PTSD

Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) – upon hearing the term thoughts of military personal returning from combat with psychological wounds springs to mind.  Although this is true, PTSD effects are much more pervasive and touch a much broader base than many imagine.  It can include individuals who have faced or witnessed life-threatening events, sexual assault victims as well as members of oppressed cultures.  June has been designated the month to draw awareness to this area so I thought what better time to share than now.

I have PTSD born out of complex and multiple traumas experienced at an early age.  Without going into all the sordid details I have spent much of my adult life in recovery from emotional, sexual and physical abuse which led me into a religious system whose theological perspectives created a context where spiritual abuse was sometimes operating…..more on that later.   What I want to focus on initially is educating; and then sharing a small piece of my story of what it is like living with the repercussions and navigating what I call ‘my two realities’. 

The science behind PTSD is comprehensive and much too complicated for a blog post.  I will try to provide just enough information to shed a light on my personal experience, but if you have a loved one who suffers or an interest I would recommend several books; A Body Remembers: The Psychophysiology of Trauma and Trauma Treatment by Babette Rothschild, Spiritual Crisis Surviving Trauma to the Soul by J. LeBron McBride and my current read, Trauma and the Body: A Sensorimotor Approach to Psychotherapy by Pat Ogden, Kekuni Minton, Clare Pain and Daniel J. Siegel. 

Trauma wounds the very core of a person’s soul.  The following is paraphrased from McBride’s book Spiritual Crisis: Upon seeing innocent children burned alive, Elie Wiesel wrote of his traumatic experience; ‘flames consumed my faith forever, murdered my God and my soul.’  Others said the experience is when ‘the spirit went numb and soul development stopped’; it has also been defined as a ‘disorder of hope, a spiritual night and a loss of faith that there is order and continuity in life’. 

PTSD is a biological response brought on by life threatening events that trap the trauma within the autonomic system; in other words, it freezes the trauma allowing for an echo of the original trauma to reactivate the initial response making the person feel like they have traveled back in time and are re-experiencing the primary threat.  It is not a form of amnesia, but an experiencing of two realities in the same moment.  Sometimes the sufferer is aware they are in the midst of an episode; most often they aren’t until it subsides.  To put it in other words, the person’s system is reacting to a past event within the context of a current situation that has little or nothing to do with it.  Needless to say, it is disorienting for both the sufferer and those who are their intimates, specifically for those who have gone undiagnosed. 

Ogden writes, “The function of the ‘mind’ – that extraordinary human capacity to observe, know, and predict – is to inhibit, organize, and modulate those automatic responses, thereby helping us manage and preserve our relationships with our fellow human beings, on whom we so desperately depend for meaning, company, affirmation, protection and connection.” 

What PTSD ends up doing is inhibiting the brains ability to function in this manner; rather it activates the response that fuels chaotic emotions reinforcing the devastation of trauma’s prior event.  Hormonal secretions (a subcortical response) explain why responses to certain triggers can seem irrational or irrelevant and even harmful in the context of the present moment.  Episodes lead to blow ups in response to minor provocations, freezing when frustrated; and helplessness in the face of trivial challenges.  Without a historical context to understand the somatic and motoric inheritance, their emotions seem out of place causing significant shame and embarrassment to those who experience them. 

Neuroimaging of traumatized people under stress reveal that the sensory trigger of past trauma activates the emotional brain to engage protectively changing the sympathetic and parasympathetic system that ultimately interferes with effective executive functioning.  This leaves their brain with less control over behavior and causing behavioral regression.  With well-functioning rational compromised; the individual reverts to ‘fixed action patterns’ as well as reactivating the physical response of terror, abandonment and helplessness in excruciating detail. 

In an effort to simplify, McBride defines PTSD as leaving the sufferer without hope and disconnected from self, others and even God by destroying the ability to integrate their experience into their personhood.  The outcome is a loss of having a safe place to retreat to within or outside of oneself in order to deal with frightening emotions and experiences; and leaving them to relive the impact of trauma repeatedly; therefore compounding and reinforcing trauma’s affects.

