MHAW19: Living on the Edge - Life with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder [Guest Post]
As part of an attempt to bring lesser discussed mental illnesses, disorders, and diagnoses to the forefront of the conversation this Mental Health Awareness Week, I've invited people to share their experiences about under-represented diagnoses in mental health (see the series here). Today's blog about PTSD was written by the wonderful Bethany who blogs over at Botany Nichols
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Diagnosis
I loved school. I was a straight A* student, top set in every class and involved in as many extracurricular activities as I could manage. I had a dream to become a vet or a doctor, save lives and keep on learning and developing for the rest of my life.
That was until sixth form.
I scraped my way through my A level exams and the dream of becoming a doctor was swept out from beneath my feet. I remember sitting in the car beside my mum one day, discussing university options and the words,
“If I don’t get into university, I won’t even care” slipped my mouth. In that moment, I no longer knew the girl I was.
Education and learning had been the most important thing to me all my life, and here I was, blasé in the passenger’s seat, considering throwing away the one passion I’d always kept close to my heart.
I changed my plans and with the love and support of friends and family I just about got the grades to study Biological Sciences at Leicester University. I was diagnosed with chronic depression, prescribed anti-depressants and was jumping from counsellor to counsellor: none of which felt like I could make progress with.
By the end of second year, my ability to take care of my own hygiene diminished, and I ended up cutting off most of my hair because it had become so matted as I struggled to care for it. I put on a lot of weight, my dancer figure from 15 years of training was gone, and I didn’t care for the subjects I was taking.
I fell in and out of “depressive episodes” for years. I tried every anti-depressant, every counselling and therapy service the NHS suggested but something wasn’t right. I was told,
“You may just have a depressive personality, and as a result will need to go on anti-depressants every so often for the rest of your life.”
But that didn’t sit right with me.
I was the sort of person that people gravitated to because I was so positive. I had always been a happy-go-lucky girl with a spring in her step and a smile on her face. The diagnosis didn’t fit, and I couldn’t work out why…
...until I started talking about my trauma.
Once the cat was out of the bag, all of the pieces started falling into place and that’s when I was diagnosed with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder.
See, the problem with PTSD is that it can masquerade as depression or anxiety, because those can both be symptoms of the disorder. No one had addressed my fits of rage, night terrors, dissociation or flashbacks.
Getting diagnosed with PTSD was the turning point in my life. I started PTSD counselling with a specialist in historic trauma cases (historic being not recent) and underwent some lifestyle changes to help limit my exposure to trauma triggers: these included, leaving Facebook and limiting my exposure to the news.
Living with PTSD
I hate talking about this because I don’t want to be like “poor me, pour me another one”, so I’ll just give you the facts on my symptoms.
Anxiety
I feel on edge, I shake, I get the jitters. It can be anytime, anywhere. I can be alone, I can be with complete strangers, I can be with friends I have known for over 10 years and I will suddenly feel the need to run home and get into bed. I feel like the world is out to get me, I am swamped with negative thoughts and emotions, and I get very overwhelmed very quickly. Since being put on Propanolol I have been able to police this better.
Night Terrors
There have been periods of my life where I have stopped sleeping almost altogether. I have been tormented by night terrors for years. In fact, night time is the time when I experience my PTSD more than any other. I wake up screaming, fighting, crying, and it’s exhausting. I have tried sleeping medication, anxiety medication and mindfulness before bed but recently I have been put on an anti-histamine which is doing the best job so far.
Fits of Rage
I used to get in physical fights, something so out of character for me. I have worked on in this in anger management, and I’m much calmer now. Anger, for me, is such a useless emotion because I can’t use it to do anything productive, so this symptom would drive me crazy.
Flashbacks
I will experience my trauma all over again, as if it was happening to me exactly as it had done the first time. I have all the same thoughts, feelings and emotions as when I did then. I used to experience this multiple times a day, and with time I am learning to control them. Sometimes these are caused by triggers, sometimes they’re not, and I don’t know what will trigger me.
