r/ptsd

I'm using a throwaway account because this is embarrassing for me. I (25F) am attracted to men that are acting abusive. I was raped when I was 9 years old, so I'm sure this is part of a trauma thing.

I have never been in a relationship, the most I've done is go on two dates with one guy and one date with another guy. Both men seemed nice, and didn't have any bad qualities that would've made me attracted to them. When I develop a crush on a guy, I imagine him acting abusive toward me.

Of course, I don't want to be in an abusive relationship, but I also know that these thoughts aren't normal or healthy. Has anyone else gone through something similar?

My story

I'm a 19 year old male and am an only child. During my childhood my mother would do the following

Blow up out of nowhere over the most trivial or littlest matters, many times i begged her to give me some emotional support when i was visibly upset but she just remained cold and cruel, drink quite heavily which was sometimes responsible but she can definitely be mean sober as well, I had expressed concern about her drinking but she just flipped, the next day she'd always act as if nothing happened, whenever I tried to get clarity on why she got like that she'd brush it under the carpet or accuse me of starting trouble, if i didn't do something just to make her happy she'd turn cold, during arguments she'd say things like I was ungrateful, didn't care about her and that I was a horrible person or that i was abusive or whatever just like my father, she would stomp, slam doors and break ornaments etc, when she gets in her crazy states it's just impossible to reason with her or get her to see it from any other perspective, she can go from saying i was the most nicest and amazing person to saying I was the most horrible and evil person, she often burdened me with all of her problems, she said before that she knows how to play the game which I found very disturbing

A couple of times when i snapped because of her behavior she called her mother to say I've been acting up and making her life hell, she often paints herself as the heroic single mum. She has been fairly good lately but sometimes I feel I was robbed of a proper childhood and have often wondered what I had done to deserve it.

I remember one time a few years ago I was about 12 she had turned my grandparents against me and my grandfather started shouting and saying he was very disappointed in me and the rest of it is a blur. To be honest to this day i can't figure out what I (only a young child) was supposed to have done that was so bloody awful. That has haunted me for years. I used to think maybe I was a bad person but I've started to see her in a different light. She always talks about hating drama yet it seems to follow her and often says that she's been so hard done by.

On the flip side she can be the most nicest person as well and we have had great times together and she can be very helpful towards me, her family and in public which makes it all the more confusing. This morning in fact I ran into an old friend of hers who said to say hi for her and she said my mother is a wonderful person and I'm very lucky. It actually made me feel sick. For about half my childhood it's just been me living with her since her divorce in which she had to sell her house and now rents which she has blamed for the way she is before. I can't help feeling bad for her but she was still quite like this beforehand as well and I don't think that's an excuse still is it? I do feel like she has manipulated me a bit into been stuck with her.

Something else that I've found disturbing is that she's very narrow minded and has a serious lack of empathy. For example when a couple of local celebrities committed suicide she called them pathetic cowards and weak etc. It was actually quite disturbing how she was carrying on and her serious lack of empathy.

I'm starting to think that maybe she bent the truth about Dad a bit during their split as i was a child and didn't know much better. My mother often calls him a narcissist and talked about all of the marital and grown up problems they had etc which to be honest I don't appreciate been burdened with. Granted he's not a saint either but has been good to me (well I'd say) most of the time.

One time last year when my Dad let me down by not been able to see me one weekend and canceling at the last minute (which he has done before) mother knew i was depressed but still blew up at me the next night over something silly and kicked me while I was down what just baffles me is how could she of treated me like that knowing what I was going through. A few days later one of my teachers checked in and said he heard I got into a bit of trouble at home ("if he meant been mentally abused by my mother while I was already upset by been let down by my father as trouble" I thought). I'm not sure who exactly said what to him. I just fobbed him off saying I was upset about leaving school (which was true as well).

I really struggle with confiding in people. I do regret not telling him the truth now. He was sympathetic and said he was very proud of me etc. Another teacher once said that he thought of me and my mother as like the dream team or something along those lines. It actually baffled me a bit. I was thinking if only they knew half the things I've been through.

I have a strained relationship with my father but we've messaged lately and I plan to see him this weekend for a family do. I have autism and went to a special support school for the last few years which were some of the best years (The teachers especially were brilliant and I had many great times such as school camps, school balls and excursions etc).

