Meandering Michele's Mind: In Memorium -- Bill Hering

For those of you who've been following this blog for a while, you know I'm a dancer and how much dance had to do with my PTSD recovery. When all therapies failed me I decided to pursue joy as a way to overthrow trauma's vicelike grip and to habituate myself to something outside of my trauma addiction, and to reconnect to my pure and innocent and untraumatised self, which I believed still existed despite the daily evidence that might have suggested otherwise.

I was a freestyle dancer with no background in partner dancing when I walked into The Ritz Ballroom and said, "Teach me." It was a rocky road at first. My mind and body were so used to being separate they did not speak the same language, nor did they want to. And I, so used to processing in the PTSD fog and dissociative state, found the present, in-the-moment, connected-to-your-partner aspects of dance incredibly difficult to sustain.

But I knew when I danced I felt joy, and when I felt joy I was transcendant, and when I was transcendant trauma and the past ceased to exist and for a little while I was free. I've already written about dance and how it impacted the evolution of my healing. I haven't written much about the man who taught me to dance, my instructor, Bill Hering.

As we're talking about seeking help this month, his portrait (above with dance partner/wife, Sylvie) becomes very relevant in its suggestion of how we can seek help in new, out of the box ways and find more help than we ever expected. I went to the dance studio Bill owned just wanting to dance, and what happened was that I discovered a whole new self, not just from the hours I spent in private lessons with Bill, but from the community he had built at the studio, the other teachers he employed, the dance parties he hosted and the classes he designed.

A few months after taking the dancing plunge (and dancing 7 nights a week because I wanted to develop a joy habit and once I began to feel joy it became addictive -- I wanted to feel that way every day!) an unexpected thing happened: the nightmares ceased. I began to sleep. The anxiety lessened. I became more open. My body and mind slowly renegotiated their connection. I became comfortable in the moment. I became comfortable in my body. I was flooded with good feelings instead of bad. I dissociated less. I began to laugh more. Good things came from my dance odyssey and Bill, for one hour twice a week and as a presence every other moment in the studio, was a big part of that.

Last Thursday while I was in Boston for the trauma conference Bill lost his year long fight with cancer. Our dance community has suffered a great loss. The funeral on Monday was difficult for all of the usual reasons but also because Bill is so entwined with my recovery. He was only 50, way too young for us to lose him.

In recovery we have to have a spirit of adventure. We have to imagine the impossible. We have to not get stuck in the rut of our own thoughts but seek help in new and unsual places. We have to think about who we are and who we want to be and how we can make the transition. We have to think about who can help us make that dream come true.

We think things through. We commit to the desire to heal. We educate ourselves. We educate those around us. And then we're left with the task of finding a way to make the fantasy reality. Help doesn't always come from the most predictable places -- sometimes, you simply pursue joy and a guide emerges to help you do so.

To heal, sometimes you just have to put on a pair of suede soled shoes, step onto the floor, give in to the music, and dance. And if you've searched hard enough you'll find someone with the patience to lead you through.

Why I Believe Psychotherapy Is An Integral Part of PTSD Treatment

To follow is an excerpt from my forthcoming memoir, Parasites of the Mind: A Memoir of Trauma, Survival, Identity and the Pursuit of Joy. This portion chronicles my beginning psychotherapy. It was 1998; 17 years after my trauma, 10 years into the extremely dark emotional pit of PTSD; the beginning of 10 years of extreme physical PTSD complications.

When I met Henry Grayson, PhD., for the first time in 1998 I immediately knew I had found a lifeline. Over the next 7 years he would become instrumental in helping me find a way to bridge the gap between what was in my head and letting it out. He didn’t lead me to complete healing, but he got the ball rolling (and sometimes gave it a necessary kick) and for that I’ll be forever grateful.


I agreed to meet Henry Grayson for this one reason: the name of the institute he founded is the Institute for the Psychotherapies and Spirituality. I wasn’t interested in therapy, but a man who understands and is interested in spirituality seemed like a man to whom I could relate. I had made a few large life decisions when I was released from the hospital and one of them was to become an atheist. At the age of thirteen I went against my parents’ wishes and gave up the idea of God and religion and my Jewish heritage in favor of developing some sort of personal transcendental focus that depends on my own self rather than some unproven entity. A therapist who believed in spirituality would, I thought, at least support those efforts.

I walked from my apartment on 64th and West End Avenue to Henry’s office, which is in a predominantly residential building on 58th and 8th. His office overlooks what used to be the Coliseum but is now the flashy new building that houses Jazz at Lincoln Center. Instead of taking the elevator, which would have been easier in my frail condition, I took the stairs because you don’t stay tough, ready for the next challenge, by taking the easy route anywhere. It was an extremely cold day and I was weak and out of breath after only four steps of the two flights to Henry’s floor. My fibromyalgic muscles screamed and burned. I sat down to rest before painfully climbing to the landing where I paused again before forcing myself up the second flight. By the time I reached Henry’s office I was exhausted and feeling faint.

I don’t remember the specifics of what we discussed that first day. The strongest impression that remains is of the dim lighting; the room glowed with an amber luster. And I remember Henry opening the office door to greet me. He is tall, six feet four, and trim with black-speckled gray hair neatly parted on the left side. His eyes, a sort of pewter color, are warm and friendly with a sparkle that hints at his deep sense of humor. He wore a simple, light blue oxford shirt with a tie and a pair of tan slacks.

“Hello,” he smiled and stood aside to let me pass through the door.

Immediately, I was hooked. Henry’s deep, smooth voice is incredibly mellow and seems to flow effortlessly from his mouth, as if he is merely exhaling a breath and there happen to be words floating on it. The way he says hello is not your usual blunt greeting. Instead, he utters the word with a sort of lilt on the second syllable so that he sounds both surprised and pleased to see me, as if he hasn’t been sitting in his office expecting me and preparing to walk beside me into my dark abyss.

In addition to this, Henry moves with effortless grace. He has an aura of such ease in his own skin that I immediately felt centered and grounded and safe just standing beside him. He indicated that I could either sit in a stuffed blue upholstered chair, or on a maroon, three-pillowed couch. I chose the chair and curled up in it, tucking my legs beneath me. Henry shut the door to the office and the room turned inward upon itself like a cocoon.

The first few weeks we focused on the events of the previous year and a half, which brought me to the admission that due to recent physical and medical events I felt completely, utterly, powerless.

A brief pause after I said this. Henry waited for me to speak again. When I didn’t, he said, “Are there other times in your life that you’ve felt powerless?”
“Yes.”
“When?”
“September, 1981.”
Slowly, I began to see how the past was so very much a part of my present.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

Those first months with Henry were very strange. Talking with him was like being released from the circus. I no longer had to perform. I no longer had to convince myself or anyone else that I was all right, that I was stable, happy or any of the other things that, when you’re ill and disgusted by pity, you try to fake. I could admit I was afraid. I could say out loud that I felt completely void of any medical safety and enormously without hope that I would ever feel at peace. With Henry I could be utterly candid because I felt secure in the knowledge that if I started to fall apart he would catch me. In the comfort of his office facing what I have always tried to deny didn’t destroy me as I expected it to, and it didn’t incapacitate my ability to cope. Instead, it brought a huge sense of relief.

In the end, therapy is nothing more than one person guiding another toward the possibility of seeing things differently. Henry is a pro at that. From the very beginning, my conversations with him illuminated the many dark places in my mind. Like a miner, he went with a lantern deep into the ore of my head and picked away in there, releasing chunks of information so that I could see how past experiences continued to inform present actions. Even when I was dead set on denying this, Henry guided the conversations along unpredictable paths until we came into a clearing and light filtered between the trees of my resistance. He was a guru instructing me in conscious meditation, and when my focus wandered, he gently steered it back.

But Henry turned out to be so much more than that. He has also been my Wu Li Master, the man who helps me discover essence and then, when I see it, leads me toward expanding the boundaries of my perceptions so that I understand even more. Beginning at the heart of the matter, he works outward toward the fringe details, allowing me to discover for myself the significant themes along the way. He begins, not with a big discussion of my history, but with my present, deep-seated emotions and then reflects their origins in images from my past. He helps me see myself without fear and with clarity.

