Weekend Stuff

Kicking back after a long and hectic week. The cable package will be coming soon. In the meantime it's work off the Blackberry online.

Symptoms still happen. And at time it's rough to try and focus. Do you still have nightmares? Do you still have homicidal anger? How do you cope with not blacking out at the worst times?

For us, it's still a step at a time. And, setting boundaries.

Here's something else that can help. Lots of exercise and massage. Is part of adrenalin surges due to lack of touch? We're not sure. But if you stay off salt and sugar, that combination can help some.

Any other ideas on how to cope? Please post a comment or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Balance is Everything

Hi on a cloudy but nice day. And welcome to our Russian audience. Keep spreading the word on this blog. Word-of-mouth ads do work.

Almost done unpacking. And, everything is really raw. We don't want to say shell-shocked exactly. But there's a feeling of being cautious. Of not ever wanting to be hurt again. And, protection is mandatory (online and elsewhere).

Looks like we'll have to drop the old therapist. For whatever reason he just doesn't have time anymore. So thanks for the help and I'll go to a new person.

How are you?

Into the New Place

Greetings from the new apt! It's very cool all around. Nice location, right in the middle of everything. Which means you could walk to 5 stores on a nice day on the same street. Eat lunch and be home in about 15 min. Can you do THAT in L.A.?

Still unpacking as we deal with other stuff (a new mobile number, mail and more). And it really feels good to be back in a bigger place. Driving down was rough though. Lots of horrible symptoms. Try to not black out when you're driving at 70 miles an hour and screaming from flashbacks. Then, start again the next day and more of the same.

Now though there's a little more focus. But we're really fighting hard to maintain that. And, if we don't hear from him soon, we're going to have to switch therapists.

More as it happens.

It's a Global Thing

Greetings to our expanding global audience. Especially to the new people in the Middle East.

Almost done with packing. Then Saturday we're off to the new location. Nice apt. and more of everything.

Symptoms are still hitting hard at times. At times we're running around touching everything solid that we can to try and stay grounded. Other things include the diet, tai-chi, meditation. And just taking breaks when needed.

Does this work for you? Or, despite all of that, do you still have crippling terror? You know you're there. But, you feel empty.

We're still sticking to censoring everything necessary to help stay grounded. Do you have the feeling that you're about 6 steps ahead of the rest of the world? Someone says something and you feel like, I knew this three months ago. You're just learning this NOW?

If something is a reflex action and you're not sure about it, stop and say why are we doing this? My multiples, little kid and I talk as much as possible. Is there one thing that's causing all of the trauma to keep flooding out? No. it's just everything is coming out. And at times you feel like you're going to snap.

We still take a knife with us when we go out in our bag (unless we're going to a high-security place). Because lucid dreams happen and you have to protect yourself. It doesn't matter that it's a dream. You have to fight back.

As for online security, here's the best thing to keep in mind. When you set up a site, blog or lots of email, mix it up as much as possible. In every step, try to never leave an obvious trail. Just use the right tools to help keep everything straight and you can do it.

Sometimes Filters Are a Good Thing

You can filter email and other stuff. This includes a lot of stimulus that can aggrevate a lot of symptoms.

How do you do that? Here are a few suggestions:

Depending on your situation, try anywhere from 1 to 5 days of almost no information:

No news, talk stations, web sites, etc.
You're only allowed to listen to music, read fiction. Or use a site that's absolutely necessary.
Also, no IM chat.

Try this and see how you feel. Also, limit your time online and see how that works.

Another idea. It's a variation on the AA cut-yourself-off-from-dangerous-stuff. Set boundaries in various areas (email, use voicemail, cut off toxic relationships, etc.).

The underlying idea here is two-fold: protection and balance. Otherwise, others will be asleep and you'll be up all night dissociating and fighting lucid dreams.

And really, we deserve better than that.

Keep Your Balance

Staying away from triggers as much as possible. Just focus a step at a time.

How's your part of the world? We wonder if anyone will talk about the trauma effects on the Haiti earthquake survivors?

Keeping Your Balance?

Taking it very easy tonight after a long day of packing. Symptoms still happen. But the holistic diet, Tai-chi and meditation do help some.

When you wake up, does dissociating hit you? Do you have lucid dreams? How do you fight back and then regain your balance? One thing that helps us as well is setting boundaries. If something is second nature but it doesn't really help, why do it?

Example: email. Unless you're a CEO, public service worker or in the CIA, do you really have to check your email every ten minutes? Look at Al Gore. Has his life improved by checking his mail 6 times an hour? That's 144 times a day. Unless of course his personal assistant does it for him. Which means this paragraph is totally pointless.

