Children Archive - Susan Pease Banitt, LCSW

Archive for the ‘Children’ Category

The Truth and the Lies Behind QAnon: A Trauma Therapist Speaks

THE POLARITY

A vast majority of Republicans believe that QAnon is a patriotic source of information designed to liberate the world from the hands of sadistic pedophile networks and that the good guys are the Republican politicians who will spearhead this rescue operation.

A vast majority of Democrats do not believe in organized pedophile networks and believe that their leaders would definitely tell them if such a thing were going on in the world.

Both sides are convinced they are right. Neither side presents much convincing factual evidence to support the totality of their assertions.

Sadly, neither of these scenarios are true. How do I know? Because I am in the business of helping sex trafficked people understand their own histories and recover from unimaginable abuse. I am networked in with over 200 therapists who do the same kind of work I do around the world and have spent 25 years researching the underbelly world of mind controlled children who are used in sexual slavery, often starting in infancy, by organized networks of criminals.

WHAT IS THE REALITY?

Because the world of organized crime is so vast and highly networked, getting reliable statistics is extremely difficult. This is part of the problem. The gaps in reliable information get filled in with a mixture of propaganda and fantasy, leading to silly ideas such as that pizza parlors in Washington DC are the problem. Children can be trafficked anywhere. I have heard more stories about church basements than pizza parlors, but, also, why not pizza parlors? A child can be trafficked anywhere.

I have treated dozens of ritual abuse survivors, mind-controlled adult survivors of trafficking and victims of pedophile networks. The vast majority of these patients are sane, highly traumatized and eager to heal. They are surprisingly undramatic in their presentations most of the time due to the amount of trauma that they have endured. Some of them have won court cases against their abusers; some are still figuring out their history. I have also sought out dozens of hours of professional and peer consultation, been on an active listserv with a prominent professional organization and read dozens of books and articles including first person accounts from therapist survivors of these networks.

WHAT I HAVE LEARNED FROM PRIMARY RELIABLE SOURCES

Pedophile networks are, in fact, extensive, organized and lead to the highest corridors of power all over the world.

QAnon has this right. However, no one party or group of people is responsible for or immune to this behavior. The famous saying, “Power corrupts; absolute power corrupts absolutely” seems to be true in the world of child sex trafficking. Some of my clients have recognized and been triggered by their abusers from news broadcasts on television. Others have family members who are involved in highly prestigious institutions or the government or have been trained and trafficked by those people. And, yes, Hollywood is involved, but so are Ivy League colleges, the military, alphabet government agencies (e.g. CIA) and anywhere else that power and money comingle.

Children can be sold into networks in various ways.

Some children are given in exchange for positions of power or criminal immunity for pedophile relatives; some are born into intergenerational slavery; some vulnerable children are identified by networked neighbors, teachers, dentists or priests and “recruited”. In some cases, parents do not know what is happening to their kids. In other cases, the whole family has been creating mind controlled children for generations for purposes of power and control of society. Some of these families refer to themselves as “illuminati”, “satanic” or “masonic”. Some just want power and money.

Churches are deeply involved in networked pedophilia.

The famous Pace memorandum from the Mormon (LDS) church was allegedly buried by church elders when Bishop Pace, tasked with investigating allegations of widespread abuse, presented his shocking findings. The Catholic Church is filled with pedophile priests, as has been in the news. Many more church organizations than these famous examples are involved. The more fundamentalist they are, the more likely, it seems, that they have ties to systemic pedophilia, which makes sense when you think about how deeply invested fundamentalist systems and cults are in controlling their members.

Every region of the country is involved, and Indian reservations are especially vulnerable.

In my practice, I have had clients involved in networked pedophile groups from thirteen states and all sectors of the United States. Thirteen! If I add in reports from reliable colleagues that number easily triples. And activity is not confined to the US; I have also heard reliable reports from England, Australia, Switzerland and Canada. Indian reservations have had high rates of disappearing children for decades. I have had at least one client who was an eyewitness to the mass murder and trafficking of native children, and I have a colleague who is fighting this battle for the protection and recovery of trafficked people on a reservation right now! Of course, recently evidence has emerged in the media that indigenous children have been sold and trafficked for decades.

There seems to be a common “playbook” for the training of mind-controlled child sex slaves.

One year, I had three different clients from three different states report to me their conditioning to be confined in very small spaces (boxes) for long period of time as young children. They reported a coffin like container either in the house, or the woods, as part of a ceremony or not. Later they reported being drugged and trafficked in crates or similar small containers in boats, buses and in the back of military type Humvees as older children. It makes sense. As one client put it, “trafficked kids smell like urine and gasoline”. This conditioning of young children is too efficient, too consistent and too effective to be trial and error. Somebody or some group is training people to do this. There have been reliable reports of these trainers using pseudonyms such as “Dr. Green” and “Dr. Black”.

The numbers are staggering.

According to the FBI, about 400,000 children a year go missing in the United States. A child is abducted every 40 seconds. But those numbers are low. Why? They do not account for familial trafficking. Of all my clients over the years, only one ever came to court attention. None of my other clients were ever reported missing. I told one client that I had been hearing numbers like 1 in 100 people were trafficked and/or mind controlled. They scoffed and said, “well, maybe if you don’t count the sleepers”. (Sleepers meaning people who are mind controlled but have not yet been called up for action or are awake to their condition.) They thought it was easily three times that amount. They have clear memories of every single child in their public school in another state being taken out for abuse and conditioning starting in kindergarten.

You know someone connected to this world, and that’s why you don’t know.

