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NOTE: There are four articles by this author on www.medicinegarden.com , front page that deal with homeopathic remedies to have on hand in case of chemical and biological attack. The articles cover:
1. Chemical attack (nerve gas attack/Sarin,
VX, etc.)
2. Plague
3. Anthrax
4. E-coli
Please download these. Everything you need to know on how to find a homeopath, buy a homeopathic kit, and the remedies you need on hand, are in these articles. They are companion articles to this PTSD series of articles.
POST TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER:
REMEDIES FOR CURE PART 2
WHAT PTSD SURVIVORS NEED
Ed Schmookler, Ph.D., from Albany, California, has a background rich in knowledge and experience as a therapist for PTSD survivors. With his permission, I'm utilizing a paper he wrote on the topic, Trauma Treatment Manual, and placed on the Internet. If you would like this article, I'll put the info at the end of the article.
1. First and foremost, a PTSD survivor needs a sense of safety. For instance, if I look back on my life, I see I've chosen to live out in the country, usually on a farm--far away from people as I can get because I felt 'safer' there. Today, I live in a desert canyon that few can find and has few people living in it.
Every survivor of PTSD must first, in order to begin the healing process, must find their 'safe place.' It may seem strange to people who don't understand or feel what we feel, but safety is a matter to be decided by the PTSD survivor. It can be going fishing. A hike in the woods. Usually going off 'alone' somewhere. Safety provides us a place to think, to ruminate, to get clear or hopefully, if we've numbed out or used up the last of our emotional reserves, to try and get back in touch with the inner voice we know that is in there. Or, allowing Nature to reenergize us. We can only do that when we have peace and quiet.
If we say, leave us alone; do that. Respect our space. If we are feeling overwhelmed and walk out or away from you, the family, the group or situation, don't judge us. Just give us our space to retreat, to find that place of safety--either within us or somewhere 'special' (a room, a rocking chair, a closet, the woods, a walk along a road, a ride on a horse, doing gardening, etc.) where we can wrestle with our inner PTSD demons.
Anyone with PTSD has learned not to trust any longer. It might be a distrust of a particular gender, in the case of a woman raped by a man. She would no longer trust any man--not her brother, her father, her husband, etc.--even though none of them were the ones who injured her. Or, it could be a general distrust of everyone, which is seen with combat veterans--even children are suspect because in Vietnam, little children would carry live hand grenades to the unsuspecting Marine or soldier, and kill or maim them. The combat vet learns to trust no one when incidents like this occur.
When I began to understand what had happened to me I realized how it had stained my whole life as well as my second marriage. I was very lucky; my second husband, David, is really a guardian angel in disguise. He gave me a 'safe place' to be--with him, with our farm out in the middle of nowhere. He respected my need for privacy, for horseback rides for hours by myself, or to spend vacations in remote, isolated areas instead of in cities or on tours with lots of other people. His kindness and acceptance and understanding of my needs eventually created a safe environment for me to start 'opening up' my own PTSD Pandora's Box and seek help. If he had not respected my needs and boundaries, I doubt I would be over the bulk of my PTSD symptoms today.
Define what is 'safe' for you. That is the place to start. That is where the true healing begins. Where you feel safe is where you will finally be able to relax--even if, a little bit. And with that relaxation, comes the slow process of PTSD symptoms being allowed to finally surface, little by little, into our consciousness. And when that happens, my advice is: have a good therapist who handles your PTSD, ready and waiting. And a homeopath who can work in concert with you and your therapist because you may need one or more remedies as these 'layers' expose themselves.