My mother loves to use my autism to her advantage. I graduated last year but now I do a course at the main campus so I still see them all from time to time. I do feel quite sad and lost now those years are over. I would love to confide in someone about my struggles but don't know where to start. I've thought about confiding in that first teacher I mentioned who's great and we're fairly close but my teachers think my mother's an absolute saint so how can i ensure he believes me, she seems to feel that she always acts in my best interests and does seem to genuinely care for me and love me, she doesn't seem to remember any of it or feel her behavior was justified and genuinely doesn't seem to believe she ever did me any harm and she thinks she did her best.

I struggle with daily flashbacks and I often feel depressed by the way I've been treated, also feel let down and wish my parents had been better to me. I can't get exact clarity on it but they both went through some shit before I was born and I think that's contributed to the way they are.

I wish I had a proper childhood of playing with friends, going to different places and been adventurous and carefree etc. I've never really had a social circle and hardly much friends. I've always been quite different I feel to most of the children my age. What's has happened to me makes me feel as though I'm unlovable. I feel quite alone sometimes as I've always struggled with making friends.

My mother does help me get on my feet and encourage met but I think she just loves to lord it over me. Whenever I've tried standing up for myself she puts on the guilt trip and carries on about all of her sacrifices and everything she's done for me yada yada yada. I think what emotionally abusing me, leaving me crying myself to sleep some nights, causing me to have no confidence and PTSD etc? Could she have some bipolar or personality condition or something and toxic traits I've wondered?

I do love her because as I've said before she has been great as well but I can't help really resenting her sometimes for all of the mental anguish she has put me through as a child and I think it has messed up my development. I wonder if I might've been different had I had proper parents. Hobbies such as music and classic TV shows have been a great escape. Now that I'm an adult and have left school I'm worried about what the future has in store. I'm very nervous about starting an adult life, getting a job and making friends etc because my mum is pretty much most I've ever known. Part of me would love to get away from her but yet I feel scared to as well as she's pretty much most I've ever known.

I’m not sure how to exactly go about this. I’m kinda shaking typing it out. But I suffered second degree burns all over the back of my hand and my forearm. It was a defective coffee pot at a job I just quit. I was doing a job I had done every day for close to a year. I never had an issues. Until I went to pull out that coffee filter. I can still see it. All the water and grinds flying onto my arm. Thinking I was okay but hurt for 5 seconds then the pain hit. I never felt anything like it. I went to the doctor. I was put on antibiotics, pain killers, and anti inflammatory. I had a blister the size of half the back of my hand. It popped and now my skin is coming off. Raw skin, dead skin. I had my hand wrapped since then. Only now can I leave it unwrapped without a wrapping. I don’t know. I cry every day. When I went back to work there, the machine beeping got to me. I remember having a slight panic attack one day listening to it. Sometimes when I try to sleep, I see the water and grinds on my arm. Feel it on me again and again.
I think it’s PTSD but I’m not sure. It’s not like I watched or went through something terrible. It’s just second degree burns but sometimes I feel so hopeless and dark and scared.

Hi guys, this is my first post in this sub, and I want to know how to help my girlfriend.

We're dating for 3 months, and sometimes she says that she feels like something is wrong, like whenever we're together, something bad is going to happen to her.

She's been in some toxic relationships before, and I believe that's part of the cause of it. I don't really know how to make her feel safe and help her overcome this fear, I love her and I just want her to be okay.

Has anyone ever been misdiagnosed? I was diagnosed with ptsd then schizophrenia and took a slew of antipsychotics that now gave me tardive dyskenesia and basically I now have been diagnosed with PTSD again? I did an FMRI and the psychologist told me ptsd with psychosis because all the voices are work related trauma! I am no longer as angry or paranoid as I used to be! I am so much happier!

Every fuckass night I get scared to sleep. I get scared because shes in my nightmares. Its awful. I cant do this anymore. I just want the nightmares to be over. Hasn't she done enough, violating me everyday for months?

I hate that I have grown to dislike sleeping. Every night I have to hope she isn't there, that I wont have to go through another nightmare.

