Troy,
I understand where you are coming from completely:
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Within the next few weeks I'll have a chance to tell my VA doc about ptsd. After years of answering VA medical interview questions with lies and avoiding the diagnosis of PTSD, I'd be asking for help if I bring this up. I don't even know how to approach the subject.
Do I just say I want to be evaluated for PTSD? What if she asks why I think that? What if I cannot even speak about it? What if I just break into tears? What if I panic? What if she refers me to a shrink and then i don't have nerve enough to keep the appointment? How do i tell my family that I have the appointment?
I don't know if I have the courage to even admit that I need help. It's one thing to tell it in this anonymous forum, but quite another to tell someone in person. The comment about the shrink waiting for me to talk ... whew... that's even scarier than thinking they'll ask questions. My experience with military shrinks has been one of using them to get people discharged, not one of finding help. I don't trust any shrink, mil or civilian. My impression is that they'll want to hold my brain in their hands and manipulate me.
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Maybe you could say that you through you were doing fine until these things have started happening.....(they you can tell then if you are having anger problems that are coming out....if you are having nightmares, flashbacks.....or whatever generally what you are experiencing). You could say that you thought they would go away, but you have found that it's not going away a is getting less & less able to control...that way it covers lying about the past...as it's actually true in that you thought you could control how you were feeling & thinking but is does seem to be becomming a problem since the control you thought was working hasn't been working lately.
You could say that you have been reading about & talking to others who have combat PTSD & you are getting the feeling that is what might be happening to you. They can take the general examples you gave them & I am sure they will be suggest that you be evaluated for PTSD without your having to directly ask (of course, if they don't....then you might have to become more direct). But any good VA Dr will be familiar with PTSD & should be able to get what you are saying to them immediately.
I would imagine that the shrinks that deal with PTSD have to be very specialized...not just the quacks (sorry if I use the wrong work) that get people out of the military......this is a whole different specialty & believe me, it's definitely a specialty. The military should have dealt with this way back with all the wars....know my Dad who came home from the Europe theater in WWII was really messed the rest of his life from it & the man I talked about that was in outpatient therapy with me now that he was elderly & dealing with dementia.....those were most of all the memories he was dealing with.....personally, I think I would rather deal with them at this point & handle them as best as I could rather than be haunted so badly later on in life....not that some memories won't be there but not as vivid as if they haven't been handles prior to that point in life.
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I don't know if I have the courage to go to the shrink that the doc will refer me to. Even as i write this, i find myself just shaking my head. no. I can't do it. I can't sit with someone face to face and tell of these horrors. I can't tell them of what these feelings have caused me to do. I can't tell the thoughts that run through my mind.
People know me as a nice guy ... if they only knew who I really am.
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Ok, this is a very important point I want to make here....there are times expecially in the middle of a war, that forces us into a stressful situation & we are forced toact & do things that we would never do outside of that situation. Those actions can not be taken out of context in any judgment of "nice/not nice" person. When we are forced to act outside of our character it is all that more difficult to live with those memories. Sometimes when we are in situations like that, it's almost as if it was not even us that acted or reacted.....as if we were watching someone else. I never understood that feeling until I experienced a mild form of that feeling with my Mothers death & the trauma that the home care person caused. I am supposing that if I experienced such a feeling from something so much less traumatic...I can only imagine how much worse it must be in a war environment.
Always remember that you are the nice person that you are....you are no longer in the war & no longer the person who had to react in that way our of protection to yourself & the others around you. You were is situations where you had to do things that you never would have to do in any other environment......even though the thoughgs haunt you, you are no longer that person who had to react that way.....& when you don't have to react, you are the nice person that you know yourself as & as the others know you as also.
Sometimes no matter how long it takes (not like you are going to blurt everything out on the first appointment), it's good to get the thoughts out & if nothing else, dump them on someone who is paid to get dumped on & help you at the same time.....therapists/psychologists who are trained to deal with combat PTSD will understand what you are going through & will be sympathetic to your feelings.....feelings you are very entitled to having.....not only that, but they are feelings that people from every war had, but never were able to acknowledge & came out in many horrible ways after WWII & the Korean war....even after Nam, not many acknowledged PTSD. I know when I was in college (back in the 70's, I dated a guy that has served in Nam.....what a mess that war left him in......such a nice person.....such horrible experiences & fear of never knowing who was safe or not).
It is about time we have the help that our military people have needed for so long.....it would be a shame to not use the help that is provided rather than to try & deal with it only to have the everything haunt you closed up inside....only to come out later in life like the man that from WWII who was dealing with it finally in the middle of his dementia.
You deserve the help that is available....especially since you know there is a problem....it will only be time until all around you become aware of that problem.....something that can't be kept hidden forever.
You have more than earned your right to be helped.....for all you have done for our country....that is the least our country can do for yo.
I know I didn't trust psychologists let alone pdocs when I first had problems.....it takes time to build up that trust.....that is all part of the therapy process is getting to know each other....it's not like we just sit down & solve the problem.
Take the step......you can see where & how it takes you....if it doesn't work out....there is no reason you are forced to continue....your family will probably be getting a little glimps that you are having prblems.....& who knows, they might be wishing that you would get help too & just afraid to say anything about it.
You have more than earned the right to the healing you deserve,
Debbie