I would suggest this: If you are a survivor of childhood abuse/incest or rape, that your therapist should have a background in these areas. If you are a PTSD survivor of combat (Vietnam or Gulf War vet) choose a therapist who has a background in this--and better yet, one who has 'been there, done that'. Vets trust vets--it's as simple as that. Also, if you are a woman, and you were raped by a man, do NOT choose a male therapist because your trust in men was broken by a male rapist--go to a woman therapist instead. Or, if you incest was done by a woman/mother, then think about going to a male therapist, because your trust in women is broken Sometimes, this element can be overcome, but the worst is that even on an unconscious level, you will distrust the gender who hurt you and you won't open up, be vulnerable, with them--or it will take much longer to do so. Or, if you are affected by the Pentagon/WTC tragedy, you too, are a survivor. The thing is, you didn't have to be at ground zero to "get" PTSD from this assault. Our psyches are highly impressionable and the more sensitive we are, the more we are likely to be affected by such a trauma, even if we live 3,000 miles away from it; it touches us.
I found this lesson out the hard way and went to a male psychiatrist who positively put me on guard and I could hardly speak to him--he was so clinical, so at arm's-length and he was big and threatening to me. I left after three sessions. I then sought out a woman psychologist who had a background in childhood abuse/rape, and in three years, helped me turn my life around--but she also gave me the warmth and nurturing I needed to trust myself to open up, too. And, my trust with women was not broken as it was via my PTSD father.
2. A PTSD survivor needs to know you are going to respect whatever boundaries they need to put up in order to survive on a hour-to-hour or day-to-day basis. A trauma means that our normal life boundaries have been smashed and destroyed--our sense of innate protection, of 'that can't happen to me', is suddenly shattered once and for all. And then, we never feel 'safe' again, so we begin to erect boundaries or walls from where we do feel safe to operate out of--to live in society and try to get a long or cope.
A good example of this is when I ask Dave that when I'm writing on a novel, to leave me alone. I'm able to escape into my other world where all things end positively and on a hopeful note. When we were first married, 28 years ago, he made the mistake of walking into my office one day while I was writing. I literally, leaped three feet off my chair, whirled around midair and came down in a crouched, defensive position, my hands and arms raised above my head to protect myself. He was shocked and rooted to the spot over my unexpected behavior. I was shaking, breathing hard, my heart pounding, in full anxiety reaction as I remained in that frozen position of defense. Then, he 'got it'. He realized instinctively that my request for this boundary wasn't some inane, purposeless request on my part.
That particular incident galvanized us both. He helped me open up, over time, and talk about my reactions. About my need for a closed door to my office. About knocking on the wall long before he came to my office, to let me know he was coming so it wouldn't scare or shock me out of my creative state.
Never force your ways of doing things on a PTSD survivor....they will simply retreat from you and hide in a thousand different ways. Whatever their boundaries are, understand that they are very real needs in order from them to feel safe. Only when you respect these boundaries will there be a prayer of them opening up and struggling to become vulnerable with not only themselves, but you and the family, over time. A lot of patience is needed on this point.
3. There were times, particularly when I was first married to Dave, that I didn't want to be held. I didn't want to snuggle. I didn't want to be touched--not sexually, not in any way. He didn't understand why (and I didn't either at the time), but when I pulled away, he wouldn't try and make me stay in his arms, or he would withdraw his hand from my arm and respect my need not to be touched. It's very hard on the spouse and/or the children, to understand this--but this is what is really feels like to us. If you touch us, without our consent, it creates trauma all over for us. It is telling us that we have no control--again--over ourselves, our body. We see you as the invader, the abuser, the rapist, the enemy in combat, all over again. That is how you, the toucher, are perceived by us, the PTSD survivors.
Again, this is about boundaries. About who has control over us. The one thing we want back so badly, is control over our environment, our body and ourselves. Each time a boundary is broken we are re traumatized by it to a minor or major degree, depending upon the individual involved and their vital force. It is a violation of our being and in cases of abuse and rape, this is particularly so. At its worst, we cannot handle intimacy at various levels or stages. Rape survivors more so. For vets, some need to be held, for in holding, the arms of the person become a boundary or a safe harbor for them. Intimacy may be a way of helping them open up and start the healing process.
