Man, having competing diagnoses sucks. I mean it’s no picnic for me, but for my family, it’s doubly rough.
A few years ago, I was officially diagnosed with PTSD, the result of a rape when I was 16 and sexual abuse by an uncle from 4-9. That’s on top of a genetic degenerative migraine condition. So I’m a ball of fun.
Both conditions have noticeable triggers. I feel like my family has slowly, over tine, come to understand what my migraine triggers are and are understanding when I need to avoid them. Areas that are super loud, lots of alcohol, etc. no one wants to see me laid out because of a bad night.
PTSD—different story. Despite the fact that I’ve tried to be open and share my story, my triggers, my family has told me that my efforts to avoid my triggers are “selfish and childish “. They’re told me they feel like I use my PTSD as an excuse and have staged multiple pop up interventions because they feel like my PTSD is actually depression. Their main concern? I overreact to things.
That’s probably fair. It gives align with the illness and while I I’m not happy, I’m not depressed. I’m not happy with somethings in our family righ now and because it’s 3 vs 1 I’m not sure how to bring it up so that it can get fixed. Unfortunately, that means just like someone hitting your bruised elbow over and over again over, sometimes you snap.
But then there are times like tonight. We all went to a party. A guy that kicked off my PTSD was going to be there. My partners are good friends with this asshole. I knew they’d want to spend a considerable amount of time with Asshole. They assured me it wouldn’t be a big deal. Asshole and asshooles wife ended up sitting at our table for dinner. That meant I had no where to go. I didn’t feel comfortable even getting my purse. Aaahokes wife continued to linger around the table.
I said something to my partners about this and was immediately met with “what was I supposed to do?” I said. “Tall the our table was full”””butwasn’t “. Partners then disappeared, visibly upset
I told my husband that when Asshole was identified as the trigger that started the chain of events leading to my diagnosis, my significant fear was that my partners would choose Asshole over me if It came right down to it. Well here we were. And they had. At a silly party.
My husband said he didn’t see it that way. I felt a rush of panic. A rush of abandonment. A rush of no one is going to believe you anyway. I felt alone. I started to well up and didn’t want to make a scene so I left.
I don’t know what to do to help them understand. Maybe it’s to much. I feel like it’s categorgirically unfairl to make the victim come up with solutions when the problem circumstances were easy to predict. I know that I’m exhausted from having to defend myself and it’s truly doing nothing for my mental health