Chapter 18: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

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I'd like to think
I'm just like
anyone else - 
that we all have limits...
There's only so much
we can take...
So much -
Pain... Fear... Loss... Trauma.
There's only so much
any of us can experience
and remain sane
and remain true to
our ideals, our values,
WHO WE ARE
and
the person we have become.

When the pain,
the fear, the terror,
the trauma
exceeds this limit,
We snap
and for a while
we drift away...
away to someplace
in our mind,
someplace utterly unknown,
unexpected,
outside reality...
maybe we come back
and then again
maybe we don't...
It depends on what
might call us back.


Reflection:  The above poem is inspired by the "confessional" poetry of Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath who wrote about their inner experiences, their psyche.  They both took their lives.  Anne Sexton wrote, "To Bedlam and Part Way Back" which was her collection inspired by mental illness and psychiatric hospitalization.  I guess she never made it all the way back since she took her life.  I made it back.


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