Under Henry’s tutelage and through a forced devotion to a sort of cognitive consciousness I began to reconnect with myself in both physical and psychological realms. The pain in my muscles gradually began to diminish. I could walk without feeling I was using an insufficient amount of weary and weak ligaments to haul a heavy skeleton up the block. With Henry, I admitted how old fears were hanging around and (for lack of a more professional way of putting it) messing with my head. I could see how my fear of medicine made me act irrationally: either I was overly cautious about prescriptions, combing over definitions in the Physicians Desk Reference and grilling pharmacists, or I threw back medications without a second thought. Rather than recognize the constant yo-yo, I always only felt the powerlessness of a laywoman in a medical world; talking to Henry I understood how my trauma survival techniques had gotten a little out of hand.

Together, Henry and I forged an understanding and knowledge of the core issues so that I developed the ability to alter myself. We clarified topics grounded in the past and defined their repercussions in the present. I learned to redesign my reactions to new events by understanding the motivating principles of my responses. We brought light into the darkness of my fear, and we did it without overwhelming me so that, not only did I begin to function better outside of Henry’s office, but I became increasingly in control and adept within it. All of this seemed to happen without my really being aware of it. Henry is a genius, a sort of magician and changes occurred in me as a consequence of the knowledge he showed me how to pull out of my very own hat.

Which is not to say that I didn’t fight Henry and the whole process from day one.

“I don’t want to go back there!” I’d say whenever he probed the memories of my illness. “Talking makes me sad and melancholy. I don’t want to go so far into it that I can’t come out. I don’t want to spend the days between our visits in a fog of depression and despair. Although,” and here I am struck by that unwitting second of clarity that good therapy brings about, “that’s not really so different from how I already spend each day.”

With this realization my attitude began to change. I started to go back closer to 1981 than Henry’s questions even suggested. Once I got going, I gave more detail than Henry may have wished, but I couldn’t stop myself. For so many years these memories had been kept behind a curtain in my mind and when I was finally brave enough to pull the curtain aside it felt good, like flexing atrophied muscles that shrieked at movement but became warm and flexible and strong with repetitive use.

Precisely because Henry and I were unknown to each other our work together gained strength. I had nothing invested in his reactions to me. I had nothing to lose by baring all to him, showing him that beneath my veneer of stoic strength I was cowering, and beyond that: I found a sort of solace in knowing it.

“When I’m happy and not worrying, things get out of control. I don’t take good care. I feel safe when I don’t feel safe,” I admit one afternoon. “As if not feeling safe is important. As if feeling fear will keep me alert and will ultimately keep me from harm. It doesn’t make any sense. I can’t explain it, but not feeling safe makes me feel like I’m not totally powerless. It reminds me to be aware and to remember who I am. I’m a survivor and if I don’t remember what happened, it could happen again. Fear feels familiar.”
“That’s not uncommon for people who have suffered trauma.,” Henry replied. “But by holding on to that feeling of powerlessness, how do you ever expect to be free of it?”
“I don’t want to be free of it. It reminds me who I am. Sometimes I feel so lost. I can’t see myself at all, except as a woman who survived this horrific thing. In the context of that tragedy is the only time I know exactly who I am. The past is what feels most real. The rest is only a fantasy.”
“You can choose your own reality, Michele.”
“I choose the truth.”
“The truth is, you were strong enough to survive. There’s nothing powerless about that.”

And just like that my whole perspective changed. From talking.

PTSD Healing: The Value of Talking

We’re coming to the end of the second month of the BRIDGE THE GAP healing workshop. In January we explored the idea of creating the right intention for healing. In February we’ve been looking at the importance of learning to speak about our trauma. Today, take a breather from all the work you’ve been doing to heal and let it settle. Sometimes, it’s good to step away and let the ideas, thoughts, beliefs and expectations work their way into their proper places in our minds.

Yesterday, I spoke about PTSD to a group of survivors and caregivers at a local hospital. A large part of the discussion came to revolve around the idea of how survivors see themselves after their trauma. One cancer survivor said that he was having trouble reconciling how he saw himself (as weak) after his cancer struggle versus how his colleagues viewed him in recovery (as strong). This is another value of speaking: in addition to finding the words to express our trauma, we also begin to find words to express what we’re thinking and feeling about it. When we can tell people what we’re struggling with we can work through the ideas so that we begin to see things in a better, more healthy way. By the end of the discussion this man began to see how others might perceive his recovery as strong even though he himself knows that he had weak moments. Hopefully, as he goes through the next few days he'll revise his own opinion of himself and see the strength his recovery represents.

There’s a balance to be found in perceptions; talking helps us find it. Through talking we learn to reperceive events. This is incredibly helpful in healing, especially because so often our perceptions – muddled by emotion – are incorrect. I’ll give you another example:

There was a moment during my trauma when I felt myself leave my body. There was a tunnel ringed with white light. I was moving toward it. In the midst of all my pain it felt GOOD! I wanted to go there and get lost in it. This memory, both incredibly intense and also fuzzy around the edges, haunted me for years. I thought about it constantly, strove to find that peace again, and wished more than anything that I could have remained in that other place. I knew myself there, I recognized myself; back here in the normal world I did not recognize myself at all.

After my PTSD diagnosis I did a lot of research to understand what was happening to me post-trauma. In all of that research I came across the idea of dissociation. I didn’t fully understand the concept, so I found Holly, a trauma therapist, to sit down with. I interviewed her about dissociation. I grilled her for all of its meanings and implications. I learned that dissociation is what the psyche does to preserve itself when an experience threatens to overwhelm it. Ultimately, our discussion caused me to learn these very important things:

1 - Part of my PTSD was struggling with recurring dissociative states of depersonalization and derealization. I needed to address these things in order to heal.

2 - I’d been looking at that tunnel memory all wrong. It was not supposed to be life-defining; it was supposed to be life-preserving.

3 - Instead of wanting to get back to that out of body experience and live there, I should respect the intelligence of my psyche and appreciate how it worked to support me in a traumatic moment.

4 - I should honor that some deep part of me knew what needed to be done and when, but also understand dissociative states are not ones in which I am meant to live, nor are my memories supposed to define my future.

5 - I’d been chasing (and chased by) a memory that was supposed to be a brief moment in time, but my own thoughts and emotions had created it into The Meaning of Time.

6 - My lack of understanding was hindering my healing.

Geez, that’s a lot to learn just from talking about one thing! The fact is though, once this misperception was corrected my healing moved to a new place. Talking can do this: it can remove our inaccurate perceptions and correct our journey so that we can heal.

Just another reason to consider letting the words flow. You might actually heal when you do. Talking leads to understanding leads to healing. Now, wouldn’t that be worth talking about??

Have you experienced something similar to this, in your trauma or healing? Leave a comment or shoot me an email.

(photo: PhOtOnQuAntiQuE)

25 Things About My PTSD

My friend over at Catatonic Kid tagged me with a meme: ‘25 Things About You’. Usually, I don’t play the tag game, but I thought it might be fun to apply it to PTSD.

So, here they are: 25 Things About My PTSD:

1 – My trauma occurred in 1981; one year after PTSD was officially recognized as a psychological disorder; many years before anyone would consider it applicable to people outside of the military.

2 – For over 20 years my hair fell out by the handful on the anniversary of my trauma.

3 – My most prevalent flashback was the moment I felt myself leave my body; and then chose to come back into it.

4 – My trauma was due to a rare illness that none of my doctors had ever seen before; they didn’t know how to help me. My most prevalent nightmare: people are dying and it is all up to me, but I don’t know how to help and cannot save them.

5 – I didn’t speak about my trauma for 4 years afterward. And then I spoke once, and went silent again for 14 years.

6 – I tried psychotherapy, cognitive behavior therapy, EMDR, TFT, TAT, EFT, Chinese healing, reflexology, chiropracty and energy healing. While they alleviated some of my symptoms so that I became functional, they didn’t eradicate my PTSD.

