Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

I think I am suffering from PTSD.  That's Post Traumatic Stress Disorder.  Not that most people would need that spelling out nowadays.  It is becoming a common phrase.  They used to shoot cowards.  It is only recently that the British Government pardoned 306 soldiers "shot at dawn" for desertion and cowardice during the First World War.  All of these men were suffering from various conditions from Shell Shock to PTSD.  There are various arguments for and against such a pardon but the arguments against are simply primitive and disgusting.  Freudian projection is probably the most general explanation of this phenomenon.  Strong brave people wouldn't shoot people who are afraid.  In fact the irony is that the 'justification' for war is so often claimed to be the protection of the innocent and supporting high moral values.  But weak people project the 'unacceptable' qualities onto others to protect their own egos.  The frightening thing is that they are probably unconscious of this act.  They genuinely believe that those whining scum are weak and pathetic cowards.  Oh how easily the words flow from my mouth.  I can be so condemning of weak, feeble, pathetic cowardly individuals.  It's easy because I was brought up in a culture of 'blame' and authoritarian judgemental attitude.  And actually I hate them with a vengeance. I might get over it when I resolve the PTSD but applying 'their' values to them is my only way of holding onto any sanity whilst I try to make sense, not only of the world out there, but the world inside me too.

Of course it is not them that have cause my PTSD directly.  It is the culture that has allowed the crimes against me and my daughter to succeed.  It is because we live in a festering cowardly blame culture that the malevolent vindictive cruelty of the ex could find traction and leverage.  Anyone who has been falsely accused of something and the mud has stuck in some seriously detrimental way will understand.  Anyone who has experienced prejudice will understand.  What amazes me is how the academics and the philosophers and any freethinking people all understand to a significant degree what is going on but the politicians, the media, the police (now there's a fine collection of corrupt two-faced hackers), the judges, teachers, priests, social services - STOP!  The list is too long - but the people 'in charge' so rarely seem to get it.  The pretentious judgmental authoritarian control freaks just don't get it.  They are so self-contradictory.  They stand up for 'justice' and dish out injustice.  They construct a killing machine to go to war to 'stop violence'.  Teachers tell kids 'don't be clever!'  Oh the irony of it all.

Gordon Turnbull is a Consultant Psychiatrist in Trauma at Capio Nightingale Hospitals, London.  He has recently written a book called "Trauma: From Lockerbie to 7/7: How trauma affects our minds and how we fight back" which on all accounts is worth a read.  I won't be reading it because I can't afford it.  So go buy a copy read it and send me the second hand volume (You can contact me HERE and I'll give you my details).  If you do I will read it and give it my most severe analysis.  I would be interested to know if the man really understands what is going on.  From an interview with him that I heard on Radio 4 I suspect he is at least half way there.  His work with PTSD patients on all accounts has a good success rate.  It seems that the prevailing view of mental illness is that it is incurable.  It is not my view and it seems it is not Professor Turnbull's either.

PTSD in my view is the condition of an emotionally unresolved experience.  When we experience stuff it gets into our neurological network and we find ways of incorporating it into our being.  One part of that process is experienced by us as 'emotion'.  The emotional experience is part of the 'healing' process.  The end result, if all is well, is that we 'understand' the world out there.  We make sense of our experience.  It is all part of the learning process that enables us to successfully engage with 'reality'  But sometimes, for one reason or another, the emotional processing is interrupted or doesn't resolve.  PTSD seems to be a consequence of something so traumatic that it takes more emotional resolution than we are given time or circumstances to handle.  But unlike some other ways of 'dealing' with trauma it is not suppressed to the point of perverting our comprehension of reality.  So it sits in a sort of no-man's-land between repression and understanding.  That is where the symptoms are visible.  Not dealing with it will result in a malfunctioning human.  And there are many of those littered about the place.  Dealing with it will give a deeper understanding of life.  It was Friedrich Nietzsche who said "That which does not kill us makes us stronger."  Unfortunately the quote is misused in a trite way too often but when calamity occurs it is often the case that either it kills you or you learn and become a little stronger.  Bones that get broken become stronger.  This is not a way to become strong though.  Although going by some parental attitude you might think so.

That's it.  That's the end of this post.  Not the end of the post traumatic stress.  If it seems a bit unresolved, incomplete, or aimless well that is the nature of PTSD!  So I have got it - SEE!