The selfishness of post-traumatic stress disorder

 After having spent some time over the past weeks chatting with perfectly friendly strangers as they came to pick up some items that I was selling via EBay, it rather hit me how much I enjoyed those contacts. In that regard it's even more frustrating that I always seem to end up by myself, whether holed up in my room as a child or teenager with books and my computer instead of hanging out with friends and classmates, or holed up in some apartment, often in front of a computer instead of hanging out with friends or family.

Pandemic aside, I think that the answer really goes back to the childhood trauma. As my mother put it, I changed practically overnight from a happy, carefree child who wanted nothing more than to be friends with everyone to a frightened child who refused to be touched or embraced by even their own mother. When you only become aware of those changes many years later and have to trace things back at that point, it's a tough job, which takes time. Time during which you are occupied a lot with yourself a lot.

Not just with digging through your own past and memories, but also trying to make sense of what it is that you are feeling and why you are responding in certain ways. Why did that one thing which I just got asked about upset me so much? Why did I suddenly start crying? Why am I feeling angry? Why does it feel right now like hurting myself is even remotely acceptable? Why do I feel worthless? Why do I feel ready to just give up on life?

Those outbursts of rage, of helplessness and intense regret and sadness are not only upsetting to oneself, but even more to one's environment, who are spared the emotional turmoil, flashbacks and intense feelings that associate such moments. When reading the story of a woman who tried to build up a relationship with a war veteran with PTSD [1], there's a lot of such moments in there. That said, the final point in that story ('It's OK to walk away') does make sense from the perspective of the caretaker, as they too have to protect themselves. On the other hand, it is also very cruel towards the person with PTSD.


As a victim of PTSD, it is not that you choose to behave in such a way. The level of awareness of one's own behaviour differs, of course, and there's a certain leeway in how far you can control your behaviour. In the end, however, the effect of PTSD if the patient is left without appropriate help or assistance is more akin to a person who is drowning. In their panic and fear, they do not realise that they are wildly flailing around, injuring and possibly killing their would-be rescuers along with themselves. Nobody is at fault, which is the real tragedy.

This article by Juli Fraga [2] focuses on loneliness with PTSD and why it's both a natural consequence and very wrong. The main thing being that becoming stuck in loneliness can reinforce the traumas. Left alone with one's feelings, dealing only with the day-to-day things of modern society (many of which are fairly hostile or can be interpreted as such), this would further promote the feeling that the outside world is unsafe, and thus also that trusting others is unsafe. If you're alone, nobody can hurt you, basically. Even though it is yourself that you have to fear the most of in that case.

Similarly, it shouldn't be up to just one other person to 'rescue' you. As said earlier in the 'drowning person' comparison, and described in the Health Line article [1], that tends to be a recipe for disaster. Speaking as someone who has also been at the other side in such a relationship (flatmate with diagnosed psychological disorder), getting the heck out of that situation is really the only way to salvage one's sanity and health. I barely got out of that situation, losing only all of my possessions when things turned a bit too... psychotic.


All of that said, I think that I am aware of most of my emotional and psychological outbursts and issues. There is obviously still a lot that I need to learn, especially since I kind of stopped that learning process back as a child for obvious reasons, but I want to understand and better myself. I enjoy dealing with the emotional fluctuations caused by my PTSD about as much as others around me do, which is to say it makes them want to run away and never return.

For me, however, I cannot abandon myself. This is the only 'me' that I have got, and it's the 'me' I have got to work with, even if it feels like a broken, shattered vessel, filled with regrets and haunted by ghosts of the past. I just have to make it work somehow. As Juli Fraga's article points out, something that can already help is to write down what you are feeling and experiencing. That would make this blog part of my PTSD therapy, I guess?

When I notice how others respond to me when they first meet me, I feel like there is definitely hope. That I can become master of these traumas instead of vice versa. Just have to rebuild that self-esteem, tweak that self-image, take a deep breath before the boiling, trauma-fed emotions get the better of me. Sounds easy.

What are you afraid of?


Maya


[1] https://www.healthline.com/health/mental-health/lessons-partner-with-ptsd
[2] https://www.rewire.org/loneliness-trauma-side-effect/