7 – For 20 years I became extremely anorexic in order to control my body so that I felt safe.

8 – I only dated men I knew I would leave so that I didn’t have to get close to anyone.

9 – After college I held 11 jobs in 15 years in 5 industries because I could not focus in one place for more than a year, or decide what career I wanted.

10 – I spent over 2 years out of work with an extreme case of fibromyalgia.

11 – My insomnia was so bad I slept an average 2-3 hours per night.

12 – I’d been a nice kid before PTSD set in. Afterward, I was always on edge, angry, sullen and in a raging fury at the slightest provocation.

13 – At the height of my PTSD I cried anywhere anytime. Could just be walking Baylee in Central Park, or on line in the grocery store, or catching a plane. The environment didn’t matter, the tears would begin and I was powerless to stop them.

14 – I struggled with undiagnosed chronic-extreme PTSD for over 25 years.

15 – For 15 years I suffered from mysterious illnesses no doctor could diagnose or cure. (Sound familiar, like, say, my original trauma?) All of these illnesses approximated aspects of the original illness, although they were not as drastic.

16 – Illnesses kept me in a constant state of being triggered so that eventually the physical toll on my body included liver, stomach and intestine dysfunction, plus an advanced state of fibromyalgia and osteoporosis.

17 – The turn in my healing came the day I: 1) realized I was living in a state of perpetual fear, 2) decided I would not accept that my life would continue to be destroyed by PTSD.

18 – As part of my healing I researched trauma and PTSD. Here’s what I learned: Their effects on us are reversible.

19 – A large part of my healing came from deliberately constructing a post-trauma identity: I worked very hard to define and focus on becoming the person I want to be today and tomorrow despite what happened to me yesterday.

20 – I pursued joy as part of my healing program. For me, this meant dancing all the time! The more joy I felt the more courage I had to do the healing work, the more I believed I could eventually be PTSD-free.

21 – It took 3 LOOONNNGGG years to heal after I was finally diagnosed. Things got worse before they got better.

22 – Healing really began when I stopped saying to everyone, ‘Heal me!’ and started saying, ‘I want to be healed!’

23 – Within one year after deciding I wanted to be healed – and doing the post-trauma identity work – all of my physical symptoms cured themselves. That’s right: liver, stomach and intestine problems healed. Osteoporosis reversed (I gave it a boost by doing strength training when the fibromyalgia finally left me).

24 – Hypnotherapy ultimately got rid of the symptoms I couldn’t eradicate myself: nightmares and a driving sense of anxiety that I had to make something meaningful come out of my trauma.

25 – I am now into my second year of being 100% PTSD-free.


I have bridged the gap – so can you!


I’m tagging all of you, readers! Post your own list in the comments, or send it to me and I’ll post it – anonymously if you prefer.

(photo: hannah.aviva)

PTSD Healing: What Lies Beyond the Words

Three and a half years ago I sat down to write out my trauma. I’m a writer, after all, writing’s what I do. I turned on the computer, I adjusted my seat, I fiddled with the lamp. I opened the window. I sat back down at my seat. I stared at that annoying flashing cursor. I decided I needed a cup of coffee. I went to the kitchen. I scratched Baylee’s belly and waited for the water to boil. I stirred up a great aromatic blend. I went back to my desk. I sat down. I stared at the blank screen. I decided I needed a cookie to go with the coffee. I went back to the kitchen. On the staircase, I passed a new book I’d bought. I sat down to read a few pages.

Do you see where I’m going here? The will and desire to heal are not a straight line. We will be pulled toward healing just as we’re pulled toward not healing. Healing is frightening. Healing asks us to go into the dark believing we’re going to come out into the light. What we must do is have faith that the healing process will bring us to a better place.

Not that faith is an easy thing. Pulling together our thoughts about our trauma and the healing process can bring up new stuff we weren’t (and, thank you, didn’t want to be!) aware of.

I’ll show you what happened when I started writing. I had just moved to Florida from New York City and bought my first house...

A lush tropical garden of weeping French hibiscus, bougainvilla, jasmine, huge red lobster and white birds of paradise surrounds our patio. It is the perfect place for me to stalk the past. While the humidity curls damp tendrils on my neck, I’m slowly beginning to look at events, recount facts, develop a chronology; mine my memories with deliberate consciousness. In the end, there will be something that resembles a plot with characters, conflict, climax and resolution. I will have followed the proper academic protocol for story writing, but will it get me anywhere? Are Charcot and his cronies correct in thinking that telling the story heals trauma? More recently, is Horowitz et. al. correct in assuming that the “repeated replaying of upsetting memories serves the function of modifying the emotions associated with the trauma, and … creates a tolerance for the content of the memories”?

When I am through with this very thorough reconstruction of events, will 1981 seem inconsequential? Will I be able to see myself after all? Or is this just another way to honor the trauma because as I get going and get the swing of laying out the facts, telling the story seems pretty damn easy compared to examining, exploring and exposing the deeper meat of it all, aka, Those Things We Don’t Discuss About Trauma.

It’s so much easier to breeze over the flow of time than to discuss, for example:

The acute and sudden sense of overwhelming powerlessness.

My surprise at being so powerless; the seismic shock of that surprise.

The internal and external measures I took (and continue to take) to accept that shock.

How acceptance of shock causes an identity to splinter.

The disorientation splintering brings.

The ways in which disorientation forces the sculpture of an unrecognizable self.

How much that new self is not an entirely comfortable place to be.

How frightened I am that no place will ever be comfortable again.

How I no longer trust myself, anyone else, or anything in the universe at all.

How difficult it is for me to talk about any of this.

How much I want to speak but can’t.

How distressed I am at this unexpected absence of words.

The fact that I am lost. I am overwhelmed. I am afraid.

Doesn’t sound like things are going well, does it? But a wonderful thing happens when we begin telling the story: We start looking beyond the facts and see ourselves and what’s really driving us. We start understanding the why of PTSD instead of just living the what. We begin learning what it will take to heal.

The past 3 weeks of focusing on the I WILL TALK healing resolution has brought you to the point that the words are moving out of the dark of your mind and into the light of the world. This is a terrific accomplishment. This act of bridging the gap between you and the rest of the world will lead to a new level of healing.

Next week we’ll start looking at strategies for choosing the 5Ws of telling our story – the who, what, when, where, why, and how of the right person, place, time and method for bridging the gap between the story controlling us and us controlling the story.

Over the weekend, take some time to 1) finish revising your trauma script, 2) practice reading it aloud to yourself.

Freedom is coming, friends. Let your words lead the way!

(photo: lotusfee)

Healing PTSD: Ten Reasons Not to Talk About It; And the One Reason You Really, Really Should

So, here we are, into February. Welcome to the month of my birth and my original motivation to heal my PTSD (I was determined to be PTSD-free by my 40th birthday).

The second month of the year means we’re onto Resolution No. 2 on our list of 12 Healing PTSD Resolutions for 2009. For the next month we’ll focus on the following healing resolution: I WILL TALK. So, exercise that jaw, warm up that tongue, for the next four weeks your quest to progress healing depends on how loosely you let the language flow.

I know this isn’t easy. By the time I was released from the hospital my lip lockdown had already begun. I could not talk about what I had experienced – for so many reasons:

One, I was overwhelmed by what had happened during my illness and could not effectively process all of that emotion at once.

Two, I was overwhelmed by the ferocity of the emotions themselves. I had never felt so strongly or fiercely and didn’t know what to do with the near-to-crazy feeling that kind of emotion brought on.

Three, I was terrified by what had occurred and could not assimilate that continued feeling of terror into a normal minute.

Four, I was so very afraid of trying to speak about what I thought, felt, experienced and endured. Letting it all stay cooped up in the dark of my mind seemed safer than letting it out into the light of my new, moving forward day.

Five, I was on the brink of a great psychological meltdown. I was certain that trying to examine everything would bring on an episode that would completely annihilate the thin thread by which my sanity was hanging.

Six, I didn’t have the vocabulary for explaining how I felt or what I had experienced.

