Yes, and the truth with me is that people around me either didn't believe it or felt I was wrong to struggle and they were actually mean to me. Even now I am not really allowed to talk about it, or how it affects me. I was just at a family gathering and I was talking to my niece and the conversation went towards challenges and I said very little and my older sister literally jumped right on top of the conversation and said, "No comparing, no talking about struggles, no comparing notes" like "how dare ANYONE have it harder than her".

My older sister is like this overpowering family moderator where she has a need to put each person in their own neat little box and god forbid you don't stay in that box the way she thinks you should. I am not allowed to talk about myself, yet she can go on and on for a long time, "until" I slip and "need" to talk about myself. I never realized how bad it was until I developed PTSD and "really needed to talk and support". For me to even have a thread about how I struggle is very hard for me, it is like a deep part of me is expecting to be repremanded for it.

For myself, my trauma was seeing so much of what I loved and worked so hard for damaged really badly, damaged because of how another person had no respect, just didn't care and even continued to have that mindset and intrude. Then I didn't know about post traumatic stress and after having to address so much damage for a few months I broke, really broke.

I was treated badly for that, treated like I did not have a right to be so upset, to develop pts, even by professionals. Even in a lawsuit "don't talk" and "don't feel" and for 7 years and counting it has just been so surreal that as I know what I know now, it's so hard to see just how "cruel" people can be to someone who "genuinely" suffers. To even be told not to talk about how I struggle with PTSD because the opposing side will use it against you and beat you up?

One therapy session I realized how my T was the only human being that actually stayed calm and gave me permission to "talk" and "feel". He also talked about how he should have a way of video taping PTSD patients when they first present to him and then after they have had time to "tell their story and vent" because of the desperation they present with and how after finally talking and venting they begin to gain more composure and control. But when one thinks about it, how sad is that? What is also so sad to me is pretty much every person I have met who struggles with PTSD tends to "appologize", and if one doesn't say "I am sorry", they feel it. Either that or there is this deep subconscious way of "expecting to get attacked" that can trigger "fight" even before the conscious mind has a chance to think about getting angry.

A person who struggles with PTSD experiences an "awareness" that the average person simply cannot comprehend. It has been observed that when someone develops PTSD, they mingle best with others that also have it. There is a new awareness of the pain that people cause to others that the average person is often "unaware" of. Yes, it is depressing and very frustrating, yes it is as though the person who struggles is suddenly talking a language that others "don't know or care to know".

Who would be a good "rescuer"? Well, I think that would have to be someone who understands it, someone who is willing to listen and actually help the person harness it better and even has the ability to stop the "disrespect" to where people "blame" the person who is challenged and understands they are not "crazy" and they really "are" saying something that "really did happen and needs to be heard and validated". But also someone who has a way to help the person find a way to "accept" how they are more sensitive and "can" often see realities that many just don't see. But, to also learn to better accept the past when the person struggling wasn't as "aware" where they didn't have enough foresight or means to "protect or defend". To learn how to hear a pin drop when others cannot and be able to adjust to that in the mind to where one thinks, "oh, that is "just" another pin dropping, no worries there".

OE