Am I crazy? This is a question I have asked myself many times. I did check myself into the psyche ward shortly after my 18th birthday. I had hated myself and self-mutilated for four years prior and knew I needed help. Does that mean I wasn’t crazy? I battled with this question even after seeing several therapists and being assured I was not crazy. In the hospital I was diagnosed with major depression and told that it would get a lot better once I graduated from high school, moved from my mother’s home, and began my life independently as a college student.
In college, away from home, I thrived academically and engaged myself in various activities. I thought I was 100% healthy and in a much better place than where I had been a couple years before.
But, as a junior in college I worked very briefly at a daycare with preschoolers. It was briefly because I was so convinced that many of the three year-olds were being molested in their homes that it kept me up at night because I knew I was supposed to help them and I wasn't sure how. I ended up quitting after a few weeks. This wasn't normal, I knew, and I started questioning my sanity.
I started seeing a psychologist on campus. We talked about my history and my childhood. She explained that being molested at three years old was the cause of my fears for the kids at work. She said that the various men my mom had in and out of the house, especially the ones that looked at and commented on my 14 year old teenage body, had been behind the fear that I lived with for years that “something bad was going to happen.” She told me that my mom’s rage, tackling me to the floor and constant yelling and belittling, was the reason why I jumped whenever I heard someone yell on campus. She told me I had Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. She said I wasn’t crazy.
But, I didn’t want to have PTSD. That was what soldiers got after combat. I ignored her advice to take medicine.
I didn’t realize that maybe she was right. Maybe all of my childhood experiences were the reasons I was still a virgin at 21 years old. Maybe that was the reason why I felt so uncomfortable whenever anyone sat too close to me on the shuttle bus or why I cringed whenever someone’s knee or leg barely touched mine when seated next to me. I told myself it was because I was a devoted Christian girl that wanted to save all of myself for marriage.
After graduating from college, I quit job after job. There was always some valid reason for quitting, I convinced myself.
I had to move back in with my mom because I couldn't hold down a job.
I started experiencing excruciating chest pains, worse than ever before. My arms and legs would go individually weak with pain. I would see flashes of light every time a loud noise sounded in my ear. I was sure I had a medical problem. Because one doctor thought that I might have MS at one point, I was sure that was it. I went to doctor after doctor for years. The majority of them suggested I had some sort of anxiety disorder that I should get help with. I denied any of it. My mom would talk with my grandma and my grandma told me she was sure I was bi-polar. We hadn’t spent any time together in five years. Her audacity to diagnose me with anything infuriated me. In the back of my mind, though, insecurities about my sanity simmered. I mean, I had self-mutilated as a teenager and I did check myself into the psyche ward at 18 years old.
I desperately started researching my symptoms more in depth on the Internet, determined to find out what physical illness I was sure I had to justify everything in my life; my inability to hold a job, trouble with romantic relationships, history of depression and self-mutilation, body aches. There had to be a logical explanation.
And when I Googled, “flashes of light with loud noises” the only thing that came up was PTSD. I was reminded of that psychologist and her PTSD “theories”. I did more research on it and discovered that all of my experiences and even physical ailments fit the description perfectly. I remembered all of the doctors telling me I must have some anxiety disorder. I realized that moving back in with mom, the place that started all of my problems in the first place, was triggering everything to happen.
Maybe I’m not crazy. Maybe it’s best to just accept that I have this anxiety disorder and stop beating myself up for past choices I made as a teenager. Yes, I checked myself into the psyche ward at 18 years old. And that was probably the decision that saved me. It's time to stop questioning my sanity and start living my life.
It’s time to move on from the past. I moved out of mom’s, returned to school in pursuit of a higher degree, and am learning to live with PTSD without such insecurity and shame.