People are terrified to think that these networks could touch their neighborhood, their church, their family. But they do. So many of us have ‘creepy neighbors’, a ‘funny uncle’, or ‘an inappropriate babysitter’. But it is too painful to live with a daily sense of unease; it creates too much cognitive dissonance and fear. So we go into denial. It is natural. Jennifer Freyd’s brilliant book, Blind to Betrayal, shows us how little we actually see of the worst of human nature around us.

HOW DOES QANON FIT INTO ALL THIS ?

I believe that QAnon is one of the most brilliant psychological operations in history. It operates with the classic Problem, Reaction, Solution method of behavioral shaping. Present a believable or even true problem: Pedophile networks are extensive and extend into government. Reaction: foment a reaction of fear, disgust and horror through sensationalization and weird details (pizza parlors). And then present the Solution. This is where the mind control aspect of QAnon reveals itself. Their solution is that their guy (Trump, or whoever they want in power) is on the side of good and will save people. The Solution is the biggest lie based on an earlier lie or suggestion that the networks exist only in one party or group of people.

This strategy works because we cannot bear the reality that both sides of the system may be “dirty”. Just as a child will fight to have at least one “good” parent, so will citizens fight to believe that their side (parent) is “good”. They will fight to the death for that belief in some cases. If both sides are involved, the world seems hopeless and bereft. We feel orphaned, just as we would if we found out that both of our parents were terrible people – an impossible realization for most people.

So, one side goes into denial about the problem (Democrats). And one side feels that their side will save humanity (Republicans) and identifies with the aggressor. Brilliant propaganda. But evil. And untrue.

WHAT IS THE ANSWER TO THIS HORRIBLE PROBLEM OF PERVASIVE ABUSE AND TRAFFICKING IN SOCIETY?

You must do your own internal work and due diligence. Heal your own traumas and fears. People with unhealed traumas are extremely easy to mislead and manipulate. The sad truth is that people you love and admire could possibly be perpetrators, and your judgment about them may have initially been wrong. Be willing to change your mind! Surrender your tribalism and sense of rightness about your position while engaging a clear-eyed curiosity about horrible things in service to the truth. Be willing to accept what previous generations could not see and accept but do this without falling into despair and nihilism.

Moving through stages of shock, horror and grief has taken me, my colleagues and my clients a long time. It is the work needed to fully address the sad truth of humanity: that evil does and has always walked among us, that children need more protection than they get and that people addicted to money, sex and power are highly motivated to destroy other people’s lives.

IS THERE ANY GOOD NEWS HERE?

YES! What we know about we can heal. What we see, we can take action against. When we take back our defenses against this information (“pedo networks don’t exist” or “my side is the only good side”) we can JOIN TOGETHER! We need both wings of the bird to fly. Imagine what could happen if we all came together: Republicans and Democrats to fight this great evil in a clear-eyed way. What if all the networks were stopped and psychopaths identified? What if all the children could be rescued and adult survivors got appropriate treatment? What might the future look like then?

Five Unbearable Things I Want You to Know about Human Trafficking and Slavery

Twenty-four years ago, my sister, author Lisa Pease, alerted me to the information on mind control that she kept encountering in her research. She said, “You are the therapist in the family. I don’t have time to research this; maybe you do”. I was skeptical of the ability to totally control another human being until I encountered the disclosures of trauma-based mind control. It was shocking. Pioneered in the Nazi concentration camps and continued after Project Paperclip had brought Nazi scientists to America there had been a deep and effective dive into gaining total control over human beings starting in early childhood or even later by government agencies and other interested parties. Immediately I realized that I had encountered some of these victims professionally, both as colleagues and as patients. I have spent the time since researching and treating survivors of what is called “sex trafficking” “mind control” “organized abuse” “ritual abuse” “cults” “mkultra” and other monikers, all of which are related to each other. For over ten years I have been a member of the special interest group, RAMCOA (ritual abuse, mind control, and organized abuse) under the auspices of the International Society for the Study of Trauma and Dissociation. In that time, I have given many talks nationally and internationally as well as speaking on a number of podcasts about this issue. Although I am currently on medical leave the last few years of my practice have been largely populated with RAMCOA survivors. It is heavy work that requires a high level of skill.

The ‘training’ to become a human slave often begins in infancy and nearly always includes torture and ritual abuse.

The human personality and mental structures of self form very early in life, largely before 3 years of age. The brain is exceedingly “plastic” in children; consider, for example, the relative ease at which kids can learn multiple languages, information which sticks in the brain for a lifetime. To gain control and mastery over an entire personality requires creating multiple compartments (alters or ANPs) and then handing the switching over to handlers. This requires extreme and prolonged torture, as well as extravagant rewards. The earlier handlers can start this process the easier it is, and they do, even before birth. This is a very sophisticated process where a computer like system is created to categorize different personalities and subpersonalities for different skill sets, memories, and behavioral programs, including ones that maintain the amnesia of the ‘front’ or ‘shell’ personality which is supposed to be very normal appearing. For clinicians this means that these people have a muddled dissociative picture. They appear to be more OSDD (Otherwise Specified Dissociative Disorder) than DID (Dissociative Identity Disorder). According to several of my clients, assets that appear as multiples are considered ‘programming failures’. Switching of personalities is something that is very subtle and supposed to happen ‘behind the scenes’ in response to subtle cues given by handlers in person, by media or by preprogramming. For the average therapist and citizen well programmed children and adults are nearly impossible to casually detect. I usually end up seeing somebody in whom programming has gone sideways through handler error causing severe psychological damage or because something happened which caused the victim to exert superhuman effort to extricate themselves.

