ptsd & pseudo-hallucinations

does anyone else get this? i have been meaning to ask for a while...

when i get really stressed, sometimes i see or hear things that other ppl can't see or hear. sometimes they are voices in my head, sometimes it's a fire alarm going off, sometimes i see security cameras in my room, or sparks coming out of the electricity board etc. none of it has really got anything to do with my "trauma" history.

usually when the stressor is over (e.g., finish uni exams) then the hallucinations go away. about 99% of the time i know they are not real.

i've been trying to read up on this, but i can't really find any info that sounds similar to my experiences. most things which mention hallucinations & ptsd have similar content e.g., a combat veteran seeing a soldier at the foot of his bed.

my dr reassures me that it is a ptsd-thingy, and not something else more "serious", and offers me meds which help me keep calm when they happen. but i must admit i am a bit perplexed that i cannot find any other mentions of this in the literature i've searched. i guess i am getting worried because each time they come back, they get more and more bizarre.

so... can anyone relate? or maybe just pretend to relate ()? right now i'm feeling very much like a ptsd-freak.

I can relate. Ive been stressing about losing my home due to taxes, etc. and i am hearing voices, seeing things too. I do believe its ptsd. as i have had issues with this my entire life. it gets scary at times, but I keep reminding myself that its the stressors, triggers. and i am for the most part, able to overlook them, kind of.

Hope this helps

Colleen

Yes it happens to me a lot. I once spent the whole day sitting on a park Bench and not understanding why those that came and went to that bench during the day, couldn't see or hear what I was seeing and hearing.

Yes, it does happen. I've had my S abuser sit behind me at work talking with me telling me never to tell anyone or else. I could hear him, feel his presence and smell his breath. At times I could feel him touching me.
It's a very weird feeling.

deliquesce, you are not alone. Please talk to your therapist about methods you can do to fight these feeling. For me it's getting Angry and yelling "You can't hurt me & It's not my fault". For you it may be some other words but you need to figure that out with your therapist. My thought are with you! You can get through this!!!.

thank you all so much for your replies .

although i'm sad that you all go through this too, it's a relief to know that this really can be associated with ptsd. it's probably been going on for 10 or more years for me, but it's only recently that i told pdoc about it, and i guess telling someone else has made me feel like it's something serious and 'real' - something that can't be ignored.

hugsneeded - because my hallucinations are completely random (and sometimes quite bizarre to the point of being funny e.g., the time i thought i had a bell attached to the back of my eyeball, so every time i moved my eyes the bell was making ringing sounds), it's just something that i deal with. when it gets upsetting i am able to take meds to calm me down, and also work on the stress in my life that's making me have hallucinations e.g., if it's uni work that's due - i try to deal with that, so the hallucinations go away quicker.

what you go through sounds terrifying . i'm glad you have a T to help you out.

mousey - yes, i have had similar experiences too. it's only after a few of those that i started realising that some things i took quite for granted were things other ppl weren't aware of. it's a bit sucky, but now whenever something 'weird' happens, i do find myself checking to see if other ppl are reacting too, just so i know if it's real or not.

colleen - thank you for sharing . i hope your stressors can die down soon, so you don't have the additional stress of hearing/seeing stuff! do you get any support at all when this happens? like you, i am mostly able to ignore it, but every now and again something consistently grabs my attention, and i find that very frustrating.

just wanted to reiterate - thank you all so much for sharing. i was actually a bit worried about posting this, in case i came back and found no one else could relate .

When I was in the height of my PTSD I was hallucinating. Mine was more like a morphing of things that were already there. Like one time I saw these really weird animals on the side of the road, a whole field full of them. I'd never seen anything like them and wondered what they were. I even asked people what they thought they could be. They reminded me of miniature elephants. Later that day heading home I was stunned and somewhat amused to find they were farm workers picking strawberries.

Another time a pick up truck pulled along side of me on the interstate. When I looked over I was surprised to see my two brothers looking right at me, then just as quick as they pulled up, they sped away. (One had been dead five years and the other had just died.)

I was soooooooo happy to see them! I knew right away they were sent to protect me. I followed them for miles and miles, trying to catch up so I could pull along side of them. I wanted them to know I was aware of them and felt safer. I was so excited to see them again!

When I finally did pull up, I was 50 miles past my exit and they looked nothing like my brothers. Stuff like that.