#ptsd

[rabbittongues]

intoxicated by terror and worry

[defire]

Fun things about trauma bonds I learned in the cult

(Specifically talking about the bond between victims of the same abuse)

Content: real-life scenarios, ptsd, trauma bond, forced labor, doublethink, emotional repression

Feels like they are the only ones that could ever understand you

Having similar conditioned responses

Having similar extreme responses--things that should be just funny become choking-hazard hilarious, things that should get a chuckle get a synchronous shrug

On that note, often saying the exact same thing in the exact same tone

Specific things like whumper's tone of voice when they say a certain thing, would be a joke when they weren't there

Singing to cope with many hours of forced hard labor, immediately going silent when whumper entered

Talking about the trauma was OFF LIMITS, only code-speak that whumper couldn't understand could be used to warn each other

Only certain feelings were allowed to be shown because we had been conditioned that some feelings were "not safe"

Openly admitting to each other that it wasn't safe inside the house with whumper and then telling outsiders that we were totally safe and thinking we were telling the truth both times

All saying exactly the same lines to strangers (example "we are all wretches" *shrug*)

Married-couple-level nonverbal communication.

"do you want this extra food? I'll sneak it to you under the table." "Give it to [other victim]." "Watch out, whumper's looking." All happened nonverbally with eye and head movements right in front of whumper.

Working together seamlessly (or else!)

As soon as you leave the cult, the pressure that forced the bond in the first place, the trauma-bond relationship can fall apart

No good relationship ever feels as intense or close as the trauma bond, and you wonder what you're doing wrong. Till you realize you aren't panicking constantly--that's the main difference

[entrapdaknation]

It's fascinating to learn about how ancient people struggled with the same traumas as modern people.

Physicians' records from the Assyrian empire describe symptoms among soldiers such as unintelligible speech, disorganized thoughts, depression, and nightmares involving ghosts. That certainly sounds like PTSD.

Nothing New Under the Sun: Post-Traumatic Stress Disorders in the Ancient World

In Histories, Herodotus mentions an Athenian soldier names Epizelus who suddenly became blind in the heat of battle, despite having sustained no injuries to his eyes. Perhaps Epizelus experienced a conversion disorder due to war trauma?

Histories -- Epizelus

Sumerian Veteran: *has severe PTSD but doesn't know it because the term won't be invented for another 5000 years* I fight the same battle in my dreams every night and my relationship with my family has fallen apart.

Sumerian Healer: *saw hundreds of veterans with the exact same affliction before* You're cursed by desert demons.

[moonlitmeadowsys]

just because your abuser has “changed” and everything is “in the past” does not mean you need to forgive them. i’m sick of abusers and the people around them expecting forgiveness when it isn’t deserved. this especially applies when the abuser has done nothing to acknowledge or rectify their actions.

the axe forgets; the tree remembers. perhaps they have moved on and forgotten about it, but their victim will carry the scars for the rest of their life. you��re allowed to feel angry, upset, betrayed or any other emotion towards them.

so, if anyone ever tries to make you feel guilty for not forgiving your abuser, remember that you don’t owe them your forgiveness. you’re allowed to feel however you want about them.

[breetz]

the war flashbacks, THEY’RE HITTING ME ALL AT ONCE

help HELP

SOS AYUDAAAAA

[weemietime]

Undiagnosed PTSD and intergenerational trauma that gets passed on to the kids. PTSD used to be known as Da Costa or Soldier's Heart because it does cause observable changes to heart and blood pressure.

I was on a beta blocker at 30, I stopped bc I couldn't handle the side effects but I should technically be on one, I'm stage two hypertensive because of PTSD. Stress literally kills you, it shortens your life. Some estimate PTSD shortens your life by like 20 years. And that's not even accounting for the harmful shit people do to themselves to cope. Drink, drugs, etc.

And not even getting into how shit their lives were when they were refugees going to Israel. Some of them would get spit on in the streets and called collaborators and shit even though they were forced to do shit. Because we didn't know better at the time. And most of them lived in poverty and never got any kind of reparations.

And not to mention that gay prisoners did not even get to leave prison. They were put right back in jail. Look up paragraph 175, I'm sure you know all about this shit though.

Just some random thoughts. All under a cut for obvious reasons.

How many people who survived the Holocaust truly survived? How many people walked out alive, but empty? How many ended their own lives? How many did so, but had it covered up by their families because mid century attitudes about suicide? Like my grandmother’s cousin: his mother took cyanide while they were in the same slave labor camp (one of Schindler’s, I think) and he had to bury her in secret by night. He came to the US after the war, but died in the 1950s from a “car accident.” Collision with a tree.

And how many died not from direct suicide, but by neglecting their health, and developing depended on substances which eventually killed them? Yitzhak Zuckerman himself said, that if it hadn’t been for Zivia, he probably would have drank himself to death.

