What does a post traumatic episode look like to a bystander?

Tornadoboy · Nov 9, 2007

I've got a female protag whom suffers from post traumatic stress disorder, and I was wondering what it would/should look like to a bystander when she is having one of her flashbacks?

At one point after a bad car crash I have her act one out in delerium, frantically clawing at a closed door and begging to be let out, though at the time my male protag thinks it is due to a head injury and hypothermia. At other times I picture her staring at things that aren't there or something that was a trigger, turning pale, sweating and looking like she is looking straight into the mouth of hell.

Does this all sound consistent with what really can happen with someone whom suffers from this?

Tsu Dho Nimh · Nov 9, 2007

Yes, and there's when she decides that a bystander is the "enemy" and tries to kill them.

Jeff Colburn · Nov 9, 2007

Basically, you're dealing with flashbacks that can be very real to the person experiencing them. I had a couple friends over for dinner soon after returning from Vietnam. Another guest repositioned their chair, and when one of the chair legs hit the floor it made a sound like a mortar being fired. Both friends jumped up from the table, launched themselves over the couch and huddled on the floor waiting for incoming rounds. They were fine a minute later, but it was all very real to them.

Have Fun,
Jeff

kristie911 · Nov 9, 2007

I have a friend that was in the Army and suffers from occasional PTSD flashbacks. I've seen it once and it scared the hell out of me.

Without going into the triggering incident because it's a long, horrible story, but he was sitting on the floor, rocking back and forth, convinced he could hear helicopters and gunfire. (His best friend was killed in action and my friend carried him to the helicopters over his shoulder while his friend bled out) He was in a total panic and nothing I did snapped him out of it. All I could do was sit next to him with my arms around him, talking until he came around. Whatever he was seeing and hearing was completely real to him.

But for him, there is always a trigger, it doesn't just come out of no where. I'm not sure if that's how it works for everyone or not.

JamieFord · Nov 9, 2007

It can depend on how the person ordinarily deals with fear and anxiety. A close friend of mine will wake up from nightmares and immediately throw up, be sweaty and shaking. But if she has a moment while she's awake, she just sort of "goes away". She'll curl up mentally (and sometimes physically) and can be almost catatonic. Often, if there's someplace she can lie down she'll just go to sleep for the rest of the day, even if it's the early morning.

eodmatt · Nov 9, 2007

To the person experiencing it, the thing is very real. My own experience is no way as devastating as those related above. But after three tours of Northern Ireland in the 70's, it was a number of years before I could sit in a restaurant, bar etc with my back to a window or door. I just couldnt do it. Even now it feels uncomfortable to do that.

I have a friend who was in the R. Navy. His ship was badly hit during Gulf War 1. He was an engine room wallah, but after the attack he found himself on deck with no recollection of how he got there. Even now, his flashbacks are vivid to the point that the colours and smells are all real to him. People who suffer such flashbacks are not usually violent towards others during an attack.

Modern psychiatric thinking is that such attacks are a normal response to severely abnormal and life threatening situations.

Gray Rose · Nov 9, 2007

Jeff Colburn said:
Basically, you're dealing with flashbacks that can be very real to the person experiencing them. I had a couple friends over for dinner soon after returning from Vietnam. Another guest repositioned their chair, and when one of the chair legs hit the floor it made a sound like a mortar being fired. Both friends jumped up from the table, launched themselves over the couch and huddled on the floor waiting for incoming rounds. They were fine a minute later, but it was all very real to them.

Have Fun,
Jeff

Jeff, that's not necessarily PTSD. It's just that you learn to respond to triggers in a certain way. I'll never forget how I was in this record store and a lightning hit a lantern outside or something - there was a loud crash like an explosion. The two salespeople ran quickly to the window to see what happened, while I automatically ducked for cover under one of the tables and covered my head. It was definitely not PTSD for me, though I was somewhat traumatized by the looks they gave me

Tornadoboy · Nov 9, 2007

Thanks for the help!

