Latest / System Speak: Complex Trauma and Dissociation / Global Trauma

Transcript

Global Trauma · System Speak: Complex Trauma and Dissociation

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Over:
• 0:11
  Speaker 2: Welcome to the System Speak Podcast, a podcast about Dissociative Identity Disorder. If you are new to the podcast, we recommend starting at the beginning episodes and listen in order to hear our story and what we have learned through this endeavor. Current episodes may be more applicable to longtime listeners and are likely to contain more advanced topics, emotional or other triggering content, and or reference earlier episodes that provide more context to what we are currently learning and experiencing. As always, please care for yourself during and after listening to the podcast. Thank you.
• 1:01
  Speaker 1: It is very early in the morning here as we continue traveling for the humanitarian aid trip that we're on, where I'm doing trauma trainings in disaster areas and war zones across the world. We've already been to California where they had fires and to Puerto Rico where they had Hurricane Maria and Houston where they had Hurricane Harvey and North Carolina as well. And then also The Middle East, and Israel, and Syria, and Gaza, and Jordan, and Iraq, and Lebanon. It's been a very difficult time for us, not just because of safety issues or triggers through our travels and the stories that we've heard, But also, we've had a very difficult time this fall. There have been times in recent months where even our safety was a concern, in a way that I'm not sure it ever has been before.
• 2:17
  But although it's been a difficult, difficult couple of months, we have learned a lot through the process of caring for each other and reaching out for help in new ways, including connecting through friendship, which has been as terrifying as anything. So in the previous episode, when I shared information about psychological first aid and psychosocial support. One of the things that I mentioned was how important it is to apply those same principles internally as well as externally. For us, I think that it's working ever so slowly and part of the evidence of that is that I am back at work consulting and speaking and presenting in ways I haven't for the last four or five years, and maybe since the parents died. So I think it counts as progress.
• 3:42
  And I'm trying, even in harsh conditions, to be sure that we're taking care of everybody inside, including finding ways to get mail out, writing in the notebook, and having little things with us that we were able to fit in our suitcase, such as applesauce, which is a familiar and safe and easy food for us, a tiny blanket that was a safe baby blanket when we were little, and stuffies both a bear given to us by the therapist and a little puppy given to us by our friend we also brought stickers and markers and crayons and even paints, trading space in our suitcase for some of the things that others needed and that we as a system needed to be able to function well. It's also been a challenge because there have been times where now time isn't safe. Times we were too close to the fires and when new fires broke out. Times where, like our trip in Africa, that just because of our location and where we were and what we were doing, there wasn't enough food or it was very dangerous and we were surrounded by bodyguards or armed military with machine guns.
• 5:15
  Other times the conditions where we were were not safe like land mines or the rubble of bombed homes and buildings. And other times it was just our heart that was so full as we walked amongst the people and met them and talked with them and heard their stories and saw their faces. But always what's there are people and stories and resilience. Where communities endure terrible and difficult things and yet still have hope for things to be different, for things to be better, for us to pull through somehow together. And so we go and we do our trainings so that adults know better how to help children with trauma, how to process trauma themselves, and how to get those toxic chemicals stored up from trauma and stress out of their bodies and feel better themselves and help those around them feel better.
• 6:26
  So that as a community they can pull together and be safer and kinder and more nurturing to one another. And as part of my travels I take data and do research and then write reports and turn them in. And hopefully, in some way, it makes some small difference in protecting children against impossible circumstances and motivates people in suits, in fancy offices, to actually do something about the people in their home countries who need help who have been waiting for help it's a hard thing to be there and to receive those stories and to promise to pass them on and to use my voice as part of their voice to use my voice to help them but have no guarantee that it will make a difference because it depends on other people who are in charge of people, which is a funny system to be set up. But it's how governments are run, how humanitarian aid agencies are funded, And all the while, people on the ground are waiting for safety, are waiting for shelter, are waiting for food, are waiting for water. On the platform site where we actually edit and post the blog, there's a map that shows where people listen.
