I've admitted before
on here that I suffer from PTSD, but by the way that I act, you would never know
that I had it. The way that I walk and carry myself, and the way that I smile
each and every single day, you would never even for a second guess that I have
my moments and bouts with depression. I mean it's not like I go home at night
and cry in a corner or something, it's pretty manageable because I have a strong
support system and medicine readily available for my use when I feel overwhelmed
or experience anxiety attacks. So to say living with PTSD isn't bad because I
can manage it the way I'm supposed to and it's a lot of work to do, but I'm
doing it the best that I can with that. But there are some days where it's just
like my brain overloads and it just all comes crashing down around me, I'm
human, PTSD just makes it a little harder to function when those bouts happen.
Before I explain what
happened, let me give you a little insight into how my mind works. I process a
lot of information and thoughts a day, and I mean a lot. I literally think of
ten different blog topics a day and I write down about three of them due to the
fact that I can't get to a pen and piece of paper before the next thought comes
through. With that same ability comes the fact that I think about a million and
one things that I should be doing to maximize my time so that I can prepare for
the next step of the plan, and there's always the next step of the plan. So
between always thinking about writing and my life, while learning stuff for my
career, my mind is always working nonstop. In my opinion, it works way too much
lol.
But what that much
thinking and always planning and what not, it comes that time where you crash,
it's inevitable. It happens to everyone that goes out and tries to do too much.
I actually JUST read a blog by
@eversoRoco entitled
Never Give Your All, which is a great read by the way, and she went
through the same exact thing that happened to me a week and some change later.
I'm really hoping that wasn't foreshadowing because I really told her to watch
out for herself and to make time to relax, words I needed to tell myself lol.
But any who, basically what happened was that I had a moment where everything
just jumped on me at worse and I just felt myself on the brink of just bursting
out of my shell, and I just started feeling sick out of nowhere and with nausea
and all of that good stuff.
I'm going to spare you
the details of what exactly happened, but it resulted in a trip to the ER and
subsequent hospital stay for like two and a half days. I didn't tell anyone that
I knew because I felt ashamed at what let up to me getting put in there and the
fact that I was in the hospital period. I see myself in the light of being the
strong one, with the head on my shoulders all of the time, readily able to give
great life advice for those that need it. I really forgot that I need the same
thing and I need people to be there for me when I need help, because the one
thing that I actually had to teach myself recently believe it or not, was the
fact that I don't have all of the answers. No matter how much I plan, no matter
how much I research and devise strategies and what not, I simply can't do every
single thing alone.
I let people get the
better of me, and I let people take advantage of my caring nature and
willingness to help. Now I'm not one to say turn down people when they need
help, there just gets to a point where they need to do their own thing and stand
on their own two feet. By me not being able to do what I needed to for me, and
always exerting myself, I was not only putting pressure on myself, but also to
those that actually have been helping me. In lamest terms, I've been slacking
all around, and I'm not ashamed to admit that. Now when I went in and I was
lying there, the hospital psychiatrist actually came in to talk to me, per
regulations, and it was funny because they saw that I was receiving counseling
there, all of this was at the VA, and he knew my actual therapist. He told me
that he knew that she wouldn't have liked to see me in there and that she
would've probably hit me if she did, which is true lol.
At the
end of the day he basically told me what I already knew, stop stressing myself
out for no apparent reason, I'm not Superman. He said that while it's nice to do
the things that I do for others, I need to do more for myself and be more of a
me type of person. I always thought those kind of people were in the wrong for
having that mentality but he quickly pointed out that I could never be one of
those people per say, just merely a happier person when I'm focusing on my goals
and current life placement. He also reminded me to stop necessarily always
worrying about the next step and tomorrow, and to just focus on doing what I
need to do for today and worry about building up towards tomorrow. He said that
not every day was a game seven, and not every day I had to make the winning shot
to make it to the next round. That analogy made sense, in part of us watching
the highlights from the game winning shots that were on ESPN at the time.
All in all I have to
sit down and be me for a while as I've said the past couple of weeks and this
whole being hospitalized and being set back a couple weeks because of it really
shows me that I need to be more in control of my life and stop supporting
others. I practically drove myself into sickness worrying about what I can and
can't do for others and then thinking about all of the things that I have to do,
and my emotions and brain just couldn't take it. I'm still learning how PTSD
really works and the lengths it goes to in trying to sabotage someone's life and
make them lesser of a person. I'm just glad that God gave me enough sense to
slap me in the head in the form of this trip to quiet time, and show me more
than ever that it's about me and me only.
I love this. You are correct...you have to consider yourself first because if you are not here physically or emotionally...what good can you be for others... either no good or not as good as you could be.
ReplyDeleteMy recent post touches on my experience and recent revelation....i have discovered that music is so powerful in evoking emotion and when you are on the brink of feeling down put on your fav uptempo song on loooouuuuddd and escape for the 3+ mins duration of the song....it might just reverse the heavy clouds over you.
Steph ��
That's a great idea, I love music and I listen to it all of the time. I need to start utilizing my playlists and what not, thanks for that reminder to use those. I'm going to head over to your blog and check that post out as well!
DeleteDev! Sorry I took so long to catch this. I was on a mental, (and physical for the weekend) vacay, so I've been off twitter and such.
ReplyDeleteAnyway. Love this! I had no clue that you suffer from PTSD. No idea how you found time to breathe, either, with that schedule. You did tell me to watch myself and take care, and then the same thing happened to you. I only like this chain of events because you went ahead and wrote about it, which is kind of like paying it forward for the next person. I respect that. Nice post! Thanks for sharing your story.
Ah it's ok! Like I tell everyone, the blog will always be here for later reading. Yea I found it so ironic that it happened not to far after yours lol But my main goal is to educate people so that they don't make the same mistakes as I do & we both have great posts to help them out on that.
Delete