My PTSD used to be really bad. While I think I have it firmly under control and haven't had major symptoms in years, this month will be the test. October was the worst, as it's the anniversary of a lot of trauma (the complications of it led to more trauma as I was growing up). I've had signs in my dreams that it might manifest in its dangerous form again, but so far it hasn't happened. If I get through this October and have no major episode then that will make me feel so much better about the rest of my life.
Most who have PTSD are not constantly paralyzed by trivial things, though there are moments that something trivial can trigger it out of the blue when 99% of the time it wouldn't. Also, anything that sparks adrenaline might trigger it, regardless of what caused the surge of adrenaline.
Another thing is that phobias and PTSD are very different. You don't need a traumatic event of falling or involving heights to develop acrophobia, for example (though it's conceivable that such a traumatic event could create a condition similar to acrophobia). Phobias seem to be more genetic (though not necessarily manifesting in the same way) and one doctor at my PTSD support group (he's there for the support, he practices medicine, not psychiatry) says phobias are something in the brain being unable to properly handle a certain brain chemical (it's been years since I heard this and that's all I remember). Thus phobias and PTSD shouldn't be treated the same way.
(And on a side note, those who experience amnesia from trauma should NOT be made to remember it before they're ready. It's forgotten for a reason, and forcing the memory can have serious harmful effects.)
I've seen the word "trigger" become popular on the internet in the last decade that is unfortunate. It's not being properly used, but that's how it is being misunderstood by the public, including people who use the word glibly, either out of sympathy or contempt.
At its worse I could enter survival mode and become dangerous. Though October was my birthday (just another reason I'm glad birthdays weren't common to me as a child, and remain uncommon as an adult as I don't care for them, and back then it could be intolerable to be fighting PTSD while trying to pretend to be happy for my birthday--hmm, no wonder I sympathized with Buffy about bad things happening around her birthday!).
I loved Halloween (and just autumn, one of my favorite songs by Bella Morte is
Autumn ), it was also when I had the most episodes. It's because of an attack on me this month when I was 11 that started the first nightmares, but calmed until the next year in which left me short tempered. Long story short, I kicked a boy in the face as we were going upstairs at school over his refusal to stop goosing me and the school shrink got a bounty to have me put into a hellish hospital (this was where meds were forced on me that have screwed with my body) the following October. Later, while a runaway with too little sleep because of these nightmares (among other factors) I misjudged a situation to be traumatized yet again that left a scar on my neck that lasts to this day (though not anywhere as bad as it was then, back then I had to cover it because people thought it was okay to ask me about it constantly), in addition to other (more severe but less visible) permanent damage to my body. So all this happened, or at least started, in October, and that month made my body go on red alert.
I learned that no one would defend me but me, so I got a gun and learned how to use it. But when I was having an episode I kept it locked away. When triggered, which could be from flashback nightmares that had me awaken with full adrenaline and having to turn on every light in the house as I patrolled everywhere, even the broom closet, in which I wouldn't allow myself a gun, but would have a stick with me...if on the off chance a home intruder had broken in at such a time, I'm sure he'd have rather been shot (even better, just cow before the gun while the police show up) than be smashed into paste by me while my adrenaline was in high gear, suppressing conscience and greatly augmenting speed and strength (at least until the crash after, which might lead to nodding off and more nightmares). Part of me was aware, but there was NO calming down until I'd made sure I was safe, and I did not want company then. It's a contributing factor to why I've always had my own room that I can set up any way I want, and if I shut it all the way then I'm not to be disturbed for any but the most important reasons (I was forced to be independent as a child, and when I'm like that I expect others to be just as independent, or start learning).
Such wasn't the only time, just the predictable one. I'd just turned 21, still wearing a scarf to cover the angry red scar on my neck though about 3 years had passed. He asked about my wearing a scarf when it was so warm (better than asking about the scar that he'd have asked about instead if I weren't wearing it), and that should've been a sign to him. I think he was attracted to me, and I liked him well enough, but didn't sense it becoming more than it was.
He wanted me to see the new
Texas Chainsaw Massacre that had come out and I said, knowing my PTSD limitations (not that I told him I had it as he'd have asked what about, which I didn't want to talk about, especially then as I had to deal with it far more than I wanted to as it was), refused. He kept trying to convince me, told me it was hokey and that if I can watch
Army of Darkness (which I could) then I can watch this, and get a laugh. He came up with something that as I grew up in Texas he wanted me to know "how accurate it was of Texans" which made me laugh (the idea of wearing dead skin masks and sawing people up being a Texas tradition, MY tradition, which may not be how he meant it, but how it sounded to me), and laughter relaxes me.
