It’s called “secondary trauma” — the trauma of living with trauma. For me it’s another morning that I can’t make sense of.
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I come to. I’m face down, sprawled across my double bed, still drunk from the night before.
Since returning to the island, it’s gradually become a more frequent occurrence. I’ve been facing up to what happened and avoiding it in equal measures. I don’t recognise where I am initially. I’m not home.
As I try to lift my head up off the pillow, in my semi comatosed state I become aware of this foreign sticky sensation on my face. Part of the pillow case cover, has stuck to my face and rises with my head. I’m more conscious of where I am. How drunk I still am and how my head just pounds. Then I notice the blood, it’s all over my pillow.
God, I still feel drunk. It takes a second or two to register, it’s my blood on the pillow. Despite my cognitive skills being ridiculously impaired, I try to make sense of what’s happened. Nose bleed or scratching my mosquito bites something rotten in my sleep, are the only logical conclusions I can come up with.
I figure out where I am.
It takes a little while to process that I’m not in London, I’m back in Thailand. I get up from my bed. I’m shirtless but I’m still wearing my jeans and shoes from last night.
What happened last night?
I have a series of blurry images of drinking on my own at different bars. I instinctively check my pockets, got my keys, iPhone and wallet – all good. It’s disorientating but it’s not been the first time that I’ve woken up in such a state. Although the blood on the pillow is something new.
My right hand stings. I look down, there’s dried blood all over it. My hand and wrist are punctuated with random cuts and grazes. It’s then I notice my face feels sore as well.
I walk to the bathroom to check the mirror. . . Fuck
“Fuck!” I just stare into the mirror. My face is an absolute mess. It’s unnerving but I’m steady, like during the tsunami I just freeze up for a second or two.
As I come to terms with my reflection, the first things that goes through my head is that “I probably deserve this”, it’s weird how your subconscious works. It’s followed by, “what the fuck happened?”
I have complete black out of the end of the night, I never blackout.
I’ve either had the shit kicked out of me or I’ve been in a motorbike accident.
God, I hope I’ve been in a motorbike crash I think to my self. I’m not a violent, confrontational person. The only fights I’ve ever been in was to protect those who couldn’t. The idea of not even being able to remember someone beating me to a bloody pulp is hard to take.
I try to piece together what happened.
It’s a haze, more painful than the physical pain I’m experiencing. I have images of me on my own at various bars, surrounded by people but I couldn’t be more isolated. Just me, “drinking for the queen”, self loathing, fighting with myself to stop ruminating over what happened in the tsunami and all the people I let down in the aftermath. Specifically the abortion, break up and what happened at Fulham police station.
Punishing myself by constantly re-reading the statements against me and the context of what was said at court. It’s stupid to reread as I know each statement of by heart almost word for word. And what happened as a result at Fulham Police station, how I was belittled by Dr. Lane and how I took a knife to my wrist after what Inspector Coleman said.
It’s brutal being back to most painful place in my life.
Having flashbacks, freaking out about literally apocalyptic trauma, while struggling to breathe, trapped in a cell/ back of a police van with the continuous images of the dead and dying while being ignored by police.
Stop mate, please!! I try to talk myself down from going back there. I refocus about what I can actually do. Breathe mate.
I look at my face, I raise my hand to my eye but the slightest touch is excruciating, the fact that I’m probably still drunk helps numbs the pain.
Fuck it, I pick up my bloody shirt that’s lying on the floor. As I put it on I notice a rip on the right shoulder, it’s then I notice the deep graze, a patch of skin has been ripped from my shoulder as well. Wearing the same clothes I did from the night before I leave my room, I need to get to a hospital.
At times, it’s hard to compartmentalize them all. Like the numerous points during the tsunami and the search and rescue, the chaos of Krabi Hospital, the fear of Charring Cross hospital and what happened at Fulham police station, waking up to my bloody mashed up face is burnt into the back of my retinas. I’ve got this for keeps.
Reset.me.
