Being helpful...

I've recently experienced something traumatic... traumatic enough that I have PTSD.

The twitching began first, then the flashbacks, the fear... the fear of each day of it happening again.

I shake, more like rocking.  Sometimes I can stop, like when I take the medicine to help me sleep.  I enjoy those 5 seconds in the morning when I wake up and I am not shaking, I haven't started shaking.  Those pure 5 seconds of bliss, bliss is the term I want to use, before the shaking stops.

I want to forget what happened, bury it behind me and pretend it never happened. JUST FORGET IT.

But I can't.

I've had to explain over and over I have PTSD.  That a doctor told me that I have the worst case of PTSD that he's seen, and he's seen people coming straight back from war with PTSD.

My body hurts, from the shaking.  I'm sore.  If I fight the shaking it hurts worse, so I've learned to just go with it.

I've had to go out.  Not just because I don't want to be a hermit, but because I have to talk to people. I've had to seek help.  And people stare.

They stare, and no your staring doesn't magically make my shaking stop.
Actually it tends to make me worse... because I feel those stares.

To be helpful, don't stare.
Don't give me medical advice, psychological advice... I HAVE PEOPLE WHO PROFESSIONAL DO THIS FOR ME!!!

Don't ask me to talk about it. I RE-LIVE IT ALL OVER AGAIN.

You can ask me how my day is, what I have planned. You can do so many different things.

So I'm asking be helpful, don't be harmful.

PTSD is hard enough to deal with. It's invisible wounds that hurt. It takes time to heal.