Beauty and the Beast within. My life with PTSD.

What living with PTSD means to me. Yup, I’m the beauty, PTSD is the beast, without the inner beauty like the beast from Disneys Beauty and the Beast.

First let me explain a little bit about what PTSD is, in my words. PTSD is a mental health condition that causes the brain to act in a way in that it doesn’t process trauma in a right or healthy manner. PTSD is caused by something terrifying to that person. It can be an event you went through, such as a vehicle accident or abuse. It can also be caused by the witnessing of a traumatic event or seeing the after-effects of a traumatic event. As well as the PTSD, I have been diagnosed with Major Depressive disorder as well as an anxiety disorder. The 3 really have similarities and it is sometimes difficult to determine if it is the PTSD, the depression, the anxiety or just plain ol life that is kicking me down. I have a hard time knowing what is normal emotions. I take everything super personal and tend to be very hard on myself mentally.

What is important to note is, something that is terrifying to me or you may not be terrifying to someone else. Living with PTSD is exhausting. Right now I am not going to go into the things that lead to my diagnosis. That is much too much for me to begin putting into words. I am still working on that part with my psychologist.

The other important thing that I need everybody to realize is that even though two people may have experienced the same situation it doesn’t necessarily mean that those two people are going will end up with a diagnosis of PTSD or develop the same symptoms of PTSD. PTSD is very individual in certain ways although it does have many common traits to it.

A day in the life of me is very different each day. Overall I tend to be super emotional at things that most people can just easily cope with and not have it affect their mental state of mind. I’m sure part of this emotional person that I am comes from the fact that I have a lot of traits of an empath. I hope to write more about my thoughts on being an empath in the future. But for now, I will try my best to share a bit of life for me living with this vicious trio of Emotional Illness.

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Let me share with a bit about triggers. Triggers are a major thing when living with PTSD. For those of you that aren’t familiar with what a trigger is, let me try and explain. A trigger can be almost anything. A trigger can be a sight, a sound, a smell, a touch, words, just to name a few. You see really it can be anything. Triggers can happen at any time no matter where you are, no matter what a person may be doing. The trigger will affect your mind and can take control of you. You may feel like you are right back in the environment where the trauma actually occurred. It affects you mentally and physically. Sometimes people are able to work through some of there triggers with a lot of hard personal work with properly trained professionals. For me, I have been working on identifying my own triggers since about 2009. I have come along way but still, triggers can wreak havoc in my life.

For example, one trigger that comes to mind for me is confrontation. Now I know nobody is really a huge fan of confrontation however for me that’s a trigger. It makes me very nervous, my anxiety kicks in full force and I start to lose control of my mind. I lose the ability to see things rationally and reasonably. I can become fearful, paranoid and an emotional mess. I hate attending hockey games most times, I understanding fighting is a part of the game, but something inside me switches and I go from a normal common sense person to a highly agitated, paranoid person who automatically thinks things are going to get out of hand and someone will die. All in the blink of an eye, I switch. It sucks, I feel embarrassed, as I know my face changes and I look totally terrified. I feel like people are watching me and making fun of me for being so irrational. I know that I am being irrational but I simply can’t control the mind and emotions, and I end up leaving and hide out at home for way too long after that beating myself up for letting my mind take over in such an unhealthy way.

Sometimes something that is a happy thing for others is a trigger for me. For example, pregnant women or newborn babies, sometimes it brings my heart happiness but depending on where my head is it can also make me very sad and can make depression set in. The negative thinking and the dreaded feeling of doom take over. I know this trigger is stemming from the loss of my second child. It has taken a lot of self-work to understand, accept and work through the way this used to totally paralyze me. This is one trigger that I have been able to get a better grip on and be able to handle a little more rationally most times. Now don’t get me wrong, I do love babies and the thought of new life. What I am saying is that the pain and the fear that I used to experience for way too many years, I am able to better handle without letting it control me.

Another trigger for me is young soldiers or the talk of War. For other people triggers are completely different, for my fiance, loud noises can really be a trigger for him.

You may be asking, what happens for me when those triggers get a hold of me and my mind starts to spin? Well, this is where the words and thoughts get jumbled. I am trying to stay focused and continue to share, but I am feeling all over the place, so I hope this isn’t too much of a mess, but hey, if it is, welcome to a day in my head! 🙂 🙁

My mood changes in an instant, I can go from being in an okay mood to being completely unreasonable. My body can get very hot I can feel very flushed, I may start to shake. Irritability sets in and I completely lose patience. Sadly the mind can start to spin so quickly for me. I can say that in the past 10 years with time and with counseling and taking the time to really look inside myself I am getting better at recognizing when I am starting to spin. I still have times where my mind gets the best of me, today is one of those days. The negative thoughts set in the thoughts of self-harm set in and my head just really goes to a very dark place. Thankfully today I am able to keep the negative thoughts somewhat in control and the thoughts of self-harm haven’t crept in in quite a few months.

Before anyone starts getting too concerned about my state of mind let me reassure you, I am going to be ok. For today anyway, I know that. It is very difficult and scary trying to explain this to folks who aren’t familiar with the dark side of Emotional Illness. This brings me to the word that nobody likes to hear and nobody likes to talk about. Yep, that word is suicide. I’ve known people who have lost their struggle with PTSD and have taken their own lives. This is the last thing on earth I ever want to do. I have lots to live for, I have an amazing fiance and amazing friends, my children are pure joy for me. Even though I have all those positives in my life and things to look forward to, when my mind gets in that dark place it is very scary. I feel like I am losing control when the spinning gets so bad. One hand, when I’m in that state, I know how much pain taking my own life would bring to those people I care about. Knowing and having a better grip on that has been a huge factor in kept me alive this far I’m sure. On the other hand, those demons in my head just take over and all rational and sensible thoughts are quickly shot down and replaced by doom, the heaviness of the dark side is unbearable at times.

