weirdowithweirdhealthproblems ·
19/04/2024 18:36
Can anyone advise me on the DSM criteria for PTSD, in particular section H?
H. The disturbance is not attributable to the physiological effects of a substance (e.g., medication, alcohol) or another medical condition.
Basically, I've just discovered I've been living with an undiagnosed speech disorder my whole life and so many things now make sense. Speech when stressed or tired is excruciatingly and unbearably stressful for me to the point that I have multiple instances of full blown trauma symptoms from situations where I was repeatedly forced to speak while stressed or exhausted (my boundaries were ignored).
I get that this can't be diagnosed as PTSD because these situations are just fairly ordinary situations to an average person but to me they were not. I've experienced several of the things on the list of experiences that would actually qualify me for a diagnosis of PTSD but they didn't come anywhere near to causing the kind of stress I feel while talking on the phone for example when stressed or tired (the only thing that compares are situations where I momentarily thought I was in extreme danger of physical violence, both false alarms and very short lived thankfully - but the stress is that extreme).
I'm trying to protect myself from future traumas by getting some formal acknowledgement of the issue but I'm not sure how best to do that. I believe that my case basically comes under H in that my extreme stress and trauma symptoms are caused by the extreme physiological stress involved in forcing my vocal cords to do something that they cannot comfortably do. Is there any diagnosis for such traumas that are ruled out, on this basis, due to being caused by a medical condition? I also have ME/CFS so experience extreme sensory stresses too.
The full criteria can be found at https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK207191/box/part1_ch3.box16/