The truth is every experience you have - both the bad and the good - impact your brain in important ways by creating a physiological environment as well as neural pathway structures. You already know how trauma has negatively impacted you and led to uncomfortable and even painful feelings and body experiences. Have you considered the beneficial impact of positive experiences and how they can help you feel better?

The majority of survivors begin PTSD recovery in traditional talk therapy. It's a natural place to start. As a society, we're very in tune with 'therapy' and the idea of talking to a professional when something is wrong emotionally and we don't know how to fix it. But is talk therapy really effective in healing PTSD? The answer is, NO. Here's why...

If you have PTSD then you know what it’s like to feel unable to control your emotions. You’re walking along having a fine day when all of a sudden you hear a siren or a car backfires and you hit the deck or hide in the bushes. Or, you’re feeling completely at ease in a conversation with someone and then all of a sudden a huge wave of anger courses through you and you react with vicious words and vehement aggression. What’s happening in these instances? Your brain is processing information that makes it feel in danger, which causes it to send messages to your body, which activates your sympathetic nervous system that leads you to respond in either fight, flight or freeze. Bottomline: Typical of anyone with PTSD you’re having trouble regulating your emotions. Not to worry, there are ways to counteract this.

On my journey to PTSD recovery, one of the first distress techniques that my therapist taught me was meditation. When he suggested it, my first thought was, "You've got to be kidding me!" My mind and body were always racing, how was I supposed to slow down far and long enough to meditate?

During my own PTSD recovery I studied - a lot! I read all I could get my hands on about trauma psychology and recovery theory. Some of my favorite current authors: Judith Herman, Babette Rothschild, Peter Levine and Robert Scaer. (Most of whom I've now interviewed on my radio show, YOUR LIFE AFTER TRAUMA.) While I focused on the current authors, I also delved back into the past, reading the fathers of trauma theory, including Jean-Martin Charcot and Pierre Janet. One of my fave quotes that made me feel soooo much better actually came from a comment made back in 1881...

Last week I wrote about how possible it is for the brain to change after trauma. This week I want to share with you one of the ways you can do that. It's all about creating positive experiences that last for long enough that your brain can record the experience through neural activity. Whew, sounds like a lot of science and hard work, doesn't it? Actually, it's as easy as eating a ripe strawberry. Here's what I mean...

In regard to PTSD, I've heard so many times - from both survivors and clinicians - once you're broken you can't be fixed (Three Ways Trauma Affects Your Brain). Really? I find that hard to believe. And now, there's proof that's all a bunch of baloney.

After trauma and struggling with PTSD we all want two things: safety and control. How do we get them? Sometimes by rather maladaptive coping techniques!

Recently a survivor wrote me a note about the fact that she was beginning therapy, finally. "I know there's a lot to do," she wrote, "Do you have any tips for how to approach the work of posttraumatic growth?" Do I have tips? You bet I do.

"I live in such a fog!", Ophelia said to me last week. "I can't see my way out of it." Boy, do I remember that feeling! Ophelia lives overseas and we work on her PTSD recovery via Skype. She's terrifically motivated, open to trying new approaches and honest about her healing experience. The PTSD fog, I've learned, is universal. I myself waded through it for decades until is was so thick I felt its swirl around me was more real than the world in which everyone else lived.