Quotessence
Home / Topics / Ptsd Recovery Quotes

Ptsd Recovery Quotes

Browse 35 quotes about Ptsd Recovery.

Ptsd Recovery Quotes

“Pretending you’re OK when you aren’t isn’t strength.” “Well, that’s where you’re wrong,” Robin contradicted him. The champagne had fizzed on her tongue and seemed to give her courage even before it hit her brain. “Sometimes, acting as though you’re all right, makes you all right. Sometimes you’ve got to slap on a brave face and walk out into the world, and after a while it isn’t an act anymore, it’s who you are. If I’d waited to feel ready to leave my room after—you know,” she said, “I’d still be in there. I had to leave before I was ready.”

“What I know for certain now is this: my anger has sharpened. It no longer simmers beneath the surface, it burns. But instead of drowning it in alcohol, I decide to sit with it. I let it crackle inside me, fueling my actions. It drives me to write this book, a safe, solid outlet for this powerful force. It propels me to press forward for justice. My anger needs to be visible. I will channel it with purpose. The power of an angry woman is something no man can ignore.”

“The Americans gave it a name, PTSD — Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. I had heard about it before: it was something that had to do with army men coming back from the frontline, veterans who had been under a lot of stress. Or survivors of terrorist attacks, bombings, massacres, or big accidents. What I didn’t know was that journalists were also considered a category ‘at risk,’ particularly the ones who had covered conflict or reported in war zones crisis zones. All those who had witnessed episodes of violence, killings, traumatic events, and who had learnt to work and live coping with the anxiety from nearby fighting and constant danger. I saw many of my colleagues devastated — broken — by what they had seen, which often I had seen too. Some never managed to really go back to their normal lives and once, after a crisis that had hit them harder than the many others, decided they had had enough. Among many terrible news came those of the suicide of Stephanie Vaessen’s husband and cameraman — him and Stephanie were two of the people I had shared the tragic days in East Timor with. No worries though. I was doing just fine, as I’d tell myself. At the end of the day, I genuinely believed it: I never really took as many risks as many of the colleagues I had met or shared the most traumatic experiences in the field with, hence I had probably been exposed to a lot less stress. (...)”

“What if I make it through this, so damaged that the rest of my life is a living hell? A graphic rerun of everything I survived, but over and over and over again?” She inhaled a shuddering breath. “So every single detail—that was already burned into my brain and every inch of my body—gets worked in like oil on a cutting board!” Tears dribbled down her face. “But I’m not a cutting board, Dakota, and what I went through in British Columbia was not oil to be worked in,” she whispered. “It was worse than dying, and I’m afraid that living after this will be a worse punishment than I ever imagined.” She shrugged one shoulder. “And I don’t think I’m up to the task.”

“A successful suicide doesn't just happen, although, of course, there are exceptions. Someone happens to be walking across a bridge when the feeling hits. Or they're on the roof of a building and realize they have nothing to live for. But most of the time, suicide takes planning. That's the way I figured. The was I was figuring...”

“The scar rippled from the top of her bikini line down to her thigh. Where normal girls had hair, Ava had a quilt of mangled skin that required tweezers to de-fur. For ten months she tried joking about it (“Turns out sharks really CAN smell menstrual blood a mile away!”). She tried fixing it with a myriad of steroid injections and silicon gels. She even tried ignoring it. Her last hope was to confront it.”

“New sounds rustled through her anti-depressant haze; a gentle reverberation from the heart of the home... another creek... another thunk... rapid clicking like the wings of a broken cricket. Then, raindrops on metal... the escalating blare of a car horn... the scream of wet tires and the clink clink clink of showering glass.”

“In 2017, after the Hollywood producer, Harvey Weinstein's sexual assault scandal went viral, the #MeToo movement grew like wildfire. It triggered my trauma. Flashbacks of horrific injustice. Old memories resurfaced.”

“I give thee permission, great god, to enter my sacred and holy place, that area within me that needs to be purged of anger, betrayal, fear, and even hatred.” (Excerpt from Spell for Relieving Stress and Anxiety)”

“Some people equate trauma to something big like war, death, extreme acts of violence, physical abuse, sexual abuse, or natural disasters. While those are all examples of trauma, trauma doesn’t have to be big like that.”

“In a moment of desperation, Jesus could have spoken new revelations or said nothing, but He chose the cling to the written Word as His sword in the battle. We cannot live on bread—natural means—alone. We cannot rely solely on medication or any other means that has been provided for us in the wilderness, but only by the Word of God. Jesus knew this and He lived this. So for us, what does that look like? It means getting up and opening up the Bible and reading even when we don’t feel like it or even when only a few words is the best we can do, because the Word really does transform our thinking and become our weapon in war.”

“Some people talk about their PTSD as if it's a badge of honor, and I roll my fucking eyes. I'm not trying to be the PDST-esy of them all. I ignored it for a really long time. I overdosed at seventeen. I had no home for a little while. Every night I have nightmares. It's gonna end my marriage, too. I want it to end. He can't stomach my suffering and hates that he can't help me and doesn't want to do what will actually end this era. I think he loves me too much to see me in pain, and the pain he does see reminds him of his own, which is just as fucked as mine. Why can't just fucking let me cry? When the men came over, they would drug me, and I still crave those drugs to this day. Every man I look at either reminds me if those men or they don't. All men are mirrors. Whether they want to be or not. I think about those men all the time. (117)”

“The Crazy Mother’s Guide To Raising Exceptional Children Is For All Parents Who Have Days When They Want To Run Away And Join The Circus. – Sonia D. Hebdon”