#40 - Post Traumatic Nation

She walked into my office sitting down in the tradtional "therapy" chair.

She took in the whole room instantaneously, measuring the quality of the prints, the luxury of the carpetting, and eyes darting to every corner to assess any potential threats to her safety.

She pushed the chair back against the wall and positioned herself half-turned so that she could see my office door at all times.

Trauma has a way of doing that to a person.

She was beautiful, tall, powerful, outspoken, engaging, distrustful, wealthy, exhausted, distracted, anxious...

everything I had expected based on her clinical history.

"I'm famous you know."

I paused a moment to reply... careful not to trigger her into the spontaneous rages that had been causing the storms in her life over the past few years...

"Yes, you are famous, but not in here. "

"I am in the news all the time. Twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week!"

"Yes. I have seen you on the news, but I want to hear your story... not from others... from you. What you have to say is important."

She slumped in the chair, angry tears silently streaming down her face.

With gritted teeth she reminded me that she did not ask to be here today.

She has neglected her children. Some of her children died last autumn because she was not in town. She was engaged in a fight with her neighbors and neglected to be there for the kids, even though there were plenty of warnings that harm was on its way.

She had committed murder.

She snuck into her neighbors' yards, vengeful and raging. Many of her neighbors were too stunned to respond, but now they are angry... her life is in danger.

"I'm fine," she reminds me as I watch the tears dry on her face. She unclenches her fists to grab a cigarette and light up. She blows the smoke in my face without apology.

She turns ugly when she does that.

"What happened?" I ask.

Disgust flies into her eyes, then a quiet "click" as everything in her heart shuts down. She is there, but she is not.

We call that disassociation.

It happens when someone has been hurt really, really bad. Too much pain to bear, so the body shuts down... grows numb.

"You know what happened," she replies in a monotone... forgetting her cigarette as the ashes burn into the rug.

"Tell me."

"NO!" she shrieks...

"No," she whispers.

"No, no, no, no... oh dear God, no," she rocks and cries again.

Here is her story:

My life ended on a clear September morning. The sky was so piercingly blue, crisp and open to a bountiful autumn.

My life collapsed in a matter of hours.

Everyone watched, shocked, terrified... no one thought that something like this could ever happen to someone like me.

But it did.

And I want to kill him.

I want to kill the man who did this to me.

He gashed a hole in my body, he killed many of my family members, he laughed as he did this, and he raped my mind.

He is devious.

He made it happen so that all of my children could watch this unfold over and over again on the television.

I want him dead. I hate him, I hate his family, I hate his friends, I hate the very ground he lives upon.

So I decided to go out there and kill him.

I know, I know... I have heard over and over again that you should never make major decisions for at least one year after such a trauma. But, I couldn't stand feeling like this. I have never been helpless... and I have never been so shamed in such a public forum.

So I decided to get him.

I couldn't do it by myself, so I had to have many of my family members do this for me. I sent them far away to where that evil man was hiding. Some of my friends were willing to help too.

And they went.

I didn't care that he lived in a poor neighborhood filled with women and children and poor hard-working men. I didn't care that they were the poorest people on the earth. I told my brothers, my sisters, my friends... kill anyone that gets in your way.

And they did.

No one wanted to tell me what to do. They were trying to respect my grief, to give me some space to work things out. But, my friends were getting hurt... hurt real bad. Some of my friends died for my revenge. My brothers and sisters were dying too... but, not as much as those who lived where that predator lived... I didn't think about it too much.

I've been told I was in a state of shock.

The nightmares came. They played over and over again on the television every day.

I learned to ignore them... I didn't want to know. I couldn't stand to think about the suffering... all I could see was this anger. It was pure and clean... if only I could have my revenge, I could feel the release I so desperately longed for.

But, more problems arrived.

I got really scared. I was called paranoid by some. I started looking around and I could see my attacker everywhere. That man reminds me of him... so does that place, and that group of people... they're all out to get me. My family reinforced itself and moved to another land and went after that man too. There is a lot of wealth in that land. We are taking it. I tell them that we deserve this, after all we have been through.

I use my money to buy safety.

For a long time my children were so frightened that they never said a word. They trusted me. They believed that I knew what I was doing.

But, now they are angry at me too. They feel betrayed. They think I have made this trauma worse by my anger. Some of them won't talk to me anymore. They fight all the time with me and amongst themselves. Nothing ever gets done around here... we are exhausted.

The head of our household was traumatized too, and all of our elders. We didn't notice. We thought they would protect us. I didn't want to think, so I just did what they told me to do.

We used to sit down and discuss family decisions together. We always have argued a lot, but things got done.

But, since I was attacked... we are too frightened to disagree. The head of our household went adrift in the sea of our collective rage... and he had no anchor. He couldn't hear his own thoughts in the raging storm. He let others make decisions for him. He lets his friends do the job. His friends are not our friends. It is such a mess.

We had an opportunity to change that... to choose a new head of household... but too many of us were afraid of one more change. Some of the children just didn't care anymore... the trauma has made them apathetic.


And now I am in so much trouble that I can't see my way out.

I wonder if I have a death wish?


I am irritable, the nightmares are real, everyone is angry at me and fed up. They don't care anymore what happened to me. They tell me to shut up and put up... that I have been selfish acting like I am the only one in the world who has ever been hurt like this.

Some of my neighbors coldly tell me, "Welcome to our world... it's about time you woke up."

Hollywood bought my story. The movies are starting to pour out onto the screens. I don't know if my children should see this... is it too soon? Will this help? It's my story... do I want someone else to tell it?

My children hate me, my neighbors want nothing to do with me, my finances are a mess, my house is falling around me, and I am so tired... so very, very tired.

I have children screaming at me to get religion, and children screaming at me to stop doing what I have been doing. Some of my children don't recognize me anymore... and think that I am already dead.

My name is Liberty.

My friends named me Lady Liberty. I used to tell everyone:

Give me your hungry, your huddled masses, yearning to breathe free.

I am no longer a lady... I have now created the hungry, the huddled masses, the desperate people yearning to breathe free.

My name was Liberty, I was beautiful, powerful, generous and strong.

Can you help me?


Her story was finished for today.

Her eyes cleared and she looked up at me with that old famous visage of hers...

"Yes, Lady. I am here to help.

I can't do this alone...

Bring your family next time and we will begin...

we are going to have to grieve some more...

we are going to have to start talking with each other, and holding each other, and trusting each other... and remembering to work together again.

My wish for you this day is that you will find in your heart that place that is safe and trusting. That generous beautiful part of you that truly is not dead. We will feed the hungry once more. We will comfort the huddled masses. We will breathe freedom.

We must start by cleaning out your home first and tending to all the chores that have been ignored.

We must bury the children who have died along the way... we must make reparations, we must heal the relationships we have severed...

We must return what we have stolen.

We must turn that heart of stone back into the heart of flesh that made you so beautiful.

Are you ready to get to work, I am... and I know there are many others who are ready too."

"You're crazy," she smiled as she headed out the door.

"Yep... I surely am... and you can be too. Believe in the impossible and join me... what else can you do?"