All Jacked Up At The Monster Jam

It's springtime and that means Monster Jam in my town. For those of you who haven't had the privilege,  it's a huge demolition derby that involves wrecking great, big monster trucks with names like Medusa and Grave Digger. It's loud and it smells like dirt and gas. A group of us decided to go last year.

Of course these things are always held in an arena, so there are a couple of thousand screaming fans in the stadium and it's just packed full of people. We found our seats. I got stuck on the end. That's a really bad place for someone who has PTSD to be. I figured that it would be ok, since I've gone for a year or so without having any major symptoms or problems.

WRONG!

The guy who sells the beer came by and stood over me handing down beers and taking money for what seemed like an eternity. I sat there feeling my heart beat for what felt like an hour. There I was, boxed in my this great big guy and his cooler of beer. The crowd is yelling and screaming The engines are roaring and there are monster truck parts flying all over the track. And this guy is hovering over me.  I felt totally closed in ( in the middle of a stadium) and it freaked me out.

Then, he moved one step down and stayed there for another eternity. Boxed in and now blocked from the exit. Never a good combination for someone who has been through what I have been through. The minute the beer guy moved, I bolted down the stairs and found myself downstairs in the open air.

Of course my friends were mad and didn't understand. As it turned out, they weren't the friends I thought they were because no one would speak to me for a few days. This is the sadness of PTSD. You feel so alone and it never seems to end. Here I had the first trigger I've had in over a year and the people around me made it worse by treating me like some kind of freak.

So, the point is: It happened and it will probably happen again.  I think the only thing someone like me can do about having flashbacks and triggers is to respond to them rather than react to them.

 My response was to get out of the place where I felt threatened. My reaction could have been to dwell on the whole thing and feel really bad about it.  I could have beat myself up for days and told myself so may horrible things. Instead, I decided that it was one night and one event and now that it's over, maybe I'll catch the show next year.