Maybe not. What's a common theme for trauma survivors? Controlling 24 hour stimulus. If you can, why not outsource stuff like this? If someone is professional, can do the job and has a high English level overall, why not do it? If they deal with your email and other things as well, this gives you more time to do other things. Which could then mean you make more money doing what you really want to do? And, you have some control over being bombarded with triggers all day long.

The point is this. This stuff is available for a reasonable fee. So if Al Gore does it, why the hell shouldn't you? Will you win a Nobel Prize if you do? If you do, we'll take the standard 10%.

So Many Choices

What size moving boxes do we need? What do we eat for lunch? Lots of choices.

But, let's take a break from the symptoms and fighting getting beaten down all day. A friend (who shall remain nameless until she gets rich from the royalty checks) came up with a great idea:

In a store, you usually have one or two different sized bags. But in this global economy of millions of choices, why stop there? That's just so retro.

With that in mind, imagine shopping and dealing with this selection:

The basic large bag that can hold almost everything you can imagine.
The almost large bag that's a slightly toned down version of the above.
The mid-size yet stylish bag that says I shop HERE, damnit!
The more expensive mid-siz bag that says it all.
The smaller bag for the enviromentally-conscious-yet-stylish.
The smaller bag specially engineered in a secret lab in Switzerland by a corporation that was recently bought out by a Japanese conglomerate that will soon own the world.
And then, the bag that says this is mine. If you touch it I'll kill you.

This could be a whole new niche. A global industry waiting to happen. You heard it here first.

Making Progress

A mix today of symptoms, pacing and more on the move.

How do you cope with violent flashbacks and anger? At times we still feel like we're going to black out. You have to concentrate and fight back hard to not fall apart. And then cope with everything else.

Hope you're doing all right.

#217 and Counting

Taking a moving break with our herbal tea and chips. Salsa is out(a trigger). Which means substitutes. And, still no personal assistant. Is it the perks? Or, the perks
with NO salary? We're not sure...

We're really keeping things in step-at-a-time mode. In a sense it's nice to have extra time (vs. doing it all in one week). If that happens, you end up giving a lot of stuff away. This time, not much profit in selling stuff. But, you do your best.

We're still taking breaks when needed. Going on to a bigger place with more of everything is the right thing to do. If it doesn't work in one area, you can only stick it out for so long. So time to move on.

Any suggestions on coping with your moves? Post or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

A Moving Break

Taking a break as the move progresses. We're out of here in one week. And, pacing is the key.

When we need to, we stop and go for a walk. Also, we're staying away from ALL other sites for a while. If it's an emergency, that's one thing. But if not, just stay away.

But you can always post here or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Trying Hard for a Balance

A horrible sleepless night. Lots of screaming and sick, twisted lucid dreams. Then, we were finally able to get some sleep. Now, it's back to moving.

And to really fighting to keep a balance. We still keep a knife or some other weapon close by just in case lucid dreams happen. If we go out (and we're not going into a high security place), we'll take it in our bag. Because you have to protect yourself. It doesn't matter that it's a lucid dream. You have to fight back.

What helps you to keep your balance? Post your comments or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Screaming and Fighting Back

Another tough day of screaming and fighting to not fall apart. Anger is really vicious. We work out, stay off junk food and try to be as healthy as possible. Yet, at times we want to kill everyone in our way.

The therapist says that this is trauma flooding out. And you have to fight back. So keep going.

Any other suggestions?

Try Not to Multi-Task

Lots to do online and with moving. Still no personal assistant. But that's all right.

We still have to fight to wake up and focus. How do you deal with that when you dissociating hits you when you open your eyes? Pasee on your comments here. Or at ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Global Thoughts

Greetings and welcome to our growing global audience. Usually, we'd say thanks and send you a free gift. But yes it's economy. So that will have to wait.

Speaking of the economy, Obama still hasn't called about us fixing it. If we did, we're thinking the standard 10% commission would be fair. 10% of the national debt here is about $100 billion. If the bankers can get millions, we can too. For actually doing work.

How's your focus right now? Everywhere you look it's really horrible triggers. At times we just turn everything off because, do we really need to see all of that recycled 24 hours a day? And besides, a lot of the REALLY IMPORTANT stories aren't being touched. So then you create your own channels to get the word out.

How is trauma treated in your part of the world? Is PTSD taken seriously? In general terms, Europe and many parts of Asia are ahead of the States (in dealing with health care, more open about sexuality, etc.).

Despite that, when was the last time you saw a guy rape survivor on TV? In our experience, unfortunately it's still manipulated (for profit and ratings). The MSM can tell you this IS a business, by the way. Which is true.

