Tag: many different ways

PTSD and Depression


      I remember a Doctor told me when I was just discharged from the military, where I served for 16 years, I would need to find something to let my inner feelings out and make it worth my while. I played with woodworking, model building, puzzles, even reading. In the end the one thing which helped me with my disabilities and my PTSD, was writing. To express myself in words on paper or on a computer and then release it to the world to read, helped me deal with my nightmares, from the Service and childhood. We all deal with life’s bad moments in a different way, some of us let it loose in displays of screaming, some in physical violence, some in other ways, but when you know the anger and feelings you carry can hurt either yourself or someone else you love, you find a way to let it out easier and slower.

       PTSD contains memories of violence, anger, beatings, pain and yes even deaths of others. The human mind builds its own defense mechanisms, and the person experiencing it all doesn’t understand why it is happening, or how, it just does to them. Fighting nightmares of bad dreams of events of your past, can get you in the end.

        So, my way of dealing with the beatings as a child the incidents of action and destruction in the Services and the nightmares of life, is to write some out on paper or computer and then let the world read about and understand it all.  Some victims of PTSD, deal with this in many different ways as I said, and they each have their own stories to tell I am sure.

         Dealing with experiences from one’s past is the hardest thing in the world to do, they tend to flash back into your mind triggered by events in current times, or people you react to because of the past. Then you react to the situation or person unconsciously and the result can be hurting someone you had no intention of hurting at all or yourself. It also can lead you into depression, opening another dimension of pain and suffering because you blame yourself for what happens or happened and you start to put yourself down. The two link and when they do, can lead to a  bad cocktail of mind problems that can kill the patient or those around them. Careful Medication helps and a relief for the pressure and feeling into words on a computer or on paper does it for me.

       No I am not a Doctor, but I am a patient, one who suffers from PTSD, flashbacks and nightmares. One who when he does, gets away from all and finds a peaceful place to relax and to calm the mind down.

        So to my fellow ex-service members and those suffering today from PTSD, get counselling, get medication, find a way to tell others your stories, your feeling and relieve the pressure in your minds and souls in someway. Write the nightmares down, and let others see them, don’t blame yourself for actions beyond your control at the time they happened. relieve the pressure by writing, reading, puzzles, medication or more, and live in peace once more if you can.

 

Video Games-Destroying America?.


Video Game Wars seem to be taking over the entertainment of AMerican children and even many adults. Games like Zumba, and The WII games, and even Playstation all seem to be in every home you’re in. You can hear kids and adults talking about the great graphics, sounds and action these games provide, through a controller of one kind or another.

       Sports games, Action games. Shooter Games, Adventure games, even Exercise games. People drawn to monitors and Television screens of all sizes, staring at a game and how to beat it for fun. While it may be entertaining, and it may even be fun, is it really safe and what we want American children and adults doing so many hours they don’t do much else?.

       Back in the 1960’s the America I knew and loved and even yes into the 1970’s, children didn’t have video games and big screen televisions or computers. The parents told all of us go out and play, make friends and explore nature or sports or something for real. We ran, jumped, skipped rope, played ball and more. We learned many things in many different ways, but, we weren’t allowed to sit in front of a screen with a controller in our hands and do nothing else but stare!. Sadly, that is what is happening in America and many other countries around the world and it is killing the motivation, the minds, and the spirits of the children of the world. They have no objectives, or wants or needs other than a computer with great speed and graphics and games, in their minds. Like the game Zombies, our children are becoming zombies themselves.

       I will give you an example of what I mean and if you, anyone who reads this blog, thinks I am wrong, then you let me know, ok?

        I own my own home with my wife and we live in a rural area in Connecticut. As we are an older couple these days and we have a mortgage to pay and bills, we rent bedrooms out to people to make ends meet. We rented a room to a person ten years ago and he is still with us today in his mid forties. The man is 46 years old, weighs well over 300 lbs. and can’t work because of disabilities. 

        One day we invited him to have dinner with us, around 11 am was the invite. My wife gave him a list of things to pick up at the grocery store as follows, 1) ten lbs. of potatoes, 2) brocolli 3) squash 4) Some other veggie too.  We were in the kitchen cooking when he came back from the store and dropped the bags on the table will the bill.

         My wife said to him did you get all the vegetables, he looks back at her and said what vegetables you talking about I didn’t get any!.  My wife looked at him and said didn’t you buy what was on the list?. He said yes he did, so my wife says, so you got the vegetables, he says nope!. We looked at each other and went what? As we took the items out of the bags it was all there so we asked him if they were veggies, he said nope and started naming them by name!. Finally we looked at him and said these are all veggies!. Oh he says and shuffles off back to his video games and tv upstairs.

      Someone please tell me why a 46-year-old man has no idea, what vegetables are? He is so immersed in his video games and tv, daily you hear it running 24/7 unless he is sleeping. He hasn’t had a girl friend in ten years that we know of and he buys electronics like he is addicted to them. He sits in a lawn chair in his bedroom, an X-box controller in hand staring at Shooter Games on a big screen and nothing else. He buys frozen food to eat, so all he has to do is microwave it or put it in the oven and walk away. Is this what we want for our future children to be?

        I once had an idea that maybe just maybe, the Russians and Chinese and Japanese all got together and found a way to conquer us Americans by inventing video games to control our minds and soften our bodies.  Tetris was just out then and I could see Americans flocking to it left and right and sitting down playing it forever. What an attack huh, that would be, but I laughed it off but still I wonder.

        Is America getting weaker because our children don’t want to read, play sports or go outside and play anymore? They just want an electronic video game console and a controller and some stupid game to be immersed in, till they fall asleep staring at them. Sad isn’t it, what happened to the America of invention, innovation, exploration, and more. The healthy and strong people of a nation who wouldn’t ever give up? We lost it all to too much electronic niceties and too many gadgets, we are becoming lazy, fat, slow, dim-witted and worse. Wake up America, Wake up now, before you are too weak to defend yourself or anyone else!.