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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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G12345 Feeling worse due to trauma
  • replies: 20

After being sexually harassed it’s just as painful as being sexually assaulted and I’ve been through both my trauma won’t let me go it’s holding my mind and I’m fighting it I’m tired of fighting I need a community to help me feel less uncomfortable a... View more

After being sexually harassed it’s just as painful as being sexually assaulted and I’ve been through both my trauma won’t let me go it’s holding my mind and I’m fighting it I’m tired of fighting I need a community to help me feel less uncomfortable and less pain can some help me thank you

Broken79 The worst type of betrayal
  • replies: 3

My heart is in my throat. My partner of 5 years sexually assaulted my 14 year old while he was intoxicated. The mandatory processes are in place And he says he doesn't remember. I asked him to leave the house as soon as I found out and my daughter is... View more

My heart is in my throat. My partner of 5 years sexually assaulted my 14 year old while he was intoxicated. The mandatory processes are in place And he says he doesn't remember. I asked him to leave the house as soon as I found out and my daughter is safe. He knows he can't come back My heart aches for my little girl. And I feel so messed up because I am grieving our relationship and I feel so guilty. Please help me get through this

Joolia95 Sexually Abused at School PTSD.
  • replies: 15

This post is hard to write as I have been silent for 20 years. When I was 10 years old I was sexually abused at school by a teacher. I never told anyone because I was scared that no one would believe me. I don't want to be silent anymore I want to te... View more

This post is hard to write as I have been silent for 20 years. When I was 10 years old I was sexually abused at school by a teacher. I never told anyone because I was scared that no one would believe me. I don't want to be silent anymore I want to tell my story so others too feel that they have a voice. I have suffered during my adulthood with relationships, jobs and trusting other people and as time goes on I believe it is all because I was sexually abused. Has anyone been in a similar situation? How did you get help and did you get lawyers involved. So much has been taken from me I want justice.

Knuckleberry_Poe Less than 680 more than 599
  • replies: 1

Over the last few weeks I've been struggling. I've had moderately ok to even maybe good, and I've had really bad days. Then last fortnight as I sat in my therapists office I told her I'd calculated that from the age of 11 to 16 the school teacher had... View more

Over the last few weeks I've been struggling. I've had moderately ok to even maybe good, and I've had really bad days. Then last fortnight as I sat in my therapists office I told her I'd calculated that from the age of 11 to 16 the school teacher had abused me around twice a week over a 22 week period over four years. Then in yr 11:- 2 to 4 times a week over a 38 to 40 week period. And that at college it was on a daily basis 5 days a week over a 40 week period. Plus 2 other seperate times outside of school and then at 20 being raped. I just couldn't and still can't wrap my head around that number. I'm not a genius at Maths in fact it was the subject I struggled with the most. So I asked my therapist was I over calculating. Each person was a different occassion and each person abused me multiple times. So was each day it happened a singular attack or were they counted as a whole. Over 599 times but less than 670 was the number we arrived at. Even being cautious I couldn't go lower than 500. I told her my life is a mess. And if I told people I knew what had happened and how many times they'd think I was crazy. And the nightmares are getting worse.

Guest_342 How should I feel?
  • replies: 4

Hi there. My nephew is very sick and in palliative care. He has been sick his whole life and this time it is looking like we might need to say goodbye. We don't know for sure. We have put our all into loving him and I have been very sad to see him su... View more

Hi there. My nephew is very sick and in palliative care. He has been sick his whole life and this time it is looking like we might need to say goodbye. We don't know for sure. We have put our all into loving him and I have been very sad to see him suffer in the years since birth. I want his parents to have the happy lives they deserve with their other little one who they welcomed last year. Does anyone have any advice on how I can feel I'm not thinking badly of him or devaluing him when I wish for his suffering to end? I know I've given him nothing but love but I have a guilty feeling weighing heavily on me for wanting to see the end. My dear brother is exhausted. What thought processes are normal and how can I do the right thing by him in that regard? How should I feel if we lose him? Even though this was inevitable and can't go on indefinitely, try as I might, I cannot seem to prepare emotionally for the time that we do eventually lose him, whenever that might be.

