Trauma Trounced Tranquillity Triumphant

Severely traumatised throughout my youth from the age of three or four and then sporadically during my adult life, I became a dysfunctional human being. I compensated for my anxiety with anger, distrust and arrogance. My mental and emotional health was severely compromised. I developed a heightened propensity for flight or fight and frequently suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, once almost four and a half decades after the event. When I was fifty, something utterly devastating occurred, as did something which inspired great hope. Distressed by the first and inspired by the second, I set out on a journey of self-discovery and self-development.

Although I was grateful just to have survived my traumas, survival is not enough. The purpose of life is not merely to survive but to be happy. This is a lesson that horses have taught me. Largely on my own and with the help of horses, I have managed not only to survive my traumas but also to help and heal myself. My physical, mental and emotional health has been restored and anxiety has been replaced with joy.

Self-help has given me the strength to withstand new traumas, such as the recent breakdown of my marriage marking the end of a relationship of thirty-eight years, the loss of friends of twenty to forty years standing, my animals and most of my possessions. Self-help has also enabled me to reconnect with my first love after a period of separation of forty-four years. Without joy, this would not have been possible.

My story of self-help, I am now sharing with others. If just one trauma sufferer helps themself as a result, it will have served its purpose.