Seven, I didn’t know how anyone would react to what I had to say. I thought people would be … unable to embrace the fact that, for example, I had experienced leaving my body.

Eight, I wanted to pretend my illness had never happened. Simply, I wanted to exit the hospital and leave behind – as my parting gift – all of my memories, thoughts and experiences. (A nice idea; it doesn’t work.)

Nine, I thought moving on was strong. I thought moving beyond trauma meant not having to talk about it. I thought being brave meant immediately letting go of the experience, which included eliminating any impulse to have a chat about it.

Ten, I thought talking would keep the past alive. Silence, I thought, would kill the beast. (Little did I know…..)

So there they are, ten of the mistaken thoughts I believed immediately following my trauma – ten of the misguided thoughts and beliefs I carried with me for the next 25 years. (And oh, what lovely, fun, happy-for-us-all years they were.) The more I stuck to this “Don’t speak!” line of thinking, the worse my PTSD became. The worse the PTSD became, the more I stuck to this thinking until the vortex of the cycle became so intense my whole world crashed. And then I rebuilt it, word by word.

But that doesn’t have to be the way you accomplish healing. There’s no reason for you to crash and burn before you begin to heal. YOU can see the error of my ways, find the similarities in your own thinking, and make the changes now that are necessary to put you on the right path.

There are many more reasons why you won’t want to talk. Feel free to list your own in the comments section below.

And then, begin to accept that for all the reasons you don’t want to speak about your trauma, here's the one reason you really, really should:

There is no way to heal if we remain in isolation, or if we allow our silence to isolate us.

This month your goal will be to break your silence – and if you’ve already broken it, to amplify your voice. Get ready, people. You'll be surprised by the sound and strength of your own voice.

(photo: Pascale PirateChickan)

PTSD & Anger, Part 4: The Psychology of Anger

In my own experience I've found two dominant sides to the psychology of anger coin: Fear, and motivation.

First, I have to apologize to my mother. I do apologize to my mother, often now that I’m healed, for all of the abuse she absorbed during my PTSD years. She is an amazing, strong and wonderful woman; if it weren’t for her love, patience and understanding we would have stopped speaking 20 years ago because there were many days, weeks, months I couldn’t be around her without snickering, snarling and sneering.

If you’ve scrolled down and viewed the ‘Faces of Joy’ you’ve seen that my mother looks eminently fun, happy and approachable. But that’s not how I saw her when I was PTSD suffering. Instead, she was the villain and I the victim of her ‘Let’s get you some help’ anthem. She saw me struggling and wanted to talk – all the time. She saw me hurting and wanted to reach out – endlessly. She was tireless in her desire to find some way to lead me to peace. And for that I hated her. For that altruistic goal I unleashed upon her all my fury.

Why? Because the pain in which I lived was intense, and I only wanted to be left alone in it. I did not want to share, explore or study it. I was afraid doing any of those things would tip the delicate balance I had constructed and everything would fall to pieces. I was afraid going into those dark places, ideas and moments would suck me in and I’d be lost forever. I was afraid I’d be overwhelmed by the pain and the memories. I was afraid the process of healing would make me weak. I was afraid the trauma would win if I lifted it up and exposed it to light. (I was wrong about each of these things, by the way.) In order to insulate and preserve myself, I lashed out at anyone who tried to get into the trenches and help me. Most often, that was Mom.

When we research the psychology of anger, however, this behavior becomes completely understandable. Our good friend Dr. Harry Mills in his article ‘Psychology of Anger’explains that one of the functions of anger (after its use to respond to perceived pain) is as a substitute emotion. He writes, “By this we mean that sometimes people make themselves angry so that they don't have to feel pain. People change their feelings of pain into anger because it feels better to be angry than it does to be in pain. This changing of pain into anger may be done consciously or unconsciously.”

Perfect. Because of course, I didn’t sit down one day and decide to be angry at Eileen. But all of her wanting to help and suggestions of things to do threatened the security of how I felt I was coping, and so, rather than become vulnerable, I became enraged. It makes so much sense when Mills explains, “Being angry rather than simply in pain has a number of advantages, primarily among them distraction…Part of the transmutation of pain into anger involves an attention shift – from self-focus to other-focus. Anger thus temporarily protects people from having to recognize and deal with their painful real feelings; you get to worry about getting back at the people you're angry with instead. Making yourself angry can help you to hide the reality that you find a situation frightening or that you feel vulnerable.” Ahhhh, Yes.

The flip side of this negative anger perspective, however, is quite positive. In his article ‘Motivational Effects of Anger’ Mills writes, “On the positive side, anger creates a sense of power and control in a situation where prior to anger these positive, motivating feelings did not exist.” Bingo! That’s exactly how we can use the anger we feel. That is, ultimately, how I used my anger.

Two years ago I was so sick of myself, my memories, my PTSD, my trauma – EVERYTHING. I got angry at all of that, instead of the usual suspects. I got angry my life was passing by in this horrible fog of pain. I got angry the trauma was winning. And so I took all of that angry energy and unleashed it on the trauma and PTSD themselves. I took all of that ferocious focus and channeled it into a vengeful pursuit of joy, and healing. We all know how powerful anger feels; imagine using it to create a new future instead of to lash out at the past or destroy the present.

I’m not the only one who used my anger to good effect. Tomorrow I’ll introduce you to another survivor, Kellie Greene, founder of Speaking Out About Rape (SOAR). Kellie has a strong and dynamic perspective. In our interview earlier this week we discussed anger and its uses, and also, the importance of self-perception. I’ll leave you with this one idea, which includes not only Kellie’s self-empowering thought process, but also a very good reason not to let the negative side of anger – its supposed protecting us from vulnerability – to be our guiding light:

I prefer to be called a victim and not a survivor because it all has to do with when you say it. ‘I am a survivor’ means you’re still there, you haven’t moved on. But to say ‘I was a victim’, past tense, you’ve moved on from it. There’s nothing wrong with being a victim and I think we shouldn’t be so ashamed to say, ‘I was a victim’, because in the cases of violent crimes, criminals are looking for the most vulnerable opportunity and there are people who have been through extensive self-defense training that are victimized as well. Criminals are looking for the opportunity to prey on someone who is vulnerable and you can’t live life without being vulnerable. You miss out on a lot of joy, a lot of happiness, relationships. You have to allow yourself to be vulnerable, there’s nothing wrong with that.

(Photo: dem vadda sen john)

PTSD & Anger, Part 2: Why Are We So Angry?

( First off, let me say for those of you who have not scrolled down and found the picture of me, this picture here is NOT me!)

Getting to today's topic: This idea of anger has captivated my attention. Mostly, because I lived with it for so long and never thought twice about it. In my world… well, that’s the state I was so often in; it seemed normal to be frustrated and angry -- when I couldn’t control my environment, when others got in my head space, when someone would say, for example, “Can’t you just let go of the past?” To which I would reply (often inside my head but sometimes very outloud), "Um… NO!"


Feeling isolated in my symptoms and experience only made me more irritable. Anger became a general daily sensation.

And now I’m no longer angry and I’m amazed by what a different world it is when I’m not feeling like a combination of The Grinch, The Wicked Witch of the West and Darth Vader every day.

This morning I started looking around for anger info to better understand why it’s such a common PTSD symptom. You might find the reasons, and how anger functions on our behalf, pretty interesting:

What is Anger?

Well, we have to begin somewhere; may as well start with the source. In this great article by Harry Mills, Ph.D. he explains that

Anger is a basic human emotion that is experienced by all people. Typically triggered by an emotional hurt, anger is usually experienced as an unpleasant feeling that occurs when we think we have been injured, mistreated, opposed in our long-held views, or when we are faced with obstacles that keep us from attaining personal goals…. At its roots, anger is a signal to you that something in your environment isn’t right. It captures your attention and motivates you to take action to correct that wrong thing.

