiety? I know I should ask my therapist, but I’m very worried about being triggered if he tells me all I have is anxiety. I’m also genuinely curious about the differences because I know these all come under anxiety disorders in the DSM (excluding CPTSD which hasn’t been included).

Yamoro Cptsd, eating disorder and now substance use
  • replies: 8

I see suffered childhood trauma. But used to deal with it quite well. Until March, when my mother physically attacked me. I’m 34-and a single parent, my ex is addicted to substances and has PTSD. I guess hurt people are attracted to each other, regar... View more

I see suffered childhood trauma. But used to deal with it quite well. Until March, when my mother physically attacked me. I’m 34-and a single parent, my ex is addicted to substances and has PTSD. I guess hurt people are attracted to each other, regardless of how toxic it it. I had always dealt with it without substances. But I have just been diagnosed with PTSD after the incident in March between my mother and myself. On top of that I have re-developed my childhood burden of binge eating disorder. And have been unable to control myself from over drinking in the evenings. I’m totally alone and scared. I loathe the person I can see myself becoming. how can I cope anymore? What reasonable measures have others put in place to drink? Please help me with your suggestions

_goldfish_:o Help and advice
  • replies: 7

I wanted to reach out because I'm really worried about an upcoming event and I don't know a lot of people I can talk t who will understand. I have PTSD from being hit by a car 3 years ago and I have road-ready coming up. I'm really worried because I ... View more

I wanted to reach out because I'm really worried about an upcoming event and I don't know a lot of people I can talk t who will understand. I have PTSD from being hit by a car 3 years ago and I have road-ready coming up. I'm really worried because I don't know how well I will cope especially since people have said that you have to watch actual videos of accidents. I don't even know if I will have a teacher or friend with me that I trust because my year(10) is going to take the course at the local college. I would just wait to do the curse until I know I am comfortable with it but it would cost me a ridiculous amount of money outside of school. I don't have a good idea of my triggers either because I just generally avoid this kind of thing. So, I just wanted to know if anyone had any advice or coping strategies, I just don't know what to do. Also, everyone can feel free to ask for advice in this thread (p.s sorry if I wrote anything wrong this is only my second post)

moss_on_a_rock I feel like I’m trapped in a cycle I can’t get out of.
  • replies: 5

Hi all. I’m currently without housing security, have no car, no license, no money and no support system. I’m 24F and have lived with extreme agoraphobia and subsequently depression since I was 13. I also suffer from C-PTSD, fibromyalgia, OCD and am o... View more

Hi all. I’m currently without housing security, have no car, no license, no money and no support system. I’m 24F and have lived with extreme agoraphobia and subsequently depression since I was 13. I also suffer from C-PTSD, fibromyalgia, OCD and am on the spectrum (just found out recently and my family won’t accept/believe it and think I am just “lazy”. I finally got out of my small town again after having to leave the city due to my mental health being awful. I was living with my best friend and my beautiful cat in a great apartment, and, for the most part, I was happy for the first time in a long time. I still couldn’t work due to my agoraphobia, but I loved being in the city. I felt confident and beautiful, and ready to date. I met a man who what I know know as “lovebombed” me, before I knew it, he had upset some pretty rough people and he manipulated me by telling me that if I didn’t come with him, he wouldn’t speak to me again. I was so scared and confused that I left with him to his home place 12 hours from my own. Within a month he beat me and my father begrudgingly picked me up, believing it to be my own fault. Now I’m living back in my home town, in someone I went to school with’s backyard. I can’t/don’t want to get out of bed. My relationship with my best and only true friend I lived with has fallen apart. I am terrified of everyone and everything. My accomodation situation is becoming toxic, but I have no money to move and start again. I have been in treatment for 10 years, on every medication under the sun, have been in mental health units long and short term with no improvement, had 25 rounds of TMS and 9 rounds of ECT and Centrelink still won’t put me on the Disability Support Pension and have rejected me twice. Apparently I need a $500+ Autism assessment before they can accept it, despite my conglomerate of diagnoses. I’m just another product of the failed system at this point, and I’m worried I’ll become a statistic. I can’t even afford nutritious food for myself, let alone a $500 assess. I want to start a GoFundMe so I can get my assessment and money for a security deposit in a sharehouse but I am just full of shame. The only thing keeping my alive is my kitty. I just don’t know what to do.