Children can be sold into slavery before they are born, after they are born and sometimes a couple of generations earlier. They are used repeatedly for the rest of their lives unless they escape.

The Jason Bourne conclusion, that people choose this, is a myth. People do not sign up for mind control or trafficking or being a super soldier. Most of the time they are born into it. I have had some clients whose families appear to have been given government favors in exchange for surrendering them to these programs. In other cases, pedophiles have been given immunity in exchange for children. Sometimes the families are literally paid money, as was written about in therapist and survivor Wendy Hoffman’s autobiography, The Enslaved Queen: A Memoir About Electricity and Mind Control (2019). I have had clients who were born into ‘illuminati’ and/or masonic families where this kind of conditioning is business as usual for the family members, who are then groomed for wealth and power. Although high achieving and well to do, the level of dysfunction in these families is off the charts.

Trafficked people may live apparently normal lives or lives of extreme dysfunction. You know some of them.

Reliable numbers are hard to come by because 1) the networks of enslaved people and their handlers extend to the media, science and government who will not report them; 2) many trafficked people are not awake to their plight yet – they are too dissociative, and 3) the masterminds go to great lengths to hide their tracks, and they are very, very good at it. Many of my colleagues give a rough estimate based on decades at work that at least 1% of people in the USA are trafficked through extreme behavioral conditioning. I said this to one of my clients and they actually laughed, “1 percent?! Well, maybe if you are not talking about the sleepers (people who have been conditioned but not called up into use). Everybody in my public school class was taken out for conditioning”. This client was believable. They were not given to histrionics or exaggeration and had a very high IQ, as most of these people do.

I have a colleague who believes we are all screened for mind control usefulness at a young age; she has a longer time in this field than even I do. I do not know if that could possibly be true, although I am now willing to entertain many possibilities that I used to not entertain. I do know that if 1 in a 100 people have this history, you have encountered them. If it is 1 in 30, you have sat in classes with them, know them, and possibly have them as close friends. Even if, against all odds, they are aware of their history they are VERY unlikely to tell anybody except their therapist and/or their partner. Many people have come to me because they know their therapist cannot handle their history and/or will not believe them.

Trafficking and mind control (behavioral) networks are extensive and are based in white supremacy. They are in every state and include members inside of the cultural institutions that are supposed to protect citizens: police departments, hospitals, justice departments and governments.

I did not know this for a long time. I just kept following the trails of puzzle pieces. Those pieces were always in plain sight. Everyone in child abuse protection knows about those few judges that just will not give a pedophile a meaningful sentence. They know who they are, but not why they are doing this and who they are connected to. Everyone in the business knows that there are good cops, but also bad ones who are not willing to believe or follow up on child abuse cases involving ritual abuse. And then there is the former False Memory Syndrome Foundation which folded at the end of 2019. This apparent CIA op (there were at least 3 known CIA operatives on the board) hurt a lot of therapists and clients. They were very successful in infiltrating the media to such an extent that it seems unlikely they were able to do that without help from networks. I have many colleagues still recovering from the “memory wars” that were waged on therapists and their clients in courtrooms all across this country (fortunately I was having babies at that time).

I have had clients from every part of this country. They have disclosed abuse and conditioning in: military bases, churches (Mormon and Catholic figure predominantly), schools, neighbor’s houses, dental offices, remote estates, and mental institutions. Colleagues have fleshed out some of these networks and connections. We know that the CIA and other alphabet agencies had a big hand in developing sophisticated mind control techniques in league with major medical institutions and prominent universities around the country and in Canada. (For more on the CIA’s involvement I recommend my sister’s book A Lie Too Big to Fail: The Real History of the Assassination of Robert F. Kennedy, 2018.)

Eventually my clients and colleagues begin talking about white supremacy and how viciously white supremacist the abusers were. They start to draw connections to the Masons, the Mormons, the Illuminati and local government systems. They can’t get records. They can’t find records. They are afraid to talk to family.

What really concerns me about the Freemasons is how pervasive yet quiet they are. My family and I have RV’d all over thousands of miles of the Western United States. I have yet to find the town that is too small for a prominent Masonic Hall. Think about it – an all male, mostly all white group of individuals that are everywhere and yet totally secret. (And just in case you know a Mason or are a Mason, only certain people from certain levels are let in on the most nefarious parts of the organization. The rest of the people just have a good bonding and educational experience.) From the point of view of systems theory, if a system is “as sick as its secrets” then the Freemasons are catastrophically ill.

There is plenty of evidence of widespread collusion, conspiracy and control. Research MKUltra. Look up Svali Speaks. Or just start to open your eyes to the patterns around you. Why can cops kill black people with so much impunity and stare in the camera while they do it? Look at Epstein. This is HARD to look at, harder than systemic racism (which it includes) and that is plenty hard. Hard because we cannot believe the wool has been pulled that far over our eyes and hard because the evidence is almost unreadable. Hard because people who believe in collusion are called ‘conspiracy theorists’ – in itself a term used by the CIA to discredit observers. Hard now, because people who see these patterns tend to be conservatives and Republicans so liberals dismiss them. In the 1970s the conspiracy observers were Democrats. Hard because you are going to see some people that you really like or love emerge as part of this nefarious system. Some of that knowledge comes from the primary source of my clients, but there are plenty of other resources for information including many autobiographies, books, podcasts and websites. Lastly, it is hard because it is overwhelming and once you really see the scope of it, you cannot unsee it, and it is easy to lose hope. DON’T LOSE HOPE! Lots of good is happening. But first, we have to deal with this mess.

