The Danger Of Minimizing PTSD

The people that do things that cause PTSD or bring that about in someone. Why is there a resistance to admitting that I've caused ptsd or I have, you know, I'm the reason that my spouse is now reacting this way. What is that resistance? You know, and I think we can, you can look at this from so many different perspectives, like why in the church or why in marriages? But overall, for the perpetrator of the activity that caused the ptsd, what does that resistance come from?

I think it comes from probably a lot of different places. Historically when we started using that terminology of post traumatic stress disorder, it was really applied to like military personnel and rape victims or people who had survived natural disaster. You know, these, these big once in a lifetime, call it shell shock.

Right?

Yes, exactly. Experiences that really we kind of put it in that. And especially because at the time those were the people that they did the research with. So that's where we get, you know, that was kind of the jumping off place for this diagnostic criteria or this mental health issue. And so. But then when they started opening that up to say, oh, and we even talk about this like with big T, little T trauma, you know that those are all like these big one time life experiences, big T trauma. But then they started to recognize that, you know what the same thing can be happening for somebody who's experiencing maybe smaller forms of trauma, but it's not just a one time thing, but it's every single day. You know, it could be right and so, or you know, like things that are happening in the family or abuse or even sexual abuse or these other things that maybe it's not the same as experiencing war or being raped or something else. But, but over time these are having the same impact on a person. And so I think that that's part of it is just looking at that historical piece and where this has come from. I also think that sometimes, because it's sometimes not absolutely clear, and especially when people, and people don't necessarily just run to the doctor or they run to their mental health specialist saying I'm having these things and I don't know how to deal with it, then I think sometimes we try to help ourselves, we try to get over it on ourselves by ourselves. And so I think that that also plays a role in this. And also what we've already talked about is that you can have somebody who's extremely resilient, you know, that because of their life experiences, their temperament, everything else that they might go through discovery or disclosure and it will impact them, but not Nearly to the degree that it would somebody else. In fact, they might have this attitude that, okay, I'm going to lock arms with my husband and we're gonna work on this together and we're gonna get through this and life's gonna be great and if it works, if that works for them, great. But for the majority of women who experience betrayal, trauma, it doesn't look like that for them. And so I think that that is part of the reason why, why people have a hard time and even spouses being able to recognize or own the fact that my behaviors created this in my spouse.

And that's what I was thinking about. There's two things that come to mind for me. Just like the struggler or the addict is battling minimization in their behavior, I think once it comes out and it's impacting people around them, there can be that same minimization of, I don't, I don't want to have to feel that I've caused this level of hurt to someone else. So it may be more a self protective measure where I'm trying to go, oh, well, it's not that bad, or you're overreacting or, you know, if you just unders, like I remember I used those words for 10 years with my wife. If you just understood the reasons I struggle and that it's not about you, you wouldn't feel this way. Well, I was totally in the wrong. And as I look back, I realize it was because I didn't want to feel bad about causing that level of pain. So I think there may be a fear for spouses or others to let something be labeled PTSD because that feels serious. But maybe it is. And maybe that's part of the sobering reality we need to face of man, my behavior can cause this much pain. I need to be a little more adamant about my recovery and protecting the heart of someone I've said I love and that I want to protect. So I think that's one side of it. I think on the church side, what can happen, there's a little bit of a resistance. We're fearful that people are going to blame bad behavior on a diagnosis like, oh, well, I have ptsd, I can't help it. And I think there are some abuses out there. There's cases of that. I mean, I recall as a pastor, I was meeting with a, you know, saw a family before church and their two year old is just going crazy and they're like, oh, well, we can't really contain him. He has adhd. And I Remember thinking like he's two. That's called being two. Like no two year old has attention. And it really felt like they were using that as an excuse to not try to parent because there was in my opin, a lack of parenting. But I use that illustration to say I think we get overly concerned about that. Well, if they have a diagnosis, then they're just going to excuse bad behavior. And what I see in the vast majority of spouses and couples, especially as we're talking about betrayal and trauma recovery, nobody wants to have ptsd. Nobody wants to get to just be stuck in depression because I have ptsd. I think in the vast majority of cases there is a genuine recognition of something is going on deeply beyond my ability to seemingly recover from it. And it can very much be a cry for help or that realization, going back to my first illustration, that there's something very serious that's happened here. And I think it's actually an invitation to churches or to pastoral counselors that aren't real familiar with PTSD to say, get educated, learn, grow in this. Because if someone is trying to express this is what I think I'm feeling, then we need to wake up to that reality and say, man, we've got to be more adept at being helpers then. Because this isn't just going to be read a couple of verses and God's peace will come over you and you'll be fine. It's like, no, there's more that has to happen. So I think it's just a willingness. The reason we don't do it is an unwillingness to face that reality. But what we need is that willingness to let this matter to the degree that we can help people engage in the recovery that's necessary.

