PTSD:Demons don't just come out at night

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
July 11, 2024

Have you ever watched a horror movie or read a book and wondered if demons are real? The answer is yes, they are.

While you probably have heard of the religious practice of exorcisms, they have been performed for centuries. The truth is, it's gone on a lot longer than that. Just read this from National Geographic.

In Mesopotamia during the 1st millennium B.C., purveyors of magic called ašipu staved off and expelled demons that brought illness and chaos. As spiritual healers, ašipu were esteemed protectors who used amulets, performed elaborate rituals and, when needed, engaged helper demon figures in their efforts. The ancient Greek word daimon—from which the modern "demon" derives—referred to god-like spirits and supernatural forces. While a daimon could be good or evil, the latter was a malevolent force that needed to be cast out or exorcized. The 1st century A.D. historian Josephus recounted the story of Eleazar, a man who freed others from a demon by drawing it out of his nostrils and repeatedly invoking King Solomon's name, attesting to a form of exorcism in Jewish tradition as well.

HealthLine took a look at sleep paralysis and the "demon."

How people describe them
What is this “demon” that leaves you trapped in your body, unable to move or scream? It depends who you ask.

For some it’s a faceless, shapeless presence trying to suffocate them. Others describe it as a creepy old hag with claws. Some see an alien and experience what they believe is a full alien abduction. And for others, the demons look like a dead relative.

Different cultures have different explanations for sleep paralysis demons.

Canadian Inuit attribute the sleep paralysis to spells of shamans. Japanese folklore says it’s a vengeful spirit that suffocates its enemies in their sleep.

In Brazilian folklore, the demon has a name — Pisadeira, which is Portuguese for “she who steps.” She’s a crone with long fingernails who lurks on rooftops in the night, then walks on the chest of people who sleep belly up on a full stomach.

If you have #PTSD, then you know what these are like. The difference is that the only demon invading you is the trauma you survived. I survived ten times, but it took the one event that changed everything for me. I write about it often, but as a reminder, my first husband tried to kill me and then stalked me. When I had nightmares of what he did, all the other times moved from the back of my mind and into my days. It wasn't much fun to constantly fight them. It was even worse to survive them in the first place. I had to remind myself that I did survive them and wasn't about to let them destroy me or my future.

Most won't tell you that but should say to you as soon as they offer any therapy. You are not facing the threat of the events that already happened, but you are facing the danger of what came with the memories of them.

And then there are people talking about the PTSD demons. Wrestling with demons: Veterans share their experiences of battling PTSD, addiction, suicidal thoughts.

Believe it or not, that's from the Department Of Veterans Affairs website.

Veterans’ greatest battle isn't always against an enemy combatant. Sometimes, it’s with themselves.

That’s especially true for Ben Evenson and Sam Lovdahl.

To mark Mental Health Awareness Month, the two Veterans shared the struggles they faced after serving — battles that included post-traumatic stress disorder, drug/alcohol addiction and attempted suicide.

The presentation, dubbed “Wrestling with Demons” because Evenson is now a professional wrestler and Lovdahl wrestled in high school, took place under a covered pavilion on a chilly, overcast day on the Milwaukee VA campus.

But the setting was apropos, Evenson said.

“Even though it's a (crappy) day out and it's raining, the sun is still shining, 1,500 feet above us,” he said. “It's the outlook on which you look at life that determines the outcome of where you're going and where you are now.”

PTSD doesn't want you to have hope, so it destroys it until you give up. It doesn't want you to know you can defeat it, so it gets in the way, planting doubts in your brain every time you decide to reach out. Stay away from the games it loves to play. You are smarter than that. You are stronger than that.

Maybe someone told you that PTSD was a sign of weakness. It isn't. There is nothing weak about surviving the cause of the demons invading you. You stopped being a "victim" of the event/events as soon as it ended. You became a survivor! Once you understand that, you begin to defeat it.

Now that you know demons are real, isn't it time you stopped feeding them are started to starve them?