So this can potentially be a good thing! After trauma we are sensing something’s wrong and we should be motivated to take a corrective action. Unfortunately, the psychological unraveling after trauma gets in the way. We are overwhelmed, and so we don’t immediately take positive steps. But I mean, really, how could we when you consider the role of anger in trauma…:

Anger & Trauma

Initially, anger is a really useful tool for us. Theories suggest that high levels of anger are actually related to a natural survival instinct. Take heart, depending on how we use it and how we perceive it anger could be viewed as a healthy emotion: We survive and are bolstered in our efforts by this driving internal force. (Remember this for later: We have a healthy, instinctive driving internal source for survival.)

This great @health.com 'Anger and Trauma' article offers this explanation of the role of anger in trauma:

Anger is usually a central feature of a survivor's response to trauma because it is a core component of the survival response in humans. Anger helps people cope with life's adversities by providing us with increased energy to persist in the face of obstacles. However, uncontrolled anger can lead to a continued sense of being out of control of oneself and can create multiple problems in the personal lives of those who suffer from PTSD.

(This article also offers a guide to finding relief, so you may want to take some time reading through the entire page.)

Adding to the mix in explaining the post-trauma emotional environment, take a look at this article about ‘Common Reactions to Trauma’ on the National Center for PTSD web site.

As in everything with PTSD, anger is another one of those coping/survival mechanisms that gets out of control. What began as something to help us cope and keep us safe outlives its usefulness, but we’re so far gone emotionally we don’t stop to consider what’s happening or how we can stop it.

Or, as I did, the aberration of who we are becomes so familiar and recognizable – and who we were before trauma becomes so far away and unfamiliar – we don’t even realize we’re living in an altered state. We accept this is who we are now. After my trauma I knew I had been changed and I accepted that. But that was wrong! Yes, of course, we are changed, but those effects do not have to mean negatively and dysfunctionally forever. We can be changed in good ways: we can have experienced something that taught us things about ourselves those who don’t suffer never know. Things like 1) our large capacity for inner strength, 2) our survival tools, 3) our deep reserve of will, 4) our incredible amount of courage, 5) our ability to face fear and transcend.

When we get lost in anger we fail to appreciate our survival. We see only the bad that happened to us, and we lose sight of the fact that WE ARE SURVIVORS, and surviving means more than just struggling through the trauma and the aftermath. Literally, surviving means we ‘outlive’ an event. But in feeding our anger what part of us lives? Not all the good, the possible, the amazing. In feeding anger we keep the trauma alive, which means the trauma wins. Now that’s something to be angry about!

(Photo: Jeneyepher)

PTSD & Anger, Part 1: When We Hate Happy People

There’s been a big debate in one of the PTSD online support groups in which I participate. It all started around the Thanksgiving holiday. It began like this: S. asked,

Has anyone been through this? I mean, seeing everyone happier than ever (of course, it doesn't mean they are) while you are struggling at ground zero.
I've been through minor but several traumatic life events which accumulated to a greater sum and my coping mechanisms failed after the last event. It's been now more than a year and my soul is still not at rest.

It just seems to me like everyone around me is achieving everything they want and ask for contrary to me who lost almost everything. Is this jealousy normal? It is extremely painful and instead of concentrating on myself I examine other's lives and can't take myself out of it. And seeing people happy makes me misarable and leaves me with the unanswerable question, "Why?" I believe maybe it is a way of keeping myself out of the original problems, I don't know.

There ensued a lot of agreement from the group that, yes, they do feel jealous of people who do not have PTSD, and they are angry at others for not suffering, and angry for the things others have achieved and angry for… the list went on and on and on. The discussion became heated as people vented their frustration in increasingly vehement @$&%! terms.

And it got me thinking, what if everyone took that angry energy and used it for something positive? What if, instead of railing against those ‘happy’ people (or, as I used to do, the unfairness of fate), we harnassed that energy and used it for our own good? When we manifest pure anger all we do is drain ourselves of good energy, literally.

I started researching this whole idea of anger and found an interesting article by Kathy Wilson. Entitled, ‘Anger: The Greatest Motivator of All’ she talks about ways to channel angry energy. Actually, what she says is,

When you experience the emotion of anger, you create one of the most extremely powerful energies that we humans have been given to work with.

Although powerful, the energy of anger isn't bad or good. It simply exists as energy. What you choose to do with it determines if it's bad or good. As with any energy, you can choose to use it in harmful ways or in beneficial ways.

This idea perfectly illustrates the point I made in the group, which was this:

What about looking at the whole topic another way? Instead of being angry, how about thinking about how much we deserve to be as happy as they are? How about getting angry that we aren't happy and deciding to fight as hard as we need to in order to achieve a happier, healthier life?

I used to be angry at my own PTSD suffering. I used to be angry my trauma happened in the first place; no one shielded me from harm; no one could stop the horrific event from continuing over a period of weeks.

On a bad day, I could add to my already deep depression with a powerful dose of anger and then -- watch out! I was really a sight to behold. That depressive anger I usually turned inward came out with a ferocity that flayed anyone around me. I feel sorry for the people I directed it at, particularly my family.

But two years ago this new year's eve I decided to take that angry energy and use it in a positive way: I decided to pursue joy and ... it worked! All of that antsy angry energy spilled onto the dance floor and out of me. I became more peaceful, more tolerant; less angry, more... well... happy.

Being jealous of others is useless. Being angry at them is a total waste of time and energy - time and energy that we really need to be channeling toward healing. Using that energy on ourselves can bring relief, so we shouldn't so easily give it away. Don't you agree?

(Photo: Amir el Mayordomo)

Phases of Healing PTSD, Part 5: The Power of Intention

One more thought in this healing PTSD series. In order to learn any new skill – in order do anything, to achieve anything – we start with an intention. We want something, we have the desire for it and commit to having, getting, finding that thing which we desire.

Healing PTSD follows the same path. My challenge to you today is to rate your intention. Is it strong or weak, wild or mild?

In my own history, there were many years I actively sought relief from the symptoms, but I had no specific healing intention. Or rather, my intention was for someone else to heal me, some doctor, therapist, practitioner – whoever! – it was up to them to make me well. I had nothing to do with it. I presented myself in their offices and let them do their thing. Needless to say, my healing was minimal and my journey long.

However, when I finally determined that I WOULD BE HEALED – well then, everything changed. Within a year I made incredible progress and was living a much better life. I am not unique. You can do this, too. My healing did not begin until I actually took on the intention myself. Have you?

Recently I wrote an article for MilitaryWriters.com. In 'Ideas for Healing Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder' I make the point that the crux of healing is what we do for ourselves. Which means, intention is everything.

This weekend, think about how strong your intention is to be well. On a score of 1 to 10 (10 being the strongest) would you say that your intention to heal is Wild or Mild? If it’s wild – meaning you will do whatever it takes to be well, including facing your fears and traumas, learning your truths, reclaiming your self – then you’re ready to achieve wellness and following a proactive path will lead you there.

But if you rate lower than, say, a 10 on the scale of healing intention, you’ve got some work to do! Before you can be well you must WANT to be well with all the power of your bruised and battered soul. You, my friends, must ask yourself why you don’t rate a 10 on the intention scale. What is holding you back? I had a list of a few things that got in my way. If they resonate with you let me know. And then - begin to move beyond them! The biggest hurdle in any achievement is recognizing what’s holding us back. Once we remove those obstacles (by recognizing and then letting them go) we are ready to move forward on our intentions.

For a little inspiration let’s turn to the father of the power of intention, Wayne Dyer. This video should get you fired up. In it, Dyer defines intention as “no matter what gets in the way I intend to make [this] happen”. Sounds like just the attitude we need to heal! Dyer references intention as a pitbull with a tire. I like that image. We have to have that kind of tenacity to heal PTSD. This post-trauma disorder is as strong, durable and flexible as a tire. WE have to be as ruthless, relentless and ­­­­­­­­­­­robust as a pitbull in order to flay this thing to pieces.

I drained my bank account and my emotional reserves chasing cures before I focused my intention. There’s no need for us all to keep making the same mistakes. Today, turn your thoughts toward clearly focusing your intention on healing PTSD. In his video, Dyer says, “You are able to heal yourself.” That’s a powerful statement. It should give us all much hope, but also, much guidance on our path to wellness.

