By Ox Drover
Yet Being Someone Other is the title of one of my favorite books and sometimes I think that title applies to me as well, at least since I recognized the post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) that has become such a part of my life these last six years. Now I’m “someone other” than who I used to be. I’m not the same person at all. I no longer think like that other person did, that FIRST ME as it were. The NOW ME is different.
This was a very disturbing thing for quite some time as I had to get used to things being gone that I had depended on previously. I had to make adjustments to the changes in myself, sort of like a teenager has to make adjustments to larger feet and longer legs, and for a while becomes quite clumsy as they learn to use these appendages which have suddenly changed in dimensions. I felt very clumsy for a while, and still do to some extent. In other ways, I feel like an amputee that is having to relearn to walk with only one leg, or to use a prosthetic leg. To me, this is quite unsatisfactory. I want the old me back, the familiar me.
Worst of all I think, is that my mind doesn’t work the way it did, and it keeps on changing. At first I couldn’t read at all, not even one sentence, as I was in shock and couldn’t retain the words from the first of the sentence long enough to add them to the last words of the sentence in order to make sense of it all. That was frustrating and scary. I’d watch a movie and enjoy it, and then put the same DVD in the next night and not realize I had seen it the night before until maybe near the end when some specific line would make me realize I had seen it. Then I would feel so stupid that I had watched it again, not remembering.
I talked to my psychiatrist about this and she reassured me, “It will get better, it will come back,” but I didn’t believe her, and even after six years, she is only partly right. It has gotten better, but I realize and finally accept that it will never be the same. I am Someone Other than who I was before. I still have word finding problems like a stroke patient, seeing the image of a tree in my mind, yet not being able to find the word “tree.” It is as if my brain is now made of Swiss cheese, with large empty holes at random within it. I stutter when I talk, trying to find the words I want to express myself, and sound to others as if I have the early onset of dementia. I apologize to them for not being able to find the word I am seeking, and explain why, or try to, but not really knowing if they believe me or not, or if they are simply humoring me to be polite. I don’t talk as much to strangers now, the New Me doesn’t want to have to explain. The Old Me never met a stranger, or was reluctant to exchange conversation with someone they just met.
I have found that for some strange reason the muscle memory of typing which the Old Me always did well, though not quite intact, is actually better for producing words and thoughts than verbally doing so. Though I now have problems spelling, and will use the word “here” instead of “hear” and not realize it until I read back through the typescript. Sometimes my spelling is so bad on more complex words that even spell check doesn’t know what I am trying to say to fix it, so I have to go back and find a simpler word that I can still spell, so my vocabulary has decreased by a large percentage.
Reading, which has always been one of my passions, is still a passion for me, but now instead of reading at breakneck speed, reading by phrases at twice or three times the rate most people read, I am again reading word by word at about 200-250 words per minute which is about average speed. I also know that my memory of a series of numbers, which was once quite extraordinary, can’t even extend to the seven digits of a phone number long enough to dial it.
Through the last six years the Now Me has gone through many changes, some quite painful, and has had to navigate through the rapids of multiple episodes of grief, make decisions while not fully functional as far as logic is concerned, and reinvestigate what my core beliefs are, and which direction my moral compass should point.
The feelings have been sometimes like that feeling of unreality you have inside a house of mirrors at the county fair! You end up holding out your hands in front of you to touch the things you think you see in order to navigate because you learn you cannot trust your eyes to navigate your way out. The Now Me must learn to use other senses besides sight to move by. Sometimes I’ve had to close my eyes and grope in the dark to find the path out of the maze because if the Old Me tried to find her way out by sight, she would confuse the Now Me.
Time has helped to calm the fears of things being different, of be being Someone Other than the Old Me. I’m learning to adjust, and to accept the Now Me and not grieve the way the Old Me was. There is really nothing in this life that is constant except change, and though the PTSD does seem to cause this change to accelerate at what seems like a breakneck speed, in many ways the Now Me has adapted well to these changes and is learning to care for herself in ways that the Old Me never was able to.