All trafficked people have dissociative disorders that are exceedingly difficult to treat, and most therapists do not have the first clue about doing this work.

I have trained and supervised clinicians for decades. Almost no therapist comes out of school with a good understanding of dissociation. Thanks to the False Memory Foundation many had their heads spun around by disinformation as did their supervisors. Many clinicians are still ignorant to the reality of organized abuse! There are only a few of us who want to and can do this work long term. It is arduous and there is little reward for it other than seeing people get free and healthy (which is amazing!). I have had clients dumped in my lap by other clinicians in a very inappropriate way because the therapist panicked or didn’t care enough to terminate professionally. I have had people move to this state just to work with me. Because there are few good options out there. Not much more to say about this other than…I and my colleagues are working on bringing this consciousness to general therapy practice.

If you made it this far in reading, I am truly grateful that you are considering this information. Take care of yourself; a better day is coming.

School Shootings: An Open Letter to Parents

Dear Parents,

I feel your pain and horror. I, too, am a parent and have two Juniors this year whose finals week was interrupted by the school shooting at Reynolds high school. They have been so busy just trying to get through finals week that they haven’t even had time or energy to integrate what is happening in their own community.

Nothing makes us more anxious than a threat to our children’s safety. Nothing makes us feel more powerless, saddened and enraged then when our schools safe walls are breached by murderous rage and terror.

Some of us are vulnerable to traumatic stress and anxiety already. Events like this can feel overwhelming to cope with, and even moreso to help our kids to cope. So what can we do?

As a professional and as a parent, I recommend that you put on the metaphorical oxygen mask first. Please take the time to do whatever you can to take care of yourself in the coming weeks. If you feel your own anxiety spiraling out of control, please get some help from a qualified trauma therapist or perhaps some other provider that you feel comfortable with such as an acupuncturist, Reiki practitioner or yoga therapist. If you feel that you need psychiatric medication, now would be a good time to get a consultation. Practicing mindfulness meditation could be helpful or whatever really helps you calm down and integrate.

If you are like most Americans you are probably going to want to think your way out of this problem and come up with a snappy and satisfying solution (gun control, armed school guards, mental health interventions etc). I would encourage you NOT to jump to this just yet. First we need to calm ourselves down and become really, REALLY present to ourselves and our families.

Trauma, like grief, has its own pace and rhythm, and some of us are dealing with both. Our kids may have known the victim(s) or even been the victim. We need to give healing its full due. If our kids see us stopping, processing and restoring ourselves from trauma, that gives them permission to do so as well. There are many resources for healing out there, including my book, The Trauma Tool Kit: Healing PTSD From the Inside Out, which has a whole chapter on first-aid for trauma shock, the first stage of trauma. Reading it will help you cope with the immediate aftermath of trauma. (You can find it in your local library and in all bookstores.)

Your children are in shock and grief, too. Like my kids, they may be in the middle of finishing up testing and not really be available for processing their feelings, or they may have a lot of time on their hands and be inwardly stewing over what has happened. Lately the world seems to have exploded in violence. Even if they are quiet, they have definitely noticed.

Make yourself extra available to them. Depending on age, gender and temperament our children will have varying needs and ways of moving through their own horror, anger and sadness. Allow them to find their own mode of expression, which may be very different than yours. But they do need to express in order to integrate.

As a child and teen therapist, I know that there are very few children who can just sit down and talk about their feelings to their parents in an adult way. It is best to find activities to do with your kids and let the conversation steer its way naturally to what is troubling them. You can ask open ended questions and make positive statements such as, “I’m really interested in what you think/feel about this event.” “What are other people saying about what happened on Facebook?” etc. Good activities can be throwing a ball, shooting hoops (I got really good at this doing inpatient work with boys), going for a walk together, driving somewhere, listening to music together (their choice), playing a card or board or video game (not too intense so there is room for conversation). You need to initiate these activities, especially for kids who tend to isolate when they are upset.

Allow your children, and especially teens, an uncensored discussion. If you have rules about swearing or intensity (such as loudness or sarcastic tone), tell your child that you have suspended these rules, so they can say, freely, whatever is on their mind. Our kids talk very differently to each other than they do in front of us. If they need to blow off steam but feel inhibited in front of us, they will blow off steam elsewhere.

Sometimes stressful events like this show areas of relationships that are in need of work. If you have been having trouble connecting with your child, this trauma will not automatically draw you closer. It may, in fact, do the opposite. If so, consider seeking out professional help for yourself and/or the family.

Put down your cell phone when you are home. Stay home and make it clear that you are available when they need to talk, even if that need comes up around 10 or 11 pm as they are going to bed (as if often will). Monitor your own need to engage in avoidance activities and choose engagement.

If you do not already have a self-care routine, now would be an excellent time to start one. I am a big fan of progressive relaxation exercises and often prescribe them. You could find some online or buy a CD and practice relaxing your whole body a couple of times a day, to reset your own nervous system. Allow yourself more downtime than usual.

Know these signs of acute stress and monitor them in your children. If they persist past 2-4 weeks they may be cause for concern:

– repetitive talk about the event

–  repetitive drawing of the event

– irritable

– withdrawn 

– needy and clingy 

– more forgetful than usual 

– having trouble regulating emotions: laughing silly “highs” crash into sullen “lows

– hair-pulling (trichotillomania) 

– disturbed eating

– insomnia or frequent awakening in fear or tantrums

– age-inappropriate behavior such as bed-wetting

– rigid and perseverative play behavior (in younger children)

Lastly, know that no matter how upsetting this event is to your family and child, healing is possible. Human beings are incredibly resilient. In the process of healing you and your family may wish to take some action in the world. If this feels right to you, do it. The wound of trauma often demands some response from us – when the time is right.

