Still questioning at what level I will be as advocate.

Still thinking about it.

I know you are all on the edge of your seats to hear how it went at the Military Experience& the Arts Symposium. Okay, maybe not at the edge of your seat. This was huge for me. I did not know how it would go, how I would respond and if I would be able to do all the days. I did.

It was totally worth it that I got to help others again, to really make a difference in someone else’s life, make a positive difference. Not for some deep wanting need to feel as though I am worth something (which is a reason many MST survivors volunteer instead of getting the help they need first), but to put positive out into the world from the negative that was done to me and others.

It was not even close to what I used to be able to do. I did not get any sleep at the hotel, I had my schedule all messed up, so my meds were all wonky, and then at the last moment I had to change the lecture to a question and answer presentation. The off schedule of sleep and meds made my nerves shake, not out of fear but like a caffeine overdose, and then I started, it just hit me. It was as if I had never been in front of people talking before. I was nervous beyond belief.

My brain was lost, the “if it can happen” did. I was told that I could walk the floor, keep at least my body moving, but the mic did the ear bleeding ring a few times and I had to ditch it. The pressure from storms in the area were making my ability to stand, and even walk without help difficult. I wanted to just say that I was sorry and walk away. I knew it wasn’t going to be even close to what I have done before, and I did not want to disappoint the people who were sitting there and the people who had given me this opportunity (I did not tell anyone, except on this blogg, but I knew they did not know what had happened, that I had dump all the advocacy, dump the writing, dump most of life).

Why not tell them? I did not want that to influence the lecture, to have them look at me with the “we did not know, we’re so sorry” look. I was there as a professional and even if I never stepped out in the public again like that, for me I had to go through it. When I changed it to the question and answer format I still did not want them to know why. I did not want anyone to be afraid of asking a question, afraid of commenting, afraid of disclosing what happened to them. I knew they would all have on their minds wanting to make sure that I was not triggered, softer on me, but again, that was not what I was there for. I understand that people have the best intentions in mind, but walking around me like I am some fragile thing that at any moment if they say something wrong I will be devastated. It is another downside of having been through trauma, treated with baby gloves thinking that is what I need.

It was hard and there were times that I could continue, but I held it together and finished. Of course I was the introduction to someone who was a professional at speaking, and even his comment off what I had said, I had to take like a professional and not personal. I had no idea that I would revert back as if I had not done that before, back to the nervousness of speaking in front of people, nervousness that I would forget everything that I knew, or say something that was wrong, or, you know, the “what if’s” forward. Even my vocabulary went to the basics, and at a point I was responding defensively, but caught myself. The whole time I censored my answers, took the feeling out of what I was saying, made it clinical.

I could beat myself up for not giving a good professional presentation about MST, for not going through with the exact format that had been put on the program. But what would that accomplish? I could rationalize that it would had been better if I started out letting the audience know what had happened to me, that I had pretty much dumped life for the past two years because of Community Healthcore and what Lori had perpetrated on me. All would understand and most would be sympathy, but I cannot use my past to make others treat me differently. It would give me a crutch to not move forward, something to use to not progress pass a certain point and say that because of what Lori did I would never be able to get through it, to integrate it and just accept that it had effected my life, immensely. Another new normal.

But I pushed through it, I know that it was not my best work, and I am okay with that. I know I am pretty much starting all over with the speaking, and I am okay with that. I know I am going to be nervous for a long time getting back to where I had been, and I am okay with that. I know that I am not going to go back to exactly what I did before, I have reconfigured my professional business card, to say, for speaking with others about MST.

I also noticed my interaction with other veterans was different, my stories were censored and I talked a lot more than I usually do. I think it was an unconscious attempt to put myself back into the veteran community, like nobody knew who I was and what I had been through, and a tendency to tell others, through my experiences, that I was qualified to talk about what I did, and that I was qualified to be in conversations. Just like when I first left the military, I had to “prove” that I was more than what they were thinking my military experiences were. The “proving” I should be in the military, law enforcement, K-9 handler, in that mindset that I had been there and done that and do not dismiss me because I am a woman. Although women were not supposed to be in combat, the minor few of us (back then) who’s jobs put us in places that other jobs would not, and were, it was a “hey.” Just like when all the news about women being attached to combat units for the “first” time. I understand it, but I wanted all to know that me, and before me, women have been in combat, and not just as nurses, but as combatants. Just because policy changes does not mean that it never happened before policy changed. There are many time when women are doing or being long before media headlines state “first woman…” There are the “first women” but for many things that seem to be firsts, but they really are not. Maybe first in this country, maybe first in this decade, but for women in combat, side by side with the men, well I will just point to Joan of Arc, very well documented, very in combat, and still not the first.