I’m sure there are studies on this, but I haven’t really crossed into work on survivors beyond the Survivors—>Their Boomer Kids—>Millennial Grandkids cycle of trauma and remembering.

Anyway, just some stray thoughts.

[kohvan]

"Hey. I know, right? It still haunts you, even these days.

But you try to be strong. You have to be strong. For them. If it would be just you, only you... it would be easier. You would be able to give up.

But you can't. Not when you carry the whole damn world on your shoulders. Not when you have a purpose to live for, a job to be done.

So you brush it away. All of the nightmares, all of the visions from your horrifying past. To keep being a fighter that you were born to be. A restless protector since your very childhood. Had to grow up early to be their shield.

You know how painful life can be. You don't want them to feel this pain. You know that the pain, the suffering is a forge making people stronger. You know that only strong ones survive. But you also know...

You can be the strong one. For them. Let them be weak. Let them be themselves. They don't need to break. They don't need to suffer as much as you did. You will be their protector, their warrior, their shield.

You couldn't save yourself, but you will take as many lives as possible, including your own, to save the others. For it is your purpose now. Your goal and your punishment for failing yourself.

You will not fail them. Even if it costs you a life."

— Letter to Jacob

[brain--rott]

"everybody experiences that" says mother who has the same symptom of the same mental illness

[unwelcome-ozian]

[frownyalfred]

Jason and Bruce are out late one night in Gotham as civilians. They get cornered by a mugger and Jason nearly pisses himself, he’s so amused. He teases the would-be mugger about their hand placement, even tries to goad the mugger into a fight because he’s Red Hood. He can disarm anyone in seconds. It doesn’t matter if you have a gun — he has two.

He’s Red Hood, and he has the literal Bat of Gotham standing behind him like a wall of muscle. They’re as close to invincible as humans get, in this town. And that kind of confidence scares off their would-be mugger.

But then Jason turns around, a smile stretching across his face, and Bruce is white. Bone white and so so quiet, eyes wide and trained on where the mugger had been standing.

[cringecorp]

[solidwater05]

Apparently this needs to be said so

Forgetting things is morally neutral! Memory issues are morally neutral!

You're not a bad person if you...

forget things quickly

forget people

can't remember entire stages of your life

can't remember important things

can remember some things very well and forget other things all the time

can't remember things (or anything!) about your interests

forget to eat, sleep, go to the bathroom, etc

forget to reply to texts

remember things and immediately forget them again

can't remember birthdays, events, etc

frequently answer 'I forgot' to questions

can't retain new information

forget things you used to know

only remember things when it's too late

have vague, distorted and/or unreliable memories

depend on others to know how an event you were in played out

have other symptoms that are worsened by memory issues and vice versa

... and anything else I might have missed!

[bl0w-m3]

Maybe she’s born with it, maybe it’s her dads fault.

[rainywhispersblog]

[starfishinthedistance]

I talk to many people who say things like "oh I have trauma but I don't have PTSD", but then when I talk to them a little more I realize that they most likely do, they just can't recognize it as such due to how lacking PTSD awareness is, even beyond the whole "it's not just a veteran's disorder" thing.

The main reason they think they don't have PTSD usually has to do with flashbacks and nightmares, either they have one but not the other or have neither. But here's the thing, those are only two symptoms out of the 23-odd recognized symptoms. Flashbacks and nightmares are two of the five symptoms under Criterion B (Intrusion), which you only need one of for a diagnosis. The other three symptoms are unwanted upsetting memories, emotional distress after being reminded of trauma and physical reactivity after being reminded of trauma (i.e. shaking, sweating, heart racing, feeling sick, nauseous or faint, etc). Therefore you can have both flashbacks and nightmares, one but not the other, or neither and still have PTSD.

In fact, a lot of the reasons people give me for why they don't think they have PTSD are literally a part of the diagnostic criteria.

"Oh, I can barely remember most parts of my trauma anyway." Criterion D (Negative Alterations in Cognition and Mood) includes inability to recall key features of the trauma.

"Oh but I don't get upset about my trauma that often because I avoid thinking of it or being around things that remind me of it most of the time." Criterion C (Avoidance) includes avoiding trauma-related thoughts or feelings and avoiding trauma-related external reminders, and you literally cannot get diagnosed if you don't have at least one of those two symptoms.

"Oh I just have trouble getting to sleep or staying asleep, but I don't have nightmares." Criterion E (Alterations in Arousal and Reactivity) includes difficulting sleeping outside of nightmares.

"But I didn't have many/any trauma symptoms until a long time after the trauma happened." There's literally an entire specification for that.

Really it just shows how despite being one of the most well-known mental illnesses, people really don't know much about PTSD. If you have trauma, I ask you to at least look at the criteria before you decide you don't have PTSD. Hell, even if you don't have trauma, look at the criteria anyway because there are so many symptoms in there that just are not talked about.

PTSD awareness is not just about flashbacks and nightmares.