h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Continuing my attempts to figure out my mental health issues.

Post-traumatic stress is a definite component. In my case: unresolved stress from an almost-lifetime of events so traumatic I have difficulty getting over them.

There are several traumas starting from very early childhood (3 years or so) that I still have horror thinking of.

There is something I just CANNOT PROCESS OR ACCEPT. I just cannot figure out why people would deliberately do cruel things to each other OR to animals. I can't describe it ... it's like a kind of existential horror, it's like a huge black hole that threatens to suck in and consume everything that's precious to me. It's a fascination and an obsession and it has led to some very bad effects to my psyche. I mean just trying to understand it. It drives me wild, it drives me to distraction and despair. This has been a kind of trauma uncontrollably spawning more traumas. This is also something I CANNOT DISCUSS with 'regular' people. The full scope and the magnitude of the damage this has done to my psyche and continues to do to my psyche is just incredible - people will not believe it - and I will not tell them or describe this because it is too horrendous.

This is the worst of it and also this is the one people will never consider because they are not equipped to, but this is the trauma that dwarfs all the others and yet I know people will never really believe me or understand. It's much easier to consider a single traumatic event, say if I was raped by a family member - THAT people will understand me being traumatized by. But THIS people will not understand, will not understand how I am traumatized and how I am unable to 'get over it'.

But I was abused as well in many ways ... not *actually* raped, but abused in other ways, sexually abused short of actual rape, physically abused, mentally and psychologically abused. I *was* brainwashed and then escaped from the brainwashing - which was traumatic. Again people whom this has not happened to will have difficulty understanding. I was betrayed in almost every way in which a person can be betrayed. I was let down. I was manipulated and exploited. My mind was poisoned. As a vulnerable child, I was used as a pawn in ideological battles. My youth, what should have been the best years of my life, was stolen. HOW does one calculate the harm and trauma from all that?

Most post-traumatic stress articles I've read don't deal with stuff like that because in scope it goes beyond what people can reasonably understand and evaluate.

I've witnessed horrific events as well. And was very badly affected because I am very compassionate. I really am like this by nature.

My psychological breakdowns and suicide attempts were EXTREMELY traumatic. Again people whom such things haven't happened to can not easily understand just how incredibly bad they are.

My parents dying was traumatic to me as well. I need them and their support still ... they were the only people in a position to really help me and they're gone ... but I don't miss them just because they helped me, I really did love them. They loved me too. We needed each other. I did all I could for them and also feel bad that I didn't do more, that I failed them but I really did do a lot for them in their last days. But I get incredibly bad nightmares about them still. This people can perhaps understand as being a trauma I still get post-traumatic stress over.

How about the trauma of being a mentally ill person in a very harsh society - of not being sure of my basic everyday survival - of not being able to have the things most people take for granted - of *needing* friends with a kind of desparate inner yearning - of desperately wanting to love someone, of wanting to find my special someone - of wanting to have children. Of wanting to *matter* in this world - of wanting to be able to contribute to society, of wanting to earn a livelihood, of wanting to be appreciated? Most people 'out there' for instance cannot understand what it would be like to be in a position where you could never have sex with another person ... never! Would they find that a deprivation they would consider traumatic? It's the least of my worries. I haven't even had a proper date yet, I've not even had a romantic kiss - not once. It's not even on the cards. It's the least of my problems - I have many much more pressing and serious concerns. The bottom line is I'm leading a cripplingly limited life - WHILE having an enormously powerful mind, lots of talents, and lots of ambitions and desires and needs ... about which I can do nothing! This, too, is traumatic.

All of this imposes massive stress on me which I cannot fully process or resolve and all of which haunts me every day.

I'm not complaining ... I just want to explain the matter. Like I said elsewhere: the problems I have are also problems many other people have. Many 'ordinary' people, though, never think of the sort of challenges so many others of us face every day. I have seen so many times people being dismissive of people with mental health problems, all sorts of things, depression, schizophrenia, post-traumatic stress. We - people who have to deal with things like that - are still human beings, with real feelings!

Thing is: we have much we COULD contribute to the world. If we are helped and allowed to get to terms and overcome those problems we could be valuable members of society!

Perhaps I have pointed you at this place before, perhaps not.
http://bandbacktogether.com/

There are lots of friendly people there, with various experiences, illnesses, dealing with their lives, and others just being kind.

Perhaps it can help you to read and communicate there? Or, if it triggers bad emotions, please back out fast.

Hello Milla, thanks for that link, I've been looking at it. Haven't found anyone so far with the same sort of problems I have but it does seem to confirm to me that there are way too many people in the world with awful problems.