Blessings on your journey of healing, Sue

Why Dylan Farrow’s Disclosure Matters

“It is very tempting to take the side of the perpetrator…All the perpetrator asks is that the bystander do nothing. He appeals to the universal desire to see, hear, and speak no evil. The victim, on the contrary, asks the bystander to share the burden of pain. The victim demands action, engagement, and remembering.”

~ Judith Herman

From 1989-1993 I worked in Massachusetts for the Child-At-Risk Hotline at Judge Baker Children’s Center, in the Longwood Medical Area. We covered the entire state after hours for reports of suspected child abuse and neglect when the departments of investigation were closed for the day and on weekends. I was a supervisor, which meant that every single suspected case of abuse or neglect was “run by” me. With the screener’s help I determined whether it was a case that was false, probably true or so emergently true that we had to take action that very shift.

Children’s lives and well-being hung in the balance so we were very highly trained and conscientious in our work. Over that period I estimate that I heard somewhere around 15,000 stories of child abuse. I developed a very good BS detector.

Like many I had heard vague allegations about Dylan Farrow when she was a child, but it was hard to know what to think and why the case had not been prosecuted.

This week’s publication of her letter to the New York Times has changed all that for me.

Since it was published last week there has been a firestorm of responses and conversations popping up all over social media, some helpful and others not so much.

As a child abuse prevention professional and a treater of many adult victims of childhood trauma I would like to add my perspective. I believe Dylan. Her story is coherent, believable and internally consistent.

Let’s look at the list of secondary gains that each side gets from lying. For Woody and Dylan there are reasons to lie and reasons to tell the truth. There are also many reasons not to.

Dylan Lies:

Pros: Cons:

She gets attention in the press. She and her family is vilified in the media.

She gets people to feel sorry for her Her credibility is forever tarnished

in the eyes of friends, employers, etc.

She’s going for a book or movie deal? Her accused is a Hollywood insider.

She could be sued for defamation.

Maybe I lack imagination but I’m already out of reasons for her to lie about this. Usually when people tell big lies there is a big positive payoff. I don’t see it here. Do you? The Cons are overwhelmingly negative and threaten to ruin her life. Just to be a somebody in the press? There are easier ways. OK, let’s look at the other side.

Woody Lies:

Pros Cons

He keeps making movies He gets a clean conscience (if he’s not

a sociopath)

He keeps all his money He may need to pay a lot of money in a

lawsuit

People keep loving him and his work People will be revulsed by him and his work

He keeps his relationships He loses friends and business contacts

The Romans used to ask an important question, Qui Bono? Who benefits here? Dylan suffers more by lying than she gains. Woody suffers more by telling the truth by far. Lying is in his best interest as it is in the case of most perpetrators. Even if we look at just dollars and profit motive, Dylan stands to lose more than she gains by lying where the opposite is true with Woody. It is incredibly hard to win lawsuits against perpetrators, especially when there was no original conviction.

But what about the argument her mother made her do it by “implanting” memories. Oh please! Maybe (maybe!!! although I’ve never seen it in decades of practice) a seven year old could be persuaded. But an adult knows better. Mind control is possible, but it requires years of skilled training to do and the only experts in the world are black ops top secret level psy military people who do not publish manuals. Occam’s razor suggests that this argument is full of giant holes. Like smoke and fire, reports of abuse almost always coincide with actual abuse!

As for Woody, well we already know him as a man with exceedingly poor boundaries and someone who acts without considering the consequences for those around him by marrying his long-term partner, Mia’s teenaged daughter. Everyone who “testified” for him at the awards show (wasn’t that strange) talked about all the roles he had written for women, not anything about his character. I had the sense that the women supposedly speaking on his behalf were really speaking on their own interests. But having said that perps are exceedingly good at getting people to believe them. And the longer the friendship, the harder to see the perp inside the man.

If you look at the Herman quote above you will see why. I have written in The Trauma Tool Kit how the mind wants to avoid material it sees as threatening to its own sense of security and comfort. Contemplating that your best loved films were created by a monster creates a level of cognitive dissonance that most people cannot handle.

But, you see, we must. Because this is one story among millions. Every day there are victims who tell the truth and are shut out of their families because the perpetrator is believed. Because the people they tell will not or cannot tolerate a change in perspective and a re-ordering of their own lives and view of reality.

Our culture is sick. I agree with the neo-feminists who talk of the ‘rape culture’ in which we live. All over the world from time out of mind women and children have been raped, dominated and treated like property. Men have relied on each other to maintain power, to satisfy their lusts and desires and do what they want. Just because they can. For humanity to evolve, this has to end. That means TELLING THE TRUTH, no matter how unpleasant or personally uncomfortable that makes us. After all, it could be your daughter or son, neighbor, friend or cousin who is the next victim.

Only then will the real healing begin for individuals and society as whole.

As for me, I’m breaking up with Woody and all his films. I wish Dylan a sense of wholeness, peace and healing for her future. She has suffered enough.

Helping Kids Deal With The Moore Tornado and other Disasters

Children can be particularly vulnerable to distressing weather and events. Even children that were not directly affected will be deeply disturbed by these community wide disasters. Most parents have not been taught to look for signs that children are under stress, or even intense stress. This blog, by request, will give you some tips on helping your children recover from the devastating tornadoes in the midwest.

