I've had so many traumatic experiences that it's impossible to list them all. So, I'll list the more salient ones. 1. Was when my beloved dog died. I had little to no love as a child certainly none from my mother who seemed to hate me; 2. My mother divorced my father which was bad enough but then she remarried a horrible man whom I never met until she brought him home and announced their marriage. He then ordered that I would be ripped from my hometown where I had everything a boy could want. Her husband, Tom as a high school PE teacher and very fit. My brother and I had a snowball fight with him when I was 11 and my brother was 7 or 8. He made up an ice ball and through it hard at my little brother smashing a finger and sending him to the hospital. My mother got pregnant by him and had a miscarriage followed by a hysterectomy shortly before divorcing him after he made my mother pay his way through insurance school. When we moved from our home in Oswego, we bought a really junkie house in Portland. We were awakened one night by a man he knew who was angry and had a knife. They fought all over the house finally beating the assailant; 3. I got drafted into the Army out of college and went to war where people tried to kill me during the Tet offensive; 4. My father, who had recently changed from a man I feared because of beatings he gave me as a child, to a loving father who apologized for all his transgressions, died in a fishing accident while my brother watched helplessly; 5. I married a woman who was an ex topless dancer. My first love. I caught her bringing multiple men home whenever I was gone. Nearly killed one guy. We had a stormy divorce. I still pine over the deep love I gave her including singing to her as she hung out her dormitory window. This should have gone to someone who cared; 6. I got demoted at Tektronix by an asshole boss. I was convenient to demote so he set me up by lying. In a private meeting he said I shouldn't even try to appeal because he would deny it and win so I quit the company; 7. My mother finally married a good man whom I grew to love. He even adopted me and my brother. He died in my arms. Later, while going through his papers I found a rough draft of a will that was extremely negative of me and it broke my heart; 8. My mother then inherited everything from my new father and invited me to a reading of her new will which cut my inheritance in half; 9. My mother-in-law who had lived with me and my wife for ten years died in my arms. I gave her CPR but it was hopeless; 10. My brother died of cancer while spitting up blood and in my arms. 11. My mother then became so unloving that she started telling people all over Seaside how horrible I was. When I found out we became estranged. 12. A doctor had declared my mother died with dementia and her will went from an original of $3.7 Million and growing to $50,000 for me. She left more to each of two people, one my cousin, a drug using chain smoking, pornography addict who spent 6 months in jail until my mother bailed him out, and a man who is an ex convict and con man who was convicted of raping his daughter, than she left to me. The rest was left to strangers and shirttail relatives who are no good. All that she had promised me since I was 9 years old she left to others including old photos of me and memorabilia of my natural father and brother; 13. Then the VA gave me the wrong insulin resulting in the eventual loss of my kidneys which resulted in a life long condemnation of the hell that is hemodialysis. To add insult to injury the VA has said I am not eligible for a kidney transplant. Okay, your turn.
If I go through and read everyone's posts & comment on each one of them.... can I get paid $200/hr? I'll even print a psychology license off the internet somewhere.... Better yet - I'll just call myself a 'life coach'.
I really don't have any stories from my life that come to mind. One of the most traumatic things that happened to me was when a pigeon shit down my back when I had a hoodie on, while I was waiting to get into a bar with friends. It was pretty vile and disgusting. I still sometimes dry heave when I think about the experience. I also once had to drive myself to the ER when I tried to use a dagger to change the batteries in the TV remote. That's about it. So far, a fairly trauma free life.
That's rough river, I know what it's like to see a dead body. Not a great experience. In fact it's probably one of the most traumatic experiences one can have.
Holy Hell. That's...there is just no word for that is. Gotta be hard to be whole after that as a person.
Damn Lanny, that's a lot and probably not all you have gone through. Glad you made it through all that, and glad you are here.
I've been to the E-Room probably more than a dozen times, maybe two dozen, six times for uncontrolled bleeding..
A humorous, sort of trauma, I once tried to swat a fly with a shoe and shattered the window. Had to go to ER for tetanus shot. Replace the window. And the damn fly got away.
I really enjoy JJ Cale music. Sorry about you're friend, thats awesome you were able to put his ashes on his board and into the current!
I have had many traumas. Here are my youngest and perhaps biggest. When I was four I saw my neighbor fall through my living room coffee table and die. He suffered a heart attack because he mixed alcohol with some medication he stole or was given from my dad. My mom and dad were throwing a party. Loud rock music, people in every room doing coke, maybe heroin, and drinking. I was playing with my Thunder Cat and GI Joe action figures in the living room. He grabbed his chest, started foaming at the mouth, and crashed through the coffee table. My dad tried to save him with CPR, but he died. When I was 5 my older brother died. He was only 10. He hung himself on the front porch. He was angry at my mom because she was babysitting a baby and feeding it. I guess he wanted attention and wasn't getting it. He told me to tell my mom if she didn't make himself something to eat, he would hang himself. So, I told her. She said to tell him that was not funny and she would get him something after feeding the baby. I went back out to him. He said he wanted food now or else. I told her and again she told him to stop messing around. There were a few more back and forths and then I went to play with my younger brother in the yard. We were playing in a mud puddle. I remember my mother's scream. You hear screams in the movies but they don't compare. Her scream will always stick with me and everytime I hear it in my mind, my spine is set ablaze He was hanging on the porch. She ran across the street to the neighbors, a hunter and his son's came running over and cut him down. They tried to save him with CPR but he was gone. Oh, and the 2000 NBA Western Conference Finals
When I was 23 I was working in a machine shop, when lunch started I removed my safety glass's and walked into the lunch room and got hit point blank in my right eye by a flying chisel, had to remove the eye. I have not let it hold me back over the years as I went to pitch fast pitch softball for 35 years. The doc told me to play lots of ping pong to help with depth perception and it worked. Thats was a physical trauma which I know is different than emotional or anxiety from a loss or divorce.
Man, thats very sad! Sorry! I commend you as you seemed to really have your shit together, stay strong!
