I'm Taking Back My Life

Written and (c) by Don Shetterly

When you heal from child sexual abuse or other trauma, one of the most difficult things is to get your life back.  In today's morning thought post, we have to say the following to our self.  "I'm Taking Back My Life!"  If you have to repeat that over and over, then do so.  Do what it takes until you stop backing down to what was done to you and you begin to reclaim your life.  I know it isn't hard.  I struggled through the exact same thing.  Draw a line in the sand today and say, "I'm taking back my life!"

Dealing With Panic Attacks

Written By Don Shetterly

Years ago, when I went through Conversion Disorder, I struggled with moments that the doctors hardly understood, let alone had terminology for.  I remember having a "panic attack", as it was called at the time, and given a pamphlet to be taken home to read.

The only thing is the panic attack was a symptom of a much larger condition.  Up to that point, the doctors had only diagnosed me with Multiple Sclerosis, which was later found to be wrong.  I would not know for some time that the diagnoses were Conversion Disorder, depression, and anxiety.  The doctors kept these things from me in those days.

We were all focused on getting to the point I could walk again, as I was paralyzed at that point.  The goal was to get me integrated back into my regular daily routine and activities as quickly as I could, but I'm not sure anyone thought it was possible.

Noise From A Yard Sale...

When I got home from the hospital, I remember waking up that first morning.  I heard a lot of people outside my door. Peering through the window, I noticed what appeared to be a yard sale by my neighbors.

This would be considered a reasonable thing by most people but all of the sudden, I would find myself shaking, crying, and struggling to catch my breath.  I was scared beyond belief.  I tried to hide on my couch, but the people's noises and talking would not stop.  I had no idea what was going on with me.  I felt as if I was going to die.  I didn't know what to do.

Calling my doctor, he prescribed medication for me and then I made the bold gesture of trying to go out and make it to the pharmacy.  I made it about two blocks before my legs were shaking so much and my breathing was to the point I felt like I was going to pass out.  Driving a stick-shift pickup was not easy, and I managed just to turn around and go back home.

Nothing was calming down.  My breathing was way off and challenging.  I felt so full of despair.  I finally called a co-worker friend to get the prescription for me.  The medication helped, but it knocked me out for hours.

Anxiety Took Me Down...

There would be many more times I'd have to deal with anxiety, from venturing outside my house to trying to get back to work, to going inside a store.  Anxiety would hit me hard and take me down quickly.

I learned to go without stimulants like sugar, coffee, chocolate, soft drinks and anything that might kick my body up.  While that helped, it wasn't the cure - but it helped.  I had many sessions of therapy where we would work through the anxiety issues, but it seemed as if they were never-ending.

Another thing I did was to keep a small rock in my pocket wherever I went.  I learned that if I felt a panic attack coming on, I could reach in my pocket without anyone knowing and just grab ahold of the rock.  To me, it felt grounding and safe so that even when my life felt out of control, the rock helped bring me back.

Would I Make It...

Life was a struggle.  It was difficult.  Normal things to other people were difficult life-challenging issues to me.  In those days, I wondered if I would ever make it.  I wondered if I would get beyond this and back to a normal life.

I have since learned so much more about how to deal with anxiety.  Even at times when it gets the best of me, it is nowhere to the level of full-blown panic attacks that it once was.  I have done so much intense and deep healing work using Unified Therapy that the anxiety is a fraction of what it once was.

While the mind plays a starring role in a panic or anxiety attack, the body is what generates it.  This is the most helpful revelation that I have found in my healing.  Ignoring the physical presence of why it is coming up makes it harder to deal with anxiety.  Dealing with what the cells of the body remember is where freedom and liberation from a whole new level takes place.

I never was one to accept a condition I had or a label handed to me.  I fought those hard, and I still do.  I know that if I latch on to the condition I was given, I see myself as that issue, not as potential for healing.  I desire healing.

I've fought the odds against so much that I was not supposed to conquer.  Even to this day, I do not accept where I am.  I'm always striving to push forward to places that too many believe do not exist.  As I heal more and more, I am finding that there is so much hope and possibility.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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I Thought I Was Adopted

Written by Don Shetterly

After reading Jody's last column, it got me thinking.  In the column, she wrote about "how it feels to be adopted."  I love how she shares some of the most personal parts of her life to help others find healing in their own lives.


For a long time, I thought I was adopted.  I truly did.  I had nothing to back it up with, and while every account made it sound like my parents were really my parents, it was hard to believe.  I went through life thinking that I had to be switched at birth or adopted or something.

How else could you explain the horror and torture, trauma and abuse that I went through?  I didn't think there was anyway a normal family would do this to their kid.  I figured I had to have ended up in the wrong family.  Surely then, I was adopted.

Finally in my adult years...

It probably wasn't until well into my adult years that I got to meet some of my cousins.  The physical characteristics were similar in many ways.  Even though I didn't want to accept that this was my family, I began to see that I was NOT adopted.

I know there was a time early on in my life where my mom had to choose between me as an infant and my dad who had hepatitis.  From what I was told, it was very contagious, and for some reason, she chose him over me.  I don't know all the particulars or details and probably never will.  However, I always felt that separation anxiety with my mom, and it never left even until the day she died.

There was another time I was told that when I was very young, something happened and I came to live with my cousins for a time.  I don't remember it.  I don't know the details, but once again I was separated from my mom.

I struggled to be away from my mom...

When I would go to church camp in the summer, I struggled to be away from my mom for a week.  I was always worried that she would be there when it was over.  When I would see her at the end of the week, I'd cry uncontrollably making my dad feel very uncomfortable.

It always felt like I had to be good enough to get chosen or loved by my mom.  My dad was another story.  I don't think he ever really wanted me that badly and my life made his life feel threatened.

Even until this day, I struggle with feeling that people who love me are going to leave me.  They will want nothing to do with me.  They will choose someone else.  I struggled hard with that.  I think this is the part that really resonated with Jody's column post.