Treejaydoo Don't really know.
  • replies: 2

Hi guys, I'm really struggling today. My children woke me up early which hasnt helped. I cry myself to sleep most nights, my kids are always fighting and I just want to walk out on them. Their dad gave up with them a while ago, doesn't speak to them.... View more

Hi guys, I'm really struggling today. My children woke me up early which hasnt helped. I cry myself to sleep most nights, my kids are always fighting and I just want to walk out on them. Their dad gave up with them a while ago, doesn't speak to them. Maybe I parent out of resentment. It wasn't a good marriage, he isolated me from friends, sexually abused me and wouldn't let me leave the house. Its been 5 years since we split, he had a partner a month after we split and the two of them have dragged me to court for the last 4 years as a way to exhaust me, I always gave them what the wanted. My partner of a year has been helpful, but I feel like I'm sabotaging our relationship because I've got all these codependency habits. I have my own house now, wonderful family that support me. I put on a lot of weight over the last few years and suddenly I feel crap about myself every night. My dv councellor was no help, my kids all have supports, I have 2 good friends I can talk to. Why am I getting these horrible feelings and bad thoughts in my head when things are finally going okay for me? I don't even know what the point of this post is. .y mental health was used against me in family court, I can't even seek help or its used against me somehow. I worry that when me kids are older, I'll have no point in this world.

Knuckleberry_Poe New Here, Old Trauma
  • replies: 8

Hi, I don't know how to start this post. So I'll just post what I wrote late last night. Hell found me. Once more after many years. It found me but I went looking for it. The flashes of faces in my head just wouldn’t stop. I just wanted them to stop.... View more

Hi, I don't know how to start this post. So I'll just post what I wrote late last night. Hell found me. Once more after many years. It found me but I went looking for it. The flashes of faces in my head just wouldn’t stop. I just wanted them to stop. Why won’t they stop? So on a windy night, after midnight, curled up in my blankets with the big tv still on because I can’t sleep in the dark, I stumbled into purgatory. I’m tired and anxious and shit scared. His face won’t leave me alone. Tap, tap, tap in my memory he goes. It’s so frustrating that I want to cry. His face is there. It’s always there. It’s been in my memory for thirty years. The problem is, I can’t see his features, it’s like something has taken a sheet of course sandpaper to it and wiped it clean. I get snatches of a smile, a whiff of sawdust and cologne. An impression of strong firm hands and shock of white hair. It’s a jumbled puzzle that my brain can’t piece together, because I don’t want to. I’ve been looking for Hell for thirty years and Hell has found me tonight. It found me through an old photo I found online. It found me because the memory is a scab that won’t close over. The photo was there with memories from a history of time. And it wasn’t his face I noticed first. It was his name, listed as the teacher but he wasn’t in the photo. The next time I found him it was those all too familiar clothes and his physique. The third time I found him was in a photo from 1985. Six years before my hell began. It was in a staff photo and there were no names, but I recognised some of the other teachers too. Maybe not their names but there was a familiarity about them. Til I found him, it was that shock of white hair that drew me. The photo was small and as I zoomed in it blurred the faces of every teacher there. Still that feeling of fear from thirty years ago became a living entity inside of me. I froze and stopped breathing. Scared that he would reanimate from the photo and become a holographic nightmare in front of me. Hell found me. Tonight. It found me again because thirty one years ago as I attended school Hell found me. And released a monster into my life that I’ve never been able to get rid of.

Boudica How do you overcome a fear of intimacy following trauma?
  • replies: 7

I am a middle-aged lady now and I cope okay with day to day life, and can pass for a regular person. I rarely think directly of my childhood sexual experiences. But I know that it broke something inside me, and I cope through avoiding triggers, inclu... View more

