OMG that’s a terrible situation to be in and would most definitely cause PTSD if not clinical anxiety.
That’s got to be a terrible burden to live with.
I have lost all my family via varying methods and, yes, there’s never any cure.
I would agree that survival and living a good life is the best you can do.
I hope you continue to live well.
Thank you! 
It’s a very minor thing and not sure it counts, but weirdly, I am still distinctly bothered/alert on the highway if a white car on the right zooms up to overtake the vehicle I’m in.
That’s what happened a few decades ago when I was driving my sister home in her car. The overtaking white car on the right suddenly veered left and nearly hit me, I swerved, spun and crashed on the median. No injury to my sister, minor ones to me, car totaled, no other vehicle touched or impeded: a very good car accident, as they go.
The white car didn’t stop and I have no idea what became of it, but a white car coming up fast on the right still pings my “watch OUT” response. Other car colors doing the same thing don’t have the same effect, which is why I think it’s a leftover reaction from my one and only (so far, touch wood) car accident.
I don’t think some here understand what PTSD is. It’s horrible and life-altering.
I’ve been run over twice on motorcycles. Those experiences have left certain impressions on my life.
I’ve got one of the bikes I was riding hanging in the rafters of my garage. Twisted like a pretzel, but still beautiful in its own way.
Real PTSD can and does ruin lives. There is help out there.
It took me a long time to discover what caused me to have such vile responses to certain things(not at all what I’m fearful of outwardly).
I got some help with it and am way less disturbed. I still have lingering, but controllable thoughts on it.
I’m usually able to distance myself from the offending thing. It pops up rarely.
There is. I encourage anyone suffering to seek that help. I finally did and that was life-altering.
True enough. Fortunately I have never experienced anything of the sort. I had a shipmate in the Navy who was severely traumatized during a SAR - lowered from a helo in the middle of the night in a high sea state, something for which he had never been trained.
I also had a subordinate who was assigned to my team who was a military vehicle technician who had been doing vehicle recoveries “outside the wire” under fire in Afghanistan.
I’ve had a real aversion to sudden loud noises since my year in Vietnam. I didn’t realize how far it had gone until I was watching a fireworks display from the bluff near our house. People were setting off explosives on the street where we were all gathered and the smell of the gunpowder and the smoke in the air triggered what I can only guess was the onset of a panic attack. I told the wife we needed to get out of there NOW. I avoid those things now.
My PTSD (adult onset, so a long time ago but not like… before color tv long time ago) also flares up during fireworks. No wartime trauma for me. I always thought the noise triggers were reminding sufferers of gunshots or bombs but it’s apparently very common with more mundane PTSD because it triggers just one’s general hyper-vigilance.
This year wasn’t too bad for me, but usually for July 4th I have to close the windows and crank up the AC units, even if it’s not hot, just to drown the noise out and not crawl out of my skin for about 3 days.
When I have my episodes, I try to tell my kid it’s not just remembering a traumatic event but reliving it. I’ve had traumatic things occur that didn’t turn into PTSD.
I recommend treatment too. Mine’s not gone, but it did get a little better. One of the best parts was validation from trained professionals that I wasn’t being “dramatic.”
I really dislike the prevalent current practice of equating certain memories, preferences, personality features with conditions such as PTSD, OCD (current thread in IMHO), ADHD, emotional dysregulation, ASD…
Even if someone is using those terms as shorthand to describe mental states, it does a disservice to folk who actually have them, and presents an image of all of us as impaired and with limited agency.
Sometimes, after a garbage truck empties a dumpster, it drops the empty dumpster back on the pavement from a couple feet up. It sounds exactly like a car bomb going off. When I first got back from Iraq, the sound could literally make me vomit.
I completely agree that the devastation caused by severe clinical PTSD shouldn’t be trivialized in any way, or downplayed by being lumped with more minor post-trauma reactions.
I thought the OP was asking about examples of particular post-traumatic psychological effects (irrespective of severity) that are typical of PTSD, such as flashbacks, anxiety, hypervigilance, etc., directly triggered by situations that resemble the traumatic event.
If I’m wrong about that, and this discussion is specifically about having symptoms severe enough to qualify for a clinical diagnosis of PTSD, then I apologize for seeming to “equate” that with a much more mild post-trauma reaction.
And thank goodness, patience, and the people who speak up about their reactions and pain who have taught me to acknowledge mine, and see it in others too. I’m glad to live in the times I do.