((((Rose)))),

I have been following this thread and I was happy that you took in my post and it helped you so much.

I did see you respond to another poster and I could see the PTSD coming through in your reaction. I have experienced this myself and what I like about PC is that it is like a living journal where we can interact with others and experience triggers, can respond with the symptoms that are a hallmark of PTSD and be able to get to that point where we can calm pass the trigger and view our responses.

I had my husband go with me one time to my therapist because my husband was handing me many invalidating responses and it was crippling me. And I know that if I am ever going to work through this horrible PTSD, I have to have someone who CAN support me and give me some sense of safety(and he was failing at that miserably). Well on my way to that therapy my husband was driving and with my husband, he has loud body language and at this point I am SO SENSITIVE that I don't even have to hear him invalidate me, his gesters alone can say it. And I had all I could do to remain calm in that 1/2 hour drive to see my therapist.

Well I worked very hard to plan the discussion in therapy as well. And when I got there there was someone else in the waiting room who had the same time scheduled as me. I had already addressed this issue before where my therapist had overbooked and so that was all I needed to activate the PTSD into upsetting me.

I was lucky because the therapist rescheduled the other patient and took us in. But I was still upset and in the back of my mind had wondered if my therapist would have taken that other patient instead of me had it not been for my husband being present (because that did happen to me before).
So I struggled to concentrate on the session and it was NOT going well either so the rage in the PTSD came out. My therapist opened his eyes wide and looked at me and said, "GEE OE, I HAVE NEVER SEEN YOU ACT LIKE THIS BEFORE" and as he said that I felt outed somehow and that I would lose the respect I needed to have that session help me get my message across. I worked at displaying what I needed from my husband, but that session did not help me really, or it did not bear the fruit that I had wanted it to.

Well, in hindsight, I am a bit disappointed because my therapist BEING A SPECIALIST IN TREATING THE DISORDER should have recognized what that anger I was displaying was all about and that I was triggered. I did get to discuss that with him later though. So in the end I got to discuss they very troubling symptom that we all struggle with when we suffer from PTSD.

Yes, I hear you Rose, no one stopped this thread, you were able to work through it and even express your strong feelings and end up with what you have posted here.
That is what I feel is ACTUAL SUPPORT.

Sometimes it can be much harder when you have two people with opposing feelings/opinions and both are struggling with PTSD. And that is because one of the most difficult issues with anyone struggling with PTSD is boundary issues. And ANY THREAT AT ALL IS MAGNIFIED IN THE BRAIN AND the end result may not SEEM SUPPORTIVE. And if that results in a thread being closed, and both posters get punished somehow, (and this happened to me), that is often what also happened when boundaries were crossed in the past as well. And that is where we need the MOST WORK.

As far as I am concerned if there is an upset it would be so helpful is everyone got together to support each other to find a resolve. I discussed this with my own therapist as well.

My therapist told me that if a disruption happens in a support group he will remove anyone that is involved in the disruption. I don't agree with this. While I can see that it is VERY IMPORTANT TO MAINTAIN SAFETY for the members. I also feel that if these members actually address this specific issue and work through a resolve, then to me that IS more support and can be very productive as well.

Ofcourse for myself, I have been involved in situations where my students reacted poorly in certain situations with other students. And I DID see where one student felt threatened somehow. But instead of putting her down and punishing her, I worked with both of them and it produced a result where there was so much growth and acceptance for both, that I would never change my style of resolve again.

I just personally feel that because boundary issues are the hardest part with PTSD, it would just be so much more supportive if together as a group suffering with PTSD we can support each other in addressing when this occurs.

Yes, Rose, I am glad you got what you needed from YOUR thread. And it has been VERY nice that other posters have also been supportive in that as well. With such a sensitive topic, I would like to thank the other posters for being honest but also taking care to respect Rose here. I can see that the other posters do struggle with PTSD themselves so it was just nice to see how even though there are strong feelings/oppinions, we all managed to see Rose's struggle too.

(((Hugs))))
Open Eyes