I'm glad she wrote the post because it helped me to explore this further.  In my relationships now, I struggle to think that anyone would love me enough to keep me.  I feel like I will at any moment be cast off as not wanted or not needed.  It affects my relationships because people do love me, but I'm so afraid of being abandoned that I hold others at a distance.

More and more I'm coming to terms with what that felt like to be passed over and not chosen.  I know I was too young to put it into words, but it impacts me in a big way.  I do try to keep telling myself that what I went through years ago, was what happened then.  It is not what is going on now.

One day I hope I will understand this more, but without the details of what truly transpired, it is hard to put it into context.  I was NOT adopted, but some days it felt that way, and at times, I wish I could have been born into another family.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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Mind Body Thoughts and My Creativity

Written by Don Shetterly

If you've been around the blog long enough, you probably know that I'm an author and music artist.  If not, let me take a moment to just introduce myself and what I create.

I am a survivor of child sexual abuse.  At age 26, I suffered from Conversion Disorder and dealt with paralysis, suicide attempts, depression, and anxiety.  I was a workaholic and perfectionist.  I could not let anyone down, even if it meant total destruction of myself.  As much as I thought I knew how to deal with stress, I honestly had no clue!

For years I fooled myself until it caught up with me, and my world came crashing down.  The two books I have written are part of my healing journey through the torture and trauma I experienced.  I am currently finalizing a new book with an expected publishing date of early 2018.

If you found this page through a tweet I posted, it most likely corresponds to one of the books below that is idenitifed by the picture in the tweet.  

Hope And Possibility Through Trauma

Hope And Possibility Through Trauma is my full-length book helping those who have been through so much in life.  If you've experienced childhood sexual abuse or trauma or other horrific moments in your life, this book will speak to you and help give you hope and possibility that you too can heal.  Available on Amazon.

A Journey Through Words

A Journey Through Words is a full-color spiral bound book of poetry and other writings.  It is filled with many poems and thoughts, created as I was struggling to find my way through the difficult moments of healing.  It includes raw thoughts and emotions from where I was at in those moments.  Available on LuLu Press

Relaxing Piano Music

I create relaxing piano music that can be found on iTunes, Spotify, Amazon, CDBaby and many other digital download sites.  It is piano music without any lyrics, from my heart.  Connect with the feeling and emotions of what you hear in the songs I have created. www.DonShetterly.com

From My Heart With Love

These things I have created are part of the way I help support my life and my purpose of working to help others.  I know how difficult it is to deal with pain, and through my creativity, words, and music, I want to be there for others.  I want to help shine the light for them to find footing on their own path.

Many have asked me to allow donations, and if you want, you can always do that at https://www.paypal.me/DShetterly .  However, I would like to ask that you help support me through the creative works I have available.  Click the images and links above for ways you can do this.

I continue to do the things I do out of love in my heart, and I just put these options as a way for others to join this cause.  I know many are hurting and I work hard to be a voice of support and help through the painful moments of healing in life.

Stay tuned, because there is another exciting project coming very soon!

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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How We Learned To Deal With Trauma

Written by Don Shetterly

When you grow up in situations where trauma and abuse along with emotional and mental manipulation are what you know, you never quite have a fighting chance early in life.  How we learned to deal with trauma and stress was anything but normal for us.

We were never given the tools to know what to do.  We were never taught how to deal with the situations in which we found ourselves.


We grew up learning to survive.  We grew up learning to find the way through what was happening to us in the best way we knew how.  We often were focusing our attention on that moment of abuse we were enduring.  There was no learning how to deal with the trauma, let alone the stress in our lives.

Many of us found coping mechanisms to escape what was being done.  Some of us just stuffed it deep down inside.  Some of us tried to match the pain through the self-inflicted harm we did to our bodies.  These were survival techniques we employed because we knew nothing else.

As life continued, we faced new stressors and situations in life.  The usual part of growing up in a world that is sometimes far too harsh presented more challenges.  Our early go-to techniques did not match up to what we needed for those moments, and so the trauma replayed over and over.  The stress continued to build.

Foreign Invaders Of Our Mind and Body...

Regardless, we knew we had found a way to survive through all the abuse and trauma we had once endured, so we didn't give up.  We kept fighting.  We kept trying to figure it all out, but far too often, our insight was formed because of what we had to do to survive.  What we needed to do for our body and our mind became foreign invaders that we did not trust.

As we get to our current day, the techniques that once served us well and how we survived now fall short.  They exhaust us because they no longer do what we need for them to do.  We struggle, and we fight.  Some of us fall victim to this through suicide, cutting, chronic conditions, conversion disorder, anxiety, depression and a whole host of other outcomes.

Healing is not easy.  Learning to deal with trauma and stress without the necessary tools is an epic challenge.  I know in my own life that I had to see the things which once helped me survive no longer serve a useful purpose.  In their place, I needed to find new tools that would help.

When you have been through abuse and trauma, you become the parent to yourself and so starts the journey of learning how to deal with all of this.  You become the teacher and the student at the same time.  We did not learn to deal with trauma or stress, and now it impacts every facet of our lives.

This is where support of others who have been through this comes in to help.  It is where therapists and qualified practitioners that know how to walk through the fires of trauma and abuse help our healing.  It is where the process of healing, little by little, unfolds and helps awaken us to more of who we are, that we have hidden all these years.

Learning to deal with trauma and abuse is not something that is easy.  It is a challenge on our best days, and a horror filled nightmare on our worst days.

I have found in my own life that regardless of what was done to me and what I went through, I can heal and thrive and conquer so much of what was done to me.  I will not say it is easy.  I will not say it is a quick process, but I know it is one that I'm winning.

I have learned that to heal, I must feel in my body and that the more I can safely do this, the more I comprehend.  The trauma and abuse were stored in our body, and for me to fully heal all that was done, the body is at the center of these endeavors.