We need to develop a powerful, fiery healing circle of intention both without and within. Dyer says intention is something we connect to. Well then, today’s the day for you to reach out and connect to a source that’s just there, in the air, an energy hovering near you, waiting for you to reach out and connect to it.

Watch this Dyer video. You may not have time to view it in its entirety today, but if you only watch the first 10 minutes it will give you plenty to think about for the rest of the weekend.

And then, as the Nike slogan goes, Just do it. Focus your intention. Take all of the angst and pain and sadness and anger and desperation and funnel it into this one, simple intention. Create that burning desire to heal. Decide nothing can stop you. Your mantra for the rest of the weekend and in all the upcoming days should be, I want to be healed. I want to be healed! Come on, let me hear you chant a few times.

Healing is within our reach, but we do have to stretch for it. Begin today. A new year is approaching. If you have the desire, 2009 can be your year to become PTSD-free.

Phases of Healing PTSD, Part 4:The Achievement

So this is it, the moment we’ve all been waiting for: Today’s the day we consider that PTSD can be – like the event that began it in the first place – a thing of the past.

This week began with my feeling gratitude for how far I’ve come in my PTSD healing. And then I couldn’t stop thinking about it. All week I’ve been writing about the parallel between learning a new physical skill (i.e. dance), and learning a new mental skill (i.e. PTSD healing). We’re all just apprentices and there are phases to our education.

And then one day we graduate. We become not the apprentice but the expert. This can happen for you, my fellow PTSDers. One day, we will all be healed and enjoying:

Phase #6: The Final Achievement – It’s been 1 ½ years since I began dancing. 1 ½ years since John and I first stepped into a Latin club where I was a complete salsa failure; since we went to Argentine tango dance parties and all I could do was walk to the cross .

But that’s not how it is anymore! Now, everywhere we go John and I are regularly asked where we teach, perform and compete. Which means, it’s official: I can DANCE.

It’s been almost 4 years since I sat myself down and decided to do whatever it takes to heal. 4 years since I dove head first into my memories, and trauma and PTSD research. 4 years since I descended into a worse hell than I ever imagined existed (and what I knew and imagined before was pretty gruesome already).

What happened 4 years ago that made me take the plunge? There was a day in February 2005 when I had a complete breakdown on the jogging path that goes up the shore of the East River in Manhattan. And as I stood there in sub-freezing temperatures and cried and sobbed all of my PTSD grief and frustration, the dominant thought that emerged was one of fear. I am so afraid! was the echoing thought in my head.

I came to the realization - was hit hard by a startling discovery - that the crux of my post-traumatic stress and related behavior stemmed from this one fact: I WAS AFRAID. So very, very afraid. Afraid the trauma would happen again. Afraid I would suffer again. Afraid no one would be able to help me or save me or prevent the event again. Afraid the next time I wouldn't survive. Afraid that in the present I would completely disintegrate both mentally and physically. The list was long and the emotion sharp. Fear was such an ingrained habit for me that I had literally lived with it and thought it was normal because it had become my natural state.

And then I thought, I can't live like this anymore. It was this moment that began my healing odyssey. The recognition of the germ of all my PTSD suffering brought with it a certain relief: I knew what needed to be addressed. I knew I had to deal with that echoing thought - my fear - if I was ever going to be free.

And so I did. I went back into therapy for 6 months and then set off on my own path. After the initial black abyss I tumbled into, slowly I began to heal, little by little, small step by small step until one day I emerged from the dark into a small pool of light. Over time that small pool of light has grown progressively larger.

I think an important aspect of my healing came from the proactive path of it; the fact that I engaged in it, steered it, willed it. Healing is not bestowed upon us. We must demand it. We must accept nothing less. In our traumas we are powerless, but in choosing to heal and following through we become powerful.

The healing process itself can be just the act we need to put the demons to rest. In giving us back a sense of our own power it returns to us something that was taken away. Namely, a sense of self that trauma so rapidly destroys. We cannot wait for healing to be given to us. We must actively seek it, and not only by seeking out practitioners, but by drawing up our own strength and implementing it.

(Photo credit: Basilly)

Phases of Healing PTSD, Part 3: Making Progress

Healing takes a while. And so does this topic! Here’s one of two final installments on the parallel between learning a new skill (in my case, dance) and healing PTSD:

Phase #5 – Making Progress – Salsa and Argentine tango became my passion and I set goals for developing my dance skills. I put in the effort to educate myself, plus to practice so that I mastered the forms. All day at work I listened to salsa music on Pandora so I could learn how to find the beat without looking for it. Every night after work I came home and practiced the special tango walk until I could do it in a straight line without wobbling.

It took about six months for me to really learn to dance. For me to understand the lead/follow relationship, learn how to follow, learn what it means to embellish on my own, to interpret the music on a second’s notice, to place that extra heel tap, to perfectly distribute my weight. It was six months before I could get out on the floor and feel like I not only knew what I was doing, but I was doing it well and with some level of technical expertise.

During those first five months, however, there were experiences that let me know I was making progress. There was the night I found out what to do with that extra salsa beat (kick, tap or roll!). There was the evening I finally (finally!) executed a perfect tango molinete. On these nights I’d leave the dance floor flush with exhilaration that I was getting better and better!

It took a little longer to develop my expertise for healing PTSD. It took 3 full years for me to heal, start to finish. Three years of research. Three years of writing out the whole story: all of what I could remember about the original trauma, and then all of what PTSD turned my life into after that, symptom by symptom. I tracked who I had been before trauma, who I was during, and who I became after so I could find the kernel of my real self, and then coax her back out. It took me three years to untangle what was trauma and what was chronic PTSD and to understand their impact on me and my life. Three years to find the right practitioner to help me achieve what I could not do alone.

[NOTE: I’m not recommending this technique of writing it all out to everyone. It worked for me. It may work for you, but it’s a tough way to purge the poison. Deliberately writing, remembering and examining provided many triggers along the way.

While I do believe it is critically important (as Jean-Martin Charcot and Pierre Janet dictated) to integrate all of our traumatic memories into our current selves so they do not exist separately, this writing process itself can be traumatic and there are other treatments that can help. Unfortunately, I had tried every other treatment except medication and I was still seriously suffering. (If you’re interested in trying this writing tactic, let me know. I think it’s best to structure your approach and I’d be happy to offer more details of my own effort so you follow a planned path.)

During those 3 years of healing, though (and this I can recommend), I came up with the idea that in order to heal PTSD and get beyond my trauma it was necessary to begin to imagine myself outside of PTSD and trauma. By this I mean, imagine who I was, wanted to, or could be without all the junk of experience.

In the middle of all this research and looking at the past I began doing little things in the present that would move me into a new future. I began taking pilates so that I started rebuilding strength and trust in my broken down body. When I was well enough I started learning to dance because I wanted to be every day that joyful person I was on the dance floor any night.]

Because at the outset of my healing journey all of my PTSD symptoms initially intensified, it seemed at first that I was on the wrong path, as if I was doing something more harmful than good.

And then there came the day I could look at photos of my illness and my stomach didn’t turn.

There was the day I read a piece of writing that described and explained all of my PTSD symptoms and I recognized myself and no longer felt like such a freak.

There was the day I wrote about the most horrible aspect of my illness and afterward felt a swell of relief, like, Whew! Now that’s out!.

There was the day I realized all the joy I felt dancing was giving me the courage to slog through the rest of the muck, and so I felt it was possible to get it all done and finally be free.

Little by little I could see myself developing a strength to cope with this ominous thing, to bring it down to size, to use my own power to contain it and developing myself to make it shrink so that I enveloped the past instead of the other way around. The goal in trauma/PTSD healing is to contain experience within the larger scope of who we are; to flip the balance of power from our being controlled by the past, to our controlling it in the present.

The more we develop ourselves outside of trauma/PTSD the stronger we become. I clung to each moment of progress and believed - every time it all came crashing down again - that those healing moments were my truth. I reached toward them. This belief in myself inspired me to get up and carry on.

After trauma, the hardest thing to do is believe in ourselves and yet, this is the most important thing we have to do.

