A Woman's Confession as a Wife and Housewife

**I’m writing this post today specifically from a women’s perspective for other women. If you are a man reading this, please don’t be offended or feel left out. I’m sure that much of it applies to you, but this is based on what I hear from other women, especially military wives.

Stress affects people in different ways, but have no doubt, it does affect you. Personally, it affects me physically. I can’t sleep; my stomach rejects food; my head hurts; my back hurts; sometimes I even get a low grade fever; and eventually my body literally gives out and I sleep for hours. I don’t mean that I sleep for eight or nine hours – I mean that I sleep for like 10 hours at night and then nap continuously the next day. Lately I’ve been lucky that those sleeping days have come on the weekends rather than during the week. It’s my own fault, I haven’t been taking care of myself. I can offer excuses as to why I haven’t but, really, that’s not important. What is important is appropriately dealing with the stressors and TAKING CARE OF MYSELF (remember that capitalized phrase, it’s important).

I cannot stress how important it is to appropriately deal with the stress in your life. Stress impacts us negatively both physically and emotionally. It can affect every part of our lives, which is not good when you have a family to care for or full-time job outside the home. I want to give you a few ideas on how to deal with stress in a constructive manner so that you can take care of yourself and your family in the healthiest way possible.

My current stressors are many but not as many as others. Currently my husband is two months into a 12 month deployment. There have already been causalities in our unit. I work full time with soldiers and then come home to a house full of wonderful but attention-demanding furbabies (four big dogs and two cats). I am also in the process of getting approved to get custody of two children who are currently in foster care in another state. Oh, and I’m getting ready to go through IVF (while my husband is gone with his frozen swimmers) in the winter. Stressed? Yes. Do I know ways to deal with it? Yes.

There are many different ways of dealing with stress, and some are better than others. Exercise is one of the better ways (in my opinion) to deal with stress. I have been failing at this and truly need to get back to exercising regularly. You don’t have to be a fitness buff or in great shape to lower stress through exercise. Walking, yoga, pilates, weights – there are lots of options. A simple 10-15 walk can be mind clearing.

Meditation is another personal favorite way to deal with stress. I use a guided meditation that is related to fertility, but there are other options out there. You can do guided (where you listen to a recording of someone talking) or you can also do meditation on your. I know that some people think that they can’t meditate, so here are some personal tips from me:

Play soft music (no words) or soothing sounds (rain, waves, etc.) in the background.

Turn off the TV, put your phone on silent and kick the kids/furbabies out of the room.

Find a comfortable position in which to lay or sit.

Take a few deep breaths to clear your mind, and then start meditating.

Usually I envision my “in” breaths taking in positive energy and the “out” breaths getting rid of the bad energy/stress.

I know, some of you reading this probably think it’s flaky but it really can work.

Another way that I de-stress is through the emotional freedom techniques (EFT). When I first started using it, I went to the website and began talking with Sarah. EFT has been especially useful to me when I’m feeling overwhelmed or on the verge of a panic attack, as well as those nights that I just cannot get to sleep. I like EFT because I can literally do it anywhere at any time and it can help me.

Lastly, one of my favorite ways to deal with stress is with a hot bath and a small glass of red wine. There is something so therapeutic about soaking in hot water (I also use aromatherapy bath crystals), listening to soothing music and sipping my favorite wine. My bath time is MY time. I don’t talk to anyone, I don’t pay attention to the furbabies, all I do is concentrate on me. It is heavenly.

Stress is a necessary part of life but many times us military spouse have more than our fair share. I hope that I’ve given you some ideas on how to deal with those stressors.

What are some of your stressors? What are some ways that you deal with those stressors?

Nightmares and Depression

In my previous posts, I have gone over different symptoms of PTSD that my husband has suffered from, but that have also gotten better with time. Nightmares and depression are two symptoms of PTSD that he still battles on a daily basis.

Let’s start with nightmares. Sometimes he’s lucky and will go weeks without one, but then when he least expects it, they hit full force. Most of the time they are triggered by something going on in his life. Stress is a HUGE factor but simple things like watching the military channel will almost always result in a sleepless night. Lately, learning of the deaths of Rangers he served with has brought on a wave of nightmares. To his credit – he has done a great job of avoiding the things that he knows will trigger these sleepless nights. So he avoids the military channel and war movies, and tries to not talk about things he did overseas. But he can’t control the news and hearing of a comrade’s death really affects him.

When he does have a nightmare, one of two things will happen. Best case scenario: He wakes up gasping for air, calms himself down and goes back to sleep. Worst case scenario: He wakes me up from all the screaming, so then I wake him up. He will then ask me to hold him, and while crying, asks me to please “stop this from happening.” I HATE when this happens because there is nothing I can do to help him. Talk about feeling like a useless wife!; All I can do is hold him and try my best to comfort him.