Yes, I have my good days and my bad days, but my life now is much more hopeful and full of possibility than it once was.  I know that even though I never learned to deal with trauma and abuse as a kid, I'm now coming to a greater understanding of what that means for my own life.  There is hope and possibility through trauma.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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In The Little Steps We Heal

Written By Don Shetterly

When you've been through sexual abuse, rape, and trauma, healing isn't fun.  Often times it can be overwhelming, to say the least, to figure out how to feel or if you really want to go through the journey of healing.


It is in the little steps that we heal, though while the horrors are raging in our life, sometimes that is hard to remember.  While we want our life to be past all that was done to us, it isn't that simple. I know that as I look back in my own life, I see the moments come together where I was making more progress than I thought I was.

Little steps of healing seem so insignificant when we are in the middle of them.  Sometimes we feel like we've only moved an inch up a 5000-mile high mountain.  Yet, if we didn't move that inch, we would not be any further to climbing the mountain.

I Cannot Do That...

If you look at a mountain and try to picture yourself climbing it in one step, you'd probably laugh and say, "I cannot do that!"  Yet, in our healing, we try to force ourselves to do that, and then we exhaust ourselves.  We make healing into such a monumental task that we want to give up before we start.

Instead, if we looked at the mountain and allowed ourselves to climb a few feet or however far we chose to go that day, we would make major progress.  Yes, we might face rock slides, storms, and get thirsty.  Yes, it might be treacherous in moments where our feet slip.

The more we allow ourselves to climb at our own pace, taking the little steps, the further we will go. It is in the little steps of that day that we get higher and higher, further and further.

In my own life, I've been able to look back and realize that all of those little steps I was taking, whether I knew it or not, were getting me further.  They were helping me to find the authentic part of myself that I didn't know existed.

They were taking me to higher points along the path, so that now I could see things more clearly than when I was several feet back.  The vantage point and viewing changed as I went further, but I had to climb through those little steps at the beginning of the journey to see more.

Healing isn't easy.  At times, we want to give up thinking we've not gone very far.  It is in those moments that we have most likely gone much further in the journey than we realize.  If we turn back too quickly, we may miss the monumental plateau that is right ahead of us.

Honor and allow the little steps because when we do, we will find out that we are healing our lives.

In the little steps, we heal.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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Feel Your Body

  Written by Don Shetterly

Okay, the title of that blog post might be raising a few eyebrows and if it is, I'm okay with that.  There is nothing wrong with the statement, and I'm not trying to dupe you into something that is not.  Trust me, the statement "feel your body" is pure, and it is helpful.


Most of us humans go through life not feeling our bodies.  Yes, we think we do, and that we are in touch with it.  Unfortunately, we are very good at fooling ourselves far too often.  I know, no one wants to hear that, but it is true.

There are reasons why we don't completely feel our bodies.  I don't want anyone to be too hard on themselves for not feeling their body because, in many ways, this is part of being human and aware.

Some of the reasons that we do not feel our body include the following:

1. Past experiences.
2. Stress in our lives (whether we create it or it is around us).
3. Physical issues we are struggling with.
4. Diet.
5. The level of exercise and activity.
6. How we learned to deal with stress in life.
7. Trauma.
8. Abuse
9. Rape
10. Childhood Sexual Abuse.
11. Unconsciousness.
12. Numbness.
13. Keeping ourselves busy all the time.
14. Not taking the time to feel.
15. Being afraid to feel.
16. Dealing with an overwhelming life.
17. Dealing with chronic pain.
18. How we connect with the world around us.
19. Immersed in the latest news and issues of the day.
20. Avoidance

These are some of the reasons why we do not feel in our bodies.  With some of these, it is easy to look at and understand.  With some of the other reasons, it may be harder to understand.

When I was working a nonstop schedule of weekly travel and handling 400 to 600 emails a day. plus being the lead tech support person for a project, I found myself feeling almost no pain.  However, even though I didn't feel it, the pain was taking its toll on me through exhaustion.

It was when I finally stopped for a moment that the pain caught up with me, and it was not pretty.  I had suppressed it so much that I didn't feel it.

I'm amazed at what our bodies do to us and for us when we are oblivious to reality.  I saw this play out when Conversion Disorder paralyzed me.  I have observed it play out in other people and at other times in my life.

Recently, I went through some major healing work because anxiety, depression, despair, and pain were getting to be too much for me.  I could hardly go on in life.  I did not realize how painful my hamstring area was until I got in that session and allowed myself to feel.  Of course, the muscles were exhibiting the reactions to trauma from years past, but I was completely oblivious to it.

I see people talk about stress being all in our heads, but that could not be farther from the truth.  Stress is everywhere.  Yes, some don't feel it consciously, but it is there.  Stress impacts us every day, and if we hide from it and ignore it, then it will build up.  As stress continues to build, it will get our attention at some point in life.

If you're going through chronic pain and other conditions, you may be feeling pain but there is so much other stuff that has been blocked. It pushes the limits of pain to levels that are extremely difficult to endure.  It is as if one side of life has been pushed to the max while another side of life has been forgotten and numbed.

Feeling your body can be scary and frightening.  We have plenty of medications and drugs out there to prove this.  There are enough wine, alcohol and OTC pain relievers so help us disconnect and numb from what is going on.

Sometimes past experiences impact us more than we realize, and they start suppressing one side of our body systems while elevating other parts.  The more this happens, the more the fear increases and when it gets to be too much, we are shutting down our connection to what is going on in our bodies.

It is natural for humans to do this.  It is part of our survival mode, but unfortunate the survival mode doesn't get turned off after stress or experiences or past abuse and trauma.  Our brain then gets hijacked by all that happened to us or all that we experience, leaving us as puppets, rather than in control of our lives.

The more we can stop and recognize all of this, the greater the chance we have to overcome so much.  Experiences in life, stress, and trauma that we have endured suppress the healing power we have within us.

Just recognizing this in the mind is not enough.  It is only part of the equation.  We need to go in and feel our bodies.  We need to go in and feel every fiber of every muscle and each cell of every tissue.  It is through that connection to the body that we give ourselves the greatest hope of being more than we are.

