Ahem.. Sorry there may be possible triggers here ! I'll talk about an event involving physical violence and domestic abuse so ,____,
When I was at primary school, my parents had lots of fights & other relationships problems - I think I know what was the cause.. but that's not what matters here. this situation made me feel very helpless and upset, and even though most of these fights were just verbal and didn't involve physical violence.. someday, when I was 10, things got worse..
It was during summer holidays (I think it's why I don't like summer holidays now.. they always remember me of it ><). Mom and dad had a particulary brutal fight on that day. At first they were just verbally arguing, just as they normally did. My mom seemed a bit upset but rather calm, while my dad was like.. screaming, yelling (he was making so much noise.. it was unbearable), throwing and breaking objects. I got scared and hid in my room, crying alone. After some minutes spend crying, my mother came into in my room, cus she noticed I was sad because of the fight and tried to comfort me. And what happened next..
I heard very loud footsteps, someone was running into the direction of my room. The door opened suddenly. Daddy entered in. I heard my mom screaming "NO!" when he first tried to hit her. She dodged his hand, but then he grabbed her shoulders and pushed her against the wall. I know it's simple to sum up like that, but I feel like words aren't enough to describe how HORRIBLE each detail of the scene was. Dad was looking into mom's eyes, and he looked just.. mad.. His eyes were weird, like full of the will to.. kill, it feels weird to say, but yeah, I really thought it was the end I thought he was going to kill her. I'm sure my mom was screaming, but I can't really remember what she said. After this.. I don't remember what happened exactly, I don't know how, my mother managing escaping and grabbed the phone, threatening him to call the police. He then ran away from the house, crying and yelling horrible things (I don't want to quote them..). A while after I looked at mum's arms and back, she had several bruises, and confessed me it wasn't the first time a such thing happened..
;;Sorry for the wall of text, but even with that I'm not sure that I can properly express how I felt on that day. How could something that horrible happen ? I was living a perfect and happy childhood and then suddenly ?? How could a mentally sane adult, supposed to be safe, responsible, protecting, loving go nuts and clobber his girlfriend in front of his child ? I just don't get it.
Let's say that it really shocked me. And I don't know if I have PTSD or not, like, I think I've got some of its symptoms but not all of them. For example, since that day I have a pretty avoidant behavior, I systematically avoid every situations involving conflict : if someone hurts me, I prefer to say nothing, so we don't get into an argument ; if I hurt somebody, I immediately apologize even when I don't feel sincerely guilty ; if two people start fighting in front of me, I just go away, because it's unbearable for me to see two people arguing now, it just freaks me out every time. Now I have a boyfriend, and I am terrified he would do me the same thing my dad did to my mother. I even do things I don't want to do just in order to please him so he won't get mad at me.
I also have some "triggers" like when I watch brutal fights in movies which remind me of what happened on that day, I feel weird. A few weeks ago I heard my neighbors arguing, oh god I was terrified, petrified.
However I wonder if this is really PTSD ? I mean, these kinds of "attacks" (by which I mean this feeling of terror and powerlessness that occurs each time I witness sometimes that remembers me of what happened) are not too hard to handle and get rid of to me. While I noticed that people with PTSD semm to live in a living hell, I feel like my life is going pretty well atm.
Maybe there's just that conflict-avoidant behavior I can't get rid of.
Dunno.
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