Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) Support Group
Find support with others who have gone through a traumatic experience. Whether you have chronic or acute PTSD, we are here for you.
to my trip back to where I got PTSD in Uruguay. Last year I stood at the street corner where my car was bombed with me in it, and it was an empowering moment. It really helped with my fearful flashbacks of that blast that shattered my childhood so thoroughly.
I'm truly lucky my best friend is going with me. It's great to have witnesses to healing moments in exposure therapy. It's great that I'll be able to log on to DS PTSD here with you all as my witnesses, too.
Exposure therapy's hard, you know, going back to where trauma happened. But the good part is that, unlike so much of our healing that is introverted, exposure therapy is by definition extroverted, it's a visible moment in the external world as well as healing in the internal world. You really stand on the spot where trauma began.
And I will stand there with the daily strength of your support, my friends. Wow. Counting down the days, with a little anxiety to be sure, but a lot of hope for another healing moment.
I was afraid to do it for so long. Has anybody else gotten some benefit from going back to the place where they were traumatized?
I'm truly lucky my best friend is going with me. It's great to have witnesses to healing moments in exposure therapy. It's great that I'll be able to log on to DS PTSD here with you all as my witnesses, too.
Exposure therapy's hard, you know, going back to where trauma happened. But the good part is that, unlike so much of our healing that is introverted, exposure therapy is by definition extroverted, it's a visible moment in the external world as well as healing in the internal world. You really stand on the spot where trauma began.
And I will stand there with the daily strength of your support, my friends. Wow. Counting down the days, with a little anxiety to be sure, but a lot of hope for another healing moment.
I was afraid to do it for so long. Has anybody else gotten some benefit from going back to the place where they were traumatized?
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I haven't written in my diary on my computer since May because I thought that my computer was dying. I got away from writing but my computer is hanging in there. I think that I will start writing in it again. It's so therapeutic.
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First, I hope everyone is doing well, and continuing to fight that good fight! Keep up the great work on yourselves; I'm rooting for all of you!So, I started doing therapy at the beginning of the year, when I was in my most depressed state, but with my therapist, I made big changes and steps in the right direction. But, over a month ago, she couldn't take my insurance anymore, and I had to stop...
Thank you for the compliment.
But...
I get kinda jealous when people talk about hometown nostalgia. Spending that first 25 years of my life in constant motion puts the concept of a hometown in league with the concept of "normal." I've never craved "normal" much, but that hometown feel is a thing I wish I could try.
Of course, it being about going between US & Latin America, plenty of people have had to emigrate because violence and for work, I'm not the first. So there's a body of tango songs and stuff about the very thing I'm feeling. About how some of us avoid visiting back home, as much as we miss home, just so we don't have to reopen the issue of wanting to stay once we've visited.
Just the most recent remake of the old Tango "Volver" ("To Return"), all about these mixed emotions about opening cans of worms by returning to South America. Gardel wrote it about thinking back to Argentina when he was living as a big tango star in France:
The current Argentine rock star Calamaro remade it because his career makes him spend at least half his time in Spain. He had to go there for his career to take off when Argentina went bankrupt in 2002 (it just defaulted on its foreign debt again last month, so the good times continue to roll, pardon the sarcasm).
Seems like home and work are in two different countries for a lot of us.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fzLXLBcWKtk
But as you said, it's a good problem to have a home, isn't it? Not everyone does. And not everybody has work or can work, either.
Time for a gratitude list for me, I think.
Anyway, I'll be packing my daughter up and driving north soon so I don't want to miss the opportunity to wish you a great trip. There's been a bit of a theme lately about recovering some happy memories amid the pain of the past, and my wish for you is that this trip tips the balance in favor of love over trauma. Provided that coincides with your own agenda, of course.
I'M REALLY GOING!
My traveling companion emailed me saying it was true, he's heading out from Minnesota. And my old high school classmate emailed me from Uruguay saying we're having dinner in Montevideo on Friday.
I'M REALLY, REALLY GOING! OH MY GOD!
Thank you, everybody. I carry you in my heart. I'll say hi from down there on Tuesday, because I'll be on a plane all day and all night Monday until Tuesday morning. Home is so, so far away.
BUT E.T.--I mean MUJI--IS GOING HOME! IT'S REAL! I DIDN"T DREAM IT!
PTSD has given me its share of nightmares, so it's wonderful when a dream does come true.
Gracias, everybody. :-))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))))) (My jaw hurts from smiling....)