The more we feel in the body, the more we can enact change and make better choices for our lives.  If we don't do this, the stress and trauma will take over and leave us as bystanders in our own life.  We have the option to connect more than we do and if we do this, the payoff is far beyond anything you most likely can comprehend in this moment.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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Healing The Physical Trauma of Child Abuse

Written by Don Shetterly

This Unified Therapy session wasn't easy.  It was tough beyond any words that I can write.  In fact, just getting myself to see Dr. Canali was more than difficult.  I procrastinated.  I tried to wish it away.  I tried to numb it away.

No matter what, as hard as I tried to wish it away, my avoidance was not helping the issue at all.  I was begging for mercy.  I wanted relief.  I could not find it on my own no matter what I was doing.  As I wrote a few days earlier in a blog post, it was the Rash That Won't Stop that got me to the point where I finally went to see Dr. Canali.

My life had become one of so much difficulty with little sleep.  The burning and itching I described in that blog post were no lies.  It was all too real.  My anger was hard to contain with everyone and everything.  I did not know at that moment before the session if I could make it through this.  I was not sure if I could make it through this.  The session with Dr. Canali had become my last hope.

What I had written, I shared...

I shared with him what I had written in that blog post. I couldn't even manage to get the words out.  My voice would not articulate them.  As he sat down beside the massage table and read them out loud to me, my eyes welled up with tears.  To most people, they are words on a page.  To me, they were heartaches and pain from the abuse I suffered.

As we began to go into what was coming up in my body, it was evident to Dr. Canali and myself just how locked up my pelvis and abdomen were.  In fact, most of my pants were not fitting at that time.  They felt like 5 sizes too small.  The itching in this area was intense.  Any touch anywhere close and the pain would shoot through my body like there was no end.

Moving through things, everything from the itching to the heat in my body and the pain would kick up.  We would take it as far as we could, and then Dr. Canali would allow me to drop back down.  It felt like a physical workout.  It felt like there were moments that were almost too much.  However, I knew that this was part of the healing process.

An empowerment boost of healing...

The more I started to see that we could go into all of these things and then drop back into a more peaceful state, the more empowered my body became. It was as if pushing into these difficult moments and then dropping back was an empowerment boost.  A boost that kept me taking on more of the trauma my body had been holding for many years.

Some of these trauma memories of abuse that I was dealing with, I have seen in other forms and ways at various times.  However, this one was the more physical side of being raped and held down with no way to stop it.  It started by the time I was around six years old and continued until I was much older.

As we moved through the session, we discussed those things, and I was allowed to share them.  It wasn't easy to say the words.  It wasn't easy to recognize just how much the evil and darkness of these abusers and tried to squash any hope for light and existence I had.

The Body Shows The Trauma...

The physical trauma resides in the body.  The body remembers even if we attempt to keep it from reliving memories from years past.  The brain will try to block it, but when the body shows the evidence, it is then that the brain is in survival and numbing.

As we went through the session, I could feel the physical tension leaving my body.  It was more than if I had gotten a relaxing massage.  It was where my body goes into that deep peace and rest that it desperately needs.  The itching came down.  The pain came down.  The elevated body temperature I was feeling dropped down.

I noticed as we left the office and went out into the summer heat of a South Florida afternoon, that I was tolerating the heat much better.  Before this moment, I could barely stand in the summer heat for a few minutes.

I noticed that the world around me seemed more at peace.  I sensed the quiet stillness accessible to me even though the hustle and bustle of the city continued.  I felt lighter and more joyful.  I felt more hopeful and alive than I had a little while earlier that day.

As we left to go back to the hotel, I started to notice that the pants which were tight on me before the session, were now needing a belt.  There was so much physical tension in my abdomen and waist that had released that I could barely keep my pants up.  It shocked me because it showed me just how much trauma I was holding in my physical body.

I went from not wanting anyone close to me touching me to allowing myself to be touched.  I went from wanting no intimacy to welcoming it happily.

In that session with Dr. Canali, so much physically changed in my body.  It was like I was coming back into my body and learning to live life again as was meant for me to experience.

Healing Is More Than A Mental Exercise...

Once again, the work and concepts that Dr. Canali has discovered are helping me understand what trauma does to the body and how we store all of this for years and years.  It is not just a mental exercise.  It is an exercise where you connect the mind with what comes up in the body and then you are gently guided in different ways how to let go of it all.  It is a process that helps you find deep healing and peace, that is more than a quick point of change.  This healing is lasting.

As I write this, several days after the session, I can still feel my body letting go and processing all that went on in that session.  I can feel how little moments in life kick up the body temperature or the itching while being able to talk myself back down and put reality in perspective with what I am feeling.

Yes, I've had moments of anger and frustration, but I can deal with them more appropriately than I was.  I'm able to go in and stop and rest and allow my body to just be in the moment.  I've been able to be in a hot tub and sauna, be outside in the heat of an afternoon and not feel like I was going to lose my mind or pass out and drop on the ground.

I'm working to take care of myself, changing how I see things in my life and observing how I react.  I want the reactions to be from a more mind and body centered approach than feeling like an unwilling participant.  I'm focusing on the bigger picture of my life much more than I have been and seeing how all of this plays into where my life goes.

I'm monitoring how much I let in from the world that is full of screaming, anger, rage, and disrespect because the actions I see every day do nothing to help me in my own life.  I'm allowing myself to disconnect from them and replace them with things that are genuinely helpful.  I know that if I get caught up in the darkness of the day, it will do nothing positive for me.

Most of all, I feel better.  I feel more empowered.  I feel more centered.  It is like there is now hope where I thought I had lost all hope.

I'm thankful for Unified Therapy and Dr. Paul Canali and what he knows and how he helps me.  He is one of a kind.  If there are others beyond him (and a few other practitioners) that can do what he does for me, I have not found them.  He is a pioneer in the field of healing trauma.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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Traumatic Effects

 By Don Shetterly

The book by Peter Levine, Ph.D. called Waking The Tiger has so much to share on how trauma affects us.  All too often we go through life oblivious to it.  All too often we think trauma is some horrific one-time incident, failing to see how the little moments can be just as traumatic as one big moment.