I finally did, and not only was it everything about slashers that keep me from watching them (especially back then, I've lightened up a bit with age) but it had an especially grotesque scene that was too close to being like where I'd been at 16 in October (just before I turned 17). I didn't care that there were little kids treating the movie with jaded disinterest (one thing that made me decide to tough it out earlier) I was getting out because I felt a major episode coming on, one in which I'm dangerous to others.
The fool GRABBED me as I tried to get past him. I'm sure he thought it was cute, maybe even saw it as his saying "Don't be scared, I'm here to protect you." He'll never know how close I came to punching his throat with the full force of my adrenaline.
It was an act of supreme willpower that all I did was cover my ears and bury my face in his chest. He thought he was cool and didn't understand why I wasn't interested in seeing any more movies with him (and wonder, did he really think the movie was a comedy-horror, or just tricking me?). Despite my keeping from killing him (and how that would've affected my own life), if I ever sit in on a jury of a woman (or anyone with PTSD) in similar situation that reacted worse than I did, I will do my utmost to vote against conviction. That was way too close.
Finally, here's a poem I wrote immediately after experiencing my October nightmares a few years later (October 23, 2006, just turned 24):
October in My Soul
Sometimes I wake up
the monsters just beyond my vision
reaching, grasping, clawing,
my nerves burning in terror
of the past resurrected
Even worse are those times I awaken
feeling empty
feeling nothing
thinking life is loss
for I've lost those I love and myself
and yet if I hadn't
I'd have lost that which I am
and those that I love now
All that is life
requires sacrifice
And beside my lover tonight
I dream of two foxes loving
in spring flowers that ends in Autumn
one fox killed by merciless huntsmen
as one fox heals alone through winter
Spring reveals a new lover
as the fox dances in joy but asks:
will the huntsmen return?
I awaken and realize I am that fox.
October is the month I love and dread the most
with its parties and nightmares
with its joyful laughter in my life
and the piercing screams
that shatter my past and my sleep
I admire the colorful dying world,
love the hint of chill in the air
but dread the tragedy I sense
riding in the wind
October is all around me
Joy and Terror dance within me
As it has been
so shall it be again
the seasons turn
the passions burn
stoking me sweetly
burning me to ashes
October reminds me that the joys of life are not without its toll
The death and loss are our constant companions to life and love
As we wander through a cornucopia
of hazy mirages and shadowy images
Life and Death, Day and Night in eternal dance
The living surrounded by ghosts of the pasts and the future
Ghosts calling my name from within my haunted soul
I was born in October
and surely I will die then, too
From the witch's cauldron we all sprang
and to the cauldron shall we all return
the cauldron of the One we all can't help
but to revere and fear
The witch of my cauldron is named October.
And as I join the witch in laughter,
the nightmares spring
from the shadows within me
haunting me by the knowledge that they have
their real life counterparts
as these echoes of the past
once again pounce
I hold on, I hold on
for I have felt their fangs before
and yet I remain
visible and invisible scars my badges
my pride, my shame
I know morning will come,
frosty and promising
and if it doesn't
then the horrors will no longer have me to haunt
dying with me
or leaving me to find other game
Though I wonder then, should I die
if I'd ever haunt others
just as others have haunted me?
Or would I finally be able to truly rest
the nightmares no more,
my dance and my mosh ended?
Though I really want to emphasize, not every day was like this. It wasn't constant misery, and this didn't define me. It was something I endured at times, but I have more happy memories than miserable ones over the years, and can speak with nostalgia about what happened before and after such experiences. Most of the time I'm resilient and clear headed in dangerous or traumatic experiences, but there are times that my body takes "survival mode" too far (or activates when not needed), and that is my PTSD.
I've had some interesting experiences that I think are somehow linked to my PTSD. One was my going to confront two men trying to lead a boy under my care away. I wasn't surprised they ran, but the girl who was talking me just before I did had gone silent and said it was like I'd drawn a knife, and that if I looked at her as I did those men she'd have peed herself. I kicked myself for not having her take those men photos with her phone, but it didn't occur to me, which I think is because my brain reverts to being a kid on the streets where picture-taking phones weren't a thing, so only after I calmed down did it occur to me.
A couple of others have been struck with extreme fear, including in one case where he couldn't have seen me THAT well...I'll always wonder what they see or sense (though I've heard theories from others that make sense, but not sure).
Finally, if any here suffer PTSD nightmares (or know others who do), I'll share how I think I made tremendous strides in overcoming the worst of it, first the nightmares and then the PTSD as a secondary effect (essentially, my brain was "caught in a time of helplessness" which I learned to overcome at a subconscious level, bringing modern advantages and skill sets to my "inner-child" so to speak) then I'll share how I did that. It probably won't do much good for someone who has led a good life and continued to do so save for a traumatic event that gave them PTSD (though if it was say several months or longer of hell then it might still work).
