Unwrapping the Gifts of Life: A Challenging Journey Through PTSD Provides a Roadmap to Finding Peace and Purpose

Trauma and abuse seem to be the theme of our times. Maybe not the existence of abuse itself, for that's gone on for centuries, but that its ugliest roots are finally coming to the surface for all to see. At the same time, our ability to help trauma survivors heal is advancing in leaps and bounds.

Humanity has been visiting harm against itself for what seems all of known history in the forms of war, genocide, child abuse, and all forms of psychological and spiritual abuse. What I know from experience is that there's always some purpose to our madness. We are the most amazing species. We can inflict the most horrific of traumas yet also perform some of the most precious acts of caring for one another.

I deeply hope that this massive uncovering of humanity's most horrific crimes against itself that we're hearing about today is the very powerful beginning of a collective healing like we've never seen before. What we're on the cusp of healing could usher in for all of us an evolution of the species, enlightened and emboldened by our past missteps along the way.

Introduction

I guess looking back over your life is common, especially in your sixties, thinking about what you've done, what you still want to do, and feeling like you still have some contribution to make. At 61, I left behind my career, moved to a distant state, a new climate, and a new life yet to be discovered. Little did I know that my so-called retirement was offering me the chance to finally tell my story in writing. For me, it was just my life. I felt honored to have been given so many opportunities to know myself and what I was made of. And then, so many opportunities to be able to use my experience to help others.

The idea of retirement never made sense to me. At first, that was because I'd gotten such a late start in life that it just didn't seem financially feasible to stop working any time soon. But it was more than that. When your life experience and career neatly dovetail until you feel like you're on a mission to fulfill a soul purpose, that doesn't end until you die. That's actually true for all of us. We're all here for a purpose, and everything that happens to us is for a reason. The trick is to find out what that reason is, perhaps by listening to the quiet voice within.

Whenever I listened hard enough, little signs would emerge that showed me the next step, even if it was a baby step. Once I gained what I needed from that step, after a while my heart would tell me something was awry, and I'd have to listen again to find out what was next. Sometimes, the steps were big and I'd be dropping out of college or packing my things and moving across the country. At times, I felt so lost and confused and didn't have a clue what my life was about. Now, as I look back, it was all in perfect order. Every step, every experience, was neatly designed to make me who I am today.

I was settling into my latest step, a new home in Hawaii, without having any idea why I was here. The transition was one of the hardest I'd made. I ended my career, said goodbye to friends, and left my beloved Rocky Mountains behind for a tropical climate that didn't necessarily seem to entice me. But the call to be here was unmistakable and undoubtedly invited yet another life adventure. It made sense to friends and family that I was retiring in Hawaii, and many were envious of my new location. All I could think was that at least guidance hadn't led me to Alaska at this stage of my life.

Part I: California

Chapter 1

Like so many, I suffered abuse as a child. It started in my home. I was born to parents who were the children of immigrants and had grown up poor. Three of my grandparents were from Ireland, practicing members of the Catholic church which we now know has harbored unthinkable secrets of childhood abuse that range from the physical and sexual to profound spiritual abuse. I know very little about what my parents and grandparents experienced as children. To a discerning eye, one could see that they had their own pain.

I attended Catholic schools during the 1960s, and there were no laws then against hitting misbehaving children in school. I can vividly remember to this day when a little second grade boy was relentlessly acting out until the teacher finally lost her cool and bare-butt beat him with a paddle in front of the whole class. I spent much of my time in school after that terrified, staying as absolutely still as I could in class and fearful that I could be next. As I look back at that day now with wiser eyes, I see an overwhelmed young mother trying to manage almost 50 kids lined up in rows of desks all in alphabetical order, feeding them mostly useless, rote-memorized information that had nothing to do with real life or with the edification of a truly exquisite species desperately wanting to break out its shell. As awful as it was that day for all of us, and especially the boy and teacher, I see now that all the many similar inconceivably painful events in the world, that line up like endless repetitions of insanity, are our own collective unconscious creations conspiring to wake us up to what we no longer want to be.

I don't know if it was my dyslexia or my struggle to find a path that best fit me, but I was in and out of colleges and universities for years. Numbers and spatial relations came easier than words, so I studied math, science, and engineering. I did well in all my classes but nothing felt right and I was miserable. Then it was on to sociology and psychology, but I needed to carry a dictionary around to translate my textbooks. Finally, I finished a degree in psychology, took a couple of years off, and then decided to go to graduate school because there weren't many career options with a bachelor's degree in psychology. In graduate school, I tried sociology again, then statistics and experimental psychology. During these trying years, I was fortunate to be honing my ability to know what was right for me and what wasn't. It was a warm feeling in my heart that said yes and a heaviness in my gut that let me know when I was on the wrong path.

