Hey, everybody, just wanting to say thanks for getting me through the latest gut punch of another pandemic travel ban.  As you all know, I got PTSD growing up in Mexico and Uruguay as a missionary kids with parents who weren't evacuated from a war zone.  They got PTSD really bad and turned to violence in the house that sadly matched the violence of the war out in the streets.

I wasn't a soldier, but a VA doctor took me on as a patient anyway, and I "graduated" from therapy under his care by returning as exposure therapy to Mexico and Uruguay where I got PTSD in the first place.  The biggest exposure therapy moment was in 2009 when my college buddy who went down with me for support took my photo at a Uruguayan street corner that was important to me.  It was not the only spot where I survived trauma because the Tupamaro War there lasted 6 years.  It was just the most stark spot, because on that spot was where my family car was waiting for the light to change when some guy hit our car with a Molotov cocktail fire bomb.

Since I had my photo taken there in 2009 I've gone back to Uruguay and to Mexico, too, and by facing down the bad parts of growing up there I've reclaimed the many good parts, too.  So much so that now I live to go back every summer, and I've rented a little house there to retire to next year for good.

Getting to where I was able to go back was a big step forward in my PTSD recovery, so being blocked by pandemic travel bans over and over has felt like a recovery setback again and again.  Your support here has helped me see beyond this pandemic that it's not.  It took a few days for your support and advice to kick in so I could feel it, it always does.  I hurt, then I go PTSD numb, but then I become capable of feeling hope again.  This morning I woke up with that little bit of hope starting back up in me, so I thought I'd say so and thank you.

I see a psychiatrist, too, it's not just one thing that works.  But DS PTSD support here works for me, too, don't ask me how but as long as it does, I'm grateful.