For other vets, intimacy is seen as the enemy. They cannot tolerate being touched, much less held. They pull away if you put your hand out to touch them in a friendly fashion on their arm or shoulder. They can snarl at you, bark or become raging if you try and hold them or touch them. Don't do it. Back off. Give them what they need because they see you as breaking down their boundary and once again, its perceived as trauma, not humanity, love or nurturing as you might. Your best, heart-felt intention won't work here. Just because when you are held, you always feel better, don't project that value on a PTSD survivor. It will make him or her feel automatically better--because it may end up having a destructive, opposite effect on them.
4. As more and more of my PTSD symptoms became the focus point of my second marriage to Dave, the more I realized how 'different' my actions/reactions to every day things were from his. I began to observe our differences quite closely after the 'office incident.' I thought my reaction was normal. He said it wasn't--that I could walk up behind him any time I wanted and it wouldn't bother him. But it would sure send me up a wall if he did that to me! We had a lot of exploratory talks about this--and neither one of us realized what my problem was--we only knew our reactions/actions were exact opposites. I thought I was normal and he was abnormal! Of course, when you live in a PTSD family, you would automatically think that. Dave had not....he'd come out of a more socially 'normal' family life. It certainly wasn't a PTSD one!
One of the most important things that Dave did was that he never JUDGEDstrong> me. He accepted me just the way I was. He didn't try to change me. Instead, he asked me what I needed so that we could live in harmony, despite our differences. Whether he knew it then or not, it was another key to helping me unlock the PTSD damaged part of myself and to begin the healing process by not standing in perpetual judgment of me or my actions/reactions.
Don't be judgmental with the PTSD survivor. Don't say: "Well, you're wrong. Nobody else jumps at a car backfiring. Why should you?" Or, "Why can't you go out dancing with me? A guy is supposed to go dancing with his girl." Or, "Why do you have to always walk away from me when I'm angry. Why don't you stay and stick it out?"
The judgments and scenarios are many. Some PTSD survivors run at the first threat of an angry word, a warlike expression on your face, the tone of your voice or your non-verbal body stance. Survivors of violence usually do one of two things: run away from the violence/fight/argument or they lose control, become raging, vitriolic and stand their ground with you. In the extreme, they may become physically abusive toward the person (who is screaming, yelling or perhaps, even trying to talk in a reasonable tone of voice to them and trying to discuss something) and they perceive this event as a heated argument or worse, a verbal attack against them--which 'sets them off' into a defense mode posture in order to protect themselves from this perceived 'threat'.
6. One of the greatest healers for me, at least, was Dave's undivided, focused attention on me when I wanted to open up and talk. He's a wonderful listener and I value that trait much more now, than at the beginning of our marriage. Not every PTSD survivor wants to open up and talk. The other end of the spectrum is the loner who is closed mouth and can't say anything--maybe one syllable words like: yes, no, and that's it.
Being a good listener for those PTSD survivors, is one of the greatest gifts you can be for us. In our being able to talk about it, you become our sounding board. That doesn't mean, necessarily, that we want you to 'fix it'--rather, just a kind ear is often enough for us. I remember shortly after we were married, I'd wake up in the middle of the night with anxiety attacks--my heart was pounding, I was drenched in sweat, I was breathing so hard I thought my lungs would burst. Dave would struggle awake, usually around 3:00 am in the morning, sit up and ask what was going on. I sat there, my arms clenched around my knees repeating: "I don't know, I don't know. I'm just scared. Scared......" And he'd turn on a light and sit patiently, not touching me because I didn't want to be held sometimes after such an event (and sometimes I did, but I always initiated it, not him--the respecting of the boundaries).
Eventually, over the first year of our marriage, each time I was awakened out of these nameless night terrors at least once or twice a week, and Dave would calmly sit and listen, I began to get more and more in touch with WHAT was causing them in the first place--and before that--I hadn't a clue--they just happened ever since I'd left home, that was all I knew. By being a good listener, Dave allowed me to delve into levels of myself that, over time, yielded a tremendous amount of direct, conscious information. And as this information became available, over the next year, the night terrors subsided and after five years, went away--never to return. That is the gift of listening and how it can help us.
