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A therapist I was seeing a couple of years ago on a short term basis whilst my regular T was on leave, informed me that I'd always be susceptible to PTSD. Seems once the brain has been down that path, it naturally goes down that path when anything bad happens. AT the time I was thinking - major trauma, big things: like a car accident or anything life-threatening, not piddly little things.

I've just recently discovered that even minor events will be stored as trauma in my head/body and I'm having to accept that I might always have difficulty re-processing stuff, even the small stuff. This scares me a little because I'm not always going to have my T to come to the rescue.

Background: So my dear friend & I were taking a walk on Monday evening. Wishful thinking on our part that we'd squeeze it in before dark (daylight savings has ended) and so we're happily walking up the road, then crack as a bottle smashes under my friends feet. She slips over the bottle and lands head first onto the concrete footpath. I get down to see if she's ok and there's blood pouring out of her head and hands. SHe didn't think she could get up, so I reassured her, I'd only be a minute and I ran to my home (which was fortunately only 300 metres away) and called the ambulance. My H helped by bringing a blanket and wet towel to put on her head and he swept up the glass on the footpath. The 111 team talked me through, checking the vital signs, and her level of consciousness and stuff, until the ambulance arrived. I was calm on the outside but, inside I had so much stuff going on. I followed her up to A & E in the car and she ended up needing 7 stitches to her left eyebrow and she had lacerations on both her thumbs (from bracing the fall) and grazed knees. It could have been a lot worse.

So, I spent the night with her to make sure concussion didn't take hold, and when I did finally sleep, I kept having nightmares about being chased and then smacked in the head, by my friends daughter. On waking, I kept seeing a slow motion movie - hearing the crunch of the bottle, then in very slow motion, my friend falling to the ground. It was horrible and when I shared this with my T she said, the slow motion thing meant something about my brain storing the memory as trauma.

So my T did some EMDR with me (It works best with single traumatic events) and it would seem that in spite of my initial calmness and appropriate responses to my injured friend, I had stored a whole load of negative stuff about myself. The EMDR has managed to tone down the video replay to just the crack of the bottle and then seeing my friend lying on the ground. It has removed the in-between part.

Yeah, there was a lot of historical material wrapped up in the curent stuff - the helplessness, the seeing a loved one hurt and feeling unable to do anything, and a lot of guilty feelings.

Anyway the point of my post is: I'm going to have to learn to accept that even minor incidents are going to be processed in my brain as trauma and that I am going to have to be more aware of this for the future. I'm obviously acutely sensitive to trauma. This is going to be hard for me to accept. I feel wrapping myself and my loved ones in cotton wool and never going anywhere again. I know that's illogical and isn't living life, but it's how I feel.

I don't blame you for feeling that way. It's hard to realize that you are just going to have difficulties like these, something that you find entirely unwelcome.

However, I suspect that you can learn ways of processing difficult events and blunt their effect. So activating event A passing through your trauma-based belief system B can in the end have a different outcome or consequence C. It would be ideal if you could change B, and hey, who knows, you may be able to chip away at it over time. But it sounds like you are effective at taking action that changes C for you. While not perfect so far, it sounds like this is a heck of a lot better for you than letting your reactions run their course. In time, you could get really good at this, routinely minimizing the disruption of triggering incidents. What do you think?

Peace,
jim

I find that I am very calm in situations that cause others to panic and it it probably due to past life-threatening trauma. It can actually be a good thing in that way, much like police, EMT, or military training can desensitize people who deal with traumatic events as a part of their career. I experience events in slow motion, which seems to give me the extra time needed to think logically. It sounds like you were able to do that in the situation and that you handled yourself well.

From what I can tell, you are indicating that the re-processing of the event is what is causing a problem for you. You were able to use EMDR in order to lessen the impact of the memory because the memory itself was causing retraumatization in a way. I imagine that over time the memory itself would become less traumatic for you and that you would cope fine.

