you have a really good question that i don't have an answer for - the way to work on it is with a good counselor. i mean the stuff that scares you too. or it would if you had a chance to see it before you reacted to the trigger/what set you off.

you have good reason to be in the shape you are in. what you were put through, i don't have words - except for - thank you, thank you for doing, for going there in order that we would stay safe.

what in the world was the idiot doing playing with a knife anyway really????

writing, lots of writing - going through it, you know? here is good, talking about it, here with us - only what you feel safe to talk about, people who know what it's like to get set off, or triggered.

but to really get some effective tools to help you, professionals. and we aren't them. we are all trying to get better too. together. and you are one of us, we are with you, you aren't alone here, hugs

ahah! i wonder if you mean suggestions to help ground yourself in a flashback?? we do have a list of those. from a great website www.pete-walker.com

the website has so much information - all about ptsd - the author grew up with it and he is a specialist now. not sure how my copy and paste will do - the list is numbered on the website

13 Steps for Managing Flashbacks

1 .Say to yourself: "I am having a flashback". Flashbacks take us into a timeless part of the psyche that feels as helpless, hopeless and surrounded by danger as we were in childhood. The feelings and sensations you are experiencing are past memories that cannot hurt you now.

2 .Remind yourself: "I feel afraid but I am not in danger! I am safe now, here in the present." Remember you are now in the safety of the present, far from the danger of the past.

3 Own your right/need to have boundaries. Remind yourself that you do not have to allow anyone to mistreat you; you are free to leave dangerous situations and protest unfair behavior.

4 Speak reassuringly to the Inner Child. The child needs to know that you love her unconditionally- that she can come to you for comfort and protection when she feels lost and scared.

5 Deconstruct eternity thinking: in childhood, fear and abandonment felt endless - a safer future was unimaginable. Remember the flashback will pass as it has many times before.

6 Remind yourself that you are in an adult body with allies, skills and resources to protect you that you never had as a child. [Feeling small and little is a sure sign of a flashback]

7 Ease back into your body. Fear launches us into 'heady' worrying, or numbing and spacing out.
[a] Gently ask your body to Relax: feel each of your major muscle groups and softly encourage them to relax. (Tightened musculature sends unnecessary danger signals to the brain)
[b] Breathe deeply and slowly. (Holding the breath also signals danger).
[c] Slow down: rushing presses the psyche's panic button.
[d] Find a safe place to unwind and soothe yourself: wrap yourself in a blanket, hold a stuffed animal, lie down in a closet or a bath, take a nap.
[e] Feel the fear in your body without reacting to it. Fear is just an energy in your body that cannot hurt you if you do not run from it or react self-destructively to it.

8 Resist the Inner Critic's Drasticizing and Catastrophizing: [a] Use thought-stopping to halt its endless exaggeration of danger and constant planning to control the uncontrollable. Refuse to shame, hate or abandon yourself. Channel the anger of self-attack into saying NO to unfair self-criticism. [b] Use thought-substitution to replace negative thinking with a memorized list of your qualities and accomplishments

9 Allow yourself to grieve. Flashbacks are opportunities to release old, unexpressed feelings of fear, hurt, and abandonment, and to validate - and then soothe - the child's past experience of helplessness and hopelessness. Healthy grieving can turn our tears into self-compassion and our anger into self-protection.

10 Cultivate safe relationships and seek support. Take time alone when you need it, but don't let shame isolate you. Feeling shame doesn't mean you are shameful. Educate your intimates about flashbacks and ask them to help you talk and feel your way through them.

11 Learn to identify the types of triggers that lead to flashbacks. Avoid unsafe people, places, activities and triggering mental processes. Practice preventive maintenance with these steps when triggering situations are unavoidable.

12 Figure out what you are flashing back to. Flashbacks are opportunities to discover, validate and heal our wounds from past abuse and abandonment. They also point to our still unmet developmental needs and can provide motivation to get them met.