I am a middle-aged lady now and I cope okay with day to day life, and can pass for a regular person. I rarely think directly of my childhood sexual experiences. But I know that it broke something inside me, and I cope through avoiding triggers, including avoiding close emotional or physical relationships. I gave up alcohol when I was in my early 20's. Since then, I have had one relationship. I really loved him, but it was difficult for both him and me. I was honest about my past and he was respectful of that, but even though we were dating for 5+ years and I made progress in being able to be touched, I still frequently had panic attacks and found I just could not be emotionally present during sex, and instead felt like lump of clay. I was attracted to him, but if I am honest, utterly disgusted by sex. It is very difficult to explain to someone that you find them physically attractive and yet you feel it is impossible for you to touch them, and if they touch you in a sexual way it is sickening. My partner at times experienced my episodes of terror, and they had a deep impact on him (and left me really hollow and exhausted). It was really hard for him to witness the raw pain I still kept in a box down deep, and it made him feel powerless and he also felt guilty for triggering me, though it was not his fault. As a result, he became very anxious and watchful whenever he touched me, which no doubt killed the mood for him too. Eventually I told him I just can't have a relationship, I do not think it possible for me. Yet it was so heartbreaking and lonely. I have not been able to bring myself to date anyone for 11 years. There have been a couple of men over the years that I have grown very fond of, and I am attracted to, but they vanish after a while when kept in the friendzone. I do so want to be able to have a close relationship like other people, but fear I will need to get through life on my own, as I always have. Is there anyone out there who has been broken like me, but fixed themselves enough to function in a relationship?

Sean_S C-PTSD: transcending the suffering and finding meaning
  • replies: 17

Hi all, I've been reading through the threads and I am stunned at the wisdom I'm finding in there. Tearing up often at people's stories. I hope to make some contributions to this community as I go about healing. I feel like I'm only beginning my jour... View more

Hi all, I've been reading through the threads and I am stunned at the wisdom I'm finding in there. Tearing up often at people's stories. I hope to make some contributions to this community as I go about healing. I feel like I'm only beginning my journey overcoming the trauma. I have CPTSD (preliminary diagnosis from a psychiatrist) and am currently working on finding a trauma-informed therapist that is bulk billing (fingers crossed). Briefly, my story. I have alcoholic parents who were drunk every night for all of my childhood that I can remember. I was harassed and hounded at all hours of the night, consequently I developed a severe sleeping disorder. My bedroom was not a safe place, and I eventually learnt to block my door with furniture. I moved out to begin university, I was free temporarily, met a woman I loved but in 2013 I was diagnosed with stage IV Hodgkin's lymphoma. I was 20 years old. We stayed together for 7 years, but I never fully recovered. She left me, understandably. I have chronic inflammation in my joints, despite being only 27. Vestibular migraines which cause me to be violently ill. I've been living back with my parents the past year which has been hell. So, I've been rather beaten up by life but am desperately trying to get healthy, get my independence and be free. I'm suffering existentially and trying to find a sense of meaning that can sustain me. Confusion and desperation is what I feel. Overwhelmed by complexity. I'm always in a state of chronic hyper-arousal, my sympathetic nervous system is hammering away. It's becoming harder to avoid taking anti-anxiety medication (which is addictive). I've started taking cold showers everyday, to try to switch of the trauma response. It helps. I'm reaching out for help wherever I can. Trying to chart a path that can carry me out of the hell I'm in. I crave insights. I want to know: for those of you much further down the pathway towards healing, what sustains you at your darkest moments? When you feel utterly hopeless, stuck between a rock and a hard place, suffocating? What did you use as your beacon, or your foundation? It would really nourish me to hear. I also want to know: if you could deliver a message to your younger self about what you have learnt, what you believe is most fundamental in treating complex trauma, what things would you direct yourself towards? What things do you regard as irreducibly important to know? Sean

bokts PTSD after seeing my son being hit by a car
  • replies: 6

Hi, i’m new here and feel like i am only now accepting that i may be going through PTSD. My 7 year old son was hit by a car a year and a half ago, he is fine now but broke his leg at the time. I have told myself and family and friends all this time t... View more

Hi, i’m new here and feel like i am only now accepting that i may be going through PTSD. My 7 year old son was hit by a car a year and a half ago, he is fine now but broke his leg at the time. I have told myself and family and friends all this time that i am fine, but in reality i have nightmares and i get a lot of anxiety around roads and driving and my kids being near roads. I feel like i have lost my happiness and i hide myself away a lot. I have always had trouble accepting help and i don’t like for people close to me to worry about me. I’m not really sure what to do as i don’t have much time on my hands with 3 young kids, work and a busy husband. I though maybe someone who has been through a similar experience could give some tools ? thanks