Peter Hill

As difficult as it is I would like to share some information with you about my diagnosis of post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)

I realise now it is important not to  keep the condition from the ones I love the most in my life. After all, you are the ones to likely see the symptoms of the disorder and how they affect me.

I am sharing this information with you as my family who are going to be understanding, trustworthy, nonjudgmental, and supportive. In other words, I don't want to share this news with the family gossip or the loved one likely to criticize me about this disorder.

That is why I am not informing certain other family members.

I now know that loved ones can be an excellent source of social support, which has been found to be incredibly beneficial for people with PTSD as I have recently read.

Over the last thirty years in my firefighting career I have seen some of the most horrific scenes anyone can imagine and been involved in some very saddened incidents with families and death. 

Each night after an incident I would return home have a shower and climb into bed like nothing had ever happened and go to sleep. I would not talk or discuss this with anyone as I felt I was protecting them from what I had seen and dealt with. The next day I would go off to work like normal. 

I guess I have a lot of unresolved trauma inside my head due to the fact I have never dealt with these situations that occurred rather than processing the traumatic event at the time of the incident. So over the years I have tried to forget it and suppress it instead, by pushing it down into an internal ‘black box’ that only grows over time and now it confronts me  and now scares me. 

These traumatic events are scary, dangerous, or shocking experiences that have affected me physically, emotionally, mentally, spiritually, or socially. 

Some of these I am talking about are fatal motor vehicle accidents, people being burnt in fires, suacide . and other experiences that affect my sense of well-being.

In the short term, I guess it has caused emotional reactions such as terror, confusion,  shock, isolation, and dissociation,  but whereas in the long run for me it has affected my behaviour, mental state, and ability to function. 

For me this called unresolved trauma causes me to experience disruptive physical and emotional reactions in the present as my body and mind continue to defend against a threat that belongs in the past if that sounds right to you all.

Over the years my symptoms  have been feeling more hyper vigilant which to me keeps me constantly on guard and prone to overreaction, the lack of trust and difficulty opening up to other people at times. Control issues, to overcompensate for feeling helpless during past traumatic incidents to which I now want to control each and every situation in day to day living.

I am aware of my anger issues and difficulties in regulating my emotions. 

Sleep difficulties, Bodily memories that cause physical flashbacks of the sensations, smell, taste, pain, and pressure of a traumatic experience.

To then go to a place like I did a couple of weeks ago where I thought it would be easier to end it all and then stand there and be man enough to say to myself I need to go home and say that I am not coping, I need help and with the support of Annmarie I am here sorting it out now.  

Last Wednesday night at a meeting with our local GP it has been decided that I check into South Coast Private hospital where they  offer treatment for Defence and Emergency Services personal.

I will be part of their inpatient program where I will be checked in for a 3 week period of therapy then hopefully at the end of this be a better person within myself.