PTSD

It's been a while since I posted on this blog. So time for an update.

How long has this process been going on? A while that's for sure. I will have to go back and look at some dates however...as healing goes, time is not the important thing and if you focus on it too much it can be very frustrating. Certain things we sail through and others are more embedded and require a longer process to overcome.

So here we are, in about a week it will be 2 years since the family was reunited under one roof after the separation and VIOLA! God just unveiled an iceberg that has been underlying the marriage issues. PHEW...here I've been dealing with the chunk of ice that is visible above the surface all the while having no clue there was this gigantic iceberg UNDER the water. PTL ... God's timing is perfect. In looking back I can see how He has been preparing me for this unveiling.

Even so, I was completely unprepared for this and it riveted me back into a painful place initially. Really thought we were past the bulk of things and now this just seems humongous and like it will take another eternity for normal to be a part of our existence. Siiiiiiiiiiiiiiiigh!

Nightmares in the Day:

For several months after some major things were resolved I found myself dealing with what I will call "living nightmares". You know, like the ones you have while sleeping that are so real you wake up wondering if they really did happen...except these kinds of nightmares really did happen and it's the reliving it part that isn't real, except, even though your head may understand that, your heart and your emotions don't. Bizarre, to say the least, but not hard to understand psychologically.

Trauma of any sort needs to be worked out and this is one way the body either works out trauma....or gets locked deeper into it. It is commonly referred to as post traumatic stress. The technical definition includes circumstances such as war, plane crashes, rape, witnessing acts of violence, and natural disasters. Disastrous marriages and dysfunctional family circumstances produce the same symptoms and this is becoming more and more identified and accepted by professionals. They call it Complex Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or Prolonged Duress Stress Disorder when it involves repeated smaller traumas.  Traumas that are induced by other human beings are the most difficult to overcome.

Repeated emotional trauma slowly eats away at one's person-hood and eventually takes it's toll on their physical, emotional and psychological health. God designed us to react in certain ways to stress and trauma and PTSD is really just a normal human reaction to abnormal circumstances. It truly should not be classified as a disorder since it really is a normal reaction. Only a dead person will not experience detrimental effects to their overall health when confronted with trauma although we all tolerate things differently and no two people will react exactly the same way to the same trauma. It becomes a disorder when the person who is traumatized doesn't receive the kind of support they need emotionally to recover from the trauma.  Studies have shown that there is a significantly greaterr chance of recovering from post traumatic stress before it becomes a disorder (within three months) if the victim receives emotional support.  Of course there are many variables that need to be factored into each individual situation including prior traumatization.

More than once the Lord has had to remind me that these reactions are related to the way He designed me not some emotional or spiritual deficiency that I have. A society of people who were emotional robots, able to deal with emotional trauma without it affecting them in detrimental ways, would be just that, a community made up of robots. Praise God we are not robots but unique individuals with emotions, equipped to act and react, and to communicate in a variety of ways to others and our environment. There is a positive and negative side to everything, but even negative emotions and actions serve useful purposes in our lives. Imagine, if you will, if my child ran out into traffic and I was a 'robot' mom who had no emotions and didn't react?

I am no longer having PTS symptoms, at least it's been a while since I did, but I'm at least not being riveted into that old stuff anymore and even the emotions attached to things that happened in the past seem normal, i.e. not more powerful than they should be. So that's a good thing...PTS can be so crippling it actually becomes worse for some people over time and they begin to avoid everything and anything related to the trauma. Interestingly, the way to overcome PTS is to face the trauma. Ha duh...pretty hard not to when you are married to its source.