I saw a video a while back of a two-legged Border Collie working sheep at a dead run. One of the things I’ve learned in my years of having and raising collies is that they are a “can do” breed and ”working,” which to them is play, is very important to them, and if there is any way they can succeed in doing that, they will find it. I didn’t see that two legged dog sitting down whining on the side lines, but running as hard as she could go, doing what she loved. It was only when she sat down that she fell over, so I intend to keep on running and being and appreciating that the Now Me, while not identical to the Old Me, is still able to do what I really want to do.
This trigger makes it that much harder that I have to be in the same building with HER at work everyday. I had myself all built up and empowered with the ability to treat her like wallpaper and hold my head up. Now all the pain and anger is back. I found myself even angered and crying over bragging about how she got him back and how he chose her over me in the end. How I was told by her that I was trash. And all the lies that she threw in my face saying that he had told her those things. The lies that he LATER admitted to me were just that, LIES because he admitted that he would do anything to get her back. I can’t wait til I am out of this job because I do not want to be in the same building with her ANYMORE!
Hiya
Erin it was tactless of me to bring this up for you now, I could just have easily made it a general topic for everyone and not personalised it by using your name. In retrospect this is what I should have done maybe.
Don’t go there in terms of reliving or feeling that you’re not equal to the job of healing yourself. Just say ‘wrong question at the wrong time’ (Delta famously direct again – it’s one of my less helpful character traits sometimes) you only ever have to share what’s comfortable and helpful for you. I asked, but maybe I just ‘shouldn’t have’ – put is down to my lack of tact and go back to doing what you were doing that WAS WORKING for you. I’m sure you’ve learned skills to be able to get back to that place of feeling less vulnerable.
I feel really annoyed with myself for triggering you quite so strongly. It wasn’t meant that way and I do want you to feel better again.
Best Wishes
Delta 1 xxx
Hens-I am totally with you on choosing to stay single. The pain that I felt when he discarded me was something that I am never going to put myself in the position to feel again-EVEN THOUGH I DESPISE HIS MALIGNANT NARCISSIST ASS for pulling the wool over my eyes and being a predator. You already know how I feel about sex. I am never going near sex ever again. He ruined me. I hate it. If I want those kind of pleasures I can provide them myself but I am NEVER opening myself up to that again. I still have to close my eyes when I see people having sex on TV or movies or I have to turn off what I’m watching because it’s not worth all the pain and tears that it gives me. I still have flashbacks from when we were in bed. When we were together the flashbacks would make me feel good. I would have them when we were apart and it would help calm me down when he went home to her. After the discard, the flashback would include us in bed and then at the end was him screaming at me and calling me names when he discarded me. It hurts to much to flashback to us in bed, when is was so wonderful and then hear him scream at me saying that he never loved me and that he was using me for sex. All the promises he made to me were just lies.
I am NOT allowing that to happen to me ever again! I have chosen to be single for the rest of my life. I should start getting a whole bunch of cats.
Erin 1972 – my sincere apologies and attempts to make amends for triggering you have not been acknowledged by u at all. I feel that me and KatyDid are being subtly blamed for what the Spath did to you frankly, which is really not on at all.
Maybe you need more time, maybe I’m overreacting myself – however am a bit uncharacteristically cross now!
Delta 1
I have thrown myself down in front of God so many times begging for forgiveness, crying my eyes out pleading for it. I know in my head that he has forgiven me. It’s just really hard that when I was hurting so bad over what he did and what I did, my narcissistic mother and her religious fanaticism told me that I got what I deserved. She had no interest in my tears or pain-thank God for my stepmom. I listened to what Wini had to say about forgiveness yesterday but there is a wall between me and God that was put up by my narcissistic mother. She was a religious fanatic who worships and throws money at the TV preachers-many of whom have fallen from grace and current ones who are being investigated for fraud. She is unable to carry conversation unless it’s about the LORD or when he’s going to come back and take her up to heaven. She is out of touch with reality. She has been like this since I was a tiny child and it made me wonder how she was able to abuse me the way she did. She has EVERYONE completely snowed.
