Life After PTSD Podcast: Healing From Trauma

Morgan was a student from the Coral-Springs Parkland community rocked by the tragic shooting at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School on February 14, 2018.  A student in a magnet program, she was not on the school's campus the day of the shooting but knew 6 of the victims lost and was getting code yellow and code red updates as that day progressed.  In addition to her peers lost, Morgan would soon...

Matt is an Army Veteran who experienced the shooting at Fort Hood, as well as loss in both Iraq and Afghanistan, followed by over a dozen more of his comrades lost to suicide.  His trauma was significantly impacting his marriage and life as a parent, until his wife heard the Life After PTSD podcast and reached out for help.  In this episode he shares his incredible story of change.  - The show is...

Laney Rosenzweig is the founder and developer of Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART) and has been a licensed Marriage and Family Therapist for over 30 years. She has served on staff at the University of South Florida as an assistant visiting professor where considerable ART research has been conducted and currently maintains a private practice in Connecticut, is an on-call trauma specialist for s...

In this episode we welcome Cyndi, a retired United States Air Force Staff Sergeant who now works as a licensed mental health counselor, to share a story from her days in the service where she and others were unfairly blamed by a pastor for the suicide of someone under their supervision.  Though her own supervisors assured her otherwise, she carried that trauma for a number of years before herself...

In this episode we welcome Heather, a pastor's wife who has battled thoughts of suicide nearly her entire life.  Heather shares of some of the criticism she has received at times for needing a lifeline for mental health, as well as how she has remained on purpose in spite of some of the naysayers.  Often times in churches and faith communities there's a predisposition to thinking that mental healt...

In this episode we welcome back Allen Kanerva to reflect on what we’ve learned in now over 100 episodes and more than a year and a half of working together in the realm of trauma. One of our learnings during this time is that the medical model uses the term PTSD for its purposes but this diagnosis is not accurate to describe what the body is actually experiencing in its adverse reaction to trauma....

New Zealander Caroline Barron is the author of Ripiro Beach: A Memoir Of Life After Near Death.  In a previous episode (#90) we learned about her story where the birth of her second child led to an emergency hysterectomy and a very intense fear of death.  We reconnect with Caroline to learn about how her own personal trauma affected both her husband and children and get some advice from her husban...

On December 30, 2018 we launched our first episode of Life After PTSD. 100 episodes later we are still going strong telling stories of those who have worked to clear their PTSD and are living a new normal of their deciding. In this first of a two part series, we revisit 6 stories from our past and allow the audience to hear the proof that PTSD is not an illness, but an injury that can heal: 1) All...

On December 30, 2018 we launched our first episode of Life After PTSD.  100 episodes later we are still going strong telling stories of those who have worked to clear their PTSD and are living a new normal of their deciding.  In this first of a two part series, we revisit 6 stories from our past and allow the audience to hear the proof that PTSD is not an illness, but an injury that can heal:  1)...

Christie is a mom to three children with a fourth on the way.  While meeting with her midwife in a third trimester appointment the traumatic circumstances around the birth of her third child triggered previously unknown fears for the birth of her fourth.  In this episode she shares how she reached out, the help she received and her new outlook for her baby's arrival. -  The show is intended to pro...

In this episode we get the privilege of conversing with Megan, who's firefighter husband Ed has been on previous episodes of the show.  When Megan was 3 years old and sitting in a car seat of her parents car, a bad Florida storm raged and the experience of driving through the storm ruined her for decades thereafter.  She recently had a session where a counselor used Accelerated Resolution Therapy...

In this episode Dr. Leslie Cary joins us to talk about the physiological effects of uncleared trauma, especially on children, and how, different from the animal kingdom, the unconscious mind of human beings processes learnings from traumatic and significant emotional events differently, resulting in a constant replaying of those events in a harmful way to our physiology.  Be prepared to be amazed...

In this episode Patty joins us to share of the work she is doing in the Charlotte, NC area with the Carolina Center for Recovery.  The Carolina Center for Recovery is paving the way with innovative therapy integrating trauma resolution along with the substance abuse treatment.  They are getting excellent results, recognizing that this wholistic approach affirms that in so many cases of s...