Dissociation
At the peak of my PTSD I would lose hours at a time. It started off that I would sit down, and then check the time and half an hour, an hour, or several hours had gone by and I had no memory of it. As it progressed, I would start to come to in places I hadn’t started in. The day I took it seriously was the day I started on a walk, and found myself miles away from home in the middle of a forest, with no memory of how I got there.
Thankfully, I can sense when dissociation is happening and am able to take steps to minimise my time disassociated. For me, it feels like I’m heading into a tunnel and my vision starts to turn dark around my peripheries. After working with the PTSD counsellor I have coping mechanisms to bring me back.
Attitudes
“You need to move on and get over the past” is one of the many phrases I have come across since my diagnosis and I will address this briefly: I can’t.
My brain chemistry has literally been altered by the trauma in such a way that the memory of the event isn’t stored correctly, but is instead strewn to the four winds within my mind. I can be minding my own business at a bus stop, see a poster for a new movie and have a flashback because a part of my trauma is stored in that subset of my brain. True story. These are called "triggers".
I can’t get over it because I don’t know where all those triggers are in my head and so my brain won’t let me get over the trauma.
Which leads to the second part of this section: Some aspects of PTSD have become a bit of a joke. “Trigger” is a word I’ve come to loathe. It’s thrown around in the media so loosely that has lost a lot of its original meaning.
“I’m so triggered right now” is associated with memes and “snowflakes” when in reality, a trigger for me leaves me paralysed with fear, reliving my trauma. It’s debilitating, and it’s terrifying.
I’m not one to promote social media policing, but I would just appreciate if people could educate themselves about the use of the term, before using it to describe for example, how they feel when people put broccoli in mac and cheese.
But jokes aside, the biggest struggle I face as a non-veteran with PTSD is that people don’t believe me.
“You can’t have PTSD if you’ve not been in a war.”
Post (after) Traumatic (frightening, distressing) Stress Disorder.
At no point in the title does it limit the holder to the experiences of war. One is more likely to develop PTSD if they are exposed to such distressing sights, thoughts and feelings if they are in a warzone, but it’s not the only place it can be developed. And I think it’s because of the confusion between PTS and PTSD.
1 in 3 people developed PTS (Post-Traumatic Stress) after a traumatic experience, including (but not limited to):
· Road accidents
· Assault (sexual or physical)
· Health problems
· Childbirth
The symptoms are much the same, but for a PTS sufferer they subside within a few months of the trauma. PTSD is a clinically-diagnosed condition. It doesn’t always develop right away but instead can take weeks, months or even years. One doesn’t have to experience PTS to develop PTSD.
PTS doesn’t require treatment, where PTSD does. Limiting PTSD treatment access to veterans would mean that thousands of people would be without the help they need.
Final thoughts
I don’t consider myself a trauma sufferer, but a trauma survivor. I have spent the last three years trying to rediscover that motivated, life-loving, enigmatic girl that I used to be. She’s re-emerging, slowly but surely.
But I am not the same. PTSD changes one’s brain chemistry, and I do respond to situations differently as a result. I have a lot of coping mechanisms to deal with my symptoms, but I’m still learning what works for me.
The world still feels like a terrifying place, and when one’s been through a trauma it’s hard to shake that feeling. Learning to trust again and feel safe is a slow, challenging process, but it can be done. I’m more cautious than I was before, I’m not so care-free, but I’m learning to love life in spite of that.
I don’t want to be treated differently, but if you think something might set off a flashback for me, maybe don’t say it or show me. I have the mechanisms to deal with them now, but of course if I don’t have to then that’s better.
And in case you wondered if I’d started to chase my dream again, I have. I’m two years into my PhD and on track to become Dr Nichols, specialising in plant sciences. Life is long and weird. You never know what other people are going through, or have gone through, so be kind, be mindful, and be patient.
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If you are struggling right now and feel like you need to talk to someone, The Samaritans can be reached at 116 123.
Interested in more content related to mental health? Click here to view more posts on this blog about mental health.
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