Learning to live without any sleep....

I've survived the last week on a mix of fruit, energy drinks and Skittles!!!! Know I am really struggling to cope!


Lately I've had problems sleeping and I am assuming it is down to the PTS. And the lack of sleep is also making that worse! Im constantly on edge, yes I know the energy drinks don't make it better but what difference does it make at this point?? 


I am tiered of being tiered! So if anyone has any suggestions of how to get a good night sleep then please, please let me know! Maybe the nightmares will stop, well there is always wishful thinking. 


Kay is being very understanding, she is trying everything to help me sleep, and is putting up with my moaning and snapping!


I just know that if I close my eyes there with be the accident again. I don't want that, I want to go to sleep and not dream, just wake up refreshed, just for one night please sleep fairy!!


going to go now as my eyes are sore and I am going to try and go to bed, for all you out there who feel the same ...... sweet dreams ............................

So what does PTSD mean to me...

Post traumatic stress disorder to me, means nothing, but after talking to one doctor I now know that what i thought was just things i had to deal with are actually PTSD. You may ask what the heck am i going on about??

Since the accident I have struggled to go back to being me. I believe that I will never be the old Leanne, the accident changed me. What do you expect?? This like that do change you! 

Directly after the accident I suffered with terrible nightmares and flashbacks, constantly, every time I closed my eyes I was hitting the lorry over and over again. Suck in that bloody car with that smell!! I just kept telling myself that I would get over it, they would stop, but they still haven't! 

When i am travelling I struggle the most, especially in a car. Its hard to explain but at first everything was going to cause an accident. I hated going anywhere I would panic, and the nightmares would get worse. So i decided to to learn to drive myself and then at least I would be in control. So i got a car passed my test and was in control of the car. But this didn't stop the nightmares, oh no! Yes I traveled better in a car as a passenger, but I still panicked, I still panic to this day. 

When I see a lorry or blue flashing lights my heart starts to race, I get a flashback and I can smell the accident all over again. I was starting to think that I would never be a normal person again but then I meet a doctor who explained EVERYTHING to me.

He told me that I did have PTSD and explained to me what that meant.....

Your brain thinks your in Afghanistan constantly and not Widnes! So every time my body reacts differently. which means when I start to panic my adrenaline starts pumping, instead off just ignoring it. 

PTSD really does effect my day to day life more than normal but that is for next time....

When I thought PTSD was just an excuss!

Before 2007 when I heard that someone had post traumatic stress I just thought it was just an excuses not to do something, a way of getting out of everything. I even thought that it only effected people for a short period of time or sent people crazy, because that’s what the telly shows! You know what I mean, don’t say you don't!!! "Oh have you heard her at number 4 has post traumatic stress! Any excuses!" or your watching some telly, CSI, Criminal Minds and there is a soldier on the loose with weapon causing panic and the reason for it is post traumatic stress!!

How I was so wrong! Most of the world, my included until recently are so naive, we live in such sheltered worlds! 

Well I am going to stand up and say it 

“I HAVE POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER, DEAL WITH IT, I HAVE TO!!!"

Yes I have been diagnosed by a professional, well multiple professionals! This blog is going to be my way of dealing with it, I want to put it all in writing for anyone to see and if they feel the same then they will understand if no one else does!

The first thing I want to address is how I got PTSD. I have never wrote down what happened or really thought about what happened, I have become a robot when people ask and just mutter of the same thing and never go into detail. Well now I am going to, all the detail.

Its February 29th 2007 I am studying in my second year at Marjon in Plymouth to become a secondary mathematics teacher. I loved it! Loved it all, the group of friends I had, the place I was living in, the way I was living. I was 300 miles from home, 300 miles away from putting everyone else first. 300 miles meant I could be me, no one else just me I could do what I wanted when I wanted, be what I wanted. I know it sounds like a cliché but going to university was like being freed!!

I had just spent a week at a friend’s, let’s call her Angela, for half term, got a new laptop, all was great. We were going up to Bristol for a gig at the Carling Academy to see a B list pop star; I won’t name names as I don’t want a law suit!! We had had nothing to eat all day but we were having a good time! 

We left Bristol at about 11.30pm (if not later) and headed for Plymouth on the A38, stopping at every, and I mean EVERY service station to try and get food, but due to the late hour none was serving any hot food. Would you believe it!! What if you’re a trucker parking up for the night and want your dinner, well you’re screwed! Just outside Exeter Angela gave up and got a pasty, I don’t remember her eating it just buying it because she got it and then we got in the car. As we were leaving the service station I asked “if she minded me going to sleep?” I was tired and struggling to keep my eyes open. Then I made the mistake of going to sleep....

The next thing I hear is a scream and then we hit a lorry! Oh not any normal lorry oh no a 7 tonne lorry that is fully laden.  Now being the person I am looking back at that split second when I opened my eyes and see the lorry I have often wondered what has gone through my mind:

“Crap, Micra Vs Lorry whichever way you look at it, it’s not going to end well!”

“Well this is it! And you have nothing to show for it!”

“Put your head between your legs and kiss your bum goodbye”

Well there I was with a lorry sat on my knee one minute and then it was gone and I could not feel anything. Once I finally got my brain to engage I tried to find a phone but could not reach mine, that was the point that somewhere in my brain I realised I didn’t have legs and couldn’t move myself. Angela was scramming about blood and when I looked she had a cut on her hand, I don’t know why, weather it was my upbringing or what but I just told her to shut up that it was a cut, I was trying to plan a way out and to a phone for help.  But then I heard voices.....

....my little heroes! It turns out she had drove into a lorry that was coming out of road works. What luck!!! They called for help prevented another car hitting us and kept me sane till the emergency services came. But that time in the car till they got me out will stick with me forever! I was stuck crushed into the dashboard of a Micra for what felt like an age, but I think it was more like an hour tops. I had to wait for Angela to be removed and then let them plan on taking me out of the car. They decided on taking the windscreen off, the door, the boot and the roof, then they pulled me out of the dashboard and I was whisked away to Derriford hospital.

While stuck in that car my mind was able to pick up enough to disturb me for a very long time! The thing that hunts me the most is the smell, Yes you heard me correctly the smell! To me it is the smell burning car, blood broken glass, disinfectant, power tools, oil. It’s not “bad” smell but a smell that haunts me. Also I while in that car I seen too much, it would have been better if I had passed out!

Once I got to hospital it was routine stuff but I was in a bad way! I broke my neck, back, right leg left foot, smashed my left knee, and had plenty of bruising and nerve damage. That lovely 300 miles had become my worst nightmare as now my parents were not round the corner but 6 hours away.

..........

Now you know why I have PTSD. Next time I write I will let you know what PTSD means for me!