Dr. Diego Hernandez is a licensed Clinical Psychologist, trauma expert, and Clinical Director of Accelerated Resolution Therapy (ART) Research at the University of South Florida and past Clinical Director of the Military Trial of ART at USF. With 20 years of mental health experience and a combat trauma expert, Dr. Diego works privately and on retreats with active duty military and Veterans. His pr...

Ed is a Florida firefighter, former Veteran and degreed counselor who joins us this week to talk about one of the many faces of PTSD: firefighters and first responders, and how their trauma is often bigger and more unexpected than what the public thinks.  In light of a recent death of a friend on the force due to cancer caused by chemicals released in a burning building, Ed gives us a glimpse...

Eric was a police officer on a smaller Florida city force who was shot in the line of duty.  The initial shock of the experience led him to assume life would go on as normal but upon return to the force he began to experience the symptoms of PTSD that heightened his fight flight response and ultimately led to his reaching out for help.  Unfortunately the average care provided by the most readily a...

Caroline Barron’s father never found his birth mother. After he dies suddenly on her twentieth birthday, Caroline develops an insidious fear of her own untimely death. When she nearly bleeds out on an operating table during childbirth, it almost seems her greatest fear is justified. Emerging from the experience a changed woman, Caroline spends the next six years poring over her family history in a...

In this episode we welcome veteran Mark whose story of multiple traumas while serving in our Armed Forces, included facing constant mortar fire on deployment testicular cancer and nearly dying of a heart attack related to his military vaccines and the subsequent outlook on life cause by constantly facing death.  - The show is intended to provide encouragement for the listener but is for entertainm...

In this episode we dialogue about how many therapists expressed feeling overwhelmed by the emotional fallout stemming from the height of the COVID-19 (Coronavirus) pandemic. - The show is intended to provide encouragement for the listener but is for entertainment purposes only and NOT a substitute for proper treatment or to be used in any legal capacity whatsoever. Please seek help from a qualifie...

In this episode we welcome Jess, who enrolled in the Armed Services at 17 years old in order to have a future that paid for the college her family couldn't afford.  By 18 she had experienced two instances of military sexual trauma (MST) and later in life her husband left her after 14 years of marriage.  Hear her story of recover and learn why so many instances of MST go unreported each year. - The...

In this episode we welcome Stacie, who's husband Michael was comatose and on a ventilator as a result of COVID-19.  As their family reeled, Stacie read a chance social post that led her to the solution that may have ultimately saved her husband's life: plasma.  Michael is now home recovering and the family is creating their new normal after become yet another of the many faces of trauma. -  The sh...

In this episode we welcome Brenton Wright, father of Calvin Desir, the second of two Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School students lost to suicide in the aftermath of the Valentine's Day 2018 shooting. Less than a week earlier the Coral Springs, Florida-Parkland, Florida community lost Sydney Aiello, a fellow survivor of the shooting.  While Life After PTSD generally focuses on the story after the...

In this episode special guest Ashley shares of how after birthing her son she grew to resent her breasts when they failed to continue to produce milk for her son.  This ultimately created a triggering response for her when her husband would initiate intimacy, specifically that part of her body.  Trauma affects countless numbers of marriages and often for reasons that aren't about bad behaviors in...

In this episode we welcome back Kim Krawczyk, teacher at Marjory Stoneman Douglas High School in Coral Springs, FL.  With the Broward County School Board having announced that classes will be held online for the remainder of the year, teachers like Kim had to shuffle to transition to an entirely different style of teaching.  Even more significant, this represents yet another year where students at...

In this episode we welcome therapist Chris and client Samantha, who was in a long term abusive relationship with a boyfriend who not only sexually assaulted her, forcing her to have an abortion, but imposed curfews and systems of permission concerning what Samantha could or couldn't do as a human being.  Domestic violence is real and it's all around us.  Please be aware of your own situation but a...