• 8:20
  New downloads, repeated downloads, people who are regular listeners, and people who are new listeners. And you and you are all over the world. There are 40,000 listeners just in The United States alone. And if I could say anything about The United States, I would beg you and ask you to please just vote. It's a simple thing.
• 9:00
  Please just show up and vote. 10% of our listeners are in Canada. I've been to Canada, and I have several Canadian friends. They are thinkers and peacemakers and mostly kind, sometimes a little too serious. We have regular listeners in Mexico to the south of us.
• 9:44
  They are enduring hard things there, and there's a lot of trauma. We ourselves have a daughter, actually. We talk about the six children. I know that they have shared about them, but we also actually have a seventh child who's now an adult which is why she's not referenced and also she prefers more privacy and we respect that but she came to us also through foster care after being child trafficked from Honduras and she was put on the beast and traveled through Mexico that way the train she hid under the train actually from armed guards And I don't know how she made it across the border alive. Her story is incredible and terrible, but she's amazing and strong.
• 10:40
  She was sold to a man in The United States who was also from a Latin American country. And one day they were driving down the highway, and just in effort to protect herself, she jumped out of the car while it was going 75 miles per hour. Falling down a hill by the highway, she was badly hurt, and people witnessed it, and he drove away to protect himself, leaving her there. And she was taken to the hospital and in the hospital after she recovered from her injuries there was no one to come and pick her up. She was only 15 at the time.
• 11:26
  And because there was no one to pick her up they called Child Protective Services and that's how she came into foster care and how she came to our home. We helped her get her green card and helped her get her GED and helped her go to college and get her first car and her first apartment. And now she has her own family and her own children, which makes us a grandparent. I don't know if you knew that. We also have listeners in Colombia and Peru and Brazil and Chile and Argentina.
• 12:14
  We shared our story of Africa last summer, and in Africa, we have listeners in South Africa and Kenya and Uganda and Ghana and Morocco and Egypt. In Europe, we have listeners in Portugal and Spain and France and The United Kingdom. Ten Percent of our listeners are in The United Kingdom and Ireland. We also have listeners in The Netherlands and Germany, in Switzerland and Italy, Slovenia, Austria, The Czech Republic, Poland, Hungary, Romania, and in Greece, where we are also going to refugee camps there, Moriah, next week. We have listeners in Norway and Sweden and Finland and Iceland.
• 13:48
  In Iceland, it's very interesting. It's a different culture from some of the other places we've been because it's a very rural place generally. I mean that's stereotyping some but it can be a very rural place and it can be very difficult to get access to help, to choose your provider. And when things are difficult in a family, it can be challenging because in Iceland everyone is sort of family. And so there's that culture where everywhere you go is a relative and that's again very generally speaking but it's kind of built into the culture a little bit and it can be a strength and it can also be a challenge depending on what your family has faced.
• 14:38
  They're also a very independent and hardened people in some ways because of the lifestyle and the weather and the way that they live there. It is just they're fascinating people. The people I've met from Iceland are good, good souls who have been through a lot. We have 400 listeners who listen regularly every week from Russia and 200 listeners who listen regularly every week from China. We have listeners in South Korea and Japan and Taiwan and The Philippines and Indonesia.
• 15:31
  Ten Percent of our listeners are in Australia, and we've lived there before. I think we've talked about that. We lived in Australia for a long time. We have 300 regular listeners in New Zealand. We also have listeners in Nepal and India and Pakistan and Iran and Saudi Arabia and Turkey and Israel and Iraq.
• 16:14
  Where we are now. I actually have many international counseling clients from The Middle East and from Asia. And in Asia, they are, as far as challenges in psychological first aid, they are people who are hard pressed and very stressed. And when you are not safe from your parents, it is very difficult because the culture is so focused on respecting your elders and those who are older than you. And any sort of struggle, especially if you're already female, is seen as a weakness, as in almost a fault in character rather than something you are battling against.