Those who are affected by the ongoing terrorist activity involving the USA assaults, are going to be dealing with some, perhaps not all the symptoms (you will if you were in New York City at the time of the attack).
7. A PTSD survivor can 'numb out' but at some point, his or her feelings will probably start coming back. It's important to realize that Time will decide, along with the vital force, when the reappearance of one's feelings can happen. This burying of feelings is an effort by our vital force to protect us because it knows we couldn't handle the emotional avalanche--that it would destroy us, so it is actually, a survival and coping mechanism. And usually, like a new seedling poking its head above the ground for the first time, progress is slow on the re emergence of our feelings. It's important to not push that person into feeling more before they are able to handle it. Don't urge them to cry more, yell more or express themselves like you do, because they can't. Be patient with them and their re-exploration of their wounded emotional superstructure.
8. The healing that takes place within each of us will unfold on it's own schedule--not yours, not mine. Many times, being alone helps PTSD survivors think or feel things through. Try not to push them, cajole them or deride them. Don't try to help us if we don't ask for help. If we ask for your help, give it. Someone who doesn't have PTSD can easily see what we can't. Unless you're asked for advice--don't give it to us. Healing is a matter of self exploration and self awareness and self discovery for us. It won't do any good for someone to come along and tell us what we need to 'fix' ourselves. The 'fix' is inside of us all.
If you want to know how to help, then ask us. Ask us if it's all right if you talk to us about what we're feeling or thinking. Getting permission helps a PTSD survivor stay in control as well as reassures them that you respect their boundaries, too. Being a know-it-all and giving us your 'two-cents worth' on what's wrong with us or how we should go about repairing ourselves, is considered an encroachment upon our boundaries. Hold your advice until and if we ask for it.
RANDOM ACTS OF KINDNESS
The spouse or children of a PTSD survivor often want to know what they can do to help. Looking back on my own experience, I found that Dave's unobtrusive, accepting presence, was healing. The environment most of us need is not a therapeutic one, although in some cases, that may be temporarily necessary, but rather, a continuum or fixed rut kind of flow that helps us minimize the 'surprises' in our life. It was unexpected 'surprises' that got us into trouble in the first place. A place that has a set time for breakfast, lunch and dinner, for example, is the type of 'rut' I'm speaking about.
This may seem ridiculously simple, but it works. Fixity, a daily regime, give us stability. Once we've got stability, we can focus on other wounded parts of ourselves. Just being a good listener, and if we need to talk, having your full attention, is a great healer in and of itself. And if we want to talk, just listen with neutrality. What we might share with you could be emotionally revolting, powerful or traumatic--don't allow your emotions to over shadow our own. By mixing and matching, that stops our flow--and usually, PTSD survivors don't talk too much about what happened to us.
Use the opportunity to be a sounding board--you don't have to fix it--just let us stumble through it. Your emotions may be triggered too, but try not to allow them to interfere in that moment, if you can at all help it. The kindness of being a good listener, being emotionally detached enough to keep your emotions from interfering with ours when we're ready to share, and keeping your heart open during these precious few and far between times, are what you can do to help a PTSD survivor heal. Simple and straight from the heart.
WHAT GOOD HAS COME OUT OF PTSD TRAUMA?
The watchfulness, the observation a PTSD survivor has, are remarkable. I've discovered that it is a useful asset to me as a homeopathic practitioner because I perceive little things, even the slightest of nuances, a change in the tone of voice, a very slight body language signal--that most people wouldn't see--or wouldn't think was important, can be. This ultra-awareness helps me figure out, usually, what homeopathic remedy the person needs in a fairly short amount of time.