First know that your child is stressed. Some signs that children are stressed include:

– repetitive talk about the event
– repetitive drawing of the event
– unusually irritable
– unusually withdrawn
– needy and clingy
– more forgetful than usual
– having trouble regulating emotions: laughing silly “highs” crash into sullen “lows”
– hair-pulling (trichotillomania)
– disturbed eating
– disturbed sleep

We forget what it is like to be a child. Under 14 years of age, children have some awareness that they cannot survive without adult assistance; this is especially true for very young children. Children watch their parents very carefully and take their cues from them about whether they should be upset or not. In addition children have losses in the storm that adults may trivialize or not realize the depth of the loss. For instance, a parent may not know that a stuffed animal was more like a best friend, or that a destroyed work of their art has taken away a precious sense of self. Because parents are suffering their own losses and in survival mode they may not feel like children are dealing with anything significant, but, of course, they are.

Here are some ways to help your child heal in the aftermath:

1) Limit media exposure of the event. Adults tend to watch traumatic events obsessively but we know from 9/11 that this can create traumas in kids who may not understand that they are seeing the same event repeated rather than several different events. TV may make them think the world is ending

2) Set some “processing” time aside every day for your kids where they can express their feelings. Young children (3yrs-8yrs) might be encouraged to color, draw a picture, or engage in puppet play. 8-12 years olds might want more information about storms, or just to spend time playing games. (Experienced child therapists know that most kids need to be occupied with a game or activity in order to talk about their feelings.) Teenagers may be able to sit and talk if they are mature, and are invited to participate in a judgment free zone. Also, ball throwing and basketball hoop shooting are excellent ways to get kids to open up. During this time turn off your phone and your own agendas and create a lot of space to just listen or answer questions.

3) Try to keep a normal rhythm to the day, even if you are in a shelter. Have regular mealtimes, structured activities and a bed time.

4) Speaking of bedtime, be aware that sleep may be difficult at first. Kids may be having unpleasant dreams processing the storm. Be patient and non-judgmental about this, while helping maintain a schedule.

5) Monitor your own reactions. Calm yourself down as much as possible. Do not share horrible new stories with your kids or in earshot of them. They will be alarmed but will not tell you.

6) Understand that quiet kids may not be OK. Invite them to play with you or help you with simple chores. Reinforce any sharing with your attention and love.

7) Provide lots of hugs and affection. Take time for yourself and for them. You both need the contact!

8) If your child has a pronounced behavioral change reach out for professional help ASAP. Red Cross will have referrals for free and low-income therapy professionals.

9) Be active in reassuring your children that life will get better. Hold the optimism for them, even if you are feeling discouraged. This is kind and wise parenting.

10) Lastly, cultivate patience! Be patient with your kids and be patient with the city and be patient with yourself. Stop and breathe as needed. Practice self-care and stay aware of your own needs! Then you won’t resist the children’s needs when they are up.

Know that there are so many of us pulling for all of you and your kids. Our hearts go out to yours. Be well and be safe!

24 Hours With PTSD

I wrote this post so that those without PTSD can begin to understand and so that those with PTSD know that someone else has been there before. I do not have PTSD any longer. WARNING: MAY BE TRIGGERING.

I wake up groggy, with remnants of a bad night’s sleep still clinging to me. I don’t want to go back to sleep, but I’m not sure I can face the day either. I cannot remember my dreams, but I know they weren’t good. Last night I didn’t yell in a nightmare and disrupt my husband’s badly needed sleep. That, at least is good. I cannot remember the last time sleep felt refreshing. Now it feels like another form of deprivation, another instrument of suffering, another of the myriad losses of PTSD. I wonder if I will ever have a good night’s sleep again.

My joints and gut ache as they do every day now as I push myself up to sit on the side of my bed. If I don’t move slowly I risk dizziness. Lately my body doesn’t seem to know where it is in space. I have bruises that I don’t remember getting from bumping into doorways, edges of tables and chairs. It’s like having the PMS clumsies all the time. The bruises don’t hurt though. On the contrary, I hardly feel them. It’s the pain inside that absorbs all my attention. I breathe, attempting, without success to ground myself before beginning my day.

My kids are waiting for breakfast and a ride to school so I need to get a move on. Every day my prayer is the same. Please let me be a good mother. Help me protect them from what I am going through. Give me the strength to do what I need to and I will deal with my PTSD later. It doesn’t always help, and guilt over bad mommy moments is a constant companion these days.
Mornings are particularly bad with PTSD. It is as if someone has gone through my sensory system and turned up all the knobs to high. Light stabs my eyeballs making me squint with pain. Sounds are amplified as if I am in an echo chamber. Internal feelings and emotions can rev to highs and lows with no warning. I keep a very zen environment. The kids know not to talk too loud, bang their plates or scrape their forks. My husband is encouraged to leave the kitchen without cleaning it because the running water sounds like white noise in my head. We keep the lights low. I never know how bad it is going to be and they don’t either. Fortunately, my kids are not morning people either. They move slowly and quietly. I worry that I’ve become too controlling, but the stakes are too high to do anything different.

I’ve tried to explain what it is like to live in this body now to my very calm, stoic Lutheran raised midwestern husband. If there is a superpower for nerves of steel, he has it. My husband deals with life and death in his cath lab on a daily basis. He works in the space of millimeters for hours on end to open blocked hearts when his patients’ only alternative is life threatening surgery or certain death. He has not experienced PTSD or any mental affliction. His mental health and stability is both an asset and a hazard in our relationship. Sometimes I just need him to lose it on my behalf, to show that he really, really gets it.