I already see her everyday. I've made eye contact with her and been only a foot away from her 2 times in a row. I already begin to panic, get teary eyed, and lose all the air from my lungs just by looking at her from afar in the halls.

This is torture. I wish i could erase her from my mind. I had to give up this really interesting book because one of the main characters had the same name as her and I couldn't read her name, over and over again. I just couldnt.

What do i do. Ik I should probably talk to my therapist, but I haven't seen him in forever and my next appointment is in like 2 weeks so like..

He had an experience I won’t go into, but since, during transitional uncertain times he concocts wild scenarios/delusions he believes to be memories he thinks he had repressed. Usually mirroring the initial incident; or the people involved following him wherever he is/moves to, usually involving physical violence and random people he hasn’t seen in ages (former friends, acquaintances, baristas etc) running into him and calling him a bad person who deserves to be assaulted. He asks people who he remembers having been there if it really happened and the answer is exclusively no. He remains unconvinced. I don’t know how to support. I have tried to remain compassionate while also firmly insisting these things are not real. I’ve also insisted he stop drinking because alcohol exacerbates this 10 fold. It’s a newer relationship, I really care and I don’t want to make things worse or have him feel like he can’t tell me these things, but I think this will eventually destroy his life at the rate it’s going and with how debilitating it seems to be for him. Any suggestions or similar experiences?

I know she’s only trying to help but I absolutely dread therapy and cannot deal with it. This isn’t the first time this has happened. Please tell me I’m not alone.

As preface, I have talked to a therapist about my experience but it was not set up as a diagnosis. I just wanted to talk to someone about what I was going through and developed coping mechanisms.

To get into it, several years ago I witnessed my sister's boyfriend blackout drunk, strangling her. The noises... Everything. I intervened. Fortunately yelling was enough to get him to stop, but I had grabbed a knife and had it behind my back. Yelling was enough to get him to let go.
I was very afraid of using force.

I am now fostering their child. He has not been pleasant and I've had fear. He has yelled at me, and in that moment it felt I was in that situation all over again.

If I watch a show or something that elicits similar feelings to that night, I just think of him and that night and all of the bad things he has done. It really lingers with me some time after that, too. It's challenging.

Even if his name comes up... It's hard.

Should I talk to a therapist about this more? I was not harmed, so I just had chalked it up to anxiety. But it feels a bit different.

Thank you for taking the time.

I was raised by addicts practically my whole life. Ever since I was a baby, there would be needles on the floor from my bio father. My bio mother, who popped pills, drank, and smoke, would have to limit my movement and such because the floor was riddled with paraphernalia. It only got worse as I walked in on my mom doing intimate things multiple times with strange men, who were both extremely intoxicated by one thing or another, and the men later did strange things to me. I practically grew up surrounded by adults who treated me like another capable adult instead of my age. Since I learned to walk and talk on my own, I had been treated like I was another addict thirty-year-old.

I just wanna know: are there any others here who are deeply triggered by the mention of topics like sex, alcohol, and drugs, especially someone else's own experience with them? Even marijuana? Whenever I hear about it, I feel like a child all over again. I feel very alone in this, especially because I've never heard of it happening with anyone else. I just want someone to empathize with.

I'm a 22 year old female. I have ADHD and Autism and got diagnosed with (complex) PTSD 1 year ago.

_Why I have (Complex) PTSD?_

1. When I was very young, I witnessed my biological father abuse my mother and a few years after, he abandoned me.

2. When I was 7 years old, my former best friend tried to drown me to death then continued bullying me afterwards.

3. When I was 8 years old, my previous stepfather abused and SA'ed me.

4. When I was 9 years old, I was kidnapped for ransom and there were several assassination attempts against my mother and I because she whistleblew against a very corrupt company she used to work for.

5. When I was 19, I witnessed my friend being abused by her boyfriend.

6. When I was 20 years old, my biological father attempted to commit a crime against my mother where he planned to frame her for a crime she did not commit.

7. When I was 21 years old, I fell into a 3-day coma and remained in ICU for 2 weeks.

_My reaction to my diagnosis_

I felt ashamed that I was not "strong enough". I wanted to be and feel invulnerable, so I rejected my diagnosis when my psychologist and psychiatrist made it last year. I wish I did not have it. But I had a panic attack yesterday and my friends were there and asked me what was wrong. I said "I never felt safe in this world." And it finally clicked.... My psychologist and psychiatrist were right.

