When you are a child trying to understand the meaning life, you have no idea if you are getting it. All you know is when you are obedient and stay out of trouble, your parents will not spank you. My life was very simple. I was born into a family consisting of three brothers and [...]
*Trigger warning - suicide. In four days it will be a year since I lost my only brother to suicide. The past year has been the most excruciatingly painful of all my 23 years. I was naïve to think I had ever known pain before April 8th of 2015. The days, weeks, and months that [...]
The Numbness in my Blood. It started fourteen years ago, and now I am a different person. For a long while, nobody could figure it out. My toddler son would have spells where he struggled to breathe, and sometimes turned a ghastly shade as he fought for air. Croup, they said at first. But the [...]
EMDR, PPD & Self Compassion... Every Monday I have my therapy appointment. This is for my new therapy that I started a few months ago, EMDR (Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing). If I tried to explain the exact technique, I think I would confuse you further. What I can say, is that it is hard. [...]
I was working as a paramedic in Long Island and preparing to go to medical school. My father has a condition called Mitral Valve Prolapse, which resulted in him having a surgical procedure. Because the condition is hereditary, I opted to have a voluntary surgical procedure on my heart to preserve my overall health. 95 [...]
Free The first time I thought about killing myself, I was seven or eight years old. My parents had recently separated. With their separation, the thin film that had kept me from falling into a dark hole wore through. In fact, I had reoccurring dreams about it, about a hole, in our front yard, sucking [...]
EMDR: For People With PTSD So often one of the first questions I am asked when people learn that I am therapist specializing in trauma work is "What is trauma and how do you really know you have PTSD?" So let me first start by explaining these terms, as they are too often misunderstood, with [...]
Inside My Head – Part III It would seem that I’ve hit the trifecta of brain damage. First, I told you about the one I don’t talk about: anxiety and panic. Then, I told you about the one I talk about all the time: concussions and post-concussion syndrome. Now, I’m going to tell you about [...]
Hello From The Outside (I Am A Hypocrite) I grew up in a loving home, with a father and a mother that were seemingly happy together. We went on family vacations and my siblings and I never went without. My parents sacrificed everything for us, and I will always be thankful for that – for [...]
When I was a child, I was told to fear strangers; that they were the threat to my innocence. Unfortunately, I was never told that real danger would come from someone in my own family. When I was 10 years old, my great grandfather molested me. It wasn’t enough that he stole my innocence from me, [...]