Yet, how would they feel if someone told them essentially to piss off because you don't exist? UNLESS we choose to admit that you're there. How would you deal with that?

For us, part of it is to just set that aside. And work on maintaining your balance.

Any suggestions on how to maintain yours? Post a comment or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Extremes

Tonight, more bitterly cold weather. Down Under, 41C. And it's NOT due to climate change?

You could extend this to extremes for trauma survivors. One minute, you feel a sense of balance. Then, despair. Today we've been fighting to keep our balance. We also talked to a mate at our local health food store re: balance.

In our case, we can't handle anything tomato based (an alkaline food). How then do you eat chips? We're still working on a substitute dip. Acidic foods (meat, chips, lemons and more) with no balance can make you more suseptable to disease.

Too much acid makes you hyper. Too much alkaline makes you dissociate.

Have you found a good balance? If you have, post some comments. Or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Working on the Balance

Taking a break and trying to focus. We still have to scream and fight to focus and wake up in the morning. Ginsing helps some. Yet, we still have to fight to snap out of it and feel focused.

Does this still happen to you? Is this different for different trauma survivors? Or, is it the same thing for everybody?

We're also still trying to keep things a step at a time. But lately it means more breaks. But that' ok.

Let's Try This

Listening online to lots of podcasts and more as we work online. And we just came across an interesting idea re: health care (and trauma too).

What if everyone who's having trouble getting health coverage and dealing with traditional doctors said, hang on a minute. If this doesn't work, what if all of us went to holistic treatment instead? What would the giant insurance companies do then?

Now, the bad part. Many holistic doctors are more expensive in some areas. Many say to hell with your health coverage. Then again, if everyone left them, then that's no longer an excuse.

As we write this, our current health coverage doesn't know that we have PTSD (from being repeatedly raped. Which to some health coverage plans is a "pre-existing condition". They won't pay for rape testing kits, HIV/AIDS tests, etc.). At the end of this month we opt out of that for new coverage (not set up yet).

If this new coverage found out about this, we could be denied. In 2010. Because of something that we didn't ask for. Yet, it's not our problem. It's a "pre-existing condition". So it's YOUR problem.

Step at a time....

Fighting Back

Into the weekend. And today's been a lot of horrible dissociating. You scream, try to ground yourself. And do everything you can. Yet, your fight-or-flight mechanism is stuck and you feel like you're THIS close to blacking out.

Now finally, a little relief?

Friday Focus (Sounds like a TV show)

Staying in and warm tonight. Almost time for some more herbal tea. The tolerance for caffeine is gone. So you switch to other stuff.

We're really working on breaking things down. At times the despair is still there. But when it happens we just turn everything off and go read a book for a while. Or, try this. Only answer email twice a day. For voice mail, check it once a day (unless you just can't do it). How many people are instantly available 24/7 for as long as you want? Not too many. Why then should you be?

Make the stimulus as manageable as possible.

Post a comment or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Trying to Stay Focused

Staying in tonight (with the low possibly down to -20F).

Now we're feeling calmer. For a while earlier today lots of vicious anger at some of the people that treated us like s**t.

Our therapist says that a stuck fight-or-flight mechanism is a common thing with trauma survivors (regardless of the trauma). Is this still a problem for you? Sometimes it's so bad we feel like we're going to black out. But you have to keep going.

Some good news. The new apt. got approved. Now, with all the snow, can we actually move :)?

Still Going Strong

A busy Thursday. We'll find out about the new apt. (hopefully be the end of today). Dissociating is still tough to handle. It's like you have to constantly fight to focus. Then at times you just stop and walk away for a while.

Does it seem like triggers are getting worse? Ever get the feeling that you're about six steps ahead of everybody else? Should we prosecute these people for tax fraud? No. Just jail the whistleblower. Obama says we don't torture. But actually we do. We just outsource it whenever possible. (It's a global economy?).

Which means you just stay away as much as possible. Deal with what you can. And above all, protection comes first.

Despair is still crippling at times. We're not suicidal or going to go back to using again. However, you have to at times really focus (especially when you feel like an empty shell). Our therapist still says that's a common theme for trauma survivors.

Does this still happen to you? You exist, yet you feel like there's literally nothing there. How then do you cope with having to fight back to not fall apart? And do everything else?

Time to go shovel snow. Post a comment or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Break it Down into Steps

How's you day? No new snow yet. Still waiting to hear on the new apt. And, trying to not get buried alive in scanning old documents. Carrying lots of big boxes around all the time when you move does get kind of old.

