Living With PTSD

Living with PTSD is an ongoing, never ending uphill battle. Some of us deal with it by compartmentalizing our traumas, putting them into a box and throwing away the key. Yet that key never gets thrown very far. It somehow finds its way back into our back pockets. Our traumas still dwell deep within us. They manifest in our dreams where we relive them in shocking realism, waking up screaming and drenched in sweat. Sometimes we blame ourselves, and slowly try to end it by acting out in ways we never would have if these events didn’t happen. We suffer through depression, panic attacks and anxiety. Psychotic breaks. The memories often come at the times when we should feel happy. Many of us can’t take the pain and think of suicide, and too many of us succeed in doing that.

It just never fucking goes away. Personally I’ve been hospitalized, been in 12 step groups for 20 years, (and no, I don’t have 20 years sober) therapy, psychiatry, medications, and the list goes on and on. In an attempt to heal myself, after years of introspection, and a devastating familial blow, I’ve tried to come to terms with my past by writing about it. In doing so, the memories were front and center. The demons and monsters that I carried with me like at ball and chain slowly ebbed as I penned my story, but now that it’s been written, I find myself more and more often in a state of panic and fear. Hyper vigilance of my surroundings any time I’m outside. Wondering if the man approaching me as I walk through a parking lot is going to hurt me. Wondering if a family member will write another unauthorized accounting of my life story in a feeble attempt to get ahead of his own evil doings.

Yet here I sit today, in the muck of it again. It hasn’t gone away, the PTSD. It’s a lifetime sentence. I can come to terms with my truth, but the terror of it persists. I’m scared. Scared that I’ll never rid myself of the beasts who robbed me of my self worth and value.

And to them, I say, “Fuck You”. I’m telling my story, how it happened. It’s not pretty, or for the faint of heart. It’s as guttural as the pit I’m feeling in my stomach as I try to get through today.
I guess what I’m trying to say here is don’t judge your insides with anyone else’s outsides. You never know what a smiling, filtered picture on Facebook has going on inside them.

Prayers to my fellow survivors.

You are not alone.