I have gone through so much amazing healing since I came here in March and I have gotten so powerful about where I am going and dealing with HER being at my job.
I came home from my first day back at work yesterday, after the concussion, and was physically feeling like shit fighting off a kidney infection. I had some takeout Mediterranean and was planning on resting and drinking a ton of water. I turn on my computer to read to consecutive posts written to me specifically asking how I could be the other woman. Everyday at this stupid job that I don’t run into HER I feel relief and thank God. She already ran me out of one job and when she came to work here in June I figured she was thinking she could do it again. I had a nursing that I actually liked and my boss really liked me. I was working PACU and she knew that I was planning on going on to the police academy and she thought it was cool. She was working all around my schedule to make sure I had some hours during the police acadeny so I could survive the paycut. I had been working at that job for 6 months when the ex’s wife shows up there and gets a very position. After 4 months of her being there she gets a hold of his phone while he’s in the shower and that begins my ruin.When she found out we were in the same hospital, I was getting ready to begin the police academy. She promised me that if I didn’t leave the job that she would call the police chief and have me fired from my academy class. I got blackmailed. Then she told everyone who would listen at the hospital about what I did. Everyone who liked me and thought highly of me instantly hated me and I wasn’t welcomed back. I am not going into the rest of this story because it has been told here countless times but this BITCH is one of the reasons that I had to drop from my beloved academy class-in addition to her SHITBAG husband.
I am only going to reveal on this blog what I am comfortable talking about. I had to go through all this with the wife when she was mind-fucking me to pay me back for what I did. It hurts me too much to answer those questions. I have had to deal with all this pain for 15 months and finally getting better and I am NOT having it thrown back in my face-again.
hey E72
I guess you’re confusing your feelings about Spath’s wife with me (guess this is normal in trigger land!!) Hun I am not Spath’s wife, I am Delta 1. I have not judged you or asked you to ‘beg for forgiveness before God’ and all that , I have several times apologised for triggering you, I have several times said share only what feels comfortable. If you put up a boundary I will respect it. I have retracted my question to you here more than once if you actually read my posts again.
So please – let it go for heavens sake! I am letting it go to ‘poof’ I don’t want to stay mad with anyone for no good reason.
Stay well whether you post back to me or not.
Delta 1
Sorry posted over you. E72
I am very sorry that I was asleep when posts were made trying to apologize for triggering me. I am fine but I have to say that here, in my world, in central standard time, I am not going to see posts that were made to me between 3 and 5 o’clock in the morning. Ya’ll may be living in different geographical locations and here in New Orleans that is the time for sleeping. I am sorry I have been angry this morning but I am trying to get out the house to get coffee so I can become a human being. I have a lot of things to do today so I am noto going to spend all day on this blog fighting with people. I accept your apologies and that is that.
Delta1–I am fully aware that you didn’t ask me to “fall down in front of God begging for forgiveness”. That was something that I HAD to do for me-not other people. It was because I couldn’t deal with what I had done. This conversation started because I told Hens that I understand how Fantasia felt with attempting to kill herself. The difference in me and her is that I would never consider actually attempting to go through with that. Attempting suicide is selfish to me. I do understand her feelings of wanting to end my life because I couldn’t deal with the guilt and humiliation. None of ya’ll know me and know what kind of person I really am.
This is what people always said about Erin 1972 before any of this went down. Erin is a good person. Erin is unfailingly honest and full of integrity. Erin treats others as she want to be treated. Erin is a mature, responsible, intelligent, beautiful woman who is very good at everything she tries. No one in the world would have ever believed that I would ever dream of doing what I did. Many people were in shock and in complete disbelief when they found out what happened. I had it all except my dream career and that one person to spend the rest of my life with and have children with. I ALMOST had the career. My hands were on it. I was going to the police academy. This blow up with the spath ruined that and since this all got so public and nasty, I had to fall on my sword and put the entire story in written documentation in the public integrity bureau( internal affairs) in my PD. That way in case the spath and his wife tried to follow through with their threats to take me down. I have that humiliation. Luckily when I was in tears in my police lieutenant’s office with her and the captain sitting close to me that neither one of those women judged me. They hugged me and told me that I made a mistake and I was fooled by a psycho. They told me that none of this has anything to do with what kind of police officer I will be. They are both going to be there for support when I go back. My captain told me that not only will I be a police officer, but I will be wearing the white shirt one day like her.
