I think it’s safe to say that when one is involved with someone suffering from PTSD you inevitably become the emotional punching bag.  And let’s be honest – it SUCKS!

I would consider myself a pretty strong woman as I grew up with a father who made it his job to point out all of my (and my family member’s) defects.  For 18 years I had someone tell me why I wasn’t good enough or smart enough or thin enough.  I left home to attend college only months after my husband and I began dating.  So in what seemed to be overnight I went from having a man in my life who constantly brought me down to having a man who thought the world of me.  And for the first time in my life I learned what it was like to have self confidence. And I LOVED IT.

But this all changed when my husband got out of the Army, moved in with me, and began demonstrating signs of PTSD.  I became his emotional punching bag and this new role took a major toll on me. 

So I have been putting this topic off for a while now….mostly because I wasn’t sure how to address the questions or the stories shared with me and because I know what you are going through. Inwardly, I think I have been avoiding this topic because it hit so close to home, and I am trying to forget.  I have had approximately 57 emails in regards to physical violence within a PTSD/TBI homes, and it saddens me to see so many of you are crying out for help. Saddening me further, is the knowledge that many of you who visit the site and don’t say anything, probably will never reveal that domestic violence is an issue with your veterans. For those that wrote me, I won’t be sharing your emails as promised, but I want to make sure you understood my appreciation for trusting me with such stories of your lives. I know it was hard to write some of the things you did, perhaps embarrassing to see it on the screen in front of you, and more so admitting that these issues were indeed real.

In my previous posts, I have gone over different symptoms of PTSD that my husband has suffered from, but that have also gotten better with time.  Nightmares and depression are two symptoms of PTSD that he still battles on a daily basis.

Let’s start with nightmares.  Sometimes he’s lucky and will go weeks without one, but then when he least expects it, they hit full force.  Most of the time they are triggered by something going on in his life.  Stress is a HUGE factor but simple things like watching the military channel will almost always result in a sleepless night.  Lately, learning of the deaths of Rangers he served with has brought on a wave of nightmares.  To his credit – he has done a great job of avoiding the things that he knows will trigger these sleepless nights.  So he avoids the military channel and war movies, and tries to not talk about things he did overseas.  But he can’t control the news and hearing of a comrade’s death really affects him.