I explain to him that on bad days I feel like I have ground glass running throughout my nervous system with sharp jaggedy edges. I explain how triggers make me want to jump out of my skin and how that jump is always accompanied by intense emotion, either a tornado of disintegrating rage, or fear or both. I explain how I know what some of my triggers are, but that every day, as I work through my healing in therapy, new ones are popping out and that we can both be caught off guard. I want him to understand that the constant flow of adrenaline makes me look alert and energized on the outside but that inside I feel exhausted. Wired and tired is how I put it. The foot is full throttle on the gas pedal, but the car is stuck in neutral. (I look for good manly analogies.) I explain that I need him to not react to my irritation and anger, to not take it personally, that it is only the PTSD rearing its ugly head. He nods his head with understanding, but the next time he does take it personally. And why wouldn’t he? Another source of guilt and rage for me. And a source of fragility for our marriage, a marriage that has always been strong. Is PTSD going to take this away from me too?

Normally couples can make up with physical intimacy. But even the least little bit of this comfort is now denied me. When the PTSD first hit, even hugging through two layers of flannel pajamas made me nauseous and dizzy. That initial shock has settled into a distant sort of numbness. I hug out of habit, but I can’t really feel it. I can’t feel my connection to myself or to him. The only connection that is safe for me is the kids. Thank goodness I can still feel my love for them. I realize that it is possible that my husband has become a trigger. But I’m not sure. Is it him? Or is it the trigger? Is our marriage viable? I have no idea, and I have to live with that uncertainty for months, and so does he. I decide not to decide until I have progressed in my healing.

After everyone leaves for the day, I face hours alone, just me and my PTSD. I am both relieved and terrified. Some days are better than others. Some days I have therapy with the shaman therapist. He is helpful and powerful, and there is no state he cannot bring me out of. I am very, very lucky to have him as a resource. Still, there are many hours to fill.

With PTSD I am never really happy. I miss simple happiness. I miss joy. I take my dogs on a walk and watch them run with abandon, big wild dog joy grins on their faces. On a good day, my insides feel like a grey, shadowless Portland winter day, flat and featureless. On a bad day, a howling storm is raging that threatens to obliterate me. Unless I am in the bleakest place I will myself to do my job as mother and housemaker: cook something, clean something, pay something. Self-care and hygiene is no longer a natural act, but something that must be chosen and willed every day. When I am in the darkest states, I curl up for hours on the sofa waiting for my next therapy appointment.

Fortunately, I did not just fall off the turnip truck. I have had a lot of training and life experience. I can meditate. I can do breathing exercises. I can walk (until I have a very bad skiing accident, but that is another story). I know by virtue of my age and therapy that this too shall pass, that there is no way I can stay in this state forever, that I am working actively on my healing. Sometimes this helps, and sometimes it really doesn’t.

PTSD taunts me with loneliness. If I had cancer, or some other major medical illness, if I were a victim of a current crime or in a car accident or had something visibly wrong with me, people would know. People would sympathize, maybe bring over a casserole, send a card, check in with me or take me to lunch. But nobody knows. I cannot talk about my disability because to talk about it makes me feel much, much worse. Talking about it makes my head spin and my stomach want to retch. Even if I could stand to see the look on people’s face when I tried to talk about my condition, most of them, like my good husband, would not really understand. They might nod their heads politely and say that time heals all wounds, or that I should be grateful for what I have now. I might have to kill them for that. Or myself. So I remain silent and withdraw unnoticed. I go to school events, put on a brave face and then crawl into bed exhausted.

If I am lucky I make it through the day without any major triggers. But it feels like walking daily through a mine field. At the end of the day I lose myself briefly in spending time with my happy amazing kids. I manage to stay focused on them and their needs until their bedtime. But then I am used up and collapse on the sofa exhausted. I have nothing left for my spouse. I try to look back over my day and find one thing to feel good about. Sometimes I succeed. Sometimes I just want to hurt myself. I watch these moods come and go with the experienced eye of a therapist and meditator. It doesn’t mean it’s easy though.

I have no idea how people make it through without the level of support that I have, and then I realize that many of them don’t make it.

Bedtime comes, and with it, intense dread. I used to love bedtime. I couldn’t wait to snuggle down into flannel sheets, cozy up to my hubbie and drift off feeling our warm connection. Now we sleep on the edges of the bed. I tell him I love him, but please don’t touch me. Trained doctor that he is, he falls asleep instantly. I am left with the final battle of the day.

Sometimes I can fall asleep easily sometimes I can’t. But I never stay asleep. Every 90 minutes like clockwork, my mind and body pop out of sleep. It is exhausting. REM sleep is where our bodies process intense emotion and memories. I think about how waking people up before REM sleep is a torture that can result in psychosis. As I slip into the dream state the nightmares come. They are bad. Sometimes they are screaming and striking out in my sleep bad. But more often I wake up before I can even have them, a new conditioned response that is out of my control. I meditate. I do yoga to relax and start over. I read. Sometimes these things help and sometimes they do not.

I don’t know if tomorrow will be any better, but I hope it will. And when I can’t hope I endure.

Healing Together With An Infinite Mind

I just returned from my favorite conference of the year, the Healing Together Conference put on by Infinite Mind. Infinite Mind is a group of people with DID, which is Dissociative Identity Disorder. You might know it better as Multiple Personality Disorder.

Why is this my favorite conference? Many reasons. This group of people who suffer from DID and those who support and/or treat them are the most dedicated, open and knowledgeable group I have been involved with. There is no lying, no minimization, no disinformation. Pain is acknowledged but not dwelt on. Jaime Pollock, the main organizer, is known for her organizational skills, her comedic timing and her immense sensitivity to the suffering of others. She is completely open about her own journey, but never triggering. There is an art room and a quiet grounding room with lots of pillows and blankets with student psychology interns available to help as needed.