PrincessMilktea Sexual assault is one of womanhood's darkest, most unreported rites of passage
  • replies: 12

It happened to me again tonight. I suppose I shouldn't be so surprised it happened - or that I'd be blamed for it. Why was I chosen? Why was I made to feel unsafe in my own body? Scared of my own shadow? We're taught to cover up, get home before dark... View more

It happened to me again tonight. I suppose I shouldn't be so surprised it happened - or that I'd be blamed for it. Why was I chosen? Why was I made to feel unsafe in my own body? Scared of my own shadow? We're taught to cover up, get home before dark, watch our drink, re-think that mini-skirt, keys between the knuckles - ritualised surrender to the reality of sexual violence and misogny.I can't walk anywhere now with someone behind me without my heart thundering, my blood rushing to my ears, my mind haunted with flashbacks. I can't tell my man why I'm simultaneously aroused yet ghastly afraid of the very things that make him so attractive to me, of his larger muscle mass, those meaty, square-tipped fingers that could just as easily bestow violence as they did rapture. I can't tell him that I can't associate sex without violence and violence without men.I can't tell him those things because he'll just look at me with some mixture of sympathy and confusion, the one worn by a bystander observing a reality he will never face but understands on a rational level, exists. And sure, men are raped by other men too, and in some ways this serves as a larger humiliation for the male ego, yet the acute vulnerabilities exclusive to women, but absent in men, makes the threat far more proportional and unimposing for the latter. Men will never experience other men the same way women experience men, and in this decoupling, is why discussions of rape culture and patriarchy will always be mediated through the fear of the victimised and the indifference of the invulnerable as she negotiates her worth on his deaf ears. There is no fairness in this. No justice.And though I'm harrowed by my experiences with sexual assault and male indifference to it - I know that when he asks me later tonight if I'm doing okay, it'll send a deluge of shame down my spine for having thought so ill of him, even in generality. Time for a cry.

lana_cat Dealing with PTSD symptoms for sixteen months now.
  • replies: 3

I left an extremely emotionally abusive five year relationship sixteen months ago and I feel like I have done everything I'm supposed to do, in terms of cutting all contact with the abuser and never seeing anything to do with him again, but I am stil... View more

I left an extremely emotionally abusive five year relationship sixteen months ago and I feel like I have done everything I'm supposed to do, in terms of cutting all contact with the abuser and never seeing anything to do with him again, but I am still having regular flashbacks to episodes of abuse, almost constant rumination about everything that happened, often intense feelings of depression and worthlessness, and frequent feelings of disassociation where everything suddenly seems alien and strange. I'm literally never happy. I haven't been happy at all in the past sixteen months. Even though the relationship was highly abusive, it was somehow easier dealing with the intensity of the abuse than it has been dealing with the flashbacks and trying to process everything in retrospect. During the abuse, there is so much adrenaline and you are reacting in the moment, there is seemingly no time to really digest what is happening, and the abuse was almost non-stop for all those years, there was never a moment where I had space to truly reflect or escape the intensity of it, and perhaps that's why I'm still trapped in PTSD sixteen months later. I've recently started therapy as well, but it's honestly been triggering. I avoid most triggers as best I can. More subtle triggers are hard to avoid and can spark a flashback before I know it, but anything directly related to the abuser I try to avoid. I just feel like it's taken over my life. I don't feel free of the abuser. I don't know what I'm doing wrong to not be able to get over it. I've poured myself into my passions, my art, travel, improving myself, but at the same time I'm completely numb when it comes to meeting people -- I can't stand the idea of a new relationship or intimacy with anyone ever again, it just makes me feel terrified and sick. My future feels empty and bleak in that sense. I have zero desire or interest in being with anyone, ever, because I now have a deep distrust of men that I can't shake. I'm so tired of flashbacks, they are so real that it's like time travel, suddenly I'm right back in the moment and it's fresh and I can hear his voice as if he's speaking to me directly again, saying terrible things, and all the intricacies of the abuse, the way I was objectified and used and reduced to nothing. I don't remember how it feels to be happy.