On to depression. I use the term “depression,” but “sadness” is probably a better way to describe it. My husband does not suffer from any sort of clinical depression – he simply becomes incredibly sad. Nine times out of ten, nightmares are the culprit. The day following a sleepless night is always a hard day for him. He likes to be left alone and tends to be uninterested in fun activities. If the nightmares persist, so does the sadness. I can usually tell when he is down because he will walk around the house with his headphones on. That’s my cue to just leave him alone. I used to try to make him talk to me, but all he really wants is to be left alone.

And then there are days when he is just sad for no reason whatsoever! He tends to be really hard on himself on those days – he will think he is a “failure” and will tell me that I deserve to be with someone better than him. Again, there is nothing I can do but reassure him that all those things he feels are not true. I always tell him how proud I am of him and of everything he has accomplished since I first met him when he was only a freshman in high school. With time, he eventually snaps out of his “funk” and becomes his joking, funny self.

When I think about it, it’s harder for me to deal with the sadness than the nightmares. As much as I love my uninterrupted sleep, seeing my husband get down on himself is so difficult for me. Maybe because I have known him for so long and have seen him accomplish so much (both in the military and in his civilian life). Or maybe it’s because when he is down it takes such a toll on me. My husband is my best friend, and when he shuts himself off from me I just can’t function. And then there’s the fact that I just can’t do anything to help him and that’s hard. I have said it before and I’ll say it again – all I can do is love him.

When PTSD Turns Physical

So I have been putting this topic off for a while now….mostly because I wasn’t sure how to address the questions or the stories shared with me and because I know what you are going through. Inwardly, I think I have been avoiding this topic because it hit so close to home, and I am trying to forget. I have had approximately 57 emails in regards to physical violence within a PTSD/TBI homes, and it saddens me to see so many of you are crying out for help. Saddening me further, is the knowledge that many of you who visit the site and don’t say anything, probably will never reveal that domestic violence is an issue with your veterans. For those that wrote me, I won’t be sharing your emails as promised, but I want to make sure you understood my appreciation for trusting me with such stories of your lives. I know it was hard to write some of the things you did, perhaps embarrassing to see it on the screen in front of you, and more so admitting that these issues were indeed real.

I have been following PTSD material, information, etc., for a while now and was quite surprised to learn that domestic violence, emotional abuse and verbal abuse was a common factor in most homes. I haven’t been able to find a straight-forward PTSD/Domestic Violence statistic online from the past few years – the ones I have, are all older than 1995-1997. Makes me wonder what happened to the people who were looking for these correlations between combat PTSD and domestic abuse then? Did everyone just stop caring?

One of you wrote that “Everyone says just leave – if I do, he will go nuts or something and kill himself. Do you understand how I feel knowing I can’t go because of this and the constant back and forth?” Yes, ma’am, I do. I have only had a few serious issues with my husband in the four years he has been home and dealing with PTSD. My husband constantly talks about suicide and the fact he wished he never came home which he thinks would have solved all our problems so he would not have to hate himself so much. It’s not a statement he uses to hold something over my head, it could just stem from generic conversations like “How did your psychiatrist appointment go?” or “You need to go get a haircut.” In the blink of an eye, his angry outbursts could turn very scary with him picking up tables and chairs, hitting walls, breaking things, and pushing me around. Grabbing me by the arms or wrists would leave bruises for a week or longer. I kept thinking to myself, “If it gets worse…I will have to leave him.” Just when I think I am ready to walk out the door and just give up…..the thought occurs to me, “If I leave, my husband will simply become another statistic on some blank page that no one cares about”. It blows over, he switches back to his semi-normal PTSD self and acts as if nothing ever happened. In the mean time, I am cowering on the inside and permanently waiting for the fists to fly. There isn’t an apology because he doesn’t realize he does it. If he does snap out of it, then its like he is humiliated and doesn’t want to even look at me.

I don’t want to admit that my husband has pushed me, hit me or cornered me in the kitchen and yelled and screamed in my face until he was red, shaking and spitting on me from the anger. I never had to deal with this growing up, never had this happen in our relationship ever, and so for the most part, I feel confused. Where do you draw the lines between “not being able to control their emotions or behaviors” and “they don’t know what they are doing as they often black out”? I do know that being a verbal and physical punching bag is not ok. I know that I should walk out and never think twice because my safety and my children’s safety is priority. So why do we stay? It’s the same question many of you asked me that echoes in my head all the time.

I often would hear of a friend of a friend who was hit by her husband….personally before he came home from battle, I would think “What the hell is she staying there for? All you would see is my ass and elbows out the damn door!” After enduring so much the past four years? That perspective has changed drastically. I don’t know whether its the counseling or doctors telling me “Eh, they all do that- just avoid the triggers, walk away when they begin boiling over and know that often times they don’t realize they do it.” that is keeping me here because I am permanently scarred for life with bad medical advice? Or is it because that small glimpses of our husbands the way they used to be keeps us hanging on to my thin lifeline desperately?

I do know this…a few weeks back, my husband suddenly turned into a monster I had never seen before. It was over something silly and stupid….he really really hurt me. Physically, I was hurt, but emotionally, I was absolutely devastated he could ever do that. I kept questioning myself….was it my fault? Could I have prevented the situation somehow? What did I do? Never once during that 24-hour time frame after the incident, did I ever stop to think it was all him. It wasn’t me… there was nothing I could have done to prevent it. When he looked at me, it wasn’t him. It was like this dark, evil, shadowy thing had taken him over. I had never seen this side of him, and that part scared me to death.

