PTSD Assignment.

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I need treatment for PTSD because I am now starting to sleep with a knife again. I also am getting about 2 hours of sleep at night when my body can no longer stay awake. I'm even on anti-anxiety medication and it is not helping me much right now.

My assignment is to write the most stressful experience you have experienced. I have two and both are bad in different ways. I can't choose between them so here they are.

A Locked Door, Frozen

I was lying in bed asleep in the middle of the night. When I hear a huge violent crash and I knew instinctively what it was. My father had smashed in the back door with one vicious strike. I know what his mission is and I know mine as well it’s been this way for a few months now. Without thought I react as alway. With an effortless swoop of the top bunk My 10 year old body lands on the wooden floor and see my terrified mother running down the hall. I know she is going to go out the front door as she had in the past and I am to go out the back because my father would be following her. My heart is pumping and I am terrified because I know that if my father sees me I’m in big trouble. The kind of trouble that I believe would mean death if he realizes I’m running to call the police. I believe it so I run as fast as my feet can carry me. Then, I am stunned by what I see. It is clear and feels like forever, but it was only a glance because I need to save my mothers life. 

My father is waving a broomstick at my mother and I see her diving out of the way and I am off. I run barefoot over a long rocky driveway. Funny thing is I don’t feel a thing. In fact I don’t even know how I got to my neighbors and got them to call the police. I stand waiting for my mother to come out of the house, but she dose not. I am scared because I know my father and he is mad  because my mom is divorcing him and he can’t handle that. He would rather have her dead than let her go and have a life of her own without him.

Everyone is standing around and I am waiting for one of the men to go save my mom and no one is moving. I don’t understand. Then a man tells me that my dad had put a lock on the outside and they could not get in. Then the police show up and they know things are bad. I sense their fear and it makes mine worse. Finally one of the cops comes over and asks me to go inside and open the door from the inside. I was terrified at the idea and froze. I couldn’t move. I know if I go in I will not come out, I just cried unable to move. I want to go and help my mom, but I am so afraid of my dad I can’t. I want to so bad, but I can’t all I can do is stand there and cry looking at all the men hoping one of them will go and save my mom. We need her please someone go!

The police eventually get in and my mother is beaten badly. The broom my father had been beating her with turned out to be an ax. My mother has to be taken to the hospital and I see my father being arrested. I hope they lock him up forever. My mom has broken bones, ax marks around her body where the ax went in. I feel hopeless and helpless, I don’t know how to save my mom.

I have no further memory of the event.

This is how you become a man

I don’t remember how I ended up with my father, but I did. I am about 11 years old and my dad is angry and drunk. I should be use to it by now, but I am not. In fact I am always in fear when it comes with my father, but utter fear beings when he begins drinking because rage will show up it always does.

He snaps and starts talking awful about my mom. He always does this, but today is a lot more intense and some how I know something is going to happen. I stay quiet and still because I don’t want to say or do the wrong thing which will happen anyway because he is drunk. Then it happens he gets up pissed and starts yelling things about my mom and I wonder how I ended up here alone with him. I know better and I can’t remember what I did or said for me to be sitting with him. Then I see it, his .22 rifle and he looks at me and I am about throw up, but fear keeps it in. “I am going to show you what it means to be a man.” my father says.

He grabs me by the arm and throws me out of the mobile home he is now living in. He locks up and ushers me forcibly to the truck. I don’t know where we are going, but there isn’t a thing I can do about it. He starts talking about my mom again and I don’t know what to do. I don’t remember what he said, but when we arrive at my moms job I get real scared. He tells me that my mom is going to learn a lesson and she will not do this to him. He tells me to get out and I don’t want to, but I have to because if I don’t he will shoot me, I know he will.

We are at a bar where my mom works, but it’s her off today. She is there for some fun and to blow off some steam. We are in the back bar and the back door has a whole where a door knob use to be. He looks in and I know he is looking for my mom. I am hoping she is not there. Then he looks me dead in the eye and tells me he can’t tell which of the two women is my mother and shoves me to the door. He doesn't ask, it’s a command. I know I need to tell him which woman my mom is. I can only imagine what I looked like looking at him not wanting to do this, but needing him to believe I’m on his side. If I don’t I’m in a lot of trouble the kind that gets you dead. He can’t know I love my mom more than him and that I wished he was dead and not my mom. 

So, I look in and see my mom and her best friend Judy sitting at a table with a couple of other guys. They are laughing and I want to yell at my mom to run, but can’t because my dad is there. My mom is sitting on the right and Judy on the left. I don’t know what to do so I just continue to stare. I don’t know what to do. What do I say? Then I feel his arm on my shoulder and he pulls me back and I don’t want to go. “Which one is she?” he asks. He knows I know and he know I will tell him because I’m on his side and if I lie I know he will hurt me and he knows I know that. 

It felt like forever, but it happened so fast. I tell God I am so sorry, but I can’t tell him because he is going to kill mom. I feel bad because Judy is a nice lady and I like her and I don’t want her to die either, but she is not my mom. So I say “Mom is on the left.” I say this as confident as I can because I need him to believe me. He leans in again and takes a long look. I think he is hoping one of them moves so he can tell. So I try to say something, but nothing comes out. Then he looks over and asks me if I am sure and I am. “Yes, mom is on the left. I know because she just got a hair cut and if you look you can tell it is shorter than before. Look, mom is on the left.” I made that all up because he need to believe me that I know mom is on the left. Because mom can’t die, she just can’t. She is my mom and what will happen to us if mom dies.

My father takes his rifle and puts the muzzle in the hole. He gets ready and takes some breaths then he pulls the trigger. I don’t remember what I felt or what I did, but then nothing. Quiet brings me back and I see the bullet is jammed in. I want to run to my mother, but I don’t I can’t have her know because she will attack him and he will kill her because he has the gun. So I stay quiet, still, no thinking, not doing, not feeling, I just stand. Then as he tries to get it unjammed we hear two men walking towards us. My father grabs me and we run to the truck. When we are both inside the truck he looks me dead in the eyes and as serious as I have ever seen him. “Don’t tell you mother.” It was the quietest yell I have ever heard. “I won’t” is what I say and I know that I will.

The next thing I remember is running into my mothers arms in tears and I tell her everything. I remember nothing else, not a thing.