I am still the same person I always was except now a little wiser. My point is that I take responsiblity for my mistakes. I have honor.
erin1972-Going to play devil’s advocate here.
Posts are made sequentially, doesn’t matter which time zone you are in. I am not too far from you geographically, and I see the same posts you see. It is when you choose to respond to some posts, and not others that are directed to you personally, that people will get offended and feel that you are ignoring their feelings, which in turn, are triggers for them. You say, “I accept your apologies and that is that.” Where is your apology?
We have all been through pretty much the same chain of events, just the details are different. As in the stages of grief, there are cycles you go through, as is mentioned here Lather, Rinse, Repeat. It is through these cycles that we hopefully grow, learn and mature from. We choose victory over victimhood. You seem to have no qualms about stating your being a victim. That is something we all understand. But when confronted with an honest question, one which at this point does not seem unfair, rude, or degrading in any way, maybe it is time to take a step back, see your part in the big world, and be able to answer in a mature rational way without getting offended, triggered, or defensive. When the question was first presented, you chose an outcry and said that you were going to take a break. Then you immediately start railing against those you feel have offended you, without giving any thought but to yourself.
Sometimes a break is what we do need. Walk away from the computer and those things that get us riled up, find a way to connect with the outside world and our place in it, find ourselves and learn to love and appreciate the peace that comes with knowledge, wisdom and the realization that we are better because of our experiences and that we choose not to repeat the circumstances that got us all here.
You do not have to answer this, I will not be offended.
Delta1 and Katydid, and to anyone else this may affect. In my younger days (I am in my 40’s), I was with married men. The first was with a man who was training at my job, he was away from home, and harmless flirting soon turned into something more. He left town, and nothing more happened between us, though he did get involved with another younger girl at his new job and eventually split from his wife and got with young thing.
The second was a manager at another job and although our “thing” was very shortlived, it is the one I had the most trouble with. His wife and kids would come into the place of business and I could play it off so well, it gives me the creeps now to realize how callous I could be, but after we ended it, I could see the pain in his eyes. That look can still haunt me if I think about it.
Although I did not consciously set out to be with those men and would never dream of intentionally destroying their marriages, I was living for the moment. In saying that most of us have some narcissistic or sociopathic traits, these are where mine surfaced. I knew nothing of boundaries and didn’t seem to care, although if you had asked me I would have not said that I didn’t care. I can’t explain it, I’m just telling the truth. I had had other relationships in between these, but when I married my exH, I no longer had those feelings of trying to one-up someone. So i guess it was a sense of power that I got from it, because I felt powerless in my life, I could use those feminine wiles to “prove” myself. My parents squashed a lot of my emotions and feelings when I was younger, telling us the same things a lot of parents said in those days, I guess I just felt it a lot deeper. So I started acting out in my preteen and teenage years.
My exH was an abusive alcoholic who had his own demons to deal with, and unfortunately he dealt with them through my son and me. I am pretty sure now that he could be qualified as a NS. He had me so far down I contemplated suicide but I chose counseling instead. As I started to find myself again, I found myself attracted to a man who paid attention to me in a good way, and ended up having an affair. I believed then and I believe now that it was crucial to my survival and to my future. I could not have lasted too much longer in that marriage and saw no way out, but the affair gave me a sense of hope that had been lacking for years. As our affair started to wane, I felt a calling from God. I could see the flames of hell licking at me and I decided at that point that I did not want to spend eternity there, that I wanted to go to a better place.
Now that I have been on both sides of the issue, and have come a long way, I am on solid footing. I choose to stay the course that God has set for me.