[Carnival Doll]

i was recently diagnosed with ptsd along with obsessive compulsive disorder, binge eating disorder, and major depressive disorder. i'm 16 years old and have been struggling with my mental health for several years so i'm happy to finally get some help. i am taking fluvoxamine for my ocd.

my psychiatrist said the ptsd is from watching my grandpa die when i was either 10/11/12. it feels weird to think that that's where it stems from, especially considering it doesn't even bother me any more. i've long gotten over his death.

i also feel like my symptoms like hypervigilance, dissociation, jumpiness and panic attacks suggest something else. my triggers seem to not even have anything to do with death, usually i have panic attacks when people yell and if i think im going to get in trouble. i also seem to have this fixation on abuse even though i don't think that i've been abused, but i can't be sure since i have a large memory gap.

this is so much information, but in the end i just want to know:
is it possible to have ptsd from something that you don't care/think about any more?
does anyone else have a similar problem?

[seeker33]

Some people can have repressed memories. Sometimes we forget about traumatic experiences and then memory gaps occur.
Id suggest talking about your past with a professional and possibly asking your family about periods in your life which you don't remember.

However since you're so young I hope you can work with an experienced professional because there's a danger of creating "false memories" and or retraumatisation caused by remembering. You'll need coping skills and support system to go through that.
It's great that at the tender age of 16 you already have such advanced understanding of your problem, you seem like a highly intelligent young lady!

[Skeezyks]

Hello Doll: Honestly... I would not know what to suggest to you here. You received a very nice reply from "seeker". I do think psychiatrists sometimes have a tendency to latch onto the first obvious thing that happens to come up... even if it's not actually correct. (That's just my personal opinion.) So, at least from my perspective, I wouldn't put too much stock in the psychiatrist telling you your PTSD is related to watching your grandpa die. It could be. But, since you wrote you've long gotten over it, it seems questionable to me. Spending some time working through all of this with a skilled mental health therapist may help to clarify, in your own mind, what's going on here. Hopefully you're already seeing someone.

There is such a thing as a "highly sensitive person". It's possible the symptoms you experience aren't directly related to any particular incident. They're simply the way you react to things... the way you're "wired" so to speak. (I think this is the case with me.) Here are links to 3 articles from PsychCentral's archives on the subject of highly sensitive persons for your consideration:

https://psychcentral.com/blog/archiv...sitive-person/

https://blogs.psychcentral.com/imper...sitive-person/

https://psychcentral.com/blog/archiv...ing-overwhelm/

My best wishes to you...

[Carnival Doll]

thank you seeker and skeezyks for your responses! i am seeing someone at school and i am going to continue seeing the psychiatrist and possibly a therapist at the same place. i guess it just takes time with talking it out and things like that! i am scared of the possibility of repressed memories and i certainly dont want to create false ones

those articles are very helpful, it does sound like that could be me! in fact i was talking about this with a family friend the other night.

thank you for your compliment by the way, seeker. i wouldn't call myself intelligent, however since my family wasn't very supportive about this until recently i had to do a lot of research on my own. for the longest time i thought i was going crazy!

thank you and good luck to you both! and happy new year!