That is the truth, Oxy!

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I just lost a long post to you guys, but anyway, will try to remember what I said! LOL ROTFLMAO!!!

We are DIFFERENT, we get more of some things (alertness becomes HYPER) and less of other things (language skills) from the effects of the SUPER-stress. Because mine was so SUDDEN after the aircraft crash, it was more noticable to me. I know that LONG stress of high levels (but NOT sudden) can also have a profound effect as well, so I think I have had BOTH kinds, but didn’t realize what was happening until the SUDDEN one happened. Just the suddeness of it madeit much more noticable.

I am sort of I think like a child that learns differently now, I hate the term “learning disabled”–I think these kids learn DIFFERENTLY—actually could they be either biologically wired differently or could they also be suffering from stress induced language difficulties? I think that might be a good question to have answered.

I wish I had known what was happening before, I knew about grief process and I think knowing about it DID help, but the arrogance on MY part of thinking that by knowing it, I didn’t have to FEEL it,was the part that delayed me. Not the nowing it delaying me, but my own arrogance that I could “over come anything” LOL

Learning about WHAT caused my word finding difficulty reassures me that it is “normal” and while I WILL BE DIFFERENT than I was, it is OK. I can’t do my parlor trick of recalling 100 numbers in a row any more, and I can’t remember every conversation I ever had word for word, (this allowed the gaslighting to work) but at the same time, they gaslighted me before the “injury” because I just could not emotionally accept that my egg donor would LIE. I thought she was just making a “mistake” so I woujld “forgive” the “mistake” without realizing she was LYING.

I hav emade adjustments to my lack of short term memory, writing lists, etc. but am no longer TERRORIZED that I am “losing it” mentally. I am just DIFFERENT than I was. Not so “bad” as before, but definitely DIFFERENT. I also stutter sometimes when I am having trouble finding a word.

I am no longer able to work in my profession because of the word finding difficulties so I retired back when it was at its worst. And, I can accept that my professional capability is no longer adequate for such a high stress job, and one in which memory is paramount in importance….people’s lives would be on the line.

But my over all IQ is the same in spite of that, which is strange to me, but has been tested so I know I am right on that. My judgment is also returning and in some ways I am much more “clear sighted” in emotional areas than before.

My hyper-alertness and FEAR has calmed, and I am more accepting of my changes and less anxious about them. So I am DIFFERENT, but that’s OK.

It takes TIME and WORK to understand these changes, and knowing that they are “caused” by something and fit a “pattern” for PTSD helps me too.

I am “obscessed” about learning about this in a scientific way, and knowing what is going on helps me a bunch I think. My curosity about causes and effects has always been high and still is.

NC though has been the salvation of my sanity, that and the validation I have gotten here at LF in a low stress environment of like-minded people who “get it”—-I am glad that by sharing what I am finding out is also helping others as well.

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I had that about ten years ago. Never happened to me before either. FREAKED me out. And then….it just went away. I am seeing now thru Oxy’s post that this is all caused by stress-PTSD. wow………I am so glad to finally understand this. Oxy…bless you for this info. LF is such a lifeboat.

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In it’s most basic form, the lesson I have learned it what it REALLY means to be human. So many questions I’ve had my whole life are now being answered: what is free will? do we really have a choice when every part of us is being influenced by genes and environment? What make people good or evil? What is sacrifice? How does stockholm syndrome happen?

If I had realized what I was experiencing during that time, I would not have been able to really experience it. (You may have heard of the effect of the observer.) The most profound part of it – the part that still boggles the mind – is the LIES. So much lying, for no reason, so irrational, so sick.

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Since the D&D and within the devastation that resulted,I have found it really difficult to concentrate generally, but I noticed that I had began to stutter when speaking to others,quite makedly, and my concentration was shot. I am still finding reading slow and difficult still,I find myself re-reading the same sentence over and over again, but I put it down to depression and just keep ‘practising’.

But I guess the depression is part of the PTSD.

The stuttering was really weird though, never happend to me before, felt like ‘nerves’, but happend with my children even, so looking back it was very strange.