Yes, I have PTSD.

It brings sorrow and tears as I reflect on how its operation in my life has hindered and aborted the very forces needed to heal; the unending consequence I pay for wrongs done to me, the time it has robbed and ultimately for the pain it inflicts on my most intimate relationships.  My journey has been much more problematic because I went undiagnosed long after the original injuries leaving me to blindly navigate it’s symptoms for many years.  Even when I was finally diagnosed in 2000 I was so embedded in a religious system that spiritualized every ill under the sun that the realities of what I was dealing with never fully landed.  In its wake I was left feeling incompetent, defective and hiding under shame’s shroud. 

In the early years I was barely functional suffering from anxiety and fear levels so high I was borderline agoraphobic.  Any event in public pulled deeply on internal resources that would lead me to shut down for hours, even days following in order to regain my internal equilibrium.  I would never travel too far or into unfamiliar places; and when I did I wouldn’t go alone needing to know the minute details of where, when and how in order to keep my anxiety in check.  Walking through a garage or entering into an elevator was an act of heroic proportions.  With my system in a permanent state of alert; the process of getting myself up, out and to work while navigating the eight hours at the task I was hired for left me with very little reserves pushing me deeper into isolation and into trauma’s prison.

It was that same confinement whose constraining nature pushed me deep into depression; yet eventually the sheer monotony of life stirred a deeper need than the anxieties I was dealing with drawing me slowly back into life.  Over the years my boundaries have expanded and passing time taught my system that daily events are not dangerous reducing the ever present anxiety to low grade hum until unforeseen triggers send me back into a full blown episode.  The saddest part of this narrative is the realization of its full implications and the way in which it has colored the actions of my life didn’t land until a decade after the original diagnosis.  But, this understanding has also helped me move away from survival mode and into a thriving life. 

The metaphor I use to paint the picture of this journey is I have gone from a place in my internal world that was pitch black, darker than night as I blindly bumped into the walls of my 2 x 2 x 2 PTSD cell.  In time light started to shine making all that I saw shades of grey and revealing that my cell was expanding.  Hours rolled into days and days into years when splashes of color would accent my black and white world.  Now the key has been turned in the padlock, the bars of my cell have swung open and I have walked into a world alive in all its Technicolor glory.  With that there is so much beauty, but at the same time it overwhelms my senses as I learn to navigate brand new challenges.  Entering into intimate relationship is drawing out the deepest trauma injuries triggering me in unexpected moments and in unexpected ways.  

I wish I could end this blog with a testimony that says full recovery is possible; but that is not the current statistic.  PTSD is a chronic condition whose effect on the system can improve, but will never completely leave.  Yet, with new studies in neuroscience and the infant field of brain imaging is providing hope to those who suffer.  EMDR and other somatic therapies are showing strong promise and my feeling is that at some time in the near future I can say I am no longer triggered allowing for my system to fully heal.

Until then, the journey of recovery continues……………..    

Mommy

It’s been 364 days, 20 hours and 5 minutes since my Mom died.  May 22, 2012 at 2:25 pm she breathed her last after a long year of hospitalizations for a broken hip, breast cancer and congestive heart failure.  There are no words to express what it is like to watch someone you love die – particularly a death where they are drowning in their own fluids. It is a pain that cannot be articulated, especially when that person is your mother.  It has left me with heartache that I believe I have not fully engaged in as of yet; a grief that will take a lifetime to process and why wouldn’t it? 

Heidi was the woman whose womb I grew in; the woman whose nurturing hands tended to me when I was sick or mercilessly teased at school; and the woman whose own traumatized childhood set the context for my own.  She was the person I most adored and sometimes resented.   One smile from my mother could make me feel so deeply loved and I never doubted her joy when I walked into the room – it would explode from behind those beautiful baby blues piercing deep into my soul.  You see my mom delighted in the personhood of all people, and she was never happier than to sit listening to another’s story.  Those that knew her adored her; her hospitality and servant hearted nature was a gift touching many. 

