Even in my quiet moments, I always had the words. I am glad they offer you comfort. At times, for me, having the words, the understanding, was a curse. Those times where, as you did, I just curled up within myself, knowing what was causing it, yet it was like watching a movie. Watching someone else crying or just sitting there blankly. Watching this stranger sit day after day on a worn couch, not leaving the apartment for days. Eventually it took it's toll on my relationships. I couldn't bear the grief of what I had become, and it hurt to have someone else witness it. Demoralizing in a way. So I let go of the one person I had loved the most in the world. And I keep going on, trying to stay busy as possible to keep those places in my mind shoved back. I try not to give them room to grow. It's a struggle.

I honestly thank this website. The people present have just given me the first sense of normalcy I have felt in a long while. I hear about people struggling with PTSD, read about them occasionally. But let me put it this way, a friend of mine, who is a police officer, tells me about the people he deals with. He talked about dealing with life in general, got quite arrogant when he discussed all that he had been through. I explained to him that in the life of those people he never sees the end of the story, never has to deal with the aftermath. That he is, for the people he deals with, only part of "the night the cops came". Seems off topic I know, but what it reminds me of is the articles/stories I read about PTSD. They are statistical/factual, the human element in a good many of the articles is bled out. So the actual moral of my "story" is this; this forum is the only place the true human element exists. When people suffer trauma, it is dehumanizing, demoralizing. You stop seeing yourself as real. It helps to see someone else feels it too. I like to call it the "I'm not crazy" factor. It helps tremendously.