After Some Four Decades: PTSD

People finally, and sadly it took two more long running occupations to garner even speaking about, are paying not only attention to what happens to many in War and Occupations of others but that it also has always been a factor for many in civilian life as well!

Any extreme, and for some even minor, trauma in ones life can start the nightmare of living or reliving the same, Post Traumatic Stress!, and they have suffered in silence or been mis-diagnosed and treated or not for other mental problems.

How childbirth caused my PTSD

I thought the diagnosis was for war veterans, not new mothers. Then I had a baby

The delivery of my son didn't start with a rush of water, or cramps that left me hunched. It was a decision, an edict, and with it, the drip Pitocin, a drug that induces contractions. The contractions came big and loud, almost immediately at one minute apart. My cervix wouldn't dilate, though. I was eventually given the narcotic Stadol, which caused me to hallucinate through a very long night. Twenty-four hours later, clear-headed but still not dilated, I told my doctor I didn't believe the induction was working, that I wanted to discuss other options. But before I knew it, he began painfully separating the membrane guarding my bag of waters.

"He isn't examining me," I yelled at my husband. "He's doing something."

Snip

But something more was going on with me. When I spoke to other women who had PPD, our symptoms didn't match up. I didn't have resentment or contempt for my baby. Further, the women I spoke to and the books I read made no mention of the things plaguing me: Just lying on my back opened a trapdoor to those horrible moments of my C-section. I would wake up from two-hour fits of sleep breathless and scared; I felt that I was stuck in fight-or-flight. Certain words and images were like a tripwire in my brain; driving past the hospital where I gave birth, I started shaking so much I had to pull over. I went to emergency rooms to evaluate pains that may or may not have been real, I consulted another psychiatrist, and another, I took a low dose of Zoloft, but none of it worked. Desperate, I consulted yet another psychiatrist — but this time, I chose a generalist, not a specialist in PPD. It was my husband's advice to try someone whose livelihood did not revolve around a certain disorder: "Never ask a barber if you need a haircut," he said. >>>>>

This should be even more understood, not only to help those who suffer from but also to take away the stigma many soldiers and veterans feel if they seek treatment or answers as to what they're now experiencing, which wasn't a part of their lives till sent into battle.

Hopefully as we go forward it finally will, and not only by us but every being on this planet!