Hi Mary,

Welcome to the forum. Mary, you are actually correct, "so far, so good!" You should be celebrating the fact that your boyfriend accepts that he has serious problems, and does want to get help. Yes, we often have criteria with our counsellers, because we don't feel safe with just anyone, and most counsellors have no idea about combat, because they haven't been through it, hence why we feel so safe with people we know we can relate with in that they have seen what we have seen, so we don't need to bullshit around with all the chit chat.

Ok, firstly, don't trust him to go do this himself, because the symptoms of PTSD often don't allow us to actively seek help for ourselves. PTSD is quite overwhelming, trust me on that. What you need to do, is find the appropriate people for him, discuss the list with him, and even just the one that fits his criteria to feel comfortable, make the appointment for him, and don't allow him to make excuses. Take him to the appointment yourself, as you will atleast be sure that he does attend. Once he goes a few times, and if he does feel comfortable with that counsellor, he will then be fine, in actual fact, may even look forward to going and chatting with someone... maybe!

What you can do is ring local counselling services around your area, this includes military ones, even though he doesn't want someone associated to the VA, they can often give you a list of private counsellors who may fit the description, or counselling agencies for you to call and ask them if they have any veterans who are now counsellors.

You are very correct Mary in your statements above, in that you do need to just support him, and not take things personally, but at the same time you WILL need to intervene and ensure he is going in the right direction, and not just doing nothing, ie. put your kicking boots on and give him a swift kick in the arse if needed to push him along.

This is PTSD, and this is the reality of the issues and concerns to get initial help. Very well done though Mary on your efforts, and using a very commonsense approach to what is the best interests of yourself and your partner.