Hello again!
I have spent the last few days letting the fact that I went public about having PTSD sink in, and I have had my ups and downs. I am happy to report that I feel strengthened and comforted by my decision. While I am not sure how I got here, I am thankful. I thought I would talk about some specifics regarding the early stages of my experience today.
Just to make it clear once again, I am not a medical professional of any kind, I am only writing about my own experience to shed some light on my highs and lows of PTSD with the hopes of helping someone understand their own struggles, or help you understand someone else’s struggles that you care about. Here we go…
I did not remember everything that happened to me right away. In fact, I came to realize that an entire night had been completely blocked out from my memory. Before that point, I only had my general worries about this guy who had been stalking me and was physically aggressive sometimes (not all the time). If I’m being totally honest, I didn’t remember all of those physically aggressive moments until memories of that blocked out night started to return.
Senior year rolled around, along with a strong desire to make the most of my last year of high school. I was determined to have a great year, get good grades, get into college, and make memories that I would cherish forever. Dating wasn’t necessarily at the top of my list, so I was caught off guard when a boy started to take an interest in me. I had seen him at my youth group the previous year and he was also in choir junior year, though it was a different class from mine. September of senior year, we found each other in the same choir class. I thought he was cute, talented, and an overall sweet, caring person (which he was and still is). We ended up spending a lot of time together and I was enchanted by the kind of person in front of me.
Now, at that point in time, I had no recollection of anything significant. However, I had certain behaviors that I couldn’t explain a purpose for. Things like never letting people hold my hands, or always being cautious of who spent too much time focused on me or having to be early to things (and I mean early, like an hour early) … I felt at the time like these were small things that would dissipate… we all know how things like that go…
By the time November came around, things were steadily escalating between this boy and me, however nothing official had been declared which was fine with me. I am a big fan of taking things slow, PTSD or not, I usually prefer the slow and steady approach. It was time for me to go on a college visit to the College of Idaho where, coincidentally enough one of my best friends attended school. I had a weird feeling all day. You know when you have that gut feeling like something is going to happen? It was like that, where I felt completely distracted from everything I was doing because the feeling was so troubling.
That night, I stayed with my friend in her dorm, and we were hanging out like normal. We talked about kids back home, about old memories and how much I missed having her at school with me. I don’t remember how we got on the topic, but we were talking about the boy I liked and then I think we shifted the conversation to a choir concert, and we talked about a specific time we were putting away equipment. And as I walked through that specific evening with her, it was like my mind opened a door, just barely so that I could see part way into what happened. I am not sure if being away from the environment was somehow a trigger to release some of these memories or if I felt more comfortable around my friend than I had before, but I remembered going into that back practice room to hang up my robe, and hearing him come in. I remembered turning around and asking him what he was doing there? I remembered feeling my back pressed against the wall by the door when I tried to get out. Then that was it.
I was confused by what had just flooded through my head. ‘What the hell was that?’ That was the repeating thought rushing through me. My friend was crying, my eyes were watering. I didn’t know what to think or what to feel. Was it a dream? A nightmare, rather? Was that something my imagination had invented? I felt sick. I felt cold and clammy and exhausted, but so alert and heated at the same time. I couldn’t begin to explain the terror that was filling me up. Then I started to think through the other things about that guy that I did remember… the stalking, him trying to follow me home, he even slapped me in the middle of passing period when dozens if not more students than that were passing by literally just inches away from me. It would make sense that he would try something like that in the practice room.
I did my best to ignore those memories and those thoughts. So what? So what if that happened, I have things to do, a senior year to enjoy and a life to live… and with that mindset, I entered into a relationship with that boy in December, thinking I could handle it.
I wasn’t able to carry that on for very long. When I went to school, one of the things we did was break up into sectionals during choir… my group was in that back practice room. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t focus. My eyes kept tracing the space between where the robes were and the wall by the door. I felt trapped in my worst nightmare. I didn’t have the energy to outwardly freak out, and if there was one thing I didn’t want, it was to freak out in front of my peers. I was feeling embarrassed and vulnerable, as if they could all see what happened to me and that I was worthless because of it… but how could I feel those things when I didn’t remember everything?
The best way I can think to describe this experience is describing having a book series on your bookshelf. Sometimes you lend a book in your favorite series to a friend, so when you stare at your bookshelf, there’s a book missing from that series. For example, if you are a Harry Potter fan and you were missing the Chamber of Secrets and the Goblet of Fire, there are two very significant details you would be missing right away: Harry Potter can speak with snakes and Voldemort has returned. Those are very significant details to the story that we need to know, so if you were reading the series and you didn’t have those books, you would know the beginning and the end, but what about the middle? How did some of these things happen? When did they happen? That’s what experiencing a blackout feels like later. There are chapters missing, memories that I cannot summon even if I sit down and try with everything I’ve got to bring them to the surface.
I don’t need to know everything that happened to go through the feelings that I did and sometimes still do. I have a lack of closure on top of a lack of understanding. I deal with questions about how or why someone could do that to me? I wonder what he could have done to me? How long was I in there? I would constantly wonder the worst, trying to push those thoughts away and in the end they would explode and I would have to deal with them all at once in a great capacity.
My fears developed from remembering the snippets of what happened. Seeing his face so close to mine, feeling his body coming closer to mine, smelling his chapstick, hearing his voice in my ear while darkness suffocated me. This is where the fight or flight response comes in.
For those of you not familiar with fight or flight, it is a response that your brain initiates of its own free will and is not a choice that you can necessarily make. Your brain assesses the threat or the situation, and then decides whether or not you need to freeze or run or fight. In my situation, my brain must have figured that fighting back was not in my best interest because my survival instincts indicated it was better for me to freeze. I told him my parents were waiting for me and that I had to go. I told him to stop, but then I was breathless. I was blind. I was numb. I was deaf. All I could sense was how fast my heart was beating and that I couldn’t see anything.
If you froze like I did, I hope I am not the first person telling you that that’s okay! It is okay! You were powerless in a situation where your brain had to make a choice based on survival. I don’t think this guy would have tried to kill me or wound me fatally in any way, but protecting my body is still covered under survival instincts. When that trust of others to respect boundaries is violated, it is so incredibly difficult to trust anyone with your body ever again. I still struggle today with my spacial and personal boundaries today, with people in my family and friends as well as people that I don’t know (which is normal).
PTSD, in my experience has its ups and downs (considering the point of this blog). My ups and downs usually happen in a series of days or weeks, not just a day by day basis. Other people may have different experiences, but for me, I have a great couple of days feeling confident and sure of myself, loving myself. Other times, if I get triggered, I go downhill fast! I start to go through all of my coping mechanisms, I usually flashback through the night at a rapid pace several times uncontrollably, and I will have a hard time sleeping, I won’t eat, and one person who had a similar experience to me said it feels like having the flu but for weeks instead of days. My last episode had me down and out for about a month before I felt like I was approaching my normal self.
My positive tip for anyone suffering from PTSD from any situation, is that having a great support system can save or break you. Having people I can trust and depend on in terms of my anxiety and stress has brought me so far, setting the foundation for me. From there though, it is up to us, as individuals to make the conscious choice every single day to best your best foot forward and give that day your best shot.
For those of you who are religious, I like to think of my PTSD struggles like this: God will never give me more than I can handle. And the beauty of that is, we get to put all of our burdens back on Him anyway! I find great comfort in that.
I hope you have a great day and a great week! I hope you find this insightful and helpful when it comes to understanding PTSD.
Until next time!
Flourishing With PTSD 