My most admired PTSD role models would skin me alive if I outted them. They are very private people. They prefer their heroism remain unsung in the public arena.

But Liz Murray is one of my personal favorite public speakers on the subject of the challenges faced by people with birthrights like mine. I don't know if she calls those challenges, "PTSD" and that's okay by me. I don't think it is a one-label-fits-all dilemma.

They made a movie about her. "Homeless to Harvard." Here's a link to it, if you are in a movie mood. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pGe3u5rLGQc

Nice, arfie, since my trouble is fitting in on the faculty at a college with PTSD. No Harvard, mind you, a third rate community college. I lost my tenured cushy private university job years ago to PTSD when I went through a divorce and didn't know how to claim my ADA rights to hang on to my job when I went in to the hospital.

So I hung on and got tenure at this community college. If Liz Murray could do Harvard, maybe I can do this community college, right?

My very thought, muji. For folks with over-developed self-preservation instincts, and under-developed faith in humanity, just showing up can be an awful lot.

I think it'd be my Uncle Adam. He was a POW of the Chinese in Korea, and that's after surviving pre-WW2 Poland, so the guy had a *lot* going on... Yet he let love be his guiding principle, and other than understandable twitches about Chinese food, he dealt with his PTSD through prayer, hoep, love, and honesty with his family about what bothered him. It was simply standard procedure to know not to offer rice to him, and nobody made a "deal" out of it. It was courtesy, as we'd show someone who needed help opening a door.No more, no less. He made it seem as if it was something to be lived alongisde, and died in his nineties still known as a man of love and peace and faith. So I'd say my late Uncle Adam.

Muji, I was going to send you a PM...I am with you on needing role models concerning PTSD...but I will put my thoughts here instead. I had to see a lawyer yesterday face to face/first time..sister issues/her lawyer/inheritance that I did not expect/ it has felt like living on eggshells again for months now, I just could not post about it yet. I was scared, had my defense ready, needed to keep it together as the sister's lawyer was called by my lawyer as I sat there.. I got through it, I also spoke to my lawyer about both Brain Injury and PTSD from early life. Muji..YOU gave me strength to speak up, because you spoke up....so I needed to tell you that you inspired me. My lawyer surprisingly had some understanding. I will continue to look for more role models to fill my toolbox and share here. This group was my launching pad. but it has been an ongoing journey...how often do we give ourselves credit for what we all have accomplished?? I don't think often enough! Support and Hugs!

Kay Redfield Jamison has been one of my role models for years. Professor of Psychiatry at Johns Hopkins who outed herself with her mental bealth battles since childhood at great risk to her career. "An Unquiet Mind" her book I found by accident. It was before I was finally diagnosed with PTSD...it is her understanding of the brain, trauma, manic depression, anxiety, psychosis, etc,etc, that has helped me come at PTSD from different angles, given me coping options. Darrell Hammond from Saturday night live, I just read has PTSD from an abusive childhood. You just never know what is behind the comedy!!

Thanks, arfie, yeah. Just showing up is huge, isn't it? People often don't know.

3 cheers for your late Uncle Adam, Leo, seriously. There are millions of unsung heroes all over the world, right? I tend to forget that. Lucky you for having a hero right there in your family tree. Wow.

Darrell Hammond from SNL, too, cheese? Oh, that's good to know. Yeah, sometimes comedy is the way to fight back, isn't it? I've heard of Jamison's title, An Unquiet Mind, but I didn't know she was in Maryland, the state where I live, too. That brings her example that much closer.

Thanks, everybody. I needed a shot in the arm for my PTSD today, and I'm drawing strength today from what you're saying here.

my role models are here, right here. you keep going, keep getting up again dusting yourselves off if needed, and continuing on. being here for others, ASKING FOR HELP - a huge one and so hard to do; but what a fine example;

I am blessed to be allowed to call you friends; thanks for that and so much more, hugs

Hey, Lilly, now you really made me SMILE! :-)

Someone from here told me in a private message that Eric Idle of the Monty Python comedy group came from an abused childhood like Billy Connolly did, too. I really look up to Eric Idle's humor. I loved the scene in Monty Python's Holy Grail where they make fun of the awful medieval practice of witch burning. Idle leads the mob, and John Cleese claims a "witch" turned him in to a newt. Everyone stares at him, and he claims, "well, I got better."

If you can make fun of awful injustices like witch burning, I guess you can put child abuse memories in their place with the weapon of humor, too. I'm hoping that will happen as I sit in the audience listening to Billy Connolly's humor tonight.

I think it's always great to have people to look up to and admire in all facets of life

Although it's a very different story I admire David Milgaard who was a Canadian who was wrongly convicted of a rape/murder and endured a nightmare when he was imprisoned... There are two books (I believe) written about his case and life.. He and his Mother who supported and fought for him for years are hero's of mine

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/David_Milgaard

Yes, and he reminds me of Hurricane Carter, too, SC.

Boy, did I have FUN at Billy Connolly's live comedy show tonight. I'm usually not lonely at a show or a game, but this one was so funny I wish someone had been there to see what I laughed at and remember the punchlines. Billy Connolly is a funny man and a good soul. He announced he has Parkinson's and just had prostate cancer surgery, so I think I saw a show on his last tour. Bless his heart, he even made fun of his own prostate cancer. What a role model.

He was much the same in regards to being wrongly convicted Muji...

However he was only 16 and was this gentle soul... Sort of hippy like so he didn't fair well at all in a prison unlike Rubin who was tough

It was actually an American organization who helped to overturn the wrongful conviction...

. Centurion Ministries that was started by a once Catholic Priest and his mother who was a warrior in his behalf and has now started a second chapter of AIDWYC in Canada

Lawrence of Arabia! To think, he has been accused of "making up" being sexually assaulted and tortured by the Turkish Bey in WW1 to add color to his autobiography. To think of sexual assault as a test, a Purple Heart, seems so positive. I love the film with Peter O'Toole. When he's thrown in the mud after being "used" in the movie, that really captures how I felt so many times. Yet Lawrence is so smart and full of greatness.

I have the Bradshaw book and it is really helpful. I find that I have to spend a lot of effort being very loving and kind to my hurt inner child.