Another added feature to PTSD is that our hyper alertness borders on more than just being in touch with a primal intuition ability. I call it our 'all terrain radar' ability. I can 'feel' people's auras; at times, I know what they're thinking before they speak. I can feel not only their energy, but their emotions as well. Fortunately, I can turn this 'radar' off at will, but it comes in handy, again, as a practitioner. I can 'feel' the root cause or core problem that has sent the person's vital force out of balance, for instance.
I was a walking PTSD survivor for 35 years before I realized how much my extra-sensory abilities could be of use. I joined the fire department in a rural Ohio community and served for three years. In a given year, I'd make 400 out of 600 runs. I drove fire trucks, tankers, air packed into burning structures, attended many grisly auto accidents, coal mine fires, wildfires, an airplane crash, looking for lost elderly people, and so many other traumatic situations.
I was the only woman in the department of twenty coal miner/truck drivers. Dave, my husband, was also in the department, but the only time I saw him was on night fires, when he was home. Most of my fire duty was during the daylight hours when me and one or, if we were lucky, two other men would show up at the fire house. That was the reason I joined: was to be a body available during the daylight hours, when half the fire occurred. Since this was a volunteer outfit, any man who was home during the day, was usually sicker than a dog--otherwise, he'd be at work.
We always ran 'lean' on day fire situations. I did the same work as any man; whether it was driving a fire truck or tanker or moving into a burning structure with a fire hose. I found that my phenomenally acute sensory ability not only saved my life many times--but it saved other firefighters, too. I could sense/hear/feel things on a more subtle level than they could--and it wasn't because they were men--it was because they weren't PTSD survivors like I was--and I was used to operating off the subtle levels in order to survive.
I could hear, smell, taste on far deeper levels than most. I could 'hear' the fire in the wall as it moved silently through them. I could smell smoke where no one else could. I could 'feel' fire before we encountered it. When in a house, on air pack and oxygen mask strapped to your face, and you can't see anything--not even your gloved hand in front of your face, my senses saved lives.
At times, I could 'feel' a bad floor where fire had burned out the trusses beneath it--and yet, to the firefighter with me, it looked safe--and was not. Or, I'd be aware of a slight shift of a room in the house where we fought the fire; and would know that the ceiling was going to come crashing down on us if we didn't get the hell out of there! Or, in a smoke-filled attic, feeling our way and knowing where the weakness was in the trusses before we crawled over them and fell through to the floor below. Or a slate roof,in the middle of winter, three stories up, icy and a fire is somewhere down below, in the attic, and knowing where to put an axe through the roof to get to it.
Fire was a great teacher to me. It used everything I learned as a PTSD survivor, to survive it--and help my partner and other firefighters, survive. At the end of the first year at the department, many men wanted to 'back me up' on a hose going into a burning structure because they'd seen proof of my peripheral abilities to 'know' fire. They knew they were safer with me, and often called me a 'bird dog' because I could 'sniff out a situation' beforehand.
The other use of my PTSD won abilities was at accident sites where there was screaming, shrieking, panic and hysteria abounding, along with blood and possible life-and-death situations on top of it all. I could detach emotionally from the grisly scene, think ahead to what needed to be done, as in a triage situation, and calmly go around doing what I had to do. My emotional reaction never got in the way--which was highly useful--because many firefighters 'lost it' and couldn't think coherently, or ahead, like they needed to in order to do their duty effectively. Afterward, after the adrenaline charge, I would come back into my emotional self. I worked through emotions at that point because I had homeopathic help to do it with, which I'll share with you in another part of this article.
Another use of my super-sensory abilities was at wild fires. Anyone who read about the Hot Shots and smoke jumpers who got trapped in that ravine on Storm King Mountain in Colorado, have a good idea of what a wild fire or forest fire can do. I respect fire greatly. I've seen it at its worst. I also know it's a living being, fully capable of moving, changing and transforming just as any of us are or can be. That may sound like a silly statement, but anyone who has dealt with fire knows what I'm speaking about.