In the following quote, he sums up so much of what happens in traumatic effects.

Traumatic effects are not always apparent immediately following the incidents that caused them.  Symptoms remain dormant, accumulating over years or even decades.  Then, during a stressful period, or as the result of another incident, they can show up without warning.  There may also be no indication of the original cause.  Thus, a seemingly minor event can give rise to a sudden breakdown, similar to the one that might be caused by a single catastrophic event."  (Waking The Tiger by Dr. Peter Levine)

In my own life, I've had those moments that connected from the current moment I'm living into something that happened in my past.  I was not aware of it. It led me to the Conversion Disorder.  It took me years to put those pieces together to understand what happened.

The series of events didn't affect most people.  They didn't end up with back and neck pain.  They didn't end up being paralyzed and almost dying.  But, I did...  See my book for more about what I went through.

The thing is, we all have those connections, and they impact us differently.  They can add to anxiety, depression, back pain, neck pain and other physical issues in our body.

What happens to us does impact our body, and so often we don't stop to look at that connection.  Even if we do, we barely open the closet door to see what is inside.  We do everything we can to avoid it and delay it and act as if it doesn't exist.

You might not be able to put one thing with the other in a connection, but it doesn't mean that it is not there.  Sometimes we just cannot see the connection.  Our brain is protecting us from things that are just too difficult to deal with in our life.

However, you can be sure that if something physical is showing up in the body, that you need to look beyond your usual paradigms and beliefs.  There is more to it.  There is a mind body connection that means so much more than the buzzword we use every day.

Just the awareness that there can be the connection present may help you heal and move through what is showing up.  Sometimes, that is the hardest part of the journey, but it is often the most important part.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
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Self Care Changes With Our Journey

(Written by Survive - Thrive - Conquer, Matt)

Self Care Changes With Our Journey

As human beings, we are creatures of habit. We do things on a daily or routine basis because "that's what we've always" done. I know I've said that very phrase countless times in my life whenever someone questions me, or I question myself as to why I do something.

Why do we go to the same grocery store, by the same brands of food, or stop at the same gas station? Because at one time we tried something and since the experience was positive and gratifying in some way, we just stuck with it. Over time, even with a myriad of other options, we often default back to what works for us. We are familiar with it, and we know the result of engaging in that behavior generally yields a positive result.

For example, there are two convenience stores within a block of each other, or right across the street from each other, how often do you find yourself gravitating towards one more than the other? I know for me, there are two gas stations that are on the way home from work, but I almost always stop at one instead of the other, regardless of which direction I'm headed.

Why?  Habit, Familiarity, Just Because...?

We also might be forming habits in our healing journey, in particularly with self-care. We continue to do what works for us because it's worked in the past, and while there's nothing wrong with that, it would also behoove us to keep an open mind to new experiences that might also be beneficial.

For me, self-care has always involved several Go-To options:

• Listening to Music
• Playing my bass.
• Going for a walk.
• Catching up on shows that I've recorded and allowing myself to be carried away in the story.
• Reading my Kindle.

Those things usually always work, or if one doesn't work as well as expected, I can try another and often find some emotional peace and relaxation. After all, self-care is about doing things that we enjoy, things that make us feel good, or take us away from the reality of what's troubling our minds for awhile.

But, self-care can evolve too, if we let it. As we age, our likes and dislikes can change. What we did as teenagers, we probably don't do anymore, or at least not as often or as rigorously. What happens though, since we are creatures of habit, we sometimes ignore new opportunities or brush them aside in favor of what works for us.

Case in point, I had a bit of an epiphany not long ago. Each year I go to a music festival not too far from where I live. It's always a very good time, two days of reliving the glory days and singing along to iconic anthems from a cherished time of my life. That festival has been a rock solid form of self-care for me up until this year.

On the drive home, I was pondering this and wondering to myself, "what is happening to me"? Am I just getting too old for this or is there something more profound happening in my healing journey or just my life in general?

It caused me a good deal of stress for awhile, not so much from the "getting old" thought but more from the, "why doesn't this work for me anymore like it used too" perspective.  As it turns out, after much debate in my head and talking to a couple of close friends, I concluded that my self-care routine is simply evolving.

Maybe I don't need to go to this every year anymore. Perhaps every other year would be fine, or maybe just going down for 1 of the days instead of both would do the trick. Only time will tell, but the point is, that it's okay to be open to change in self-care. Just because something always worked before, doesn't mean that we can't ever deviate or find something different, should that time ever arise.

Back to this whole creature of habit topic that we started with - do you find yourself doing the same self-care just because it's always worked or because it's become a habit?  Have you begun to feel twinges that maybe something isn't working quite the way it used too?

If you have, I encourage you to sit with that feeling, explore it, and understand that there's nothing wrong with you. There's nothing to fear, and you aren't suddenly going backward in your healing. It just simply means that your needs are changing as you grow throughout this journey.

What's done the trick and been your go-to method of self-care might just be evolving into something new and exciting, or maybe just slightly different. Either way, what matters is that we do what's best for us and be open to whatever that change may be.

Rock Your Survivor Journey!

 - Matt (SurvivingMyPast.net)

Read all of Matt's Columnist Posts

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Matt

Blogger
Podcaster, Author
Advocate

Visit Matt At:

Website:  SurvivingMyPast.net
Twitter:  @SurvivingMyPast

Make sure you check out Matt's Free E-book, Surviving Grief 

Check out his Weekly Podcasts every Sunday.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly and Matt

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I Struggle To Let Go

 By Don Shetterly

One of the things I believe happens to people who have been traumatized is wanting to remain in control, long after the events are past.   It makes sense in my mind because if control is taken away from you in abuse or other traumatic incidents, then it is the thing that your mind and body attempt to reconcile.