We're fighting hard to keep a sense of balance. It's tough though when you have to edit triggers that are everywhere. At times we just turn everything off and go for a walk. Flashbacks still happen. When they do, many times it's hard to know what's real and what's not.

How do you cope with despair when it hits you? My multiples, little kid and I talk as much as possible. When this happens we just curl up in a corner and quietly rock back and forth for a while. Just to regain that sense of balance.

Post comments. Or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Snow Almost Everywhere

Staying warm tonight? Here, another 3 inches of snow on the way. In parts of the U.K., up to 4 feet. And even some graders are stuck. What's next?

How are you staying grounded these days? Holding onto solid things and being aware of your surroundings can help. However, at other times you're screaming and fighting to not black out.

Feel free to pass on your secrets.

Protection Comes First

Happy Tuesday. Going ok?

Here, we're really trying to keep things a step at a time. This also means protecting yourself and setting boundaries.

Can you politely walk away from something and NOT explain? Yes you can. Another part of coping right now is compartmentalizing. Set it aside and deal with something in sections.

The therapist is trying to give us a referral in our new location. If no luck with that, then we'll keep going with him via email or phone sessions. Also, we have a good list of other sources that we can use if necessary. If you don't have it, what's the best online calling to use?

We've had really good luck with Skype. In the States and Canada, unlimited calls for about $3 a month. Overseas calling to landlines for about $12. Can YOUR local VOIP service do that?

Feel free to post a comment. Or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Keep Your Focus

It is Monday. If you want to keep the holidays going, best of luck.

As for the rest of us, it's back to the grind. How are your symptoms? We're moving on the 24th. And it's the usual moving stresses: finding the new apt. Then, the new job. A step at a time. We'll hear about the new apt. hopefully in the next 2 days.

As for dissociating and other symptoms, it's hard at times to really focus. You grab everything you can that's solid to have some grounding. And even with that, it can still be tough.

At times, flashbacks still hit. Do you ever feel lost and you're not sure what's real and what's not? What helps you?

Whaever you do, try to stay off caffeine and sugar. Those are two of the worst triggers.

Post comments or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

When in Doubt, Outsource it!

Almost time for lunch. Then, more snow to deal with. Here, we've had at least 8 inches. How much more today? We'll see.

How are your symptoms? It's still a battle to focus when you wake up to really wake up. One trick: massage your ears as you try to focus. In meredians throughout your body, the ears are centers of chi. Despite that, you can still have to scream to focus.

Do you still get bombarded with flashbacks? It feels like every asshole that treated you like shit is trying to beat you down. Which means you have to fight your way out. You know it's not your fault that you got raped. How then do you also deal with this feeling of having to fight your way out? And, to not get eaten alive by the anger from NOBODY paying attention.

In this global economic meltdown (depression), lots of people still have the usual pull-yourself-up-by-your-(fill in the blank) and get on with it. Nobody has time to listen to your complaining. Do you see me bitching about everything? No. Why then should I listen to you?

What do you do here? The best thing we've found is to just blow them off. You're not responsible for what others say and do. Sounds basic, but it's true.

Also, you have to fight back to try and keep a sense of balance. Any tips on what helps you these days to do that?

Post a comment or email to ptsdsurvival at gmail.com.

Saturday stuff

Just got back from seeing the therapist. Now, it's lunchtime and finally we're feeling more focused again.

Symptoms are still hitting hard. And it feels like you constantly have to scream and focus to fight back so you don't disappear. All trauma survivors know this. You fight through this all day long. AND, go to work and deal with all the other stuff that comes up. Which is delibilitating.

Then again, you don't have a choice.

What helps to cope? Here's a partial list that at times seems to help:

Try for at least 8 hours of sleep a night. Not just an ideal. But it is possible to do it.

Several balanced meals throughout the day. Try using ginsing instead of 3 cups of coffee. Caffeine depletes your chi.

Pace your vitamins and herbs throughout the day. All at once maybe isn't the best way to go.

Check your email no more than 3 times a day. If somebody really needs to find you, they'll leave a voice mail. And so what if you don't instantly call them back. Get over it.

If you need to, turn everything off and go for a walk. Go to the store. Just kick back and look out the window. Then go back to it.

Hope these help.

Happy 2010

Have a good night? Ours was rough. Staying in was the right thing to do.

Today though, it's just CHILL.

But here's a helpful idea to cope with symptoms (especially triggers).

Unless you're a head of state (or, the CIA), try this. For 1 week, do a media fast.

This means:

No surfing online
No checking emails
No newspapers
No multi-tasking
No regular TV
No non-music radio
No non-fiction reading
No browsing thru magazines or newspapers as you wait

Try this for a week (if possible). And see how you feel.