And it affected so many of my relationships. The friends I lost. The colleagues I pissed off. The family members I hurt.

I feel so sad that I did not accept this when I should've.

I am not a veteran, but at one point in my life I needed to use a gun in self defense.

The gun was a revolver, it came to me as a gift just two weeks earlier and I carried it when going to the wilderness because it was cool, but I had not yet taken it to the range to learn how to shoot it nor did I just try it out in the woods.

The situation involved an angry drunk man with a shotgun who had intent to kill me. I was able to get into cover quickly and draw my revolver, and it was dark out so I lined up a shot and pulled the trigger.

Except it was a fucking single shot revolver and I didn't know what a single shot revolver was. I pulled and pulled but the trigger wouldn't move.

Luckily as the individual was drunk and it was pitch black out I was able to run away safely.

But every single night in some dream I have need to use a rifle or pistol and every single time I pull the trigger it is stuck and nothing happens.

After being assaulted by my husband three times during the last few months, I managed to break up. I was pretty sure he was in the process of killing me.

We have been separated for three weeks now and I am starting to develop some serious symptoms.

Directly after the assault I was feeling fine, but now I can not watch lousy criminal TV shows and the usual Hollywood blockbuster - I can't go a minute without believing he will kill me very soon and very gruesome - randomly triggered fight or flight responses - snapping at my loved ones - dizziness - the urge to throw up and to not eat well - dissociation blabla. You name it.

Do you recommend seeing a therapist (with a specialization in EMDR) as soon as possible or would you wait until October or so to see how things develop naturally?

I am thankful for every advice!

I can't even watch the trailer because her behavior is reminiscent of someone who really traumatized me

First responder here, (27F). Diagnosed with PTSD due to work experiences. Curious if any women first responders or women with pre existing PTSD have falling right into a postpartum issue (anxiety, depression, even though severe- psychosis)
Feel very uneducated and it makes me quite anxious with the entire Lindsey Clancy case happening.

Just wanted to share this and see if anyone else saw it and related, i’m watching it for the first time. probably the most accurate representation of the chaos you go through after being >!sexually assaulted!<.

this is in reference to episode 4 of Baby Reindeer. Not sure if anyone here has seen it, it would probably be pretty triggering for most so just warning if this post somehow catches your interest and makes you want to watch lol.

okay now spoilers and TWs for SA, drug use, stalking:
>!in Baby Reindeer there’s a flashback episode to the main character meeting up with a friend who promises to get him into acting/comedy. they start doing a ton of drugs together and the dude assaults him whenever he’s in a drug-induced coma. the following montage after he goes through this felt so accurate to me. he goes out into public and doesn’t want to be seen. he masturbates to porn he wouldn’t usually watch and says he isn’t sure if it’s because of the trauma or something that was already within him. he becomes hypersexual and starts hooking up with people and putting himself in risky and dangerous situations. he unfortunately gets assaulted several more times via strangers, at least he implies that.!<

>!also even the last scene of the episode: he talks about his stalker martha and says something like. “she seemed pitiful and innocent, like it was unintentional, compared to the guy who assaulted me who seemed pernicious and intentional. admitting that martha’s behavior is wrong would be admitting that his was too, and i wasn’t ready to admit that to myself yet.”!<

relating to that last scene:
>!i actually related to this a lot bc one of my least favorite ptsd symptoms is being too sympathetic to creeps sometimes. i used to work at a bar and had a customer who i felt bad for similar to the show. he was a middle-aged guy but almost naive or innocent-seeming? nobody else would talk to him or they’d just serve him his drink and not pay attention to him. i felt bad and thought poor guy, he’s probably lonely and has no friends. so i started being nice to him and asking him questions about his life.!<

>!anyways he ended up stalking me basically; wouldn’t leave my shifts at 3am even when everyone else got the hint to leave when i said “everyone has to leave were closing.” he started eavesdropping on my conversations and sending me fb messages about it. ofc i didn’t give him my fb he found it lol. he would be there for every single shift i had from start to finish and not take his eyes off me the whole time. anyways the whole situation became really messed up when my managers didn’t have my back and i started fearing my safety. i got into a screaming match with the guy one day when he wouldn’t leave the property at closing time lol. anyways i work at a different job so it’s all fine now but fuck the owners and managers of that place i hope they go to hell.!<

Idk, i don’t think i’ve ever seen a piece of media so accurately display the chaos and mental anguish it puts you through, plus the fact that you become suspicious of everyone including yourself. it was validating to see honestly, i feel like whoever wrote that episode has been through SA trauma.