Often we get lost in this during recovery because things just don't fit together.  We strive for a series of events that fit and many times, these events have not surfaced.  It becomes like putting a puzzle together, and the pieces don't fit until you get enough in place to see the puzzle more clearly.

What our rational brain now sees compared to what was happening during the event does not mesh together.  It is like two separate things attempting to operate at the same time, and it just doesn't work.

I struggle to let go of things.  I struggle to let go of control in life.  When this happens, I increase the anxiety and stress in my life.  Yet, even though the best thing for me to do may be letting go, I cling to it as if it is my existence.  I cling to it because it feels familiar.

Unfortunately the more we try to control everything in life, the more difficult we make it.  Sometimes controlling everything is the worst thing we can do, but when you attempt to tell that to a traumatized brain, it laughs in your face as if you know nothing.

These days, there are many ways that most of us don't let go.  You can see it online in social media where someone just has to get that last word or that insult in.  You see in political discussions that no matter what side you are on, someone is not going to let up until they convince you that their ideas are right.

When couples argue, you can see this first hand.  Neither party often wants to give up and let go, for they are right and the other is wrong.  It is so prevalent throughout relationships, and in friends and people we meet every day.

Often times it shows up as "I'm Right, You're Wrong, " but that just brings more harm, strife, stress, and anxiety to the world.  You may prove your point, but you lose all that matters to yourself, your relationships. and your humanity in this world.

It is not easy to let go.  While it may be easy to say or create happy thoughts about letting go, most humans struggle with this.  Even if you're the most enlightened of individuals, this is not easy to do.  We tend to continually hold on to things that we don't need to hold on to in our lives.

Sometimes on social media, I find myself struggling to just walk away from the insults and arguments.  I've had people mock me for being on Oprah, when if they would understand that the show was about male survivors, most likely they would not have been mocking me.

In those times I want to put them in their place, but then I would become just like them.  My mom always told me to not lower myself to their standards, but keep my head held high.  In essence, she was telling me to "just let it go."

I know it isn't easy to let things go.  I struggle with it too, but don't give up that process.  We create a lot of our stress and a lot of anxiety in our lives and the more we can learn to let go, the better off we will be.  It is a continual process of learning and awareness, not just something you write as a happy thought.

Learn from the process, and let the process of learning to let go be your guide to greater awareness and possibility for your future.  That's what I'm striving to do!

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
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The Flashbacks Wipe Me Out

I've come a long way in my healing.  I've leaped over mountains.  I've not only survived what was done to me, but I have thrived and I'm conquering new worlds.  Yet, the flashbacks come up every now and then and wipe me out.

The feelings are the first to show up for the flashbacks.  Then it progresses to the hint of the images.  Next the images start to take a shape, and a larger view of what they are follows.

The night time becomes an exercise to convince my eyes that it is okay to close them for a few hours.  I try to coax my brain into turning off long enough to get some rest.  It becomes a tug-of-war, and who wins is anyone's guess.  The winner result will be known when the sun comes up.

As the images, thoughts, feelings, and sensations come on, my mind works feverishly to hide from them.  In this stage, I despise them.  I hate them.  I abhor them.  How dare they sneak into my conscious thought!  How dare they!

At times, I feel like a deer caught in the headlights, not sure what to think or what I'm seeing.  At times, I just sit there bewildered and caught off guard as if my thoughts are a million light years away.

My mind tries to rationalize the flashbacks as if there was some way to make sense of them.  There is no way these images are real, I scream violently back to them.  There is no way this could have happened.  "Are you so stupid that you would think they would," I chastise myself.

Yet, myself laughs at the ridiculousness of my aversion to the flashbacks.  It knows more than I see and sees more than I know.  Yet I'm not about to give up the control.  I'm not about to hand over the keys to something I don't know exists.  No way - no how!

Then I read an article in the paper about some father sexually abusing and torturing his 7 year old daughter.  My eyes turn to rage.  I want to make that father suffer as much as he made his 7 year old daughter suffer.  For I know that this will forever change her and it will be something she has to deal with for the rest of her life.  I try to silence my rage and anger, for they will lead me down a path that will not be good.  I can only hope they lock him up for good, but I know all too well, that often the child abusers get very little punishment if at all.

The flashbacks don't stop.

The flashbacks continue.

At times, my body feels like a wrung-out wash cloth ready to be tossed into the garbage.

At times my body feels like an exhausted mess of muscles, tissues and cells all frustrated with another episode of flashbacks that I have to deal with in my life.

This is what my life becomes at times.  This is the horrible world of flashbacks that I live with from all the abuse and torture that was done to me as a kid.  I struggle to write those words because what child would even think a family member could do anything bad to them.  "How dare the child think this?" I scream at myself!  It is hard to accept.

The images aren't pretty.  It isn't only my mind that remembers.  It is the physical reactions I can see in my legs and across my skin.  It is the shivering one minute, followed by heat and sweating the next.  It is the rash that shows up.  It is the burning that I feel one minute, followed by nothing the next.

Some days I wonder if I've gone crazy.  Some days I am so tired of dealing with flashbacks that I despise the air I breathe.  Some days, I just don't feel strong enough to face them.

Yet, I know - that this too shall pass.  One of these days, things will calm down.  Yes, I know, I've got more to work through in my life and when I get through these things, there will be greater peace.

Today, that all seems like a dream.

Today, I will hold on to that dream.

Today, I feel wiped out.

(From my journal on 6/22/17)

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
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A Simple Touch Can Change So Much

If you read my blog post from yesterday on "Traumatized By Seizures", you will understand more of what I am writing today.  All too often we are just not fully connected to life, and we fail to see that a simple touch can change so much.

I'm sure we would all agree that healthy touch is good, but why is it we live in a society where touch is not honored and celebrated?  If it were, everyone would be having weekly massages and sharing hugs with one another.  Yes, I know there are some that do this, but it is more the exception than the norm.

