Submitted by dedelight4 on 07/13/2014.
How much is known about post-traumatic stress disorder and ADHD, or living with someone with ADHD? I've read about post traumatic stress disorder and I have a lot of the symptoms of it, after living with undiagnosed and undertreated ADHD? Maybe it's just a coincidence, but I'm just asking. Anyone else known anything?
I don't know anything
Submitted by PoisonIvy on
I don't know anything official or scientific. But I'll offer my layperson's opinion, based on my own experience. I think that PTSD can arise as the result of a variety of circumstances and situations. Whether a person's "condition" rises to the level of PTSD probably depends on the severity of the symptoms rather than on the cause. I don't think my condition is PTSD, but I do think that I have some similar symptoms that occur less frequently and at a lower strength than in full-blown PTSD cases. For me, it manifests as a heightened state of anxiety that is present nearly all the time, even though my husband and I are living apart and our existences are very separate. I've always been somewhat prone to feeling overanxious, but now I feel that way all the time, despite the objective lack or low level of anxiety-producing factors. The simplest way to describe it is that I always feel as though something bad is about to happen. Not that I never make mistakes or am perfect, but let's just say that most of the traumatic events or crises during the past several years were not caused by me, but I had to help fix most of them. So now I'm constantly hypervigilant, which I probably don't need to be.
thanks Rosered
Submitted by dedelight4 on
Thanks a lot Rosered. I am always hypervigilant, and am worried that something bad is always going to happen. It's a horrible way to live, and I haven't always BEEN like this. All the years of constant CHAOS and extreme living FAST, FAST, FAST, FAST, with NO slowing down, or let down time has made me anxious as a nervous nillie.
My ADHD husband never walks through the house........he RUNS........runs from room to room, everything he does has to be FAST. NOTHING is done slow or methodical or with patience. Things just "have to get done"......(his favorite phrase) But, they never REALLY get "done". It's only his "idea' of done. (if that even makes any sense) It's like living with a human tornado in the house 24/7. I can't handle this any more, and told him I can't keep up with him. He says, "I never ASKED you to keep up with me".......but that's NO ANSWER. The chaos is non-stop, the tension and stress is off the charts, and everyone who's in the room with him sighs a big sigh of relief, every time he leaves the room. (this includes guests and co-workers) He lives with an "aura" of anger around him every minute of the day, which also causes stress. We've ALL talked about this with him, which he DENIES, and then blames us for being paranoid and crazy. It's insane.
Gaslighting
Submitted by jennalemon on
A counselor was talking to me about something similar just last week. PSTD is obvious when someone has come back from war or been involved in a traumatic accident and the like. But there is also the trauma of being the recipient of smaller, expected traumas over a longer period of time.
The term "gaslighting" is a trauma that pecks at a person's well being by years of nonsensical insistance that wears away a person's confidence and sanity....being contrary and saying that the truth is not the truth and that a lie is the truth and that you don't know what you are talking about and calling you crazy when things become confusing and frustrating and you stop believing in your self. Believing that you must love someone who is causing you pain.
My own paradigm
Submitted by I'm So Exhausted on
jennalemon,
A dynamic that was ever present in my early years of growing up in an alcoholic home, and then in dealing with dysfunctional people, was the craziness of ignoring the ever-present elephant in the room. Ignore the huge issues, and then waste time and energy making mountains out of molehills. It was as if someone points out the window at the green grass and says: The grass is purple. I could spend countless amounts of time providing facts to the contrary, including the possibility of their colorblindness, but the ONLY way to get to a place of calm was to just go along and AGREE the grass was purple.
Craziness. I no longer play. The grass is green.
There is no actual corollary
Submitted by NLKohlenberger on
Dedelight4
There is no actual corollary between ADHD and PTSD. However, based on what you are describing, it sounds like you might be experiencing a high level of anxiety, which can certainly cause hypervigilence at its highest level of intensity. Gaslighting occurs when someone is purposely trying to be abusive by distorting the truth. I don't think that is what is going on here. Sounds like your husband's hyperactivity is running rampant Doesn't sound like he's on medication. Am I getting that right? Medication would calm down the hyperactivity a bit. If that's not something he will do, exercise can be really helpful to blow off some of that steam. Sounds like he may not be willing to take your feedback seriously, though, which can be very challenging.
If that is the case, you might consider medication for yourself to help with your anxiety. I would not recommend anything like a Xanax, or an anti-anxiety drug, but rather something like an SSRI that would help with the anxiety and your mood overall. When you're under as much stress as you are reporting, supporting yourself in this way can be very helpful. This can be supportive even if it's just for a little while, until you begin to feel calmer. And you may consider working with a counselor who knows EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing) which is used very effectively with people who are experiencing all kinds of traumas. It can be very effective with high level anxiety as well.
I wish you the best.