PTSD vs Higher Education

It is impossible for me to imagine what post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) feels like.  To me, the entire concept is nonsensical.  I do not understand the lack of emotional control, the social anxiety, the gut-wrenching fear of everyday activities.  As a child, I was abused by my step-mother and molested by a family friend, but looking back I do not remember feelings of stress, anxiety, or fear.  I only remember acknowledgment.  I remember accepting the fact that it happened and moving on.  I do not know how I came to simply accept it, and to my knowledge, those events do not traumatize me.  I have no concept of a life-altering traumatic event, and to be honest, I hope I never do.

About two years ago now, my mother was sexually assaulted at work.  At first, I did not understand why she did not just accept it and move on.  To me, it seemed like such a little thing.  Then I found out what her childhood was like.  My mother had been molested by my family throughout her childhood.  Couple this abuse with the bullying and torment at school and it’s a wonder my mother survived long enough to have me at all.  I remember as a child, she told me she contemplated suicide when she was 16.  She said the only thing keeping her alive was that she could not figure out how to tell God he screwed up, that her life was terrible, and nothing good could ever come from living on.

I do not want to say I blew her off or did not believe her, but I guess I never fully understood what she went through or everything she did to protect me.  When I was born, she set down ground rules with my grandparents.  They are both dead now so I cannot begin to tell you what those rules were.  I know the gist was “abuse my daughter in any way, either physically or psychologically, and you will never see her again.”  There were others, I’m sure, but this one laid the foundation for my relationship with my grandparents.

I won’t deny my family has its issues.  I think all families do, but growing up, I loved my grandparents.  My grandmother and I had our fair share of differences, but I loved them both very much and neither ever abused me.  So when my mother told me about the horrors befalling her childhood, it was impossible for me to rationalize the nightmare she described with the loving, compassionate people I knew.

When she was sexually assaulted, at first she tried to move past it herself.  But she could not.  She couldn’t sleep, couldn’t keep anything down, struggled to focus, and began having severe anxiety attacks doing simple tasks like going to the store.  Her counselor connected the dots between her past and present trauma diagnosing her as suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).  It’s been about two years now.  Nothing has changed.

She cannot go anywhere alone.  She carries anti-anxiety medication in her purse and is in constant fear of being attacked again.  Shopping is a nightmare and Black Friday?  That’s a “barricade the front door, pull the curtains, and hide in the tub” type event.  To be honest, I truly thought I was losing her.  Hope seemed a distant memory; laughter forgotten entirely.  I watched my mom sink into a deep depression.

Then suddenly…there was a glimmer of hope.  A program gained notoriety; it trained service dogs for veterans suffering PTSD after returning from war-zones.  My mom caught wind of the program and wanted to look into it once we moved out of our 900 square foot apartment.  Well, she is in the process of buying a house, her very first house, and now its time to research PTSD dogs.

She found a website called Dog Wish which trains service dogs for both psychological service and passive protection.  They research the applicant, find a suitable dog based on the applicant’s psychological needs, and train the animal for service and protection.  It sounds like an amazing program and as such, it is extraordinarily expensive.  Dogs typically range from $15,000 to $25,000 with a minimum of $5,000 down, ideally half.  Fundraising options are available, but $5,000 down is still a daunting amount.  Training takes about 6 months and additional costs apply such as travel and expenses.

While my mom is the one buying the house, it takes four adults to be able to afford it.  All of our collective savings are going into buying this house.  There is no extra money.  My mom needs a service dog, there is no question about that.  But how can I help her get one?  I am barely able to pay my bills as it is.  I have no savings, no extra income.  All I have is my book and the vague hope that I can publish.  But I already had a cause in mind for publishing proceeds.

My plan was to publish, hopefully earn enough to send my brother and husband through college, and then use left over proceeds to help Middle-Class Americans afford college.  That was my goal, my dream: to make higher education more affordable for those that slip through the cracks.  But now, I want to help my mother afford her PTSD dog too.  On the one hand, I know she needs the animal.  I know she needs to feel safe again, but on the other…I have a responsibility to help society, to do my part for a better future.

I have heard the “good of the many outweighs the good of the few” speech through history, politics, and literature, but now that it is my choice, now that I stand at the precipice…which way do I jump?  In Fable 2, when it came down to a choice between my family and my dog, I chose my family despite being more attached to my dog because I felt I had a responsibility towards a digital collection of people-shaped pixels.  But now…they are more than just pixels.  And now, it’s a choice between people I know and love, and people I share a tax-bracket with.  Am I crazy for losing sleep over this?  What would you choose?