I had an interesting conversation with my Niece that ties in with this maybe?(bit of background) To cut a long story short, she is the daughter of my ‘imaginary sister’( I was told my memories of her living with us were false she was taken into care when I was young) and has been in and out of care her whole life, Her mother (my sister) displays all the signs of being a sociopath and I also believe some munchausen(sp?) symptoms.

Niece is an incredibly well adjusted woman now, I think being taken into care and having the support of counsellor and social services saved her life and sanity.

Anyway, waffle waffle, my point is: she was telling me that when she was a child she felt like she was living in a fog, that she didnt know who she was, which is very familiar to me, but at one point she LOST the ability to speak. Completely, for about 6 months, when she was able to speak again she only spoke in ‘spoonerisms’ – probably about 7 or 8 years old.

So does the brain shut down systems when under extreme stress (PTS), in order to conserve itself, and speech/language / reading is one of them… but it can be remedied right, she’s totally fine with regard to that now, and I am getting better every day… just partially brain dead;)xx

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Thankis for posting that link again. It IS a great one.

One of the things that GRIEF DOES is to MAKE US VULNERABLE. It does this in several ways.

Even if you are not in PTSD, just “ordinary grief” puts you in a vulnerable spot, plus the STRESS of grief does a number on you too, so many of us, and THAT INCLUDES ME, look for a “painless” way out—-and another relationship will APPEAR to be one. Sometimes a person will “luck out” and find another good relationship, BUT it is a “well known FACT” (notice I put that in quotes) that a “widow” (and that also incluses anyone who has lost a relationship) is VULNERABLE for quite some time.

Boy O Boy! Was I EVER vulnerable! Grabbed up by ther first passing Psychopath! He was (I thought) going to rescue me from my loneliness, my sadness and make me feel like a princess the rest of my life!

Twice, in my case and in my son Ds (he was IN the crashh and was burned) the language problem and short term memory problems were SO PROFOUND and so IMMEDIATE that it didn’t take us long to realize WHAT the problem was. Literally couldn’t read even a sentence, and we are both big readers.This inability to read was almost total for several months, then slowly got better. We both read and read a lot now, but I do find that there are parts I have trouble remembering but can remember the over all concepts (I think) on most of what I read.

My word finding ability has not totally come back however, my spelling is still not back, and I find myself using “smaller words” when I write. I still have a LOT of trouble with remembering names and frequently can’t remember them at all for actors etc.

I am no longer any “good” at all in playing word games like “Wheel of fortune” and I was very good at that, and I watched Jeapordy last night for the first time in years and I would not have answered 1 out of 10 questions, where I used to be able to answer 99% of them. I still can’t do my “series of 100 numbers” repetition, and that was never a problem at all. so there are definitely some difficulties that were SUDDEN and very PROFOUND and noticeable in my use of language and retrieval of language.

There has been great improvement in the five years since my husband’s sudden, traumatic, and accidental death, but I realize there are still remnents of these injuries/changes in my way of processing language.

The major chaos and stress I was under during the year preceeding my husband’s death (my father was very ill) and after my husband’s death with the chaos of the P-attacks etc. I realize that truly I have only been working hard to recover for a couple of years and that’s a lot of trauma and stress and fear to over come in only a couple of years, so (pat-pat—–that’s the sound of me patting myself on the back! LOL) over all I ithink I have done well.

The NC is so important to our recovery I think because it keeps us from having NEW INJURIES.

If you will read back through a lot of the posts here EVERYTIME someone breaks NC they come back here in PAIN because of breaking NC and getting a NEW EMOTIONAL INJURY. It is like tearing the scab off the wound. It can’t heal like that!

Understanding “what is happening” emotionally, with the grief, the new injuries, etc. does help me some in putting it together and knowing what happened about my lost language skills and memory also reassures me somewhat, just that I’m not becoming brain dead.

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People on the whole dont change their basic behaviour a whole bunch and S+Ps definately do not, its worth reminding ourselves.x

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You think YOU are so special!

http://www.heartless-bitches.c.....cial.shtml

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