"How do you help a young man showing PTSD symptoms?" Mon Jul-06-15 12:40 PM by double negative
or depression or just....straight up emotional darkness
ay yo okp.
I flew in two cousins for the 4th weekend to party it up. One is 19 and the other 24. We were having a lot of fun and it was a good time for me to play uncle/older bro. It felt really good to be able to hook it up on my dime.
Partway through the trip, the 24 year old started to retract and shut down. Men in my family are space cases, present company included, but he is on another level.
Dude displayed deep teenager like levels of sulkiness and unresponsiveness. I've never seen anything like it. And whats worse is that hes showing obvious signs of emotional pain.
I know the family situation, he just lost his father and his mother is kind of a piece of work. His brothers are nothing buy a thorn in his side and hes slowly becoming a dick to people who want to help. He dropped out of high school because he didnt have a proper support system in place (because his immediate family is too busy dealing with their own bullshit). He is also currently unemployed and kinda not looking.
Talking to the brother I see that he feels deeply defeated and he alternates between being a bright, scary intelligent, highly intuitive individual and a depressed, subdued, dejected person. One minute he is cheesing and cracking jokes and the next moment hes just totally shut down and non responsive.
I mean
besides just being there and letting it be known i'm here to help no matter what
1. "do what you suggested" In response to Reply # 0
look up his local mental health center for when he gets back home if finances are an issue encourage him to just start talking seeing as he's going through a ton of things
Ted Gee Seal Member since Apr 18th 2007 10091 posts
Mon Jul-06-15 02:03 PM
2. "Sorry to hear about this" In response to Reply # 0
It's a long road. Definitely see if you can get some professional help on board if you want to move forward with this. But either way, be prepared for a lot of small, incremental progress and even some backward steps.
He might be pre-emptively pushing people away to avoid feeling rejected. Persistence is key, and accepting that you never know when you're going to turn the corner.
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