I think that where the retraumatization causes the most problems is when we respond in ways that are not effective. A classic example used with PTSD is for someone with military trauma to dive to the pavement when a car backfires. I used to duck and cover my head when someone would try to give me a hug. Those sorts of responses are examples where we react to a situation as if it were traumatic because we are really responding to triggers of past trauma. Instead of our brains coping with the actual situation, we are left unable to cope effectively because of the past trauma. This seems different to me than what you are describing as dealing with a situation in the moment but then reliving it as trauma once it is over.

What studies have shown is that when people experience traumatic events, talking to someone about their experience with someone immediately after the event helps to lessen the long term impacts of trauma. With physical and sexual abuse where children do not talk about what has happened out of shame, there is a tendency for us to carry that trauma into our adult lives. However, when there is not shame involved and we can talk about our experiences, such as being in an earthquake or other disaster, they do not have such a lasting effect. It is much easier to "get over it" when that process begins right away. Perhaps if you have people in your life, not necessarily a therapist, who you can talk to about things that upset you, they will not have such a lasting impact on you.

I don't think I have been as clear in my explanation as I try to be so hopefully this still makes sense even if the wording is not as precise. I have been pretty scatter-brained lately and it is hard to hold onto my thoughts long enough to make sense of them sometimes.

I think you aren't so far from normal as you think. That was tramatic. A trauma reaction is normal, since it was a trauma, something most anyone would find traumantic. Seems to me it doesn't mean you're brain damaged. (Labeling.)

I do think you show a good self understanding in your post. But, I also think this wasn't a minor incident. I think you do yourself a disservice by thinking of it as a minor incident.

I agree with Ellen about calling what happened a "minor incident." As I read it, I thought that I would probably panic if it were my friend. I don't think I'd be helpful at all. Blood pouring out of her head and hands? It's making me squeamish just thinking about it. I know that the experience would upset me, and I would probably think about it afterwards, too. I'm not sure about the slow motion movie, but I think I'd replay it also.

I'm not saying you weren't traumatized and that you won't always have a problem with processing trauma, just that the event as you described it was not "minor", in my opinion.

I'm glad your friend was not badly hurt.

Yeah, changing B could be the solution, maybe? I think in this situ, A the activating event, somehow it passed through the Belief system: I have to ignore whatever I'm feeling right now, in order to get through the difficult situation, effectively. This is the default program from way back - Ignore my feelings and do whatever I have to do to survive or get through the situation. Yes, this was effective In the moment, for both myself and my friend; who has since praised me for my calmness and reassuring presence for her.

However I didn't really do myself justice; because once again Amanda failed to process her feelings surrounding the event which left me feeling traumatised by it. Ok, it was a quick turnaround - 2 days to process my feelings, but that only happened because my T picked up on it. A few people have pointed out that it was traumatic but, I hadn't thought of it as such, even though I was displaying symptoms of having been traumatised = reliving the event (both in my sleep and when awake) and the hypervigilance (a sense that something awful was going to happen at any moment) and the adrenalin rushing, on alert feelings in my body. I am now more aware of the concept of secondary traumatisation - one doesn't have to actually be hurt and in danger to feel traumatised - seeing another in a life-threatening or traumatic situation is enough.

I guess, I have to be more careful when I've put my feelings on the back-burner in order to get through the moment. I have to go away and process that stuff at a later time. I can learn from this experience. I did an amazing job of getting my friend through the situation so PTSD doesn't set in for her, but in the future if something like this should happen again, I have to also be aware that I need to take care of myself.

Amanda,

I also agree that the event was traumatic. I think we are more susceptible to being triggered by such events, depending on how far along we are in recovery. I think it would trigger me to experience an event such as that. I still trigger often, and I realize that it is going to take strict mental discipline to end it. I'm no longer in the jungle, now I can calm my mind.

But to think my brain is damaged for life? That's a pretty bleak way of looking at things. The upside is that I can succeed at what I choose to, given sufficient time and resources, regardless of the fact that I am recovering from bpd, and that's a gift. That certainly wouldn't be what I would define as brain-damaged.

You acted to help your friend during a difficult time. That deserves a pat on the back. You're so hard on yourself, when you did the right thing, regardless of the way you felt.