My name is not important, so I’ll just leave it out of this. I want to talk about something that has had a major impact on my life in recent years—my experiences with PTSD and trauma.
It all started back when I was a kid. Growing up, I went through some difficult things that no child should ever have to go through. Those events started to fade away as the years passed, but I never truly processed those traumatic experiences until recently.
At first, the only thing that would make me feel better was to just keep busy and try not to think too much about things. I put up a wall around myself and hid away from the world, gradually pushing everyone away without even realizing it because being alone felt like my only security.
Whenever something triggered a memory from my past that wall came crashing down and suddenly all the emotions associated with those memories would come flooding back in full force: Fear, anger, rage—it felt like they were smothering me and there was nothing I could do to make them stop.
It soon became clear that burying these feelings wouldn’t work forever though; eventually, I had to seek help for what I had been going through. After seeking treatment from therapy and working with professionals in the psychology field, there has been immense progress in healing this trauma and learning how to be more prepared for similar circumstances should they arise again in the future.
I hope by sharing this journey of mine someone else struggling with issues similar to mine will reach out for help before living with them any longer than necessary. It can be terrifying at first but it’s worth taking that leap into making yourself whole again!