More on Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

Here's a weird thing about PTSD--you don't know you have it until it kicks in.

I know that sounds stupid because you never know something until you know it.

But PTSD is different.

It's like some kinds of cancer. You can have cancer, have veiled symptoms that you might ignore, and then have it erupt. Then, it can consume you.

I didn't know I had PTSD until about eight months after I was raped and assaulted. Suddenly, I started having panic attacks, and I didn't know why. I thought I was okay, that I had worked it all out. Obviously, I hadn't. Those sounds, words, memories kept invading my sensory world, causing physical and mental reactions I didn't understand. Until I started seeing a therapist who specialized in trauma and a psychiatrist who could treat the symptoms, I had no clue why I was falling apart.

Denial is a huge part of trauma. During the trauma, I disassociated, meaning I felt I was above my body looking down at myself. It didn't hurt as much that way. I got hit across the back of my head, which left permanent nerve damage. At one point, I know I blacked out.

The morning after the incident, I called my best friend and told her I didn't care and that, "You know something is kind of wrong when you don't care." I was numb and wanted to stay that way even though I knew something was indeed wrong. I went home and pretended everything was normal. Except everything wasn't, and neither was I.

My best friend (up north) had known there were problems with my medication which allowed me to get into a bad situation that led to the incident. Her husband is a pharmacist. He was the one that told me my sleeplessness, racing thoughts, agitation, bizarre behavior and suicidal ideation were side effects of too much Prozac, which my former doctor had prescribed.

I wasn't myself. My friend's husband advised me to call my doctor immediately, which I did. Unfortunately, I got no response. So the madness continued until I fell into such a state, my safety was in jeopardy.

PTSD goes beyond simple anxiety, first because there are triggers (sights, sounds, etc.), and you never know what those might be. These triggers throw you into a fit. I got so scared of encountering triggers that I didn't want to leave my house. I gained more than 70 pounds which I had previously lost. I didn't even want to walk to my mailbox.

PTSD breakdowns are different for different people, but for me they included freezing up, crying fits and inability to function. I had nightmares. I felt suicidal and vividly imagined how I would do it.

I couldn't work outside the home--at all. I couldn't control my thoughts. I couldn't do anything but the bare minimum to keep my family intact--and that was difficult on its own.

PTSD made me feel self destructive. I did things I wouldn't normally do because after the trauma, I felt worthless--even after the criminal admitted in writing that he had raped me.

After rape, it is common to feel filthy, unfit for anything. My husband didn't know what was wrong with me. "What is the matter with you that you feel you deserve to be beat up?" he kept asking. I didn't know. I couldn't sort it out at the time. It was like a different me had taken over. I couldn't handle life. And it made me vulnerable to all sorts of ill intentioned people.

I would say it took me over a year to start functioning outside the home again. It started with volunteer work and moved into some more contract jobs. I had the best, most supportive and understanding bosses you can ever imagine. (They also knew I have ADHD before they hired me, so this helped.)

Along the way, I started going to Bull Run Unitarian Universalists church in Manassas where I met more and more wonderful people who helped me to heal. I was never quiet about the trauma, and I felt safe sharing it with people there. They understood and were not judgmental. I've lost the weight again, changed my image, regained my life and restored my physical and mental health. I am a survivor, not a victim.

Understand that part of the problem people with mental illness have is the stigma that lingers long after the traumatic event. Others don't understand and would love to assume the worst. It's just juicer for them, I guess. Or they are ignorant and would like to stay that way.

I'm not alone in all this. Our soldiers are coming home from war, are preparing to serve or have had personal issues that have resulted in PTSD. But in the military, there is even more of a stigma, as mental illness is considered even more of a sign of weakness. The military is starting to realize it's a normal reaction to trauma and that our soldiers need help. No one should go this alone.

It's time for me to write about PTSD, depression and anxiety in a more direct way than I have in the past both here and through creative writing. My new book of poetry, Poems from the Battlefield, was a creative means of coping, but it was never a direct expression. It is a five-year metaphor for my own battle. I began the book a year before I was raped. I am just now publishing it. Poems from the Battlefield is not a biographical account.

My book is a merging of pain,the historical, the philosophical and the sociological. It's not all about PTSD.

This entry is.