Thoughts on PTSD, Choices, Awareness, Cannabis, and Related Matters
When you are allowed the blessed freedom,
and the arching solitude, to honor whatever your body can or cannot manage to
do, why then, some days reveal themselves as restoration days. Rest rest
resting days. Which often culminate, in the latter part of the day, with some
reward of battery recharged. Enough for a few household chores, and a dog romp
outside, as the sun sets and night approaches.
One of the interesting things one learns,
if one has been taken down by certain conditions, is the newly intimate
relationship between unconscious stressful responses/choices of thought/action,
and the physical impact upon the body. As if everything is quieter and simpler,
so you begin to notice the cause and effect of things.
Hence, there emerges a great and
remarkable feedback system, where even the smallest seismic alterations are
perceived, responded to, and choices of action/thought are changed in response
to what is most beneficial for the body.
Kind of like the stereotype of the holy
person in the cave, who of course can be more present than when they're driving
on the freeway, picking up groceries, mentally reconfiguring the bills and
budget, and dulling awareness of their aching back and exhaustion.
You know how the more you get to know a
chicken or a crow or a bug or someone you did not expect depth of relationship
with, the more complex and close and responsive the relationship becomes? Your
intent and theirs, the time you spend, creates increased complexity.
With healing from PTSD, a similar dynamic
occurs, if one is lucky enough to be able to significantly shift exposures to
triggers, and calm everybody the heck down. The awareness of WHAT sets things
off, and WHEN they are getting set off, and the extravagance to be able to respond
to the setting off, increases.
Yet,
I would say that the MOST significant problem with PTSD is in the
INABILITY TO PHYSICALLY MANAGE MEMORY EXTINCTION. The damaged of parts of the
brain (from trauma) related to memory extinction. The normal capacity we and
other living beings have, to break down memories so that they fade. Away.
If someone has developed PTSD from
whatever crappy origin, the areas of the brain that do this are damaged. Ripped
up. And the memories stay ALIVE as if they happened yesterday. So it's not
'psychological', this aspect, but PHYSICAL. There increasingly occurs this
flooding of SO MANY MEMORIES crushing themselves into the present day, or
present moment, which is simply not possible to tolerate. Thus, there are many very
predictable secondary aspects of PTSD.
It took me a long long time to realize
that overdoing it, and going on beyond for important situations and living as
you WANTED to be able to, as opposed to what you actually could manage, sets us
up for Adrenal Fatigue. And if we race far enough off the cliff, while
remaining oblivious to how far we are going to crash, we can end up pretty
spent. PTSD fosters this whole vulnerability. To overreach. To over react.
To underestimate. To dull out ways we feel
so we can function as we think we should. All nice ingredients in a disastrous
direction.
There are so many tools that help with
this, including supplements like GABA, Phosphytidyl Serine, Theanine, 5htp, and
more. There are so many herbs like Skullcap and Chamomile and Gotu Kola and
Holy Basil, and a range of Chinese herbal combinations. There is EKG neurofeedback, which is
remarkable, slow, cumulative, and often you can find a therapist who can't bill
for the neurofeedback, but can see you
and do neuro and bill for therapy session. There are BMC practitioners who can
help repair the brain and body in so many ways. There is EMDR and EFT, both of
which, once you become familiar, can be so incrementally useful and helpful.
And then there are types of mindfulness that are especially helpful in ongoing
groups, where one learns one aspect, and
then another, gently, until the repetition and homework begin to enable you to
integrate some very nice tools.
But some of the most exciting news
related to PTSD is regarding CANNABiS ,
and great success with some very sedating strains of medical marijuana, CBD
dominant strains, watching the herbal cannabis actually REPAIR these places in
the brain, so that memory extinction begins to happen. This is not drugged
memory impairment, or other bandaids, many of which are very valuable
supplements. This is physical repair.
PTSD is a lot like the injured arms and
backs and legs of my old clients, where, in order to heal, the reactive,
damaged, over-utilized nerves would have to be left alone to heal; no zapping.
If they avoided zapping, and they got worked on, they would HEAL. And then the
client could begin, very judiciously, to use the limb. If they did too much too
fast, it just cost them more money, because we would have to work on everything
longer. They usually got the gist after a few zapped times.
Mindfulness, or common sense, can be
great for PTSD, or wonderful in conjunction with therapy and other components.
Acknowledging a trigger or a memory or a feeling, being with it for a bit,
watching it pass away like a cloud, and
then turning our focus to something else, works very well with practice.
Lovingly helping ourselves become
immersed in something easy peasy and soothing, or useful, like doing the
acknowledging thing with a zap, and then watch it go by, and then look down
into the dish water as you wash the dishes, really just washing dishes and
watching the sunlight glisten on the soap bubbles, feeling your feet on the floor
and your legs and hips and torso and shoulders and head, brings you nicely into
the present moment, in which everything is a bit more manageable than awhile
ago or speculative thoughts of the future.
And beginning to get the cause and effect
of , yeah, too much news, or too much FB, or too many phone conversations or
the actual cost of going above and beyond what you can FEEL your body
struggling about; really getting the memo, and deciding to sit up and take
notice, and respond as well as possible under the circumstance to what you
actually need, is the very coolest most powerful thing.