When I went through the seizures of Conversion Disorder, I was so frightened and I felt so alone.  Yes, people were there with me, but deep inside I wanted someone to help comfort me.  I wanted to feel supported.  I wanted to know I wasn't going through this alone.

Yet, no one touched me.   No one supported me.  Everyone just stared at me through their own frightened eyes.

I have now realized that just a simple touch is what I needed.  That simple touch could have changed so much in me.  My eyes fill up with tears as I think of how alone I felt in those moments.

If you want to inflict further pain and trauma on someone, just withhold touch in a moment like this.  If you want to change someone's life, use a simple touch and see what happens.

Touch doesn't have to be extravagant and skilled.  All you need is touch that says, "I care about you or I love you."  It can be as simple as laying your hand on someone's shoulder or touching their arm.  It can be as simple as lightly caressing their arm or back, or even holding on to their hand with strength and courage.

A simple touch just requires that you show up, not to manipulate or cause anything to happen, but just to be there in that moment without judgment or preconceived ideas of what should happen.  Touch can be so light, but with your presence and your heart, you can affect so much in another person.  It can be most powerful when you are just holding the space for someone.

We can see what anger and hatred and a lack of healthy simple touch is doing to our world.  We have the power to change that.  We don't have to wait or depend upon anyone else to do it for us.

For a long time though, I was so afraid of simple touch because of how badly my body was beaten, abused, and traumatized as a small child.  It took me a lot of hard work to accept touch and to accept a hug.  If you're in doubt, ask permission from someone before hugging and touching.  In that small act of asking them permission, you might just be helping them to take major leaps in healing.

Regardless, let's get away from being afraid of touching others and allowing ourselves to be touched.  Massage, in the professional sense, is about healthy touch, and the human body really needs that.

Let's make the world a better place by realizing that a simple touch can change so much in the life of another person.  Let's not forget it can also change OUR lives in big ways.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
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Traumatized By Seizures

One of the things I experienced in 1991 was a condition called Conversion Disorder.  Many people see it in different ways, and there are many who do not understand this condition.  In a nutshell, it is like an overloaded circuit in the body that tends to flip the breaker and shut you down.  That is how I've come to understand it in my own healing and life.

Pseudo-seizures in Conversion Disorder are part of what I experienced after I lost control of my body through paralysis.  In those early moments, I could not walk or stand and function on my own.  Eating, talking, moving, and many other actions we take for granted were gone from me in the blink of an eye.

However, the seizures I went through was by far the worst.  I did not understand what was happening to me.  They would go on forever, it seemed.  My parents would watch me in the wheelchair I was sitting in as the seizures kicked in.  They would be frightened, and so would I.  The only thing that stopped the seizures was when my body got completely exhausted.

In these seizures (that's what I call them), my body would tremble and shake.  It felt like my arms and legs would move violently all over the place with absolutely no control.  It didn't feel as though I was present in the moment of what was happening, and it always felt like there was nothing I could do.

I was so frightened during these times.  I wanted so badly for someone to come and put their arm around me and hold me.  I didn't want people to stare at me as if I was some freak because they were afraid themselves.  If anyone talked to me or put a hand on me, I don't remember that.  I don't think that happened.

While I was in a healing session the other day, this is the subject that came up.  It took me by complete surprise because I had not even thought about it.  I sure didn't think I had been traumatized by the seizures.  However, I found out just how much is still locked up in my body from these seizures.

In the work I have gone through called Unified Therapy with Dr. Paul Canali, shaking and trembling are often part of the healing session.  It is normal for our bodies to shake and tremble to dissipate stress or trauma.  However, most of the time the mind and body stop this.  So if we allow ourselves into these healing moments, they can release so much locked energy within our cells, tissues, and our mind body.

It is important to make a note here that just shaking and trembling by themselves are not the healing part.  When you connect it to an emotion coming up in the body or some experience you've been through that automatically appears, then you have the basis for a very powerful healing moment.  If you're not careful though, you can get locked into this trembling and shaking and have it yield nothing more than re-traumatizing yourself or a person you are working with.

As the session went along, all of this came front and center and something that was actually healing and helpful was frightening to me.  Dr. Canali is able to understand this and work with me so that I don't go into the overwhelm moment.   I go up to the edge of it, where I am instead empowered.  While this may all sound like too much and too scary to go through in a session, he is careful not to re-traumatize you.  The more you can go into these moments, the more healing and awareness comes out as a result.  It becomes empowering to aid you in further healing and growth.

It did not dawn on me until this session that I was storing so much trauma in my body and my mind from the seizures.  I just thought that once they were done, it was all over and I had moved on.  As I keep gathering the fragmented pieces together of what I went through, I begin to see a new picture of who I am.

All too often, we think that once things are over we are past them and we've moved on.  In fact, we often tell ourselves and others that we have moved on, or that they should move on.  It isn't until we allow ourselves to connect all of these things together that we truly are in the healing part of the mind body connection.

This is what healing and awareness are all about, but it all depends on how far I'm willing to let myself go into these moments.  If I hold myself back, they will not happen.  If I let go and surrender to them, the other side of peace and joy that I gain is beyond any words I can use to describe it.  If I do not integrate them in and acknowledge their presence in my life, I will continue to wander through life as if it is another foggy day.

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
• You are welcomed to share the LINK to this blog post.  

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Fear On Autopilot

I see this subject talked about online so much, but yet few too many people fully understand it.  Even,  I consider myself a life long learner when it comes to the subject of fear.  Yet, there is so much more I need to learn to fully understand fear.

We are on autopilot more than we realize with fear.

Fear is insidious.

Fear is clever and crafty.

Fear hides from our awareness and view. 

We may think we see fear and we may connect with some of our fears, but far too much of it goes hidden from our view.  It keeps us blind to that which we cannot see and it keeps us numb and disconnected.

So if fear is on autopilot in our lives, how do we notice it?  How do we go in and deal with it?  How do we become aware of it?

For if you're not aware of something, it is pretty difficult to work on it.  If you're not aware of its existence in your life, why would you even be concerned?