Alright, so I have a cousin (16M), I'm (16M) too and to start all of this, last April till June, he lived in my home with my mom because he just came out from the rehab center and he had to attend some court meetings here in my city. So what I am angry about all the time is the moments where he keeps on coming in my head, he always tricks me, for example, he asked me to have my wifi's password because my mom said so but when I asked my mom, she didn't say anything, I got tricked. And another moment is when he tried to steal my laptop at like around 11 PM, luckily I was still awake and then my phone alerted that someone was trying to hack into my google account, so I went to his room (f\*\*k him), he has my laptop and I asked like, "hey! give me my laptop back!" I got it and so I went to my room, and at that moment I had a mental breakdown, I was so angry and I think that was my first time that I had a mental breakdown related to him, and so even when he finally left my house to live with his family in the province, these moments are ALWAYS REPLAYING IN MIND. It's too much that I always have a mental breakdown, whatever I do, I think of him, I always think of revenge and stuff, punching the air and so on. And that is why I need help, please just make him get rid of him from my mind! My mom keeps telling me, simple, just stop thinking about him, well, that doesn't work, those moments are just too much that I keep thinking about it and having mental breakdowns about it, anger issues. So please, does anyone have a tip to help me? I cannot control my anger or my emotions...

Anyone here taking Wellbutrin? How’s it been for you? Have you had any side effects like heart palpitations, increased anxiety, feeling on edge, etc.?

My dad committed suicide in September 2021, in the morning. I was awake normally, asked him for some pocket money, and left for class. About an hour later, when I went back home, he wasn't in his room. My younger brother had made him breakfast — bread toast and tea. When I asked my brother where dad was, he said "he is gone," but my brother was playing games in his room and didn't really notice anything. I went back to my day, waited for him, but he never came back. My whole family started calling him and searching every room in the house. We found his phone. We called his friends. My little brother said, "let's check the storeroom" — it's on the top floor of our house. We found the storeroom light on. We knocked 4-5 times, no answer. We tried to break the window, and when we finally broke the full wooden window open, we saw his legs first, then realized he was hanging. He had used a nada dori. The storeroom was locked from the inside.He used to be very cheerful, and somewhat strict, but I was deeply attached to him. I wanted to become a person like him — I admired him a lot. This happened right when I turned 18. I'm 23 now, and I still haven't recovered from it. It affected my ability to focus on my career.I've looked into suicide cases and most seem to involve family problems or money problems. My dad worked, but he never saved anything for himself. He'd also broken some promises, and the whole family was against him because of it — like he'd betrayed them first, and after that, my family started treating him badly. At the time, I wasn't able to process what the actual problem was.I still miss my father every day. I keep asking why he did it. Sometimes I've even thought it should have been me instead.

I've taken multiple online ptsd self assesments and all have told me I don't meet the diagnostic criteria for ptsd. mostly because avoidance was my only high score most of the others were low to moderate, not high enough to cross the threshold, with hyper viligance always scoring very low and ruling it out

But I recently just started trauma therapy, and was professionally assesed, and my trauma therapist believes I meet the criteria for ptsd. In all catogeries. Including the hyper viligicance. Actually, she thinks I have cptsd, but that isn't an official dsm diagonosis yet.

So now im super confused.

I know I dont meet the diagnostic criteria for ARFID because I have no functional impairment caused by my ARFID tendencies, but my eating disorder therapist got me diagnosed me with ARFID because she's confident enough I have it regardless of the strict criteria. So I know I have ARFID.

now I'm wondering the same thing about ptsd. Do I have it or not???

(ik none of you can answer that question I'm just asking in general I'm so confused now)