I can say now, that I am getting a better grasp on those demons but it is still scary knowing how strong those demons can be. I’m getting to a position now where I can recognize that I’m in that dark place and I’ll take precautions to keep myself safe. This is something that has taken many years to learn to accept and understand and hopefully with time those demons will start to have less control over my mind.

“The anger, the rage, the hurt and the cold loneliness that separates you from your family, friends and society’s normal, daily routine are so powerful that the option of destroying yourself is both real and attractive.” 

Dallaire, after he was found collapsed in a public park following his retirement.

I know this has been a long read so far, if you are still reading, I thank you from the bottom of my heart. It means the world to me that you are taking the time to read about mental health issues that no one really likes to acknowledge or know how to acknowledge and understand. Although I can smile a lot of the days now, more so than I could in the past, let me tell ya, there are still days where I’m very dark inside. Hopelessness is a word that I used to use quite frequently. With the help of many psychologists over the years, and with paying better attention to who I am inside, and why I feel certain things, that hopelessness feeling occurs a lot less.

PTSD has robbed me of a lot of my memories. It has left a lot of gaps in my past and it also has affected my short-term memory. It is very difficult to stay focused on one task. Memory is quite important and when the short-term memory is affected because of the PTSD, it makes concentration very difficult.

It has only been in the last year that I have been able to say that I am actually having feelings. That may be kind of strange to hear. In the past, I thought I was feeling emotions, but in reality, I was just stuck in a constant state of feeling numb, not really able to recognize much of anything emotion wise. The more I learn about my mind I realize that in fact I was just numb and I really had no feeling at all. I wasn’t able to actually feel joy or actually feel sadness. I was just in a constant state of nothing. This is probably more of the depression making me this way, but that is something else I am still working on, having good and bad emotions and knowing how to deal with emotions.

I remember about a year ago I was in with my psychologist and I was very worried because things were going quite well in my life at that time. I had described my feelings to her and told her about what was going on in my life. I was getting more involved with the veterans support group I helped co-facilitate. I had reconnected with a wonderful man who was helping me to find life again. Yeppers, that man is my fiance! What I didn’t understand was that I was actually feeling happy, she explained to me that everything I was saying to her was happiness. What the heck do you mean this is a normal feeling?? Oh my gosh, what is going on! That really hit me hard because I was so worried that I was entering into a state of mania, I was not sure what this feeling was and it made me scared. So for her to say that I was simply being happy that scared the crap out of me. It meant I was actually starting to feel emotion again. You may think that that is a great thing and yes while I guess it was, and is a great thing, at the time it was really scary because it was so foreign to me. I was so used to having complete numbness and not really knowing any highs or lows that actually being happy made me scared.

“Happiness is when what you think, what you say, and what you do are in harmony.” 

Mahatma Gandhi

I know life living with me is not easy, my children have been through some very difficult times, they’ve seen me in some super depressed states. They’ve been at the brunt of me losing patience at the simplest of things. They’ve seen me lose my cool and overreact at things they have done. They’ve seen me cry over the littlest of things. I’m happy to say, even though it’s been hard on them, my children have also been able to see me own up to my actions. They’ve seen the look of complete paranoia and fear in my face. They’ve felt the awkwardness of not knowing what to do.

I’ve tried to educate my children at their level on what my PTSD is and how it affects my everyday life. It took me quite a few years to be comfortable to try and be open and educate my kids on something so raw and uncomfortable. For the longest time, I tried to hide everything. I tried to hide my PTSD, my depression, my anxiety attacks. These are taboo things in society and I certainly shouldn’t admit to my kids that I am not perfect!! LOL, because in my mind every other Mom out there was perfect and I was nothing like that in my head. I see myself differently most days now. I used to and hide my outbursts or cover them up some stupid ridiculous lie. It wasn’t until I decided to be open with them and share a little bit with them, that things in my head got a little better. When I was in the phase of trying to hide things from them it brought a lot of guilt to me. They felt that they were doing things wrong. They were feeling like they could never please me because I was always losing my patience. What they didn’t know and what I was hiding from them was the fact that I was super proud of them and my outbursts and my reactions were not a result of their actions. This was the result of me letting the vicious trio get the best of me.

The biggest thing I think I have learned so far about being a mom and being a partner with PTSD is communication is so important. With no communication, my kids, my partner and the people around me don’t understand where my head is at. When I am cranky or when I am irritable and I don’t tell them why it’s easy for them to assume it’s because of something they did. So slowly I’m learning to communicate and just simply say ‘ holy crap I’m having a day.’ This is kina my warning label for those around me!! Oh, oh, the vicious trio is taking over her… ughhhh .
I’ve learned to apologize for outbursts that may have been hard for them to see. I’ve learned to vocalize more when I’m having a struggle so that they know it’s not their actions that are making me upset or sad.

I feel like I’m starting to lose focus and am getting a little overwhelmed. I’m going to sign off for now. I hope this sheds a little bit of light on what it’s like living with PTSD.

I’m slowly becoming an open book as far as my journey with PTSD and the vicious trio, any questions you might have I would be happy to try and answer.

Thanks for taking the time to join me on this journey as I begin to share my PTSD struggles.

Future blogs will eventually explore more of the physical effects that PTSD has on me! Oh the joys, the restless legs at night, the migraines, the belly issues, the sore jaws, the lack of sleep, oh me oh my!!

Until next time my friends, be kind to yourself and look out for others.