I have always considered myself a pretty disciplined person. It’s always been somewhat easy for me to control my thoughts and emotions. After I lost Gianna, I noticed that started to change drastically. I couldn’t control the waves of grief emotions that would surface. I couldn’t control when I would cry. I couldn’t control the thoughts of Gianna’s death that would appear in my head and cause a breakdown. I felt so different after her death and completely out of control. Who was I now? I didn’t recognize myself.
I began to notice the PTSD symptoms right away. I didn’t know much about the disorder but knew enough to realize that it might be happening to me. PTSD is a mental health problem that can occur after someone has been exposed to a single traumatic event or multiple traumatic events, such as sexual or physical assault, natural or man-made disaster, and war related combat. It started at night when I was trying to go to bed. Every time I closed my eyes, I would be back in the delivery room. It wasn’t just like a simple, passing thought. And it wasn’t just looking at myself in the delivery room from the outside, like an observer. It was actually me reliving the experience. I was back in the delivery room, on the bed, reliving Gianna’s traumatic birth that led to her death. I would think of how unknowingly, I pushed her to her death, inside of me. These thoughts were too much to bear and they would cause my heart to race, my breath to become shallow, and I would have a panic attack. That’s when I knew something might be wrong. I had such a hard time falling asleep for this reason. I was actually scared to go to bed because I knew these thoughts would take over my brain and I didn’t have a way to control them. I would become anxious and distraught during the time when my body needed to relax the most. [Read more…]