Can PTSD Do This?
chairdesklamp
Registrant
Now, it's possible I might also be very slightly autistic, because this is a known symptom of autism. However, in my time, only white cis boys were properly diagnosed for autism. These symptoms also weren't present before my teens. Which is a big tell that it might be PTSD. I did have an awful stutter, but I didn't recieve speech therapy until adulthood, and not in Japanese, where a bit of stutter does remain independent of this.
If it isn't PTSD, I will probably never get tested for autism. They still believe it's a children's disorder that just magically diappears when you reach 20 (and the agency that's doing all those commercials is run by people who also come out in support of parents who murder their autistic kids and delete all negative speech about them from the internet, so don't say that name, but you probably know who I mean, and they might just be in favour of culling autistic children before they become autistic adults)
Anyway, testing adults is not covered, absurdly expensive, and several hours of relentless Hell, from what I hear (basically seven straight hours of stress testing), so I am not going to get tested from that direction.
The problems are:
1. I have to plan what to say in my head before I say it ("scripting"), and
2. Too much noise can completely scramble my mind, and hence my speech, and generally make me panicked.
Examples:
In English, on Thursday, the previous night, again, the stockboys didn't finish their work, and it fell to me. This makes me pretty mad, because I'm doing their work and being paid less for it, having been passed up for promotion to anything for several years. Other managers usually yell at me for complaining. This manager asked me what I would like to do instead. Now, that could be a smarmy comeback, so I asked what she meant. She asked again, and it became obvious she was earnestly offering to not make me do it if I had other stuff to do, or could suggest a viable alternative. All I could say was "I don't understand." About three times. I understood. In fact, I understood well it was something I haven't encountered before and had no "script" for. So my mind went blank, and I couldn't reply.
2. In Japanese it happens, too. So, I've ben running since they set the old boss up. I'm the only non-manager still with the company known to be in support of the old boss (this man fed the homeless out front out of his own pocket and never asked us to do anything he wouldn't. I would have happily followed him forever). The set up of me has started. I also know the entire reason Japanese Americans generally earn well is either coming here transferring to an American branch of a Japanese company or being given a chance at non-menial jobs by other Japanese Americans. I'm also looking for housing in Little Tokyo, so I can be near my church and actually go regularly, but, at any rate, I went into this one store that had a hiring sign. It was a store that sold comic merchandise. Generally non-Asians who want to do what was done to me for 25 years flock around anything dealing with Japanese comics. I wanted to ask if the clientele was like that, or how many of them were. Especially since a woman in her 20s was running the counter (would probably bear the brunt of it)
So, I'm talking about a very stressful topic, and the reason I'm asking is very stressful. Lots of stress to begin with. At the same time, there's a karaoke event just outside in the square. Very loud, very off-key, I'm classically trained, also the music sounds like new stuff I don't like. So it's a lot of very loud, very unpleasant noise. I start getting midway in a sentence, then skipping something and backtracking. So a lot of "uh, I mean, That is..." At this point, I really can hardly think. It was so loud that afterwards, asking directions in two languages from five different people, only one person could hear me (and he didn't know, so I had to wander around lost for an hour!) I'm not exaggerating about the loudness.
I was able to say more words than in English, but my speech was still pretty erratic.
I do also tend to say more words, whether or not I'm really saying anything when I feel confronted, moreso in English bwcause that's the language I've been confronted the most in, and Japanese the one I've recieved the most kindness in, but I didn't feel confronted even though I did feel stressed, language spoken regardless, so I don't think that was it even though it was a subject of confrontation and trauma.
The issues I'm wondering about is the needing to plan what I say each time I speak, and, as I've shown, it's not terribly language dependent, and the amount of extreme stress very loud noise causes me--I will be unable to think, therefore speak, and I was actually also panicked throughout.
EDIT: I should probably also mention screaming or any other violence in front of me scares the living daylights out of me. And I used to live in Oakland and do social work there. I don't show outward symptoms save disordered thought and shaking if you look closely. I did have to break up fights betwen clients and deal with a lot of confrontation. But it was usually followed by a three-cigarette smoke break and not being able to stand for a few minutes. That much I know is PTSD
Can PTSD cause the rest of this?
