A whole month off and PTSD

As always it's been a busy last couple of days. My in-laws left first thing Saturday morning (!!), Sir and I celebrated my birthday Saturday with a walk around our local pond and a trip with little bug to the local ice cream shop, we decided to be heathens and skip out on church Sunday and instead went for a gloriously long walk that ended with pumpkin spice lattes from Starbucks, and we concluded the weekend with a friend's birthday party. All in all quite the enjoyable weekend (perhaps too enjoyable as we both woke up with hangovers this morning...).

My favourite season has officially arrived and the foliage is starting to change colours!! We have beautifully vibrant oranges, yellows and reds decorating some of the trees and I can't wait to watch the colours move up the hill towards our apartment. This year the arrival of fall is bringing something in addition to beautiful leaves and cooler weather. As a joint birthday present to Sir and I, my employers have given me a month fully paid leave starting today. This time is to be spent getting myself healthy, figuring out what I want out of the business and taking time with little bug and Sir. As part of getting healthy I've started seeing a therapist on a weekly basis and Sir and I are in twice a month couples sessions. I think this will all be good for me, and I'm looking forward to feeling more like myself again and Sir and I working on some of our issues together.

My therapist came to an interesting conclusion last week, namely that she believes that while being highly functioning, I'm suffering from PTSD. This thought honestly had never occurred to me. To me PTSD was a problem confined to those who suffered some severe trauma, such as soldiers or war victims; or really anyone other than me. I can't suffer from it. I have my shit pulled together, I've processed what happened to me three years ago. Just because I've been having flashbacks, panic attacks when I see someone who looks like him, an intense fear of letting people in... that doesn't mean I'm suffering from PTSD, right....? Or does it. But I've forgiven him. I still in many ways love him. I couldn't hold onto my anger towards him because it was eating me up, and sapping me of what little energy I had. So I had to let go. That means I've processed it right? I can't still be affected by something that happened over three years ago, can I? Apparently I was wrong. I can and am still affected by it, this one event that lasted no longer than 15 minutes in a room that I had to walk by on a daily basis for two years after the fact.

As part of processing everything I'm supposed to write to him daily. One of those letters has been posted and more might follow. I hope that I find answers and health in my month off. Or at least have a chance to catch up on all of my knitting projects :-)