Remember the movie Sybil? Well, the real Sybil, Shirley Mason painted her way through her treatment. There was a beautiful and moving exhibit of some of her paintings during the conference. Despite the recent book questioning her diagnosis, most people who knew her, and most specialists believe, she was, in fact, DID. The pictures in this article are some of hers. Some facts about them: she often painted telephone poles, sail boats (to sail away from her pain?) and yellow, she said, was the color of her mother’s screaming.

Another famous multiple, Truddi Chase, wrote the runaway best seller When Rabbit Howls. Her daughter, Kari, gave a very moving account of what it was to be the daughter of a multiple growing up. It was very clear that a distant, mean father was much more of a liability to a growing child than a mother with DID. Another interesting presentation was a mother-daughter pair from England discussing the same topic. Carol, who only “discovered” her DID later in life brought some remarkable videos of herself in other personality states (called ‘alters’ or ‘parts’). Her daughter with much patience and humor described a mother who often could not remember what she had said five minutes ago, but she was fun to play with! They shared a very dramatic and, at times, journey of healing which continues today.

On a more serious note, the mental health system in England and other places is severely lacking and there is much international work to be done on educating practitioners not only about the reality of DID, but how to work effectively on integrating painful memories.

Here are a few important facts to know about people with DID:

1) DID begins at an early age, usually before 7 but is often not diagnosed until later in life.

2) DID is always the result of severe and prolonged trauma. There has to be immense force involved to shatter a mind.

3) Most people with DID are law-abiding and peaceful people who suffer from extreme internal torment.

4) Many people with DID grow up to be loving (if somewhat dysfunctional) parents.

5) Children of parents with DID can thrive, especially with support from the community.

6) People with DID hold jobs in all sectors of society. They are preschool teachers, lawyers, police officers, writers, hospice workers, etc.

7) You cannot tell if someone has DID by looking at them.

8) With appropriate treatment people can integrate fully and heal from DID and their traumatic histories that were the cause of their problems.

9) People with DID almost always have problems with losing time. Often people think they are pathological liars because different alters give different information. Over time they learn how to compensate for these difficulties.

10) DID is fairly prevalent. It is estimated that 1 out of 100 people in the USA suffer from DID, and it is found in every country.

I had the privilege of giving trauma informed yoga classes in the morning and presenting two workshops: one on Yogic Modalities For Healing From PTSD and one on The Effects of Abuse and Trauma on Developing Children. The audiences were engaged, and responsive.

If you are a therapist, a physician, someone suffering from DID or you know someone with DID I would highly recommend this yearly conference as a place to learn, to laugh and to commiserate with a group of compassionate and knowledgeable people. It is held in Orlando, Florida every year in late winter. I feel very grateful to be involved with this amazing group.

Find Your ACE Score

Last year I posted about the largest study you’ve never heard of : the Adverse Childhood Events Study. ACE has shown by using over 17000 participants data over several years that the more adverse childhood event categories you’ve been exposed to, the higher your chance of illness, obesity, mental problems, and socioeconomic ills. You do not have to have full blown PTSD to be exposed to these risks. People with the highest scores died, on average, 20 years sooner than people with the lowest scores. The good news is that getting treatment and adopting healthy lifestyle behaviors can mitigate your risk.

What is your risk? Take the questionnaire below:

Finding Your ACE Score While you were growing up, during your first 18 years of life:

1. Did a parent or other adult in the household often or very often… Swear at you, insult you, put you down, or humiliate you?

Act in a way that made you afraid that you might be physically hurt?
Yes No If yes enter 1

2. Did a parent or other adult in the household often or very often… Push, grab, slap, or throw something at you?

or
Ever hit you so hard that you had marks or were injured?

Yes No If yes enter 1

3. Did an adult or person at least 5 years older than you ever…
Touch or fondle you or have you touch their body in a sexual way?

Attempt or actually have oral, anal, or vaginal intercourse with you?
Yes No If yes enter 1

4. Did you often or very often feel that …
No one in your family loved you or thought you were important or special?

________

Your family didn’t look out for each other, feel close to each other, or support each other? Yes No If yes enter 1 ________

5. Did you often or very often feel that …
You didn’t have enough to eat, had to wear dirty clothes, and had no one to protect you?

Your parents were too drunk or high to take care of you or take you to the doctor if you needed it?

Yes No If yes enter 1 ________

6. Were your parents ever separated or divorced?
Yes No If yes enter 1 ________

7. Was your mother or stepmother:
Often or very often pushed, grabbed, slapped, or had something thrown at her?

or
Sometimes, often, or very often kicked, bitten, hit with a fist, or hit with something hard?

or
Ever repeatedly hit at least a few minutes or threatened with a gun or knife?

Yes No If yes enter 1 ________

8. Did you live with anyone who was a problem drinker or alcoholic or who used street drugs? Yes No If yes enter 1 ________

9. Was a household member depressed or mentally ill, or did a household member attempt suicide?

Yes No If yes enter 1 _______

10. Did a household member go to prison? Yes No If yes enter 1 _______

Now add up your Yes scores: ___________

For more information go to www.acestudy.org.

Helping Kids Recover From Hurricane Sandy

Children can be particularly vulnerable to distressing weather and events. Most parents have not been taught to look for signs that children are under stress, or even intense stress. This blog, by request, will give you some tips on helping your children recover from Sandy.