Lyssaa Scared of liking someone
  • replies: 1

Hi everyone,Recently, I think I've started to develop feelings for a guy that I've met at uni- for reference the two of us have been talking over snap for nearly two weeks now and have hung out once in uni. So far, all I'm seeing from him is green fl... View more

Hi everyone,Recently, I think I've started to develop feelings for a guy that I've met at uni- for reference the two of us have been talking over snap for nearly two weeks now and have hung out once in uni. So far, all I'm seeing from him is green flags, and maybe even some signs that he likes me- he asks me how my day has been, he told me over snap that he thinks I'm really pretty when he was drunk and the next day he confirmed that he does think that, he's told me I have beautiful eyes, and during the day we hung out after class he was really easy to get along with and we joked around a lot. All my friends are saying it sounds like he likes me, but due to my past experiences with guys I'm afraid for a few reasons.My last relationship was nearly four years ago and even though it was only a few months and I was young, I was left with a lot of self-esteem issues- him and a girl who I thought was my friend at the time but actually wasn't were close with each other throughout our relationship and would always say they loved each other, and he facetimed her on one of our dates. He also made a joke about my acne, which at the time was a huge insecurity of mine, and didn't treat me very nicely overall. My other major experience with a guy during high school was with this guy who liked me consistently for four and a half years whom I was friends with, but he could never seem to take no for an answer and would constantly find ways to subtly touch me, be around me and do things which made me uncomfortable- making a photo of the two of us his wallpaper, always staring at me, implying to his dad that we were dating and even going so far as to admit that he used to drive his car past my house sometimes. Because of these past experiences, I'm afraid of a few things. I'm afraid that this guy might not actually like me but is just saying nice things to me because he has some ulterior motive or is trying to play me, because I'm convinced that no guy could ever actually truly like me as a person. I'm also afraid that even if he does like me, he'll either turn out to be an arsehole like the guys who have liked me in the past, or he just likes me for my looks or something- again, because I don't believe a guy could genuinely like me. All my friends are trying to reassure me and I feel so stupid- does anyone have any advice for me, or any kind of input on this situation at all? I hope everyone is having a wonderful day

Shawtyreckless_ Family trauma and loss
  • replies: 4

I grew up in a really conservative home. I never saw my parent's show any form of affection with each other. Im only now realizing the impact it's having on my relationships. I remember the first fight I witnessed between my parents. I saw how horrib... View more

I grew up in a really conservative home. I never saw my parent's show any form of affection with each other. Im only now realizing the impact it's having on my relationships. I remember the first fight I witnessed between my parents. I saw how horribly my father would treat my mother. He didn't respect her, he didn't care about how his actions hurt her, and us as kids. As a kid I was oblivious to their fall outs. I would see some things, my mum crying and praying in her room. My dad not coming home until very late and sleeping in the garage. I'm now 17 years old and Im only now seeing the damage it's having on me. I'm getting flashbacks of trauma I experienced at age 5, and all the fights they've had. I resent my father now because, he was someone I looked up to from when I was reeeaally young. Like he was a superhero to me. He took care of the family. He worked all night making sure we were fed and had somewhere to sleep. But I just feel like it was all meningless knowing that he didn't want us. It was really easy for him to walk out and start a new life without us and I'm bottling up my true feelings because I have young siblings who have no clue what's going on right now. My cousin says I'm strong. But I don't believe it. I don't. It took 2 years for me to move on from my uncle's death, and now I'm dealing with the void from my father leaving with no explanation. I just think I'm the unluckiest human alive. But what hurts and scares me the most is that, after everything that's my father's done to my mother, the cheating, lying, sneakiness... I know she would take him back in a heartbeat even when it's draining for us too.

P12 Long Term Trauma
  • replies: 6

I received a recommendation to start a new discussion when my main discussion has apparently not initiated discussion with other than one other member over the past few months. I would like to ask whether anyone may share their experience overcoming ... View more

I received a recommendation to start a new discussion when my main discussion has apparently not initiated discussion with other than one other member over the past few months. I would like to ask whether anyone may share their experience overcoming long term trauma? My experience is that the prevailing strategy is to assume that long term trauma exists because the individual holds an incorrect belief. Therefore the solution is to correct the belief. However, I found it almost impossible to change a belief that is validated by stronger evidence than that which is suggesting an alternative belief. Thank you.