P.S. This is only so verbose because I'm trying to explain throughly without really knowing how to. Also, stutter does not sound like Porky Pig. The movie The King's Speech is a realistic portrayal of a stutter.
If it isn't PTSD, I will probably never get tested for autism. They still believe it's a children's disorder that just magically diappears when you reach 20 (and the agency that's doing all those commercials is run by people who also come out in support of parents who murder their autistic kids and delete all negative speech about them from the internet, so don't say that name, but you probably know who I mean, and they might just be in favour of culling autistic children before they become autistic adults)
Anyway, testing adults is not covered, absurdly expensive, and several hours of relentless Hell, from what I hear (basically seven straight hours of stress testing), so I am not going to get tested from that direction.
The problems are:
1. I have to plan what to say in my head before I say it ("scripting"), and
2. Too much noise can completely scramble my mind, and hence my speech, and generally make me panicked.
Examples:
In English, on Thursday, the previous night, again, the stockboys didn't finish their work, and it fell to me. This makes me pretty mad, because I'm doing their work and being paid less for it, having been passed up for promotion to anything for several years. Other managers usually yell at me for complaining. This manager asked me what I would like to do instead. Now, that could be a smarmy comeback, so I asked what she meant. She asked again, and it became obvious she was earnestly offering to not make me do it if I had other stuff to do, or could suggest a viable alternative. All I could say was "I don't understand." About three times. I understood. In fact, I understood well it was something I haven't encountered before and had no "script" for. So my mind went blank, and I couldn't reply.
2. In Japanese it happens, too. So, I've ben running since they set the old boss up. I'm the only non-manager still with the company known to be in support of the old boss (this man fed the homeless out front out of his own pocket and never asked us to do anything he wouldn't. I would have happily followed him forever). The set up of me has started. I also know the entire reason Japanese Americans generally earn well is either coming here transferring to an American branch of a Japanese company or being given a chance at non-menial jobs by other Japanese Americans. I'm also looking for housing in Little Tokyo, so I can be near my church and actually go regularly, but, at any rate, I went into this one store that had a hiring sign. It was a store that sold comic merchandise. Generally non-Asians who want to do what was done to me for 25 years flock around anything dealing with Japanese comics. I wanted to ask if the clientele was like that, or how many of them were. Especially since a woman in her 20s was running the counter (would probably bear the brunt of it)
So, I'm talking about a very stressful topic, and the reason I'm asking is very stressful. Lots of stress to begin with. At the same time, there's a karaoke event just outside in the square. Very loud, very off-key, I'm classically trained, also the music sounds like new stuff I don't like. So it's a lot of very loud, very unpleasant noise. I start getting midway in a sentence, then skipping something and backtracking. So a lot of "uh, I mean, That is..." At this point, I really can hardly think. It was so loud that afterwards, asking directions in two languages from five different people, only one person could hear me (and he didn't know, so I had to wander around lost for an hour!) I'm not exaggerating about the loudness.
I was able to say more words than in English, but my speech was still pretty erratic.
I do also tend to say more words, whether or not I'm really saying anything when I feel confronted, moreso in English bwcause that's the language I've been confronted the most in, and Japanese the one I've recieved the most kindness in, but I didn't feel confronted even though I did feel stressed, language spoken regardless, so I don't think that was it even though it was a subject of confrontation and trauma.
The issues I'm wondering about is the needing to plan what I say each time I speak, and, as I've shown, it's not terribly language dependent, and the amount of extreme stress very loud noise causes me--I will be unable to think, therefore speak, and I was actually also panicked throughout.
EDIT: I should probably also mention screaming or any other violence in front of me scares the living daylights out of me. And I used to live in Oakland and do social work there. I don't show outward symptoms save disordered thought and shaking if you look closely. I did have to break up fights betwen clients and deal with a lot of confrontation. But it was usually followed by a three-cigarette smoke break and not being able to stand for a few minutes. That much I know is PTSD
Can PTSD cause the rest of this?
P.S. This is only so verbose because I'm trying to explain throughly without really knowing how to. Also, stutter does not sound like Porky Pig. The movie The King's Speech is a realistic portrayal of a stutter.
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