(Photo: Jim Donaldson)

Phases of PTSD Healing, Part 2: Stumbling & Moving Forward

Picking up from yesterday’s post about the phases of healing:

Phase #4: Stumbling & Moving Forward – I went to a group salsa class for a few lessons and did well, so when John (whom I met in my very first group Argentine tango class) asked me to go salsa dancing, I thought I was prepared. We went to a fabulous Latin club in West Palm Beach. It was a large space with a sunken dance floor. We got out on the floor and I immediately discovered… I couldn’t dance at all! In group classes they slow the tempo of the music; in Latin clubs it’s a whole new ball game. I had no idea what I was doing. I couldn’t hear the beat. I couldn’t follow the rhythm. I had to concentrate. I had to watch other people dance so I could learn from their style and expertise.

Tango was even more difficult. Of all the dances it is the most complicated to learn. Unlike other dances, tango lacks a set pattern of steps. This makes following and learning more difficult, as does the complexity of the footwork in general. There were many nights in class that my brain went into overload and I left the dance studio with a wicked headache and a strong sense of the futility of what I was trying to do.

With both of these dances I had several moments when I thought I can’t do this! and I’ll never be good at this! But I wanted to be able to dance both dances well, so I made the commitment to learn. I quit the salsa class and John and I went to Latin clubs 2 – 3 nights a week. I watched. I tried. I stumbled. I watched some more. I tried again. Eventually I got the rhythm and figured out the steps, timing, and embellishments.

We continued going to tango class and I would come home and practice the special tango walk and other footwork. We went to weekly milongas (tango dance parties) so we could practice. Comfort came slowly. My capability developed a tiny bit at a time. My technique slowly evolved.

Healing PTSD became like this, too. I began researching my trauma and writing out my memories and thought I was prepared to do the work. I thought if I could handle looking at photos of my illness and learning statistics and other trauma information, I was making positive progress. I thought if I could write out what I remembered that proved I was stronger the trauma.

I began doing all of this and felt like I was in control. But then my memories and nightmares increased in frequency and intensity, the insomnia raged, my emotions swung like a pendulum; I became more depressed than ever. I couldn’t think about anything except my trauma twenty-four hours a day.

For weeks, every PTSD symptom grew worse until I’d break down, renounce the struggle, wail I can't do this!, put away the research, turn off the computer and walk away – for a day, or a week before the old desire was back; before the determination to be healed needled me until I sat down in the middle of it all again for as long as I could stand it before the next breakdown.

This process repeated itself over and over, but each time I made forward progress. Each time before the breakdown there was a surge in knowledge, understanding, education and empowerment. I went from not being able to think about my illness to being able to look at pictures of others afflicted by it. I went from not being able to speak about my trauma to developing a vocabulary for it and the ability to discuss it out loud.

As humans we should be used to this sort of method. As infants we learn to walk, stumble, fall and get up again, competely determined to master this skill. As adults it’s a mental experience and so, much more difficult. But we’re wired for this, we know how it goes and that there will be struggles and pitfalls and injuries. The thing is, we also know: One day, we’ll be able to run.

(Photo: temp13rec)

Phases of Healing PTSD, Part 1: Desire & Commitment

When you attempt to do anything, or learn something new, there's usually a plan. You have an idea of where to begin and what steps you'll need to take to follow through. You appreciate and accept there'll be a process, a learning curve, a period of time to develop the situation or new skill. You know you'll be out of your element sometimes, and out of your depth. Because you desire the outcome of this situation or the development of this skill you don't mind these things, you know they come with the territory.

I think we have to approach PTSD healing like that, too. We have to really desire it, and we have to know that there will be phases of it. I’ve been thinking more about the similarities between learning to dance and PTSD. Actually, the processes (and you could substitute learning any activity here) have similar phases. When I started writing about this topic I realized I have a lot to say; this is going to take more than one day...

So, here it is today, the first 3 things on the list of Michele's 6-Phase Outline of PTSD Healing:

Phase #1: Discovering the Desire – All of a sudden there comes a day you discover you really, really want to do this thing. In regard to dancing, this night caught me by surprise. I was miserable, deep into a dark and shaky PTSD depression – and then I found myself on a dance floor full of joy and I was shocked it was possible to feel that way. I decided I wanted to feel that way more often; I decided to make dancing a weekly event.

Likewise, the idea to heal my PTSD came out of the blue. I had just moved from Manhattan to South FL and was really enjoying the beach and the idea that just crossing state lines could eradicate memories of my trauma (OK, so I was naïve!) when I read THE YEAR OF MAGICAL THINKING, by Joan Didion. This simple memoir of a woman’s struggle with grief inspired me: through a series of chapters that alternated between a research oriented approach and an exploration of her grief-inducing memories, she made a peace with it all. I thought, Maybe I could do that... So, I started researching my trauma, and then PTSD, and then I started writing it all out, as if it could be transferred and then contained by 8 ½ x 11 inch margins. I developed a plan; I saw an end goal.

Phase #2: Finding the Way – I had no idea how or where to learn dance. I showed up at a dance studio near my house and just dove in without a clue.

I did pretty much the same thing about learning about my trauma and PTSD. I didn’t know much about either. I dove into the research and a whole world of understanding opened up. When we have the desire we find the way. The path shows itself to us when we begin to imagine the path exists.

Phase #3: Committing to the Path – My first dance lesson was a huge revelation. While I’ve always been an avid and comfortable freestyle dancer, partner dancing is something else entirely. I wasn’t used to following a lead. I wasn’t used to being hemmed in in my physical expression. I wasn’t used to having to coordinate my body and mind (which PTSD made very, very difficult). I wasn’t used to being held in the arms of a stranger. I could go on and on. There were many things about learning to partner dance that made me uncomfortable and pushed me beyond that zone in which we live where all things are reliable and known. But I wanted to learn, so I pushed those things to the side and barreled ahead.

I did the same thing with my trauma and PTSD research. It was horrible to read about the facts of my illness and disturbing to read about PTSD. But I had the idea that demystifying it all would allow it to become something of which I was no longer so afraid. Despite the discomfort I pressed on.

PTSD Healing – Take A Moment of Gratitude

Something very exciting happened this weekend: I danced well with many different men. Before you completely give up on me and wonder why this is remarkable - and what this has to do with PTSD - let me explain:

I began dancing salsa and Argentine Tango (classic salon style and Nuevo tango) a little more than a year and a half ago. I did it as a concerted effort to pursue joy, which was part of a larger effort to deliberately construct my post-trauma identity, which was part of my desire to heal my PTSD. As many of you know, this dance experiment worked in spades.

What made learning to partner dance incredibly difficult though, is this small problem I have: I don’t like being touched by strangers. I have trouble trusting. I don’t like getting close. This makes partner dancing particularly tough. With John it’s different. My connection with him is unique and he’s become my partner both on and off the dance floor. This has been a good thing, although it has spoiled me. Instead of learning to dance with a variety of men and many different leads, I’ve become extremely comfortable with John and one or two friends. Otherwise, I stay away from strangers, which in the world of social dancing is pretty limiting and ridiculous. But dancing with strangers was out of my comfort zone. I was tentative, unsure, anxious, and afraid I wouldn’t be able to follow an unknown lead.

Over the past few months, however, as my dancing expertise continues to define itself, something has shifted in me. The anxieties I’ve felt began to wane until, this Friday night we went to our favorite Latin club and I danced with several men besides John – and I was able to match my salsa style to theirs and follow the leads that were clear and improvise for those that weren’t. We went to a milonga on Saturday night and I danced with many men and the same thing happened so that by the end of the weekend I was basking in the realization of how far I’ve come. That 1 ½ years ago I could not salsa or tango at all, and now I am completely proficient. And I thought:

It’s just like healing PTSD. Three years ago, when I first began my quest to be healed I was very sick. It seemed impossible to imagine I would ever be well. That I could ever be healed. But then I did some research. I educated myself. I decided on a plan of attack. I developed a process, stuck to it, went waaaaayy outside my comfort zone and found relief.