13 Be patient with a slow recovery process: it takes time in the present to become un-adrenalized, and considerable time in the future to gradually decrease the intensity, duration and frequency of flashbacks. Real recovery is a gradually progressive process [often two steps forward, one step back], not an attained salvation fantasy. Don't beat yourself up for having a flashback.

well, you will have realised by now, Pete Walker's specialty is complex PTSD. some of this will still be usable. also, often people who suffer from PTSD later go on to realise they do have complex PTSD from childhood as well - they just did not remember it. it happens a lot. i hope this is some sort of helpful to someone.

my husband can see and sense that shift that happens in me. we had to learn together what to do. it has not been easy for either of us. we both needed time together and apart. i say this to validate the struggle both you and your wife are feeling. neither should ever be belittled.

getting stuck in a loop is worse for me than the inciting incident. took me a long time to even be able to ask for help to get out of it. i'd just be stuck there on repeat. if anyone approached me i did get violent. thankfully its not that bad now days. not gone. just not that bad.

in my experience the best thing one can do is keep asking questions and sharing your story. it helped me separate myself from my trauma, in both my eyes and my husbands. it helped me when my story helped others.

i hope you find some of this helpful. this is a good place to share, vent, ramble, be goofy or just sit back and read other people's words.
DG

Thank you all for those words they have been extremly helpful. those steps i have already put into good use. thank you this will help in so many ways.

So sorry, ab. I didn't just look like I was gonna take a guy out, I did it. What you said reminds me of when my elderly dad sneaked up behind me when I was visiting him in 2007. He triggered by PTSD and I whirled around and slugged "the threat" before I even knew what I was doing. I went to a psychiatrist right away and got myself put on Seroquel.

Meds weren't the whole answer, though. I got introduced to pete walker's stuff when I first came to DS PTSD myself, and his stuff still works for me
nowadays. Hope it does for you, too.

Um... I'm with Muji. I try all the stuff above but THursday a guy was in my home for repair reasons, and for the first time in freaking *28 years*, I had to get a knife and carry it on me, hidden. And he got too clsoe and I had no exit and suddenly... There I am, hunting knife in my hand, out of nowhere, and he jumped back and I needed till yesterday to calm down the whole way.
Which is why I don't carry a weapon ever. I hadn't even taken that dang knife outta the drawer in *years*. Why that guy triggered me, I still can't say exactly. Still sorting.

Normally, the tools work. SOmetimes, they don't.

I'm no angel for sure. Not even combat. Unless you count my dad and sis, from age zero to 17. I have no rules. I only know "don't go down or it's worse". I know "Run!" I know 'Hide!".... My dad being former military, along with 90 percent of all other males in the family tree, I pickedu p some stuff without knowing it, in terms of "moves", and the rest was "how do I get this psychotic witch off me without dying?" (My sister was five years older and first tried to do me in, witnessed, when I weas *two*).... Soooo....

Yeah.

I did hurt my husband. I still feel horrible. He didn't know about touching me from behind withotu warning. I laid him flat. Elbow to gut, then... blur for both of us, but he was on the floor. I burst into hysterical tears and shook for hours. I didn't even think of him being a possibility, y'know? Just... Danger signal = reaction.

I've been in therapy 4 years now for PTSD specifically and it helps a lot. Meds, too.

So.... I can't offer more than what was said, but I've had a few "moments", as Hubby politely calls them.

Puma purrs of healing to you.

Sorry, should add: Hubby and I have had three rounds of marital counseling, one separation, and he sits in one a couple of my PTSD sessions a month so we can learn/address jointly. So far, so good.

Big hug for you abu..... I was looking online and there are a number of sites for Family and Friends of PTSD ... It would probably help your wife to have some support.... It would help re education of the disorder as well as giving her some support.... Another hug and a blessing.....x

http://www.ptsd.va.gov/public/family/resources_family_friends.asp