Even in times of trauma, we try to maintain a sense of normality until we no longer can. That, my friends, is called surviving. Not healing. We never become whole again … we are survivors. If you are here today… you are a survivor. But those of us who have made it thru hell and are still standing? We bare a different name: warriors.
– Lori Goodwin
I am Frustration. I am Memory-Lost. Sometimes I read a line a dozen times before it sticks. My creative force has slipped. I type slower, speak slower, think at a snail’s pace. I’m Life shape shifted by Post Traumatic Stress, bastardized by Fate.
– Chila Woychik, On Being a Rat and Other Observations
It is as though some old part of yourself wakes up in you, terrified, useless in the life you have, its skills and habits destructive but intact, and what is left of the present you, the person you have become, wilts and shrivels in sadness or despair: the person you have become is only a thin shell over this other, more electric and endangered self. The strongest, the least digested parts of your experience can rise up and put you back where you were when they occurred; all the rest of you stands back and weeps.
– The Throat by Peter Straub
Rose lived the same life I did, but she doesn’t have PTSD. No bad dreams, no missing memories. Sometimes I’m jealous that she seems to deal with everything better than I do. But then I’ll catch her with this hollow look in her eyes and think maybe she just disguises everything for my benefit.
Maybe she’s broken on the inside too.
– Paula Stokes, Vicarious
Trauma is personal. It does not disappear if it is not validated. When it is ignored or invalidated the silent screams continue internally heard only by the one held captive. When someone enters the pain and hears the screams healing can begin.
– Danielle Bernock, Emerging with Wings: A True Story of Lies, Pain, and the Love That Heals
I spent many years trying to make up reasons about why I had the flashbacks, memories, continuous nightmares. When I finally decided to quit trying to hide from truth, I began to heal.
– Karen Marshall, Amongst Ourselves: A Self-Help Guide to Living with Dissociative Identity Disorder
I have suffered pains and torture of all natures. I have heard many say, “I am a survivor.” I am not in a boat in a sea of torture awaiting to be rescued. I am a Conqueror, I am a Victor…
I am one with myself.
I AM FREE!
– Stanley Victor Paskavich
If the sound of happy children is grating on your ears, I don’t think it’s the children who need to be adjusted.
– Stefan Molyneux
A person said on a PTSD site they weren’t happy with their life but they were still breathing. I replied. Personally I love breathing I try to do it as often as I can between cigarettes..
– Stanley Victor Paskavich
War becomes a part of you. It is a feeling just as much as an experience. If you can’t feel it, you weren’t paying attention. And if you weren’t paying attention, you are probably dead anyway.
– Clint Van Winkle, Soft Spots: A Marine’s Memoir of Combat and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder
Understanding trauma and that we each respond to it differently will help us be supportive and nonjudgmental toward each other.
– Stephanie S. Covington, Beyond Trauma: A Healing Journey For Women
Hiding my pain and acting strong, afraid to cry and show my tears, I struggle with all this years later.
– Erin Merryn, Living for Today: From Incest and Molestation to Fearlessness and Forgiveness
Trauma is hell on earth. Trauma resolved is a gift from the gods.
– Peter A. Levine
I’m a stranger behind the same set of eyes that the girl in the photo holds.
– Amanda Steele, The Cliff
There are edges around the black and every now and then a flash of color streaks out of the gray. But I can never really grasp any of the slivers of memories that emerge.
– Katie McGarry, Pushing the Limits
Always remember, if you have been diagnosed with PTSD, it is not a sign of weakness; rather, it is proof of your strength, because you have survived!
– Michel Templet
“Phrases such as “I’m beside myself,” “I was frightened to pieces,” “I feel lost,” “I feel like part of me is missing,” originated from a sense of soul loss.”
– S. Kelley Harrell, Teen Spirit Guide to Modern Shamanism
“The inability to get something out of your head is a signal that shouts, “Don’t forget to deal with this!” As long as you experience fear or pain with a memory or flashback, there is a lie attached that needs to be confronted. In each healing step, there is a truth to be gathered and a lie to discard.”
– Advocate and author Christina Enevoldsen
“A nightmare has taken hold of my body. Lunacy has dug its way inside my mind.”
– Amanda Steele, The Cliff