And now here I am, taking a moment to feel gratitude for the fact that it is possible to find liberation; for the hard work I did during the times I thought it was all useless; for the things I tried that didn’t work; for the things that worked but not too well; for the things I stumbled on that brought me one step closer to a life that’s now PTSD-free.

We’re all on the same healing path and as we move forward through the days it’s important to remember that healing is a process. It doesn’t happen overnight. We have to go out of our PTSD comfort zone. This takes dedication and commitment. Some days we fail; we don’t hear the rhythm of healing or put together the right sequence of steps. Some days we make great progress and execute a move that a month ago seemed impossible. And then, some day down the line we look back and see how far we’ve come. We take small steps and eventually something shifts.

Don’t forget to feel gratitude for the fact you’re on the path. You’ve come this far. We all survived our traumas, and now every day we survive PTSD, too. We’re pretty strong. We’re fighters. We’re survivors in the best possible way. Don’t forget to appreciate yourself in the struggle.

Don’t forget to applaud yourself for being here, reaching out, looking for answers, trying to heal. Despite how difficult PTSD makes each day, what can you be proud of doing? Make a list. Honor yourself, even if the list begins with, “Today I got out of bed.”

And then: Reward yourself! Give yourself a treat. All the tough days can't be without their upsides. Last night I splurged. For the first time, I bought a real dance skirt when John and I were at Gold Coast Ballroom. Something a pro would wear. I figured I deserved it: To overcome PTSD and become a good dancer I've worked so hard!

PTSD: Holiday Recovery, Part 1

I flew back from California late last night. I arrived home around 2am after 12 hours of travel and weather delays and a long drive back from Fort Lauderdale’s airport. Suffice it to say, I’m a little tired this morning.

But here’s what I’m thinking: I feel good. I’m so surprised and taken aback by this idea I’m like a kid with a toy; I can’t stop playing with it. I can’t stop thinking about how good I feel. I make my morning cup of tea and think, “Wow, I feel good!” I make the bed, get dressed and open the shades. I walk out onto the balcony from the bedroom and pause to look at the lake behind my house and think, “I feel so good!”

This all must sound ridiculous to you, but there was a time when traveling brought me to my knees with weakness and fatigue and the general meltdown of my body. In a body that was already depleted and dysfunctioning because of PTSD - that was crippled by Chronic Fatigue Syndrome and extreme Fibromyalgia - traveling just threw me into a downward spiral of epic proportions. But now here I am today having gone back and forth to San Diego twice in 5 days and when we almost missed our connecting flight in Atlanta I ran, yes, me – I ran from one terminal to another carrying an overstuffed tote bag, a laptop and two jackets. And I thought, as I was running and feeling strong and just like everyone else who was sprinting around me as we all made a mad dash for our flights, “I’m healed. I’m really healed!”

I’m still so often astonished that I am truly, finally PTSD-free. I am still so caught off guard to be healed and no longer always in pain. Every time I do something that I could not do before, or something that would not have been possible before, I’m hit over the head with grattitude and the recognition that I’m someone else now. I’m not the trauma girl anymore. Let me explain:

I always dreaded those cross country flights to visit family in San Diego. I always dreaded traveling, period, because my body just wasn’t up to it. Before I even packed my suitcase my muscles ached and my joints ground. My head hurt and my eys stung and I was bone-tired weary with just the thought of leaving the house. I boarded every plane already dreading the deep exhaustion that a day of traveling would bring, and with it, the deeper dissociation because beginning with my trauma I dealt with physical difficulty by just checking out.

By the time the trip was over and I was home again I’d be sunk into an even deeper PTSD depression because my body had me thoroughly convinced that I was, actually, every bit as weak, frail, fragile and debilitated as I thought and felt. Or more so, depending on the stress of the trip itself. Plus, the anxiety of worrying about this added to the stress I already lived with daily. Also, if I hadn’t been able to contain my anger, hide my fear, bury my sadness; if I’d spent any time during the vacation faking my feelings or defending them, then I’d be more than bone-tired weary; I’d be almost comatose with exhaustion. At least, that’s the way was for the 25 years.

But this morning I woke up as tired as a normal person who had traveled all day on the worst travel day of the year. My body’s feeling fussy from too many hours spent on an airplane, but that’s all; it needs to be stretched, it needs to get to the gym, but it doesn’t need anything more than that. And my mind is fuzzy from not enough sleep, but otherwise it’s in great shape. I’m happy this morning. As happy as I was before I made this cross-country shlep. I’m no worse for the wear and now that I’m back at home I’m jazzed and ready to resume my life, which I missed. I haven’t danced in a week. I haven’t seen Baylee. I haven’t walked on the beach.

As I woke up this morning I realized that Thanksgiving 2008 is a landmark: it is the first holiday since I was 13 that the shadow of trauma has not loomed over me, body and soul. And it is the first time I have traveled that all of my PTSD symptoms did not exaggerate and intensify my negative perceptions of myself. I was not a Foghead traipsing through the airport, I was a good traveling companion and Bret and I had fun. I contributed to the holiday dinners and festivities and, more importantly, did not feel drained, depleted or alienated by them.

All of us have so much to be thankful for: We survived our traumas; we continue to survive survival. This year I’m also thankful for the healing I have found. I am thankful that although the journey was difficult and long I believed in myself, and I believed that I could make it. I believed that freedom was possible and that I could, in fact, reconstruct myself so that I no longer live as a survivor but as a ‘joyor’. After truama I believe the most important thing for us is to feel joy so that we are reminded that our true, untraumatized selves still exist. I am thankful that this new self has emerged in me, and has lead me to you, and that together we can travel this long and winding road until we are all happy and free.

Good News for PTSDers

So… Yesterday did you find some one act to affirm your desire to be well? I’m thinking about you. I’m hoping you’re at least thinking about doing something that can facilitate a positive attitude toward wellness.

Even though I’m healed, I still reinforce this attitude on a weekly basis. I’ll give you an example: John and I dance 3 – 4 nights a week. It’s part of my joy habit. It’s part of my commitment to being well. The upcoming weekend looks like this:

Friday night: La Fonda in West Palm Beach; a delicious Cuban restaurant that turns into a latin nightclub after 10pm with the best music mix of salsa, bachata, merengue, valenato, cumbia and tropicale.

Saturday afternoon: Salsa Fest! An all day outdoor salsa party with such greats as Victor Rojas and Eddy Herrera; an event that combines my love of dance with my love of community events that bring together so many different people for one shared passion.

Saturday evening: Milonga (Argentine tango dance party) in Deerfield Beach. Our favorite Argentine tango instructors are teaching a class and then hosting a party until the wee hours of the following morning.

Sunday: We’ll drive down to Pompano to dance in a 10,000 square foot ballroom; 5 – 8pm is all latin, 8 – 11 is all ballroom. What a spectacular 6 hours!

OK, maybe dance is not your thing. And maybe you don’t have that much time to devote to joy. That’s just fine. It isn’t the activity or amount of time spent, it’s the quality of joy you derive. You can do something for an hour a week and that will be enough to remind you that joy exists. You can do something for ½ an hour and that will be enough to ignite the desire for more. The main purpose here is threefold:

1) to remind you that you can feel joy (I know, I know, it doesn’t seem possible, but just try it. You’ll be surprised how possible it is).

2) to begin developing a habit of joy that increases your positive attitude, which will in turn support your PTSD healing.

3) to ignite that spark - that I want to LIVE! spirit – that DESIRE to be well that is the crux of PTSD healing.

Don’t tell me it can’t be done. I know it can because I have done it. It was tough. It seemed like an idiotic, insurmountable, useless task I put before myself --- until it worked.

And don't tell me I was not as badly PTSD as you, because I was at least as bad as you, if not worse. Don’t be fooled by my positive attitude. For 25 years I was (to put it bluntly) a mentally and physically dysfunctional mess. And then I decided to do the work.

I’m asking you, I’m begging you, for the sake of your own happiness – DO THE WORK. Make the commitment. We can get there together.

Wouldn't it be great to be part of a community of healed PTSD experiencers instead of a group of PTSD acceptors? I think it would. Let's shoot for that.