Talking to other spouses, I knew that this was not acceptable. It just leaves you in a stupor asking, “What in the hell just happened?”. I know it’s very easy to say, “Get out, run and never look back”. It’s easier for family members to turn a blind eye when it comes to needing help, and even more so for people to lay all this advice on you when they haven’t been in your shoes. I won’t give you that spiel of “Call the 1-800 domestic abuse hotline-they can help you.” because many of you told me you had the numbers. I will say this….protect yourselves first. I forgave, but I haven’t forgotten. I learned a lesson and now am more cautious and definitely more aware of his anger. If you can’t stop to think of anyone else but him, look at all the murder-suicides happening all over the United States. Our veterans didn’t learn to half ass do anything, especially in combat, so when their anger gets to that point…they can seriously be a danger to you, your children and themselves. After that incident a few weeks ago, my perspective has totally changed about my husband and what goes on behind closed doors of PTSD homes. Not everyone is going through this, but there are many.

Do make sure you protect yourselves…..have a flight plan in case you must leave. Make a private account, and slip a little money in there. I myself have started this, and although it kills me to take just a little and move it because we are on a very tight budget….I know that something may happen and I will need that to get the hell out of Dodge! I had a friend offer a place to stay, I have 911 programmed in my phone. I make sure I have a phone charger in my car, and my battery is always charged on my cell. The car has a spare key that I hid, the gas tank is filled up constantly so it’s never past 3/4 of a tank.

I don’t have all the answers to give you…I am not a professional and don’t try to be. All I can give you in return is my story, validate your feelings of not wanting to leave or give up, and tell you what I would do or my plans if this happens again. I read on a domestic violence website that if you question whether you are or aren’t in an abusive relationship, then you are in one. How does one tell the difference between abusiveness and PTSD? So much isn’t our veteran’s faults, and some of it is. It’s like a constant mental tug of war for spouses like us who are in these situations. I totally understand where many of you are coming from.

Check out . I quite often visited her site at the very beginning because she was really all we had for spouses to go to for some answers. She has a section on PTSD and Domestic Violence. I also came across this

I saw an episode on Oprah with this author on it. How funny that at the time, I thought to myself, “THANK GOD this hasn’t happened to us.” I hope this makes you all feel somewhat better that I do know how you feel and I have walked in those shoes before….all I can say is, sometimes you just have to get out. There is only so much love, so much support you can give our combat PTSD veteran’s and still not be enough for it to keep them inflicting their anger upon their closest ally. Don’t stop yourself because of what he might do to himself, you have to think of yourself foremost. Counseling and inpatient programs have helped some of the anger physical outbursts here, but I just never know….and we never know when the battle will escalate to the point where someone is seriously injured or dies. That is the first thought that needs to be in our heads……

I receive e-mails sometimes from combat PTSD veterans themselves, which gives me a chance to see the other side of it. One veteran told me that he doesn’t know what happens to him, and that he never could figure out how the anger and rage would come and go without him even realizing it. He told me that Eminem’s and Rhianna’s song Love the Way You Lie best portrayed how he felt most of the time. He has given me permission to copy his e-mail and post it here without his name:

” I hear the song Eminem sings with that chick and I swear it’s my life USM. I love my wife, and I don’t know how I can be this way and not know it. The part where he says “Cause when its going good/ its going great/ I’m Superman with the wind in his bag/she’s Louis Lane/But when its bad it’s awful I feel so ashamed/I snap/Who’s that dude/I don’t even know his name/I laid hands on her/I’ll never stoop so low again/I guess I don’t know my own strength.” It’s not that I intentionally set out to be some ass it just happens. I get lost and I remember nothing. It’s like I am asleep and then get woke up. She thinks I am crazy. I just wanted you to know I read your blog and try to gain some ideas of what I am putting her through. She left me but I am trying to fix myself so I can get her back-she is all that mattered to me but my PTSD is smothering everything and everyone in my life. I am too much of a p&s*y to kill myself but I see some of our brothers do it and I totally get why. You say you live in hell. I get that. I cant imagine what we do to our families. I just want you to know we are proof that hell exists in our world and no matter what we do, Iraq will always be there haunting us for the rest of our lives pulling us under. I wish I could just make it go away”

Wow, huh? I wanted to include that because I am trying to be fair to the veteran’s as well since so many are reading my blog. On the other hand, for you veterans out there….we have to protect ourselves first. We may love you to the ends of the world, but if you hurt us…..we often can’t protect ourselves from you. If any of your hell is close to that, then surely you can understand why we have to find our ways out.

If anyone else would like to comment, share a story or advice…please feel free. I may have a big mouth, but never all the answers. Sometimes in subjects like this, it hits so close to home that I just don’t have the right words or know what to say…..

Hurting Inside for All of Us,