Like all mother daughter relationships ours was deeply complicated.  I am the first born and with it came all her adoration as well as every one of her unreasonable and at times impossible expectations that follow the trailblazer of subsequent sibs.  The responsibility for her emotional well-being landed smack dab on me and I spent my entire life trying to fill a hole left by her traumatized past unsuccessfully.  My mother received more of my time than other adult children give to their parents; yet even when present I felt like I could never be present enough.  There was something about our dynamic that made me feel like she wanted to consume my being back into her own.  The ensuing outcome was that I never felt like I could be enough, do enough or love her enough. 

I once heard someone once say that when those you love pass you only remember the good.  I’m so glad that is true of their experience; but it really isn’t mine.  My nature screams for authenticity and truth; and I cannot face this experience without speaking honestly about the good, the bad and the ugly.  The grief over the loss of my mother is a mixed bag that contains sorrow I can’t yet get close to and relief that I no longer have to bear the responsibility for my Mommy’s pain.   Those who have lost parents know the heaviness that descends over everything, the exhaustion one feels even after twelve hours of sleep and the loss of part of yourself that was mirrored by one who was your foundational relationship.  No matter your age, you have lost a part of yourself and you don’t fully know who you are without them. 

This journey has been complicated by having to watch my Dad grieve the loss of his life-mate of fifty years….to him – the loss of his life.   I watched my father age right before my eyes, listened to him promise her he would search the stars when he passes; and come home to countless swollen and puffy eyes knowing he had spent the entire day in loneliness and sorrow.   A part of me wonders if the full weight of my Mom’s loss will hit me when my Father passes.   Nonetheless, I have promised myself not to borrow trouble from tomorrow; and to stay present today navigating the waves of grief when they consume me. 

This week has been heavy – but, light has begun to find its way back into our lives.  The constant heaviness is lifting and energies are beginning to return.  I find myself noticing both the best and worst of my mother’s characteristics within myself; embracing the good as a gift that says she is still with me; and working to relinquish those that did not serve her.  Today I grieve her passing, but I also hold onto the hope of resurrection, in my character, in my relationships and in my tomorrows.  And maybe, just maybe; when it’s my turn to close earth’s chapter,  I will see those love filled baby blues again.

The Millennial Generation

The Millennial Generation is once again being castigated in the media as the ‘me, me, me generation’.   This time it is Joel Stein’s article in May 28^th edition of Time Magazine.  It begins with an admission that he is doing what has been done by generation’s prior – accusing the younger generation of being lazy, entitled, selfish and shallow; but before anyone derides him he goes on to say that he has statistics to back up his evidence, stating that the incidence of narcissistic personality disorder is three times higher in this generation then that of the Boomers.  That is as far as I got, because to read the entire article would mean I would have to purchase a subscription online – no thank you, not interested. 

Now, I am not a part of the Millennial Generation.  I was born on the cusp of the Boomer and Gen-X transition depending upon whose data you are going by.  For the most part I identify with the Gen-X Generation much more than the Boomers for a wide variety of reasons that are irrelevant to this blog.  What I can say is that about sixty percent of my friendship base is currently Millennial so I feel compelled to speak out on their behalf.  This amazing group are some of the most talented, insightful and authentic people I have ever met. They question everything – as they should!  This is what makes them the loving visionaries whose social minded ideals propel them toward making a better world than the one they were born into.

Accusations of this sort are nothing new with this trend beginning with the 1960’s – its Flower Children were accused of rebelliousness born out of discontent – those that had been given too much with no sense of appreciation.  Gen-X was treated as the throw-away generation – a lost opportunity, very rarely identified as anything other than an extension of the Boomers.  Those who are now among America’s unemployed/under-employed work force raising families in the face of economic and social difficulties.  Now the trend has moved to point the finger at the Millennial – the Peter Pan generation - those people born in the 1980’s when American prosperity and indulgence was at an all-time high.  