Well basically what happens in a key scene is something occures in her workplace that is somewhat related to her trauma and makes her uncomfortable, so she makes an excuse to go outside for air and get out of the situation. My male protag is walking alongside her chatting when he notices that she is no longer there, and discovers that she had stopped halfway down the hallway and is staring at something, which later will be explained as a trigger.

Like I had mentioned before she looks like all the blood has drained out of her, she's sweating and her eyes are almost wide with horror. He is smart enough to know a little about PTSD and quickly understands that this is probably what is going on, so he approaches her cautiously and tries to talk to her, but she is of course oblivious. When she comes out of it a minute or so later she practically bolts for the exit, and when he catches up with her in the parking lot she's sitting on a curb, trembling like crazy and trying to pretend nothing is wrong.

This is a very important moment for the story because it brings together a lot of pieces in his head that he's gathered over the year that he has known her, and he realizes that the other episode I mentioned, the one where she claws at the doors, was also a traumatic flashback. Also since he had once survived a disaster that left a lot of others with severe PTSD he knows a little something about it, but somehow it hadn't clicked in his mind until now that she has quite a problem herself.

As far as the way she deals with stress she doesn't handle it too productively, she tends to get angry and defensive too easily and lives in denile that she really needs to get help.

Poohcat · Nov 10, 2007

A PTSD attack- if you can actually call it that is basically a panic attack. The victim experiences a trigger event which causes an extreme panic.

PTSD is not a single "disease" but a disorder with a combination of many signs and symptoms. It is also known as "shell shock", trench shock, and many other.

The effects can be as serious as psychosis to a mild panic reaction and everything in between.

The individual reaction depends upon a number of factors. The original event, the time period the person was exposed to the stressors, the patients psycho-physical make-up and coping mechanism.

For example, I worked with a guy who spent his 19 birthday being shelled by the Vietnamese. His reaction was four fold. First loud noises made him dive for cover and he drank prodigious amounts of alcohol. He had chronic depression and impotence (due to the depression) and would never talk about the event with anybody who was not a close friend or an ex soldier from his regiment.

So to answer how your character would look would depend on the cause, the coping mechanisms and the trigger in the scene.

Linda Adams · Nov 11, 2007

Tornadoboy said:
I've got a female protag whom suffers from post traumatic stress disorder, and I was wondering what it would/should look like to a bystander when she is having one of her flashbacks?

I was a bystander to someone suffering from PTSD. When I was on Fort Lewis, I used to go to the community center. A medically retired Vietnam vet was a regular visitor to the community center. Every time I saw him, he was in a state of flashback. Others mentioned a trigger, but I don't think he had one. He was simply in a state of flashback, but he never got violent, never started shouting, or was any threat to anyone. As I recall, he never moved out of his seat while he was having a flashback. But he would relive these flashbacks out loud. When others passed by him and heard him, they kind of gave him this look and steered clear as if he would contaminate them somehow. So a reaction doesn't necessarily have to be violent.

I also had a woman friend who was deployed over to the Persian Gulf. She was in a small unit of about seven guys, relatively isolated for about a year. The guys sexually harrassed her every day for that year. She came back with some physical symptoms, like a constant upset stomach. PTSD? Maybe. The Army went for the medical reason and last I heard was planning on cutting her open with a surgical procedure that would break every one of her ribs.

But here is a laundry list of PTSD symptoms from the VA: http://www.ncptsd.va.gov/ncmain/ncdocs/fact_shts/fs_commonreactions.html

Poohcat · Nov 11, 2007

Yeah it is a hard one PTSD. With me I repressed it for years then it just got on top of me and I got very depressed and quite physically sick.

Others I know have bad dreams and poor sleep which leads to lots of other problems.

Most PTSD aren't violent unless they have an underlying pychosis which may have been triggered by PTSD

What does a post traumatic episode look like to a bystander?

Tornadoboy

I bite

Tsu Dho Nimh

Jeff Colburn

kristie911

Happy to be here

JamieFord

giving resonant directions

eodmatt

Gray Rose

Beware of the Thorns!

Tornadoboy

I bite

Poohcat

Linda Adams

Soldier, Storyteller

Poohcat