Ptsd Memoir

The causes of Complex Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder range from severe neglect to monstrous abuse. Many survivors grew up in houses that were not homes-in families that were as loveless as orphanages and sometimes as dangerous. If you felt unwanted, unliked, rejected, hated, and/or despised for a lengthy portion of your childhood, trauma may be deeply engrained in your mind, soul, and body. This book is a practical guide to recovering from lingering childhood trauma. It is copiously illustrated with examples of the author's and his clients' journeys of recovering.

By age thirty, Stephanie Foo was successful on paper: She had her dream job as an award-winning radio producer at This American Life and a loving boyfriend. But behind her office door, she was having panic attacks and sobbing at her desk every morning. After years of questioning what was wrong with herself, she was diagnosed with complex PTSD—a condition that occurs when trauma happens continuously, over the course of years.

Behind the tall, foreboding gates of a commune in Brazil, Daniella Mestyanek Young was raised in the religious cult The Children of God, also known as The Family, as the daughter of high-ranking members. Her great-grandmother donated land for one of The Family’s first communes in Texas. Her mother, at thirteen, was forced to marry the leader and served as his secretary for many years. Beholden to The Family’s strict rules, Daniella suffers physical, emotional, and sexual abuse—masked as godly discipline and divine love—and is forbidden from getting a traditional education.

A raw and intimate memoir of one woman’s experience navigating infidelity and divorce, Andrea Merkl illustrates what it means to heal trauma individually and collectively as she gave birth, endured a year-long social media detox, ran a triathlon and discovered a dissociated childhood trauma of sexual abuse.

Longlisted for the RBC Taylor Prize: In this piercing memoir, Roméo Dallaire, retired general and former senator, the author of the bestsellers Shake Hands with the Devil and They Fight Like Soldiers, They Die Like Children, and one of the world's leading humanitarians, delves deep into his life since the Rwandan genocide. At the heart of Waiting for First Light is a no-holds-barred self-portrait of a top political and military figure whose nights are invaded by despair, but who at first light faces the day with the renewed desire to make a difference in the world.

After serving in a scout-sniper platoon in Mosul, Tom Voss came home carrying invisible wounds of war - the memory of doing or witnessing things that went against his fundamental beliefs. This was not a physical injury that could heal with medication and time but a "moral injury" - a wound to the soul that eventually urged him toward suicide. Desperate for relief from the pain and guilt, Voss embarked on a 2,700-mile journey across America with a fellow veteran. Listeners walk with these men as they meet other veterans, Native American healers, and spiritual teachers.

Jessica Stern is one of the world’s foremost experts on terrorism and post-traumatic stress disorder. She has interviewed some of the most feared terrorists in their own camps in Pakistan and Afghanistan. She has worked with the National Security Council and the FBI as an expert on what extreme trauma can do to a person. By her own admission, she feels no fear in these terrifying scenarios. On a fall night in Concord, a quiet Massachusetts suburb, in 1973, Jessica was 15. She and her sister were at doing their homework after ballet class when a serial rapist entered their bedroom.

James Hatch is a former special ops Navy SEAL senior chief, master naval parachutist, and expert military dog trainer and handler. His fateful final mission in Afghanistan went south, and Hatch was left with a shattered femur from an AK-47 round and the SEAL dog who fought alongside him was dead. As a result of his horrific leg wound, his 24-year military career came to an end - and with it the only life he’d ever known. In Touching the Dragon, we witness his long road to recovery.

In 2017, President Obama, in his final Oval Office interview, was asked who gave him hope for the future of the country, and Jason Kander was the first name he mentioned. Suddenly, Jason was a national figure. As observers assumed he was preparing a run for the presidency, Jason announced a bid for mayor of Kansas City instead and was headed for a landslide victory. But after eleven years battling PTSD from his service in Afghanistan, Jason was seized by depression and suicidal thoughts. He dropped out of the mayor’s race and out of public life. And finally, he sought help.

From Beneath the Ice is more than a book, it is a triumph of the human spirit. Todd’s mind was hijacked, but he slowly took the helm and charted a new course. It was a difficult process for him to write this book, but in the end, it was empowering. Publishing was even harder, knowing that his darkest moments would be ‘out there’ for the world to see. He knew his primary focus was to help people and contribute to ending the stigma about mental illness. To do this, he had to be more courageous than he had ever been.

In January of 2019, I was trapped in a hotel room in the DusitD2 in Nairobi for 17 long hours while Al-Shabaab terrorists attacked the property. I was completely alone, and certain I was going to die. However, thanks to the incomprehensibly brave men who fought to get us out, hundreds of us were extracted to safety. After the attack, though, PTSD made me so miserable that I started to wish I had died after all. This book is the in-depth retelling of the attack, combined with my personal journal entries about PTSD afterward. It's a true story about trauma.

In Psychedelics for Everyone, a number one Amazon best seller in 19 categories, Matt Zemon provides listeners with an inspiring foundation for understanding the profound transformational power of psychedelics.

When US Marine Rob Kugler returns from war not only had he given up a year of his life in service to his country, but he had also lost a brother in the fighting as well. Lost in grief, Rob finds solace and relief in the one thing that never fails to put a smile on his face: his chocolate lab, Bella. Exceptionally friendly, and always with - you wouldn’t believe it - a smile on her face, Bella is the friend Rob needs, and they spend their days exploring nature and taking photos. But then Bella develops a limp in her front leg. It’s cancer.

For 18 years of my life, I dealt with harm daily. I suffered over 40 years with a substantial assortment of trauma-related manifestations. The devastation of the problems began when I was a child and lasted until I was in my mid-40s. I know my story sounds bleak but don’t be discouraged. Peace, laughter, joy, and happiness eventually came my way.

One in three will experience a significant trauma in their life. Brilliantly read by author and army Apache pilot Lt. Col. Brian L. Slade, experience the war from the cockpit as he shares his experience with trauma in Afghanistan.

A vivid, fascinating, and compelling story of a helicopter pilot surviving Vietnam and its aftermath. Joe Sheridan’s memoir is one patriot’s true account of the helicopter war and the brave pilots who fought alongside him.

Fergal Keane has spent his adult life witnessing war, travelling through dangerous or devastated places and reporting the atrocities back to the rest of the world. In the course of those decades, he has lost friends, sustained injuries and experienced countless near misses. He has patched up colleagues and seen the worst of humanity: mothers robbed of their children and bodies mutilated. Along the way, he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. Yet he could not stop going back to the wars.

He shares that experience in Rolling Through Afghanistan for the benefit of those who have wondered what it's like to be part of the United States armed forces fighting on the front lines in war...and to help those who may not be ready to face the memory of their own experiences.

Just as polio loomed over the 1950s and AIDS stalked the 1980s and 1990s, post-traumatic stress disorder haunts us in the early years of the 21st century. Over a decade into the United States' "global war on terror", PTSD afflicts as many as 30 percent of the conflict's veterans. But the disorder's reach extends far beyond the armed forces. In total, some 27 million Americans are believed to be PTSD survivors. Yet to many of us, the disorder remains shrouded in mystery, secrecy, and shame.

When Jill Sitnick sat on her therapist’s couch trying to stop the panic attack that had lasted for months, she didn’t know she would eventually heal her deeply embedded childhood trauma with psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy. In Rescuing Jill, Jill shows you why it took a year, and multiple journeys, to fully heal. By describing how MDMA let her view her father’s beatings and mother’s suicide attempts from her adult perspective, she gives you a front-row seat into how psychedelic-assisted psychotherapy healed her trauma and transformed her life.