#PTSDDaddy Memory Problems, OCD, and Depression
I have had a rough couple of weeks. My wife thought it would be good to write about them so this is my attempt at writing about the events the past few weeks. I have added issues in life that may or may not be PTSD induced.

Chewie… my sanity check.
Memory Problems…
Ask my wife, I forget shit all the time. This combined with the fact that I had to change my plans from being in the Army until retirement to medically retiring NOW and having to figure out WTF to do. I ended up moving to Florida for a job and long story short, the whole situation caused some financial issues and bills not getting paid on time. This has come to a constant game of “who is on my ass next?” It’s always a surprise and as much as I budget and write things down, and calculate and recalculate… I always miss one. That one always calls me up angry, and some how pretty much everything I thought I had extra to pay extra on bills I got current, all go to THAT guy. I spend a lot of time putting out fires and this combined with my PTSD and memory issues has made life stressful at times. I do not know where I would be without my wife. She is a HUGE reason I have been able to keep our heads above water even though we often tread water for a long time. I swear I go over and over and over the bills and somehow I miss someone. I blame memory issues because this did not used to happen to me. I did not forget bills. We recently got some difficult news on a bill, which did not leave many options. This led me down a depression path that seemed like I could not get out of even though my wife was so positive about everything. The next day her car broke, the day after that something else happened. It’s like really? I finally get on the bills I paid a LOT of bills and literally the afternoon I am stepping and fetching to work with these people on figuring out an option that they will accept that I CAN do but it’s extremely painful. I went from thrilled to death of how well I got on bills to WTF I’m going to hell the next moment.

OCD Everything in it’s place
OCD…
So this issue leads to the OCD part of me. Now I have to re-arrange EVERYTHING to make up for this one thing. I cannot focus until I get all my ducks back in a row. This is the part my wife truly hates is when I obsess. I hit a point where I cannot “fix” something so I scramble to move decimals over here and pennies over there and add shit and subtract shit until everything fits in the square. I know I have memory issues so what really makes it worse is that I know I forgot something but what? Back to analyzing, calculating, re-calculating, writing shit down, going through bills, bank statements, anything and everything. As soon as I think I found everything I remember “oh yeah I paid paypal for this other thing is there an auto payment?” I lose sleep, I can’t eat and then when I do I overeat. By over eat I mean I order a pizza, wings, and bread and finish all of it. I go out with my family to do family things and my wife asks me a questions. I see this, I hear this, but I don’t hear it. My brain is back calculating and obsessing with numbers. Overall it is NOT that big of a deal. In the long haul I am stressing way too much about something that will be fixed. But I view this as a status of my “manhood”. If this is the status (a temporary hard time) then I am a complete failure as a father and a husband. I then begin to get short with my wife. I do not do this on purpose I am just lost in my world of “fixing shit”. Every time she talks it interrupts my ability to fix it and if I cannot fix it then I have no purpose as a man. Â A “real man” provides his wife and kids with food, water, shelter, clothing, education and a few fun things here and there. But this one issue means I have failed at all of this.

Depression
Depression…
I will be honest I fight the thought of me having depression just as hard as the PTSD. The biggest issue is that to this day I still fight admitting I have depression. Once something happens that I view as a complete failure I trigger my depression. I have a distaste for people and socializing to begin with having PTSD, but with depression I want to shut the door, turn off all lights, go to sleep, and just say “fuck the world.”  I know my wife realizes when I hit this state because the poor thing will look at me and try to help. I hit a point she cannot help and she sends me to bed. She knows… she knows I am my worst critic. She knows that I am  horribly negative at this point, and she knows that really the only thing I can do is take a few moments to shut out the world. At this point I do not even realize that I am doing this to everyone. I become quite unpredictable when it comes to “is he in a good mood or not?” questions. The more unpredictable I am… just shows how hard I am fighting it. I know my wife sees this point because she has hit the point where she will stop talking. I hate this. It drives me absolutely bonkers because
Smile if you’re dysfunctional!
I knew I had issues as I couldn’t stop laughing at that bumper sticker.
I hate to admit it, but I felt like I was reading something I wrote. Minus the wife the memory issues I don’t think people believe me on, I have talked to my Drs about none of them say it’s due to my PTSD or my MEDs. So this article gave me some peace in hearing I’m not alone in this cycle of forgetting, obsessing and depression.
Ted, I’m glad to hear that. I have been getting this type of response from a handful of people which comes as a surprise to me as well. I am writing to put out the tales that I feel we all go through. Ultimately, I think we all feel it may be just us until someone else says “hey me too.”
Thanks for sharing this with me, it’s comments like this that keep me writing.
–David J. Brock a.k.a. PTSDDaddy
I love that you are able to turn to your wife and acknowledge what she does for you. It may not always work but she tries to be there. I wish my kiddos with PTSD could see the same thing. Good luck to your family. I’m amazed with how reflective and introspective you can be. Thanks for opening a door into the PTSD mindset.
Well thank you so much. I have come a long way, with alot of work along the way. I have trouble admitting when I am wrong and looking back on things I can see now what I couldn’t see then. I wish I could be a little more cognoscente of these things while they are happening. I am getting better at anticipation of when I’m going to go full PTSD mode and I am getting better at getting OFF that bus alot quicker. There is still more work to be done. I am glad I can offer an open door. I figure maybe if I can tell my side of it, even if it’s “messed up”, at least everyone can see better the “WHY” behind what I do. I’m sure your kids will get there, it’s a matter of time, work, and more work.
Thank you