PTSD Patrol Empowerment Zone: Hope is contagious

"What is behind you, is not as strong as who is beside you."
PTSD Patrol
Kathie Costos
March 18, 2018

Yesterday was St. Patrick's Day.

"The love of God and his fear grew in me more and more, as did the faith, and my soul was rosed, so that, in a single day, I have said as many as a hundred prayers and in the night, nearly the same. I prayed in the woods and on the mountain, even before dawn. I felt no hurt from the snow or ice or rain."

Patrick's captivity lasted until he was twenty, when he escaped after having a dream from God in which he was told to leave Ireland by going to the coast. There he found some sailors who took him back to Britain and was reunited with his family. (from Catholic.org)

Many do not understand that the day they say everyone becomes Irish, is a celebration of a victory. Patrick defeated doubt. He escaped his captors and went on to greatness.

You can escape PTSD holding you as a prisoner by defeating doubt too. Stop telling yourself that this life you are living is all you get. Stop telling yourself that getting numb is coping with PTSD. 

You defeated the thing that sent PTSD into you. Why let it win now?

I love this memorial because it shows two soldier side-by-side, walking forward, ready to face the enemy.

That is the way you fight PTSD. Side-by-side. It is one of the biggest things discovered in the done to defeat this. Peer-support works better than anything else. 

If you refuse the other help available, at least do this. Go and spend time with other veterans. Sooner or later you'll discover how much you do have in common with them.

Make your healing even better by going to the VA for mental health help. Considering that everything learned about what trauma does, started by researching Vietnam veterans, they know the difference between trauma and other illnesses. 

The only way to get PTSD is being a survivor of something that happened to you. Yes, it hits you!

You can still make a difference in this world by doing whatever you have to do to fight PTSD. Then you can go stand by the side of another veteran who needs to be shown the way. Think of it this way, healing is a something that doesn't stop, because as you help others, you heal even more!

Hope is contagious!

If I look different in these videos it is because I went off my meds for my back. Every once in a while, I try to give my body a break and stop them for a while. So, yes, I was in a lot of pain and it shows. 

Physical pain shows and so does the pain you feel everyday with PTSD. No matter how many smiles you show to the world, take a look at your eyes in the mirror. You can see it. The good news is, you can put back the sparkle you used to have when you stop letting PTSD win.


PTSD Patrol Sunday Empowerment Zone
Yesterday I went out to the Vietnam veteran memorial across from Lake Baldwin VA. I love it out there. There is a memorial with two soldiers, side by side, with weapons raised as they walk forward. That image is exactly what I've been trying to say. You don't fight in combat alone and you can't fight to heal alone.

PTSD Patrol Take Life Back

PTSD Patrol Making a Difference

PTSD Patrol: Get in and drive your life

Change what drives you
PTSD Patrol
Kathie Costos 
March 17, 2018

When I was explaining what PTSD Patrol was about to a co-worker, it dawned on me that I never really explained it here.

You may be wondering why it is all related to vehicles. Simply really, everyone understands it no matter what form of transportation it is.

Sometimes we are a passenger. That is what our childhood is like. Our parents are the drivers. They are in control. They decide where we go and how fast we get there.

Then we grow up, learn how to be in control of the wheel, speed and direction we go in. We get a little older and we own the thing, which is our lives. We own what we do with the lives our parents brought into the world.

The engine is our mind. The body of the vehicle is like ours. Everyone can understand you need to take care of your engine and the body of the vehicle. 

Each person picks a vehicle based on many choices. What they can afford and what they like. Sure, some invest the time in learning about the thing before they decide. Some will look for the best deal. No one usually buys it without taking it for a test drive first.

No matter what you get, how powerful it is, the thing won't do anything other than sit there without feeding it gas. 

So look at your life like a vehicle your soul is in. In this case, the gas you put in your tank, feeds your soul. Without hope, you run out of gas.

We are the ones who determine where we go from one moment to the next. Sure, we can get trapped in a traffic jam, sitting there, waiting for others to get out of our way. 

We can get lost trying to get where we want to go. 

We can get behind a driver moving too slowly or have to move out of the way of someone driving way too fast.

We have little control over what others do, but we do control what we do. Same thing with life.

It gets draining just hearing about the bad stuff. I know what that's like since I track all the news stories across the country and my frickin head explodes when I read about someone doing something talking about a number, but never seems to mention what that "something" is or why they didn't even bother to read the report.

So, that is why PTSD Patrol was started. It is about getting in and driving your own life away from the past. No, not forgetting it, but making peace with it. It is about empowerment and fueling your tank without getting too preachy.

Remember, while I am a Chaplain, I am far from the type you may be used to.

Oh, almost forgot. The picture I use is from a trip out to Nevada for a wedding and my daughter is driving. Go figure! She got to drive and I was in the back seat!

On Sunday mornings there are videos going up about what is hopeful and telling you things someone should have mentioned a very long time ago. You can heal and your life can get a hell of a lot better. 


No more excuses. Stop being comfortably numb!

PTSD Patrol, Get Out Of Neutral

PTSD Patrol Sunday Empowerment Zone
PTSD Patrol
Kathie Costos
March 11, 2018 

Why is it the simplest message can also be the most powerful? Think about some commercials you see on TV and how some will just stick in your head. Now think of all the veterans needing to heal, but only hearing about the worst possible outcome. 

Isn't it a lot better, a lot more powerful, for them to know that from this moment in, they are in control and can choose to take their lives back, instead of taking them?

Yesterday, my buddy Jonnie Rodriguez had something he wanted to share. His simple, powerful message of healing. When he thinks about what his life was like when he had no hope of getting out of the hell he was in, and what his life is like now, he gets angry. Angry that others are settling for being defined by PTSD instead of taking control as a survivor.


The road ahead is yours! Stay in neutral, getting numb, feeling sorry for yourself, or get on the road paved by others who have gone before you.

It is a lot of work, but hey, training was hard work too. Your job is/was hard work. But as with any road trip, you can get help to get to where you want to go.

Think about every road has been laid out by someone looking at a forest and figured out how to connect one place to another. Same thing with healing PTSD. It took someone seeking a better way to get through what was keeping them out of where they wanted to go.

You can do the same thing.

PTSD Patrol Empowerment Zone-Healing

Don't be defined by what is wrong with you!
PTSD Patrol
Kathie Costos
March 4, 2018

Yesterday I went to an event for this fantastic veteran!

Kelly Smith will not let anything stop her. You can see the video from the event on Combat PTSD Wounded Times later today.

For now, we need to talk about some of the conversations going on at the event. It was more about a veteran worried about another veteran, than anyone talking about themselves. AND THAT IS THE POINT MOST OF YOU MISS!

No one is in this after combat alone! The same people you would have died for, the same ones who would have died for you, still care! What the hell makes you think they wouldn't listen to you if you need them? What stops you from talking to them if you think they need help?

This video also introduces Murray! It is a glorious morning here in Florida and he wanted to get some fresh air. 
Don't settle for the way thing are today! TAKE YOUR LIFE BACK!

PTSD Patrol Sunday Mornings Empowerment Zone

PTSD Patrol Fuels Hope
Kathie Costos
February 25, 2018

We need to talk! How many times have you heard those words and thought, oh crap, bad news coming? This time, it is good news!

Starting today, PTSD Patrol is going to be changing the conversation from suicide to healing. We need to face the fact that we will never know how many took their own lives but we do know why they did it. They lost hope that the next day would be any better for them.

We're going to be changing that conversation and start giving them reasons to hope for a much better life even with PTSD.