I hear you LindaLu; I have things like that in my family's background too, and the little I already told her she has already assigned to paranoid assumption that the CIA is hounding a relative....actually it was the DEA and it was definitely true. One of the problems as you know with that kind of thing is you can't necessarily bring forward the other individuals who can support the veracity of your situation, because they often cannot or will not do so based on what they do and their own fears for their families etc.

I absolutely realize that some mental illnesses have these kinds of manifestations, but as you point out, there ARE people who have worked in the military, law enforcement, government, and there ARE people who have relatives who have gotten involved in things or gotten into trouble etc. It really can't be automatically assumed such things are fiction, especially if the other elements of the story seem logical (i.e. the person comes from a military town, has military/government connections or work history, someone in the family hung out with questionable groups, etc.).

What is so troubling about this is these are the exact kinds of events one needs to really be able to talk about, because they are so utterly traumatizing and typically extremely destructive in one's life. AND you can't talk about them to friends, and no one believes you anyway. So the very thing you need a therapist for, they can jump to a conclusion that you are making it all up. Frustrating....