It's going to take some time for me to process this. I thought I was just going to see a show by Roger Waters of Pink Floyd. Instead, though he was there and sang his hits, it really was a concert about PTSD!!! OMG!!

Half of his band consisted of major rock stars--G.E. Smith of Hall and Oates, Tom Morello of Rage Against the Machine, and Billy Corgan of Smashing Pumpkins.

But then the other half consisted of Iraq and Afghanistan war veterans who survived improvised explosive devices. LIKE ME!!!! They're from Walter Reed hospital, and they're a group called "Musicorps."

http://www.musicorps.net/About.html

"During long and difficult recoveries, MusiCorps brings activity, purpose, and joy, and aids recovery from war-related trauma, including PTSD (post traumatic stress disorder) and TBI (traumatic brain injury)."

TW
If you don't know my story, by PTSD began when I was in a car bombing in Uruguay at age 9. Then came domestic violence in my home for years, two molestations by a pedophile when I was 11, and torture by a death squad when I was 15. Torture that ended in an attempted execution in which the gun held to my temple at my head jammed twice when its trigger was pulled, so I was let go.

Yeah, I know, I have raging PTSD and probably should be a suicide case. But things like tonight keep me going and they have somehow for 48 years now. When those guys in their wheelchairs on stage sang "Comfortably Numb" with Roger Waters its message about dissociation, ironically enough, connected me to them and to the thousands of people in the room. Like I told donna here, I wept.

After the show, one of the singers in a wheelchair stayed on stage and talked to people in the audience. They were all thanking him for his service and so on, but I just had to push through the crowd of well wishers with my cane and gush. I said, "Man, I didn't know kind of show this was, but I survived an I.E.D., too, and I'm part of an online PTSD support group every day. Thank you for getting up here and talking about what we've got. I'm going home to my computer to tell my group about his right now."

The guy got it, and shook my hand. All the well wishers just stared with their mouths open, but I didn't care. The guys on stage got it, and I knew I was coming right back to here to DS PTSD to tell other people who get it, too.

Like I said, it's going to take a while to process this. OMG!! I was in a room where THOUSANDS of people showed respect to people with PTSD for once!! OMG!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I have to pinch myself, it's a dream come true....