The Unique Intimacy Only We Know

The image above from a chronic illness article on The Mighty captivated me. To me, it explains how each of us experiences our chronic illnesses uniquely, and how our chronic illnesses experience us. We may have disorders X and Y, and our treatment plans may nearly be identical, but we each experience our conditions in...

I Never Stood A Chance

I weighed less than the amount of water I now drink in a day. I was innocent. I was vulnerable. I deserved to be protected. I deserved to be nurtured. I did not deserve the violence and neglect and abuse that were coming my way. Within the first few years of my life, I showed...

Developmental Trauma Disorder vs. Complex PTSD

Recently, I've been learning about a diagnosis that I believe better captures the essence of and better directs the treatment for what has been termed complex PTSD. Developmental Trauma Disorder (DTD) has been refined and advocated for inclusion in the DSM for a number of years, since or before 2007. The evolution of this line...

The Problem With Trauma Therapy

Like countless others who suffer from complex PTSD, as part of my trauma therapy, I have done a lot of my own research in order to understand it. Where does it come from? What types of therapy are utilized? How is my healing likely to progress? How much of this is permanent and to what...

Parents, if we resist your efforts to help us…

Most parents are pained to watch their children go through challenges no child should ever have to go through. They will do anything to end their suffering, including trading places with them. However, sometimes the child recoils and resists any attempt to help. It’s confusing, it’s excruciating and everyone feels helpless. From my own experience,...

Advocacy

This morning, on her How to ADHD YouTube channel, Jessica McCabe posted an urgent, time sensitive plea for advocacy (https://youtu.be/pY_-zaLeSPA). The federal government is considering a reduction of protections and services for students who require accommodation in order to succeed academically and socially, the very things modern education is all about. Regulations.gov has set up...

Flirting with Self-Destruction: Good Things for Dysfunctional Reasons

To slowly lose the ability to do both the big and the little things in life, to be the hand who carves out pieces of his own heart and surrenders them to the invisible and uncaring Nothing is the most painful way to be driven to extreme withdrawal. I used to be able to do...

Wars upon Wars: Transitioning from One Existential War to the Next Is a Battle of Its Own

Insidious wars, I suppose, are the worst kind of war for a child to be born into. Threats are unseen and unforeseen. They are only limited by the imagination and ethics of the attacker. Anyone on the defensive side of insidious wars must use every resource of knowledge and experience to anticipate and minimize the...

I Refuse to Heal

Healing, in my mind, is a return to a pre-symptomatic state. After all, when we cut ourselves or break a bone, our bodies work hard to return the wounded bits to the state that existed before the insult. Yeah, our bodies are cool like that. As one with PTSD, symptoms of depression and anxiety fill...

The Fight to Lean into Nightmare Meds

Night after night, month after month: nightmares. It’s a guaranteed companion: nightmares. No two are the same, even when they are the same: nightmares. Predictably, they rob me of restorative sleep. To be euphemistic, complex PTSD keeps life interesting; to be real, complex PTSD makes life inordinately difficult to manage. There is almost always some...