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WhiplashSmile -> RE: Post-War PTSD and the lifestyle (5/19/2007 2:04:29 AM)
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This is a subject that I don't talk about much or share with many people. I made a bold post back in Feb this year to the "How did BDSM help you" thread. http://www.collarchat.com/m_857772/mpage_1/tm.htm#859277
Needless to say I grew up with PTSD complete with Freddy Krueger like nightmares. I used to dread going to sleep at night and having nightmares. I would lay in bed at night trying to keep from falling asleep out of fear. My family did not fully grasp what was going on with me other than I was just a kid that suffered from having Bad dreams or nightmares. The nightmares started around the time I was 4 and were frequent up until I was around 15 years old. The older I grew I thought I was being demonically attacked at night literally, this was how bad it was for me. Around the time I was in 5th-6th grade I actually started making crosses out of all kinds of things, blessing them with prayers and hanging around ever portal/opening into my room. Just doing shit I had seen from watching TV horror movies or shows where people combated demonic forces. This somewhat worked and it helped reduce or ease the nightmares for awhile. But I was one freaked out puppy dog growing up as a child fearful that something demonic was screwing with me at night. A nice buzz word for these type of dreams is "Waking Dreams", hell I'd swear I had my eyes open looking at my room, I'd hear the footsteps and then something jumping on me shaking my body, pulling on my legs. The bitch is how a childs mind processes things with PTSD and deals with it growing up.
About the time I turned 14 my fear of this nightmare attacker slowly started to transform into anger out of frustration. I was sick and tired of being scared, attacked, harassed and not being able to sleep at nights. All the prayers, Crosses, and even protection pentagrams were simply not working for me. Yes, I even resorted to making pentagrams from a few books on witchcraft. I even tried Egyptian wards/glyphs... Well, I think you get the idea here. Anyways none of these things worked and I was at the end of my wits and rope... Hence, I became frustrated and angry. So I found myself literally getting pissed off, one of the center themes to my nightmares was a door. Whenever a door showed up in my dreams I grew fearful, knowing full well that my demonic attacker was going to come after me from the other side of it. Mine was a big hairy creature, a sort of demonic version of big foot. Needless to say, if I think about Big Foot it scares me still to this day. Funny, I mentioned that on a previous thread as well. Anyways, I actually read somewhere about people being able to take control of their nightmares.. literally be able to consiously interact with their dreams. Hell, I tried everything else and it did not work. Long story short after working at it hard, I found myself starting to be bolder and bolder in my dreams... then one night when I was coming out of a nightmare and being still attacked in a "waking dream" level.. I finally managed to speak directly to my attacker.. it was very difficult.. however, stupid as it was I found myself saying "Who are you?"... I felt the hands that were shaking my legs freeze while still having a grip on me. WOW.. this was uncharted territory... Next thing I felt this whole enity jump on my whole body.. and the first time ever I heard it's voice in exchange.. a super low beastly tone.. an extremely low forceful heavy breath threaten me with "One of these days I'm gonna get you"... and I swear I literally felt this whole demonic attacker simply fade away. That was my last experience with it! WOW... I still had dreams from time to time about that door, however I found myself charging at the door opening it and trying to attack first. LOL...
For many years I thought I had actually had a demonic experience growing up! Hell, I still remember when Nightmare on Elm street 3 : Dream Warriors came out.. I felt a strong connection that whole damn movie it was not funny! Hell, I even went out and bought the Dokken Cassettee tape to listen to "Dream Warriors" over and over again. Learned how to play the song on my guitar.
I need to move this post along faster... Needless to say it was not until around 1994 that I became aware I suffered from Post Traumatic Stress. It actually made me laugh to discover this! It was a great experience to suddenly realize that I had not been a victim of demonic attacks or any crap like that. Long story short, I ended up getting counseling, therapy and buying books and going through the process. The real bitch was when all the suppressed memories started happening, major flashbacks to aweful things that happened. Growing up I had a set of memories about my childhood abuse, however these were more mild memories compared to the shit I had suppressed.
The bitch has been working through PTSD triggers and behaviors, and my PTSD is more more manageable. I've had to learn to embrace all the wonderful things that PTSD did for me. It drove me to explore religion at an early age, it made me less trusting of the world around me, got me pissed off enough to learn how to confront my own personal fears, Mind you the thoughts of running into Big Foot still scares the hell out of me (no walks alone in the forest for this dude), I know why big foot scares me and it's connected to a childhood incident with my childhood attacker that happened in the woods outback of our house.
I'm posting a lot here in the hopes that perhaps somebody growing up with a similar PTSD experience will not feel alone, or be able to indentify with this. Perhaps there are those that still believe they are the subject to demonic attack and are not aware it's really PTSD.
PTSD has affected my life in more ways then just nightmares. The trick is realizing that you have PTSD then seeking proper help, and becoming more self aware and being able to develop coping skills. PTSD is natural for anybody that has gone through a major stressful event, be it rape, childhood abuse, war, victim of violent crime, even major automobile accidents and other things that can be the cause of PTSD.
Anyways I'm just another person on these message boards and I have a past fucked up childhood, go figure. I've shared with everybody a little of my bagage (um.. make that Samsonite Luggage set) with the hopes that it's of some value for somebody. To at least let them know that they are not alone, that there are others out there.
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