I had just dropped out of my latest school, again lost and confused but determined to find what it was the planet had in store for me. I needed a break. I wanted to do something totally different, something that felt free and unencumbered, something to clear my head and perhaps give me a fresh perspective. An opportunity arose when my cousin Mike came for a visit, and we decided to hitchhike around the northwest, camping along the way. I loved camping. It brought me back to myself and to a connection with the Earth.

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Chapter 2

It was the summer of 1981 and I was 25 years old. Loaded down with large backpacks, Mike and I headed out to the interstate, thumbs out, to begin our journey north. I was refreshed by our travels. We went from Northern California all the way to Vancouver in British Columbia, and we met incredible people along the way. Most memorable was a couple from Germany who had come to the United States to visit their exchange-student daughter. They had purchased a VW van to travel in, and they squeezed us into the back seat. We spent three days with them, sharing about US culture, visiting tourist traps, and singing as we went. One stranger after another picked us up, and we learned about their lives and their homes. My favorite part was setting up camp in the evening, cooking over an open fire, and then sleeping under the stars. It was a dream come true.

As the summer wound down, we found ourselves in Wyoming and it was time to go back to California. Mike had to return to college, and I needed to get back to figuring out whatever it was that I was meant to do next. For some reason, it seemed more difficult to get rides going back to the West Coast. We were about a two-day drive away when we hit pay dirt. A man in a white pickup pulled over and said he was headed right where we wanted to go. So we settled in for the long drive.

Occasionally, I helped with the driving since I knew how to drive a stick shift. By nightfall, we stopped somewhere in Utah and set up the tent. Our driver slept in the back of his truck. Up early the next morning, we headed for California. We pulled into a gas station in Reno Nevada as the sun was getting lower in the sky. Our driver suggested we camp out one more night and drive the last leg in the morning. We stopped for groceries, and then we directed him to a spot in the Sierras where Mike and I had camped just two months before. It was a bit of a hike from where we parked the truck and up a steep hill next to a running stream. It had been a long, dry summer, so the creek was barely trickling but provided us with enough water for cooking.

After dinner, Mike and I hiked to a clearing and set up our campsite. No rain was in the forecast, so we decided to sleep out under the stars. The cool mountain weather made for good sleeping, and the gentle trickle of the creek was hypnotizing. I easily fell asleep, safe and sound in my sleeping bag. I had no idea what time it was, though I later calculated that it was about 4:30 or 5:00 in the morning. I was suddenly awakened from a deep sleep. I was faced down in my sleeping bag and I felt something pounding on my back. A gamey smell wafted in the air and I immediately imagined that a deer was trampling me. In an effort to free myself, I attempted to turn over. It would be years before I would remember what I saw. My mind kept thinking it was deer hooves pounding my back and now smacking me in the face.

I can only imagine it was pure survival instinct that prompted me to roll in my sleeping bag until I tumbled down the bank to the edge of the creek. I landed half upright with my back resting on a large rock. Everything went quiet. I must have called for help because Mike woke up and made his way down the bank to my side. He helped me back to my camp spot. It quickly became apparent to him that I'd been severely injured. He could hear what is called a sucking chest wound. My left lung had been punctured and was collapsing.

Instinct drove him down to the highway to flag down a passing vehicle for help after he discovered that our driver and his truck were gone. Mike was wearing just a pair of gym shorts, and his chest was covered in my blood as he stood on the shoulder of the highway trying to wave down help. Car after car swerved to miss him and continued on down the highway.

Meanwhile, as I lay there, my sense of hearing was waning. I'm not sure to this day what that was. Perhaps my ears were filling with blood. I also felt like I was fading away into the dark. I looked up at the tall pine trees surrounding me. They were somehow pulling me up and keeping me afloat as my blood continued to spill out onto the ground. Then my vision started to go away. Again, it could have been blood in my eyes, or perhaps my consciousness was getting ready to check out of this life. I just know I was profoundly tired yet acutely aware of the moment. A funny thought crossed my mind. I'd left the Catholic Church years earlier. But in that moment, as I was facing my death, I thought that maybe I should get back my religion. Undoubtedly, it was some early programming about the perils of dying without religion.

Something profound happened to me that morning that continues to unfold to this day. Many have asked if I had a near-death experience. I was certainly near death. I have no recall of traveling down a tunnel to a light as many have described. Many years later, I attended a professional conference on treating post-traumatic stress disorder. During a video presentation of the treatment of a man who had almost died in a car wreck, he vividly recalled his own near-death experience. As he recounted that memory in detail, my heart leapt in my chest. It was shockingly familiar. Perhaps I did have a near-death experience and it was deeply buried in my unconscious.

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Chapter 3

So many things lined up that morning to save me. I guess it wasn't time for me to leave yet. Eventually, an off-duty Nevada sheriff who was headed to California for vacation with his family saw Mike on the highway and stopped. The two of them scrambled up to our campsite. I'd been laying there unaware of the time that had passed. I was floating in my own little world now, not being able to see or hear anything. All of a sudden, I heard a twig snap and I was wide awake and alert. I later realized that I'd become sensitized to the sound of a twig