I'm a carer for my husband who suffers from PTSD as a result of 29 years in the NSW Police Force. When it first became obvious to me that he wasn't coping with his job and life it was in the context of an argument that I suggested he should get help to reduce his stress levels his reply was immediate and explosive. "Don't give me that s#@t! There's no such f$#%ing think as stress. That's all bulls@#t! Only soft c@#k nancy boys go off on stress."
Things were realy bad but he was in total denial. I figured the only way to reduce his stress levels was to get him away from work and the town we lived in for a while so I booked a week for two in Vanuatu and gave it to him as a Christmas present so he couldn't refuse to go. He was tense and uptight for four days and really had only just begun to relax when it was time to come home.
It took another two years and a seemingly trivial happening for him to break completely and go off on sick leave. That trivial happening was the straw that shattered his mental stability and forced him to seek help from both his GP and a counselling psychologist.
To this day I believe that had he sought help when I originally pointed out that he had problems he possibly wouldn't have snapped quite so completely but we'll never know.