I'm starting. Just needing to get everything out! Out in an anonymous way, that lets me vent and share without worry about hurting him if he reads it. So no real names and no pictures. I don't have time to go to a counselor, so this is going to be my counseling. Maybe just getting it all out instead of holding it all in will help because heaven knows I am at a breaking point. Even though I just had a vacation last month.
VA wanted to do a caregiver survey and said that they would let you know if there was caregiver stress. ROFL!!! I called and left a message, as I was not picked and called for the survey and said, "I don't need anyone to tell me I have caregiver stress. I know I have it and if you have info or help, PLEASE I would LOVE it!!" There isn't any help out there for the spouse/caregiver. I have looked!
They come home and they have a big meeting and tell them, "There is this and this and this program for you. Oh and there's counseling and some sort of programs for you spouses." But they never tell you what they are. And when my husband came home, they had this meeting like 2 days after they got home which was 4 days before Christmas. We were so happy just to have them home, we weren't listening. We were thinking, "Why is God's green earth are you making us sit here all day for a mandatory meeting 2 days before Christmas after not seeing our spouses for a year?!" Now they have the 30/60/90 day program. How I wish we had had that, but how grateful I am that they have that for my friends now.
But I am still looking for that help! I have 4 kids and a husband, who is like another child, sometimes it feels like a very disabled child, that I have to take care. Not to mention taking care of a household. So guess who takes care of all the bills, cleans house and laundry (because heaven knows that I don't always have the energy to make the kids do it like I should), take the kids to their counseling appts (and that's only 2 of them), make sure husband makes it to his appts, make sure I make it to my neurology appts (I suffer from major migraines almost daily, and no this started when I was teenager, but I am sure that stress makes it worse and KNOW that his smoking makes it worse) get kid to band, and probably play practice soon, cook, take care of those little things that need fixing around the house that husband can't seem to fix, (speaking of I noticed the bathroom lights are almost all burnt out.) grocery shop, take the cars in for fixing (which had to have major repair work this month),
I found a great link to page that says EXACTLY what I feel about my husband some days. The VA part is not always true for me. We are pretty lucky where we are. We have had our moments with them, but overall we have been lucky. But the over all perspective of this page is me! Is my life!
http://www.ptsdasoldiersperspective.com/2010/06/letter-of-complaint.html?showComment=1296104728996#c895429616520527423
People ask "How are you guys doing?" Those that know us, I tell them, some days are good and some days are bad and some days are both. I never know. And lately it's been getting worse. I feel like ever since he decided that his VA counselor wasn't doing anything and that he should stop seeing her and just see his counselor at the Vet Center, he has gotten worse. I don't think his vet center counselor really does anything but "pats his hand" and says "yes you have PTSD and everyone should let you do whatever you want". He has reclused more, pulled away from me more, stopped taking me out on dates, been more agitated, started staying up all night or not sleeping at all and therefore being easier to startle and then therefore easier to have flashbacks. Not fun!
The last month he has 2 VERY bad ones. A couple of the worse ones he has ever had. Worse ones he has had at home. One he had a couple weeks ago that lasted probably 15 mins. He thought he was back in Iraq and I was an insurgent. We were talking and I was at the kitchen sink doing dishes. I don't even remember what we were talking about now. He got really quiet all of a sudden. I turned and he was in his own little world. I knew he was gone "back there". Yes if you are a wife of a PTSD soldier, you know. I started talking to him, trying to bring him back. He wasn't responding. I walked slowly over to him, and then he thought I was an insurgent. I slowly called his best friend, who was already coming over for dinner in a bit, and told him I needed him to come over now. Thank goodness, his friend lives only a couple mins away. But he had just gotten home from work and had to change. So in the mean time. Husband made me sit in chair and started to interrogate me. Luckily 3 of 4 children were gone. 4th one luckily did not argue when I told him to get off computer in the other room and go upstairs. And luckily , husband did not freak out when he did. He did, however, freak when said child came back down a few mins later and husband grabbed him. I had to jump up and take him out of his arms and tell child to go back upstairs. Then husband put and I mean put me into a chair in kitchen and starting to interrogate me again. A few more mins and he snapped out of it. And then I asked where he was and he said kitchen. I asked if he knew how I got from sink to the chair. He said, you walked and sat. I had to tell him what had happened. And then he broke down. I had to death grip hold him so he knew that I loved him and was there for him. That it was ok. Then I knew it was time to let him go. I followed him outside and he started to cross the street saying that he shouldn't be around. Luckily that's when his friend pulled up. I quickly explained what happened while we followed him. And then I let his friend take over.
Thank God for his friend! Thank God for his wife! They have been my saviors many times. I'm sure it's hard for her to let him come over sometimes, but she does. And there are times when it's late and he has to work the next day but he still comes. Tonight was a late night! (But that's another post.)
Back to story. 3 kids come home right at that time. And poor little one was scared almost to death. It seems that he is pretty tough though and after a talk, is doing fine. He is dads bud. He is my Iraq baby. Husband didn't get to see him until he was almost a year old. He didn't get to come home for his birth and did not get any leave, at all. Not any in or out of country leave.
I had to explain, as he just turned 6, that daddy thought he was back in Iraq and that we were the bad guys. he almost broke my heart when he said, "I'm not Daddy's best bud anymore?" That was so hard! I told him he would always he his Daddy's best buddy.
Although we all have our own stress and secondary PTSD from the nightmare from the last 5 years. My 2 older children know Daddy from before and Daddy after. They have such a hard time seeing him struggle and hurt. They wish so bad that he was the same as before, for many reasons. They wish he hadn't had to go to war. They wish he didn't have to be the way he is, and that he could be the Daddy he was before. The one that would wrestle with them. The one that would take them out an play with them. The one that would play around and read to them. The one that would go to their programs and activities.
The younger 2, who are 6 and just about 3, only know the after Daddy. They don't know any different. They know (as much as a 3 can) that sometimes he plays and wrestles and sometimes he doesn't. That sometimes he can handle being climbed on and sometimes not. That we aren't suppose to jump around him. How hard is that for a little one? Sigh.
It shouldn't be like this! It's not fair!! (6 yr's favorite saying is lately) No it's not. It's not fair, that he went to a war to help keep our country safe (and yes there were WMD, he saw them), and to help win the freedom of a people who deserve it as much as we do and then to come home broken. It's not fair that we were left at home to hold it together and wait. And then have someone, who is not the husband and Daddy that left, come back to our home, broken and hurting. Someone who, some days I wonder, "why am I still here?" And then the next, "I love him so much!" He's still the husband and Daddy we sent off, he's just broken and hurting and we have to help him. Just like I tell my kids. And we just have to keep loving him.
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