I’ve been thinking about PTSD more than I usually do lately, even when I first knew I had it a few years ago. That all by itself triggers me more than I thought it would, but anyways. I’ve been thinking about it more.

I think what I hate the most about PTSD are not the memories themselves, even though those are extremely bad. It’s the triggers I hate most of all.

Of course, someone who knows how to push your buttons can be dangerous, or at the very least damaging. But someone who knows how to pull your trigger is the most damaging of all where trauma is concerned. The result of yanking it isn’t that you get angry, it’s that you go out of commission. An automatic self BSOD. ((Blue Screen of Death, like you sometimes see when Windows crashes.))

It’s bad enough when they do it by mistake. It’s bad enough when they don’t know it’s exactly your trigger, but were intent on causing damage some way. It’s horrible if they do it by design and by intent.

Open yourself too much to somebody, give them too many clues as to what causes you to crash, and one day, if they ever get mad at you or wish to get back at you for something, boom. It’s all over except for the increased amount of therapy.

I did want to talk about what triggers me. But then I realized: hey. It could be that guy uses it to hit you again. Or a guy like that guy. If they ever don’t like what you write, all they need to do is this and then you’re done. You’re out of the game. Maybe even talking about triggers even this little amount is too much information to give to strangers who may some day decide to get back at you. And what an easy way to do it. No marks, legally speaking, and every bit as effective as hiring someone to terrorize you, because your brain ends up doing that automatically.

Though frankly, some of what triggers me I don’t know myself. The brain makes really stupid associations sometimes (that is, after all, a large part of its job), and the other thing I hate about triggers is that if you’re not careful, what you do to avoid the trigger can itself become another trigger. Which is an approximation of what happened to me a few weeks back.

So. Yeah. Thinking about PTSD. The idea being that knowledge is a key, even in this kind of storm. Too bad you can’t simply recite “Mary had a little lamb” to keep the telepaths out of your head.