Maps.org
Neurons to Nirvana (documentary)
The culture high. (Documentary)
The union. Documentary
Sorry for the spelling mistakes
Have you heard of maps.org? Reset.me? These websites explain how psychedelics like psilocybin, LSD, MDMA (ecstasy), marijuana and other psychedelic medicines to help people with PTSD and other mental disorders in one or two sessions along with psychotherapy. Look these websites up. Again, they are maps.org and reseat.me. It sounds like you are in such pain. These medicines help us to let go of trauma help us to see life from a different perspective and have a lasting effect with only a few sessions. When nothing else works these medicine break through the barriers and our egos a rip us… Read more »
Comparisons can be such fickle things. That notwithstanding, I underwent my own Post-Trauma. P’raps relatively light, yet when can the PTSD sufferer ever be said to be “cured”? I’ve had phases of, shall I say, being “cleansed” only to have an intrusive trigger ruin my afternoon and night and rest of the week – ’nuff said. I’m in the school of thought that questions the “D”. I submit that Post Traumatic Stress is not a disorder of any sort. Rather PTS is a natural, bodily and to some degree predictable reaction to a trauma experience. If that last idea is… Read more »
Sam, thank you for writing and sharing. I was for many years a clinical trauma specialist, working primarily with sexual trauma survivors and survivors of child abuse and domestic violence. Five years ago I fell in love again with the man who was the live of my life and the survivor of horrific child abuse and then multiple traumatic losses. He died very suddenly and I suffered the consequences of traumatic loss. I am playing around with a blog to make public what trauma and grief are like- and also to try to a address shame – a way of… Read more »
I’m sorry you are experiencing this. I am recovering from C-PTSD and found EMDR therapy for PTSD miraculously helpful as well as Peter Levine’s books on trauma. Surviving Survival also explains the processes at work in the brain when we experience trauma, which de-mystified the experience of triggers. Just hope your ‘medicating’ of it doesn’t create another trauma much harder to heal. AA.
Part of getting through PTSD is figuring out the context of the experience so you aren’t reliving it, but are using it as a foundation for other things. I realize that is easier said than done. What constructive impact can the events of your life have on others? It might not sound like that is helping the person suffering from PTSD but in a round about way, it is the key to success.
Robert Longley do you know a Michael Reston from Pattaya if so contact me at [email protected] thanks
Reston is brown bread mate, good riddance as he was vermin….
I dont understand brown bread – the rest I understand. Just so we are clear this is a guy that was injured in Iraq and retired in Thailand. Are you in Thailand?
this is a guy that went to Iraq and already had severe back problems, several operations in BKK Pattaya Hospital before he went there and wasn’t fit for any kind of duty…. he injured himself by jumping off the back of a truck or out of a helicopter, please don’t make like he is some kind of ‘war hero’
No I am not in Thailand anymore but I knew Reston very well… he tried to blackmail me many years ago….
Like I say good riddance… brown bread = dead
I am the CEO of Thai888 Law Company in Pattaya thai888.com and I have been given the task of Probate for Michaels estate. I am just reaching out to anyone that has any information. I didnt mean to imply that he was a war hero, I was just using the reference to Iraq so that people I contacted would not confuse this person with another. I have contacted many people along with his brother as I have been going through a list I found at his house. Thank you for the info and now I can cross you off the… Read more »
OK thanks everyone I have sorted things out with his estate now
What an intense piece of writing. So impressed by your guts in putting this out there. The world needs more ‘real’.
Hi Louise,
Thanks for commenting on my work. I had never written anything of any significance before my PTSD treatment. I write from my heart. I’m happy you felt the “real ness” of that morning. Sam
I’m so grateful that you’re sharing your story, and if it even helps one person, that’s saying a lot. My heart goes out to you and I pray that your PTSD healing is swift and leaves you with trust and happiness.
(((hugs)))
Hi Alana,
Thank you for incredibly kind words. I’m doing much better thank you. I know there’ll rough days ahead but I’m focusing on the good. I hope I can humanize the mental health stigma, especially with regards to PTSD. Your support means a lot.
Sam x