Yeah, a follow up too to that one. There's so many follow up questions we have, which is that's just me. It's a great topic is, you know, cause you talked about earlier, you know, the example of, let's say I had sexual brokenness in my life, my spouse experienced betrayal, trauma, and I travel for my job. And one of the things that I can do to maybe help, you know, after discovery is to get a different job and to be home more often. Is that the only way that you can help someone who's experienced PTSD heal from that process or what else could it look like? How? What other ways could we help our betrayed partner or spouse recover from this? Heal from the PTSD of something that maybe we did that caused it?

And I know that we've talked about this before that if you're the one that has caused harm, you might not be the best person to try and help them.

Would you say that again? I feel like it's important that people hear that.

Yeah.

That if you're the person who has caused harm, that you might not be the best person to offer help, especially initially. But I think there's other things that you can do. Like if it means that you make sure to have time with the kids so that your spouse can go to group or can go to counseling or can have time for self care. All of those kind of things are important. That you're the one who, if you have older children, that you take the lead on telling them on disclosing to your kids, that you don't put that on your wife. Same with other family. You know that you own what you've done and that you're the one that communicates this in a healthy way to those who probably need to know in your life. Just those kind of things I think would be really helpful. I also want to say one other thing about the labeling, because I know that in a lot of arenas, mental health labeling is seen as kind of a negative thing. But I just want people to understand that if you don't accurately label something, you can't accurately treat it. And so those two things go together. And so there's a lot of times where people are misdiagnosed and they spend years on doing the wrong things that are not helpful and they wonder why they're not getting better. And so it really is not to label somebody, but to get an accurate diagnosis so that you can engage in the proper treatment is super helpful and important.

My mechanic didn't know what was wrong and was working on the part of my car that was working just fine, fine. And then they ruin that by trying to work on it. Of course my car wouldn't run properly. So you can apply that principle across the board.

I think it's a good word that we want. The purpose of labeling something is so we know how to help and how to heal. Not to be a shame. Moniker of like you have this thing. And again, we at Pure Desire really try to avoid kind of that disease model idea of addiction or mental health. Things that says like, I caught this and we want to understand how it happened. But it's not something we just that happened out of the blue. It's connected to our story and our relationships. And you know, one of the things that came to mind for me about how we can help, because Heather, you're Spot on that if we cause the pain, we in many cases won't have, at least initially, for sure, much of a role in helping. But I think we can provide time and money. In a lot of marriages, I think money is a concern of what they really need is weekly help with a professional counselor. And that costs money. And so if you're the spouse that caused it, you may need to say, whatever we need to do for you to meet with that counselor, I'm willing to make happen. And that might mean selling a boat or stopping golfing or getting rid of your hobby. And that's like, whoa, whoa, whoa. That's. No, that's entirely fair. It's entirely fair that if you cause pain that requires or necessitates your spouse receiving some professional help, that you limit anything else you would spend money on to show that I really want to help you recover. So go to that counselor. Providing time, as you said, for them to either go to their group or even. It may just be friendship of women or if it's men in their life that are supportive, that are helpful or caring. And I just would say from personal experience, as we walk through our early years of recovery, for my wife, if I created space like, no, go to that women's retreat. No, go out with those friends. Oh, our small group, women want to go do this thing.

Go.

And I didn't. You know, when we had small kids, I didn't love that. I would rather I didn't solo parent for those times, but I just over and over saw she'd come back with something new. And I'm not saying, like, it made it all better, but, like, oh, there'd be a little more energy, a little more spark, a little more life. And it was like, okay, that's so good for her to get out of here. Get away from me with helpful separation. And it does something to help her recover. And I don't. I don't know if my wife would say she ever had to the level of ptsd, but certainly trauma and serious trauma. And it was that freedom that I had given her. And I think in many relationships, a spouse is still concerned about, well, I don't want to make him mad. I don't want to spend our money. He complains he has to watch the kids. And if they're thinking that at all, like, well, your role is to alleviate those fears and say, whatever you need, whatever time I'm going to give it, you go, you don't need my permission. Let's just communicate on a plan that can make a real difference. So you might not be able to sit and talk them through it, but you could give them the time and resources to go talk through it with people that can really help.

And I can hear many people maybe on the front end of discovery, like, well, that's not fair. And it's like, well, sure, but it's also not fair that you had sexual brokenness in your life and it traumatized your spouse. And so it's a really hard balance there because you don't want to say that in a shaming way, but you also need to address and accept that that is the reality of the situation. And if you want your spouse to heal, if you want your marriage to be restored, you have to do what it takes. And it takes doing that, taking responsibility. And that's part of the natural consequences that we talk about of what actually happened, is you're going to have to find new ways to prioritize your spouse and their healing. If you ever want your marriage to be restored, if you ever want to, you know, be put in a situation where you can prove, you know, the durability over time, it. It's just. It's a commitment.