I used to have a talk with my professors at the beginning of every semester. If the topics of x, y, and z came up and I did not feel like I could handle it that day, I would leave for as long as I needed. It was a fairly short talk. No one tried to change the curriculum. No one was fired. I’ve needed to leave the classroom a handful of times; it’s never been a big deal. My experience with PTSD in the classroom is not exactly sensational. The Atlantic has not covered Clarion University’s take on mental health and whether or not I am being coddled.

Why am I telling you this? Because I have seen a lot of hand-wringing about trigger warnings, and not a single article about anyone’s actual experiences with triggers and PTSD. While some articles do acknowledge that trigger warnings may actually be for people with PTSD, they quickly gloss over that and go back to making fun of sensitive college students who need coloring books and play-doh to deal with their feelings. When writing about extreme examples, the actual experiences of people who deal with mental health issues in the classroom are swept under the rug and trivialized.

Here’s the thing about PTSD. It’s kind of like acid reflux. Red sauce and coffee trigger heartburn for me. Things that are associated with past traumas trigger various unpleasant mental problems for me. It’s actually a real thing and not something crybabies who didn’t feel like reading The Great Gatsby made up.

The dreaded word “trigger” is actually a term commonly used in PTSD terminology. It refers to anything that sets off your associative memory back to trauma land. This includes anything from a brand of soda, to a smell, to a song you’ve heard. Veterans could be triggered by something such as seeing footage of battle, reading articles about battles or war, cars backfiring, fireworks, etc. Triggers can be anything from a small annoyance to setting off a serious mental breakdown. I’ve brushed off very dangerous situations and I’ve cried over commercials. (Shout out to my boyfriend for not questioning why I was crying over a commercial at three AM.) It can also refer to things that trigger anxiety or depressive thinking.

Whether or not I can handle these triggers is dependent on a lot of factors. Have I eaten that day? What time did I take my medication? Did my meds get adjusted recently? What news articles have I read that day? Did I have a nightmare about this issue the night before? Again, it’s like managing my heartburn. I can have certain foods if I’m careful when I eat them. On a good day, if I really wanted to, I could listen to songs I associate with trauma. For some reason?

But yeah, it’s managing an illness. It’s actually kind of boring. I probably get triggered a few times a week. It happens. Sometimes it’s bad and it takes me a few hours to recover, sometimes it doesn’t bother me. Therapy and medicine have helped a lot to deal with triggers, but it’s still a long process.

I don’t know how I feel about trigger warnings as a whole. I have a habit of ignoring them and regretting it, so my opinion may be moot on this topic. However, I don’t think trigger warnings are unreasonable requests. Because that’s it, they’re just warnings. A heads-up. And maybe a day I walk into class I’ve had a nightmare that morning, maybe I forgot to take my medication, maybe the cauldron of chemicals inside my brain has randomly decided fuck you on that particular day. While I usually have an idea of what class is going to be about (usually), a trigger warning would help streamline the process.

It’s telling someone, “Hey, this poem is about Zeus as a swan raping someone.” And sometimes, having a warning about the swan rapist could mentally prepare someone for that lesson. It could also let them know it might be a good day to skip if the discussion of Leda and The Swan happens to fall on their traumaversary. You never know!

Some journalists worry students cannot handle these topics. If trigger warnings are used, no one will ever read a book ever because students are too lazy and books will hurt their feelings. I realize in some cases people may take the concepts I am defending to their illogical extremes. As it turns out, some people are jerks! Believe it or not. It’s also nowhere near as common as people seem to think. For the very small minority of students who refuse to interact with the material, why do we care? They’re the ones wasting their money.

I am just one girl with a PTSD diagnosis. I cannot speak for everyone with PTSD, and I have been very lucky to have professors that are mindful of my needs. But please, there are actual issues in the world. Go wring your hands over things that are actually making the world a dangerous place.