Today I picked a fun video, Carley Simon Let The River Run. If you saw the movie Working Girl, then you know it is a story about an average woman with big dreams. Tess McGill (Melanie Griffith) was really smart but didn't have many chances to prove it and change her life...until her boss broke her leg. Even her friends thought she was nuts to try it, but she did and in the end she won.
The song is about dreamers. People dreaming about making something better too. Making their lives different than they are because they believe they can be. What do you believe? Do you believe your life can be different than it is? Do you have chances to prove you are right?
When you have a dream that's great. It sucks if you do not think you have a chance in hell of making it happen. If you have PTSD, it sucks wanting to be happier but believing there is no way it can happen because that was what you heard. If you know it can happen, then you find a way to make that dream come true.
You get a roadmap to get you from where you are to where you want to be. You believe in yourself because you know in your heart it is possible and one mile at a time, you learn how to get there. When you do, you discover that you can win first place in a better life for yourself too.
If you know how to heal because you did it, then wake the rest of the people up in the nation so they can dream about doing it too!
"And I've been down there on the floor" when my ex-husband decided I needed to die. It wasn't bad enough he came home from work, started another argument like always, but this time, he decided to hit me. I hit back. Ten minutes later, after grabbing whatever I could to hit him with, being chased from room to room and screaming for help, he got me on the floor, got on top of me with his hands on my neck and tried to strangle me. It was the first time he hit me...and the last.
He stalked me for about a year, as far as I was aware. He drove muscle cars, so as soon as I heard the sound of an engine like that, it all came back. Nightmares, flashbacks, mood swings, paranoia and panic. About 2 years after it happened, I met my current husband. We dated about a year and a half when we decided to get married. I had to get in touch with my ex-husband for the annulment because I wanted to get married in the church again. The next day, he walked over to my husband to be and introduced himself.
That was even worse for me because then I knew for sure, when I thought I was free of him and safe from him, I really wasn't. There is no way he would have know who I was marrying if he hadn't been following us all that time.
Years later, we moved from Massachusetts to Florida. Even down there, the sound would cause instant panic and all that came with it. It wasn't until my cousin sent me his obituary notice from the newspaper letting me know I was finally free of him, that I knew he would never hurt me again.
It wasn't until last year when my daughter and I were talking about this and she said, "You never told me you had PTSD." I said, "I didn't." Then she let me know that was exactly what I said I had. All those years I was in a sort of denial, even though I had become and expert on PTSD and dedicated almost 40 years to helping others heal. The thing was, all the research I did, never once had what I was dealing with. I saw two therapists and they didn't see it in me. Maybe researchers need to start looking at that too.
Anyway, I am telling you all this because the Violence Against Women Act has passed the House. It is up to the Senate to pass it now. If you don't think it is important because you do not know anyone it happened to, you do now. If you are reading this, then it means you know what I do and why I do it, but now you cannot ignore the price paid by women like me when the laws were much different. There was nothing there for me and very few resources.
This Act will provide justice but there are some in the Senate saying they will not support it. I am asking you to contact your Senator and ask them if they will support this and if not, ask them why they are defending the abusers, because that is exactly what they are doing.
Now you know too much to go back and pretend, so please don't let us go down that road again. Let the Senate hear you roar in numbers too big to ignore~
House Renews Violence Against Women Act, But Senate Hurdles Remain
NPR
Susan Davis
March 17, 2021
The House approved with bipartisan support a reauthorization of the Violence Against Women Act, a popular 1994 law that protects and provides resources for victims of domestic abuse and sexual violence. The measure passed 244-172.
As a senator, President Biden played a lead role in passing the landmark law, which he recently called "one of my proudest legislative achievements."
The law was last reauthorized in 2013, but it lapsed at the end of 2018 after Congress failed to act due to partisan disputes over guns and transgender issues. The lapse has had little practical effect because Congress continues to fund related programs despite the lack of authorization.
The core legislation has broad support, but certain provisions added to the bill in the previous Congress exposed divisions among Republicans. In 2019, the House passed the measure with 33 Republicans voting with Democrats, but it was never brought up in the then-GOP-led Senate. read more here
Rep. Debbie Dingell also knows what it is like. (Detriot News)
Dingell has openly discussed growing up in a household where she lived with domestic violence, noting statistics that 1 in 15 children also witness domestic violence.
"We don't forget about hiding in closets. Or our father taking locks off of doors. Or my grabbing a gun from my father, so he wouldn't kill my mother, and being convinced that we would die," Dingell said of her early life with her siblings.
Who did you run away from? If you have PTSD, leaving the people in your life is common. It is also common that you never gave them a chance to know what you were going through, and all too likely, left them without ever telling them the real reason that made you leave. If you did, then your biggest problem is not having PTSD. Your biggest problem is having it but not knowing what it is. If you did, then you'd know there is nothing to be ashamed of. You're a survivor of something that could have killed you and that is the only reason you got hit by PTSD.