There were a few questions that were raised while I was there, and I wanted to respond to them, as I did most of them there.

Q. Is there more men who have experienced MST?

A. Yes, the number of men who have experienced MST is much higher than the number of women, but there are two things to understand. There have been much much more men in the military than women, and there is a higher percentage of women who experience MST. Pretty much the only reason there are more men who have experienced MST is that there have been and are more men in the military. Even though, either men or women, both is wrong, both have a higher rate of PTSD than other military traumas, even than other civilian sexual assaults.

Q. Isn’t MST a worse trauma than combat traumas?

A. Traumas do have some level of severity over others. No two traumas are the same, and rating them just lessens all traumas. Yes, MST survivors have a higher percentage of PTSD than combat survivors (militarily speaking), but understand there is a wide range of possibilities for experiences in both. I used my own perspective, the betrayal of the experience (for me) was what hurt the most. I have no ownership in the assaults, but I do have some ownership and responsibility in the combat. It is different for every person, but one is not more traumatic than the other because it is just not an experience in a bubble, it is an experience to a person who has a life-time of experiences behind them, unimaginable variables.

I made a statement that not all sexual harassment is traumatic, and someone asked Q. who says.

A. I said “I did, not to be rude but I had really never thought anyone thought this way. I realized that again, the definition of sexual harassment for me (clinical) and for the person (emotional and traumatic) was where communication was off. No, not all sexual harassment is traumatic, traumatic is not hurt feeling, feeling humiliated, embarrassed, traumatic is trauma and even though it does take a little out of how a person felt about it, there is more to it. Clinically if a person reacts to normal life experiences (bad ones) as if they are traumatic, it is their own character flaw. A coworker comes up and makes an off comment about sex, that is sexual harassment, but it is not traumatic. The experience on its own does not go in the line of traumatic.

During the question and answer period a guy felt the need to help explain the difference between restricted and unrestricted reporting. I think both of us were not understanding the other. But as I said then, I do not agree with restricted reporting saying I can only speak to 4 people who already have been chosen, that is called silencing by policy. I either allow all to know or I do not get to tell my closest confidants? That should not be a choice. The other problem with it is that not everyone deploys with all those 4 positions.

Trust is truly an issue with most MST survivors. And I was asked (not during the presentation but alone) how do you tell who to trust and who not to. This is where the past has given me experiences (I wish I never went through) that answer this. What Lori purposely did to me was horrid, but I had a feeling about her, one of those gut feelings. As stated in previous posts, I listened to “professionals” instead of myself. It is hard to tell who you can trust and who you cannot. Think of it this way, how many people get married and think nothing will ever separate them and they tell each other everything, then they divorce and use that every information to drive a knife deep into the other. There is really no way to know, so I do the bit by bit. I give small information and see how that is taken, and so forth. I now and not going to listen to any professional when I have that gut feeling that there is something off, I do not care what is off, I am not about to dismiss my own feelings. Does this mean at times I am wrong, yep, but I would better be wrong and not trust than to trust and go through what I did. There is a bit of faith, but I do still not tell all. I have never and I will never, there is no need for any other person on this earth to know all of what I have been through, all my thoughts, not even my husband. I trust one thing, I trust one way and I trust one person, I trust God (through Jesus Christ) to know everything, to hear everything and I can tell everything to. I trust that no matter what I do, no matter what happens to me, I will always be loved in the very same way by Him. Humans, sorry but after what I have been through, you have to prove you are trustworthy, no matter what. There are people who I trust with tons, others I trust with knowing my name.

I still have not decided if I am going to go back to speaking, but even if I do it will not be the same. I cannot go back to the lecture format, I would rather do the question and answer, but I will start with a little more information than I did this past time.