• 17:10
  And it can be so difficult and isolating and hard to find support. In The Middle East, many of the people I work with in The Middle East struggle with family dynamics in a similar way in that especially women often live with their family until they are married. They don't always get to choose who their husband will be or who they love and are punished for any anything that is unchaste, whether that is loving someone that was not chosen for them or whether that is connecting sexually with someone outside of marriage or whether that is same gender attraction. And sometimes it's even just the perception of that if they wear something the wrong way or the wrong clothes or even want to go to school or get their education in a way that's not permitted or outside what the family has agreed on. And it can be very difficult for these women to find autonomy or help outside the bubble of their own family.
• 18:38
  And it's difficult for them to get away. I think it's part of why I have so many of these online counseling women because they're not permitted to leave the home. And so while I agree with many other clinicians who say online counseling is not the best way or the most viable option, there are many circumstances and many ways in which it's the only option. And I am glad to be there for those people in that way, even if it has its own limitations and is not the same as an office setting. And so for now, it works for me to do counseling online while I have to be flexible because of our children, and while there are people in the world that I can help in ways that I couldn't otherwise.
• 19:38
  And so our days right now are getting up between two and three in the morning and doing all the work of our online counseling and then going to present from eight in the morning to six in the evening and touring the refugee camps and the rubbled cities. It's been a scary week for us safety wise because while we were in Israel, they took out a Hamas leader that they felt to be a terrorist. And Gaza has retaliated with missiles because they were not happy to lose their friend. So regardless of what side you're on in politics, it's been a dangerous time for everyone, and there have been air raids and missiles crashing through, and it's not been safe. And we drove north into Syria because we were scheduled to tour there anyway, but obviously they're going to side with Gaza.
• 20:50
  Some of them, you know, politics. And explaining the whole history of those politics is a whole different kind of podcast, not the one that we share here. And I don't mean to talk about politics to isolate anyone. I'm just saying being here on the ground while countries are at war is a scary thing for us and a mind numbing thing for the people who live here. And so we've worn bulletproof vests, and we've worn our helmet, and we have shown up with crayons and paints that we have shared with children to do these expressive art therapies and to do these trainings and to teach people how to talk about hard things.
• 21:46
  Because whether it's a home in America where abuse is at night and held secret, or whether it's in a war that's televised on TV and everybody knows about but no one's doing anything to stop, it's not okay for children to be hurt. It's not okay for children to be traumatized. It's not okay for people to not have shelter or food or water. It's not okay for people to be left for seven years in tent cities without sanitation, with only a liter of water a day, and with only a cup of rice. A whole generation is growing up in these conditions, and they haven't been to school.
• 22:35
  Their bodies are not kept safe, and their childhood is not held sacred. And that's not okay with me. And so maybe it's been a hard couple of months for us, and maybe we share on the podcast so that our weakest and most vulnerable moments are broadcast out to the world. But maybe it's a way to connect with others who are hurting. And maybe it's a way to help someone who knows what that feels like.
• 23:13
  And maybe it's a way to be not alone in a very big world where we feel so isolated sometimes. So I want you to know if you can hear this that you are not alone. Whether you are someone in a faraway country that no one seems to notice, where it feels like no help is coming. You are not alone. Or maybe you're in a first world country, maybe even another clinician, and maybe just have heart days, and no one sees them because you're busy helping.
• 23:56
  You're not alone either. And part of what keeps us strong when circumstances seem impossible It's just knowing that you are seen and that you are heard and that you are loved and that you are not alone. We share the same sky. We share the same sun and the same moon. And the air that blows here blows there and back again.
• 24:39
  And why we can't always control democracy or politics or sometimes in some cases even our votes if we get them. We have the right and the choice to decide how we respond to our circumstances, to make the choice to keep living, to choose not to give up, and to somehow find our voice and use it for good in the world. It's been a hard couple of weeks, after a hard couple of months, after a hard couple of years, and one really hard lifetime. But we are not alone, and we're starting to be able to remember that. And I wanted to be sure that you know it too.
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: Thank you for listening. Your support of the podcast, the workbooks, and the community means so much to us as we try to create something together that's never been done before, not like this. Connection brings healing, and you can join us on the community at www.systemsspeak.com. We'll see you there.