Mum (Kathy) asked me to come on and answer this, as I have PTSD. I can only speak for myself, others with PTSD might have a different experience. But personally, self-awareness is something I didn't have a lot of when I was really ill and not in treatment. Most of the time I didn't realize the effect my actions had on others. The few times when I did realize, I didn't really care. That sounds selfish, but I was in so much pain at that point that I had nothing to give to anyone else. I was just trying to survive, and trying to avoid as much pain as I could, if that makes any sense.

Even now that I've partly recovered and worked on a lot of my issues, I still go through bad periods, where the stress gets to be too much for me and I can't see how my actions effect others. The past couple of days in fact, I had a major stressor which has made me ill. I have attempted to pick fights with and hurt my family and one friend here over and over again during these two days. But I only realized how nasty I was being for the first time yesterday. I was about to send yet another nasty email to my friend (who was being very patient with me) when I suddenly realized what I was doing. Until that point I hadn't realized. When I get very stressed and ill, it is very difficult for me to see where I am wrong and hurting others. I don't think clearly during those times due to the amount of pain I am experiencing. I am getting better with working on myself, but it is a long painful process.