Through much of the deep trauma healing work I've done with Dr. Paul Canali, we've come up on the fear that I often don't realize is there.  It is just too easy to miss it and often like I said, "fear keeps us blind".  Yet, fear controls so much of our lives.

One of the first things we do on the table in a Unified Therapy healing session with Dr. Canali is we are asked to "sense what is going on in our body".  Now, that may sound stupid and simple, but believe me, most of the time we as humans walk our days not fully sensing and feeling - even if we think we do.

When you stop and start to allow your mind to sense, you see so much that you didn't see moments earlier.  Generally, fear will be the next thing you sense, because it wants you to keep your eyes closed to the deeper truths of your life and your own awareness and consciousness.

When you come up on that fear you start to connect with, it almost feels like a gigantic mountain that you can't move.  If you can go into that fear, then you begin to take back its power and see just how much it is physically robbing from you.  Often times, it means doing this with a trusted healer, friend, or therapist that knows how to walk through the fires with you.

If you allow yourself to go through this process of feeling and sensing which leads to discovery, you'll be more amazed at just how much fear takes your life on autopilot without you knowing it is there.  Remember, fear is insidious.  It keeps us blind to that which would take its power away.

The thing is, this is not just a mental exercise.  Yes, you can attempt to program your mind to numb and disconnect from fear, but it only burrows deeper within your mind and body.  It is only when you go in and look at it face to face that you begin the process of reclaiming the power it has stolen from you.

I don't write these things as a mental concept that is unproven.  I write them from my own experiences of healing from trauma.  We are just so alseep in this world and not aware of as much as we think we are.

We have our fears being on autopilot to thank for that.  However, if we choose too, we can go in and take our life back.  It just begins with stopping to sense and feel in our body.

But come here fear.... 

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
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But Come Here Fear

These days, my heart goes out to every human.  It is so easy to get wrapped up in the fears that are a part of everything we do.  It is so insidious that we don't even see it.

That's the tricky part about fear.  It blinds you to its existence while taking over everything you think, do, say, and how you act.  Most of the time you're not aware of it, even if you know it exists.

Fear is a good thing when being chased by a tiger in the jungle.  Fear is a good thing at night when you're being stalked.  Fear of failing can be good as well as many other fears.  However, fear is meant as a temporary moment, not a life long relationship.

Unfortunately, far too many in our world have experienced a not so safe childhood.  We've either gone through trauma and abuse, witnessed domestic violence in our homes, suffered at the hands of a bully, or gone through other things.  They all produce fear that resides within us and alters who we truly are.

Maybe it's a parent that does not instill a sense of safety in you as a child.  Maybe you're a witness to horrific acts of violence or bombs dropping.  Maybe you saw or were in a car accident as a child and so your sense of safety was taken away.

There are many experiences in life that leave us feeling unsafe.  In these current days we are in, fear is getting pushed to the limit, whether it is on the news we consume or in social media or just in the water-cooler talk among friends.  It is everywhere.

Even if you do like we do and turn the news off and try to mute all the political stuff of the day, you can still feel fear.  It is everywhere.  It permeates every bit and piece of our society these days and that is so sad.  My heart breaks when I see it.

These days, you can barely say anything or write anything that doesn't invoke fear's response into a statement that is twisted from your intent.  Fear keeps us blind to this practice.  Fear does not allow us to see things in clarity and with the awareness and consciousness we think we have.

I don't think numbing and disconnecting completely from the fears that are alive is necessarily the right course of action.  However, I believe that if you're watching the news and engaged in the fear rhetoric of the day, you're harming yourself and the world.

You have to make the choices for yourself about what you let into your life and what you feast on in a day.  You have to be willing to open your eyes as far open as you can, so you can see what fear has done to you.  It is not easy to do this.  It goes against every fiber and ounce of energy fear can muster up, but in order to reclaim your life, you have to take back the power from fear.

I know from experience that fear waits in the tall grass to pounce upon you in every moment.  It takes strength and courage to stand up to fear.

In the words of Joy Harjo from her "Fear Poem" come these are two lines that I just love.

Oh you have choked me, but I gave you the leash.
But come here, fear. I am alive and you are so afraid of dying. - Joy Harjo 

May we stop allowing fear to choke us, by not giving it the leash so easily.  May we remember to tell fear that we are alive and it is so afraid of dying. 

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Blog Post And Images (c) 2017 by Don Shetterly

• Permission required before any part of this blog post is reprinted, reworded or used in any form. 
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Introducing Barbara and Insights Into Healing

I'm so happy and proud to announce the addition of another regular columnist to Mind Body Thoughts.  Barbara Lempereur is one of my long time friends who has helped me be more than I am, and helped countless others to help heal their lives.

One thing I so love about Barbara is her compassion, caring, and love for other people.  It is a pure love and compassion, without judgment that makes Barbara a true healer.  It is what has helped me find my way through difficult moments.

While I realize that Barbara has experienced some difficult things in her life, she has found a way to continue on.  Yet, she didn't stop there because she took that pain and found a way to help others walk through those difficult moments they were facing.

She has a very grounded view of healing and what helps get us through the moments that sometime seem impossible.  It isn't pie-in-the-sky thinking, but something that makes sense and is easy to grasp on to.  She uses her own experience to reach a healing hand out to others.

Barbara is also an assistant working with Dr. Paul Canali in Miami, Florida at the Evolutionary Healing Institute.  Through the work of Dr. Canali, she has learned and helped advance Unified Therapy.  It is the work that I've also been involved with and is life changing when it comes to healing trauma.

So, it is my pleasure to introduce Barbara Lempereur as the new regular columnist on Mind Body Thoughts.  Her blog posts will be appearing every other month, and I think the insight into healing that she will bring will benefit everyone that reads it.

So, help me welcome Barbara to the team!

For more information on Barbara and the articles she writes, go to the page on this blog, Insights Into Healing.  Look for her articles around the alternating fourth Monday of each month.