PTSD

PTSD, sometimes I think I'm done with it and then sometimes I'm just not. When I first began struggling with PTSD I had no idea what it was. All I knew was that I would be in situations where I suddenly felt trapped, my head began to spin and then I couldn't breathe. I would shake and it would hurt to breathe deeply and it would last for seconds or minutes or hours. Typically if I could escape the room I was in or the situation I was in I was able to calm down with some space and some cold water on my face.

Sometimes the PTSD would come at night. I would wake up with sweat dripping down my body. For people who know me you know I don't sweat. I don't sweat when it's 100 degrees out with 99% humidity so waking up with sweat on my body could only mean one thing. After a cold shower I would typically be able to go back to sleep often unaware of what set it off.

As I've gotten older and more removed from my former life my PTSD has shown itself less and less frequently almost to the point where I tend to forget that I ever struggled with it. Last night Doug and I were both exhausted and ready turn in. We got in bed and Doug turned on some program on PBS about methamphetamine's. The show was interesting and so I began watching it. About twenty minutes into it I felt my chest get tight and it became difficult to breath. A familiar feeling but one that hadn't happened in a long time. I rolled over, Doug felt my rough breathing and quickly changed the channel willing me out of the direction I was heading in. It worked, the episode was short and eventually I fell into a peaceful sleep.

I continue to be grateful that my episodes are few and far between often short now but the fact that they happen at all are a constant reminder that its all still there, it was real, it happened and I lived through it all and yet I'm still here standing.