If you didn't give the people you shared your life with a chance, then you pre-judged them. You didn't give them a chance to support you, comfort you, help you, or yes, decide they didn't want to stay with you. You just assumed it would end badly.
Today the featured videos are Carole King, So Far Away and The 5th Dimension One Less Bell To Answer. More than likely the people you walked away from have no idea why you did. You'll never know until you try to communicate with them and explain it to them. First learn what you need to know and then give them a chance. If you think the next relationship will be any different, it won't be because they will not really know you and you will prove you really don't trust them.
When you survive something, there is an expression, "Everyday is a bonus."
BONUS: something in addition to what is expected or strictly due
If you have PTSD, and are suffering, it can be hard to think of your following days that way. But you can make a #BetterBonusDay everyday from this point on.
You do change after you survive. I did every time an "it" happened. I changed after the first two it happened in one night, along with all the other times. You go through the grieving process. Something died inside you and something else replaced it. The person you were before, is not 100% of the person you become the day afterwards and all the days to follow that day.
"But now friends are acting strange, and they shake their heads, they say I've changed." Maybe you thought that way a time or two...or more, after you survived whatever caused PTSD to hit you. In my case, friends would be worried if I wasn't acting strange, because they'd know I changed, without a doubt.
I've seen PTSD from both sides now and I know that the better side of it is a lot happier than the side of darkness. This is why today the featured song in Joni Mitchell, Both Sides Now.
So what do you want to do with your bonus day? I wanted to change the world. I wanted to make a difference being alive. Maybe because I was so young when I was introduced to having my life on the line, I had a head start on healing. (Excuse the pun because it was head trauma at the age of 5.) All the other times, were added onto the scars that were already there.
What do you want to do? Do you want to be better in your own life? Then it is time to heal the scars in your life so you can come closer to whatever you want your bonus days to be.
Get help to heal, in whatever way you need it to be. Therapy, support groups, educating yourself, talking to friends, or whatever will help you that isn't drugs or alcohol.
That takes care of your mind healing, but you also have to heal your body. Every part of your was involved in whatever "it" was. Go for a walk, do Yoga, meditation, play music, write, create art, anything that will help your body to find calmness enough so it gets used to not being fed by adrenaline rushes.
Now for your spirit. If you are struggling wondering why you survived, listen to your soul and find out what you were put here on this earth to do with your life. Want to be a better person, then start there. As you get stronger, help others understand how much power they have to heal too.
People will notice the change in you from that side of your life's better bonus day!
Are you fighting people who are trying to help you? Are you fighting God? Are you fighting yourself? You know you are not the way you want to be, not the way you used to be and nothing looks the way it did before. What are you doing about it? Are you trying to find someone to blame for the way your life is? Then maybe you should start with yourself because for whatever reason, you ended up believing you are a lost cause.
Time to start believing you are a worthy of better days.
Most of the time, survivors left the church because they did not find what they needed there. At least that is what some say but the truth is, what you needed was the foundation the faith was built on. That foundation is Jesus. Personally I don't attend church anymore and became a Chaplain so that I could care for the needs of fellow churchless souls, much like Jesus and His disciples did. They went to where the people were and tended to their needs, giving them reason to hope for better days, learning a better way to live and know they were loved.
There is no way of knowing why you survived and others did not. The only thing you can be sure of, is you did and it is up to you to define what you will do for the rest of your life. If you are blaming God that is because you think He judged you and wanted you to suffer...but those are your thoughts and not His.
PTSD strikes the emotional part of your brain and that is where your soul lives. If your soul has a strong emotional core, then you feel things more deeply. That means you love more deeply and feel pain stronger than others. What you may not be aware of is how powerful that soul of yours is. Everything you need to heal is already there. The purpose of getting help is to help you find it within yourself. One more thing you may not be aware of is that Jesus, the Son of God, had no problem asking for help when He needed it. He couldn't have done what He was sent here to do, alone.
This is why today the featured video is Goo Goo Dolls, Better Days. You may think it is about Christmas but if you remember what church services were like, it was all about that one day when He came into this world, and the day He left all His love behind for all of our days!
Better Days
Goo Goo Dolls
And you asked me what I want this year
And I try to make this kind and clear
Just a chance that maybe we'll find better days
'Cause I don't need boxes wrapped in strings
And designer love and empty things
Just a chance that maybe we'll find better days
So take these words and sing out loud
'Cause everyone is forgiven now
'Cause tonight's the night the world begins again
I need some place simple where we could live
And something only you can give
And that's faith and trust and peace while we're alive