We had wildfires in Ohio every Spring and Fall. I got to hate them. Imagine going up and down hills in forty pounds of turn out gear, a helmet and then carrying, roughly forty more pounds of water on your back in what is known as an 'Indian tank.' Eighty pounds of gear, usually on a hot day, and then to be chasing a fire that is whim to wind, temperature and humidity, over a hundred acres or more, is a prescription for disaster in the making. I always carried homeopathic remedies on me for heat exhaustion and sun stroke--two things that struck many a firefighter. My PTSD 'radar' was put into good use when I could 'sense' a change in the fire direction.
Picture this: You are down in a two-hundred foot rocky, brush and tree lined ravine. The fire, which is in a grassy field, is moving toward you. You're getting hung up on brush, stumbling, and chasing the fire. The wind changes--no one notices it, except you. You feel/sense it. Looking up, you know that that 'little grass fire' can suddenly turn and explode down into the ravine--and there's five of you down there, negotiating the territory and trying to clamor up the other side to reach the fire. Not a safe place to be.
That actually happened and when the I felt the wind shift, I yelled at everyone to get the hell out of there as fast as we could--and to move toward the approaching fire. My people, who knew of my abilities, listened. Another fire department personnel working with us, ignored my warning. The wind shifted, violently. It went from a mild,little breeze, to a sudden, twenty mile an hour shift. The 'little grass fire' suddenly 'blew up' on us. By the time we had scrambled on our hands and knees up to the top of that ravine, we were facing a thirty-foot wall of flame. Unlike Hot Shots, we didn't have any silver tent to throw over ourselves to outlast the heat and flame. My 'senses' told me to leap through the wall of fire. I had no idea how far that wall of flames was--it could be a few feet thick or much more.
Our turn out gear is flame retardant, but it will burn if put against too much flame and heat for too long. We all had our plastic visors down across our face to protect our eyes. I yelled at our men to follow me--and I leaped into that wall of fire, my thickly gloved hands pressed against my lower face to protect it. I shut my eyes, held my breath, and jumped! I felt the fire and heat envelop me, embrace me, whip around me. I left my body. I saw that the wall of flame was roughly, six feet wide. I remember landing hard and stumbling forward. I came out the other side of the wall of flame, rolling head over heels. All the rest of my team came with me. The guys down in the ravine weren't so lucky--a number of them had to go to the hospital for burns because the whole ravine 'blew up' from the fire as it leaped over it and trapped them. None of our people even got singed--which was a miracle. I thanked my PTSD symptoms because it had saved our lives and stopped us from getting burned.
How does your PTSD symptoms serve you in a positive way? This hyper alertness and vigilance can pay off. I've heard more than one police officer tell me wryly that a little 'paranoia' is healthy--they distrust to a higher degree than those who don't have PTSD symptoms. Nowadays, especially for women, a little 'paranoia' is good--we have to watch where ever we are when we're walking alone, hiking, or even going to a car in a parking lot after dark! I inevitably am looking around, sizing up situations, people around me. That's another use of our heighten abilities. In the next part of this series, we'll look at shamanism as a 'tool' to see how it can help a PTSD survivor take back the missing parts that were split off by the trauma.
With the ongoing threat of continued terrorism in the USA very real, everyone needs to be a little "paranoid" and stay alert. Be watchful. Don't put your head down and walk. Keep your head up and notice who is around and what is happening around you.
REFERENCES:
Schmookler, E., Ph.D., Trauma Treatment Manual, 1996, http://users.lanminds.com/~eds/manual.html
Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, 4th edition, American Psychiatric Assn., Washington, D.C., January, 1995
The Merck Manual of Diagnosis and Therapy, 16th Edition, edited by Robert Berkow, MD, Merck Research Labs, Rahway,NJ, 1992.
Butler, K., The Biology of Fear, July/Aug., 1996, The Family Therapy Networker, Washington, D.C.
PTSD Part 1 of 7
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