The Millennial Generation is largely in their twenties and the question I would like to ask; who wasn't somewhat entitled, selfish and shallow at this time of life?  These should not be lobbed toward them as inherent character flaws, but an acknowledgement of a real and certain developmental reality.  The twenties lend itself to a time of leaving one’s family of origin, while venturing out into an unknown world trying to figure out who we are and how we fit.  This is a deeply self-reflective time of life that may look self-absorbed, but quite to the contrary is a necessary step toward maturity.  This is not a unique experience to this generation, nor should they be lambasted for circumstances that have been largely out of their control. 

In many ways this generation has been robbed of that development process growing up in a historical backdrop that is filled with economic uncertainty and social unrest; a period of global instability and redistribution of employment opportunities that have kept them from finding positions that are well below their talents and qualifications; or not at all.  Are they resentful?  I would say they have a right to be!  One in two college graduates are unemployed still living with their parents.  This is not only delaying careers, but obscuring their overall vision as they face a future filled with more questions than those that plagued the generations before them.  If the prophecy turns out to be right; and they are a narcissistic generation of lost souls, we only have to look to those who raised them, a generation that were so consumed with economic advancement, they neglected to take account how that might affect future generations.

My personal experience has led me to believe that this generation is going to be one of the finest generations in over a century.  I have met them, spent time with them, been loved by them and believe in them with all of my heart.  So I turn to my Millennial friends to say, I have nothing but the utmost confidence that you will face the challenges life places before you touching the world in profound ways.  You constantly amaze and inspire me with your passion.  You remind me to keep dreaming, to embrace life and to continue to grow in relationship with each other; as well as the world we live in.  Millennials I both love you and salute you!
   

Shame

Shame – crafty, scheming, devious and illusive - an emotion whose name alone conjures its own feeling like a witch calling forth an evil spirit.  It rises from the abyss to plunge its serrated edged dagger of self-loathing into the core of the soul; ripping open the victim’s self-image from the inside out and leaving their psyche trapped in its putrefied scent like the wanderer’s misstep into pitch.  With its prey firmly constrained it sinks its fangs of denigration into their character extracting all traces of self-worth, but never satisfied to leave one numb from the void. 

It resolutely attaches itself inside of the shadows hiding behind memories waiting like a street thug to strike at any hint of trauma’s echo.  Its elusive nature coerces its target to use its own voice against itself; compelling the bound to participate in its own demise like a victim at the mercy of its perpetrator.  With stealth like intimidation it attacks convincing the quarry its damaged goods leaving them indefensibly cloaked in an oppressive shroud of torment and driving them deep into the darkness dividing them from all that is good.

Shame is an aggressor skilled in treachery that prostrates the martyr at the altar of its deception exacting revenge and driving self-retaliation.  Shame promotes anguish, discharges sorrow, conceals dignity, hides self-worth; demanding allegiance to isolation’s depths.  Shame rejects all counsel, discards support, refuses the truth, snubs encouragement, disallows legitimacy and rebuffs love.  Shames goal is to eliminate pleasure, dissolve satisfaction, question integrity, induce agony and kill dreams.  It is a calculating, fraudulent, misleading enemy that oppresses, humiliates and threatens bent on destruction with the ultimate goal of dehumanizing its prey.   

Some capitulate to the idea that shame is inherent in the human condition, born out of humanities depraved nature well deserved in the face of its guilt.  LIES!!!!!!!!!!!  Perpetuating that perception binds shame's sufferer to the baseless belief that they are defective partnering with shames duplicitous satisfaction.  God’s testimony speaks to the cherished and distinctive nature of humanities essence; its creation a precious investment that testifies to his/her goodness and mercy.  Creatures whose worth is so deeply inherent that God nailed her/himself to a cross, not to appease Divine anger, but to solidify the profound legitimacy of his/her eternal acceptance, love and the priceless nature of one’s person-hood. 

Shame is the antithesis of acceptance and authenticity; the burial garment of hope born out of unimaginable helplessness and traumatizing pain.  Shame is the heaviness of sorrow draped over the heart's eyes obscuring the ability to see one’s authentic self in all their unique purpose and beauty. Shame is not an emotion that leads to life; but a tyrannical persecutor that intimidates, rejects, distorts and devours one’s capacity to be loved.    

Shame IS the Guardian of Darkness.