Friendship and Faith: Overcoming Trauma's Shadows

Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
When it feels like you've lost your way and the
road disappears in the haze,when your fading heart needs a
northern star, I'll walk withyou to the other side.

Speaker 2 (00:24):
Hey everybody, and welcome to Wednesdays with
Watson.
It is July of 2024.
And you are in for a little bitof a different experience If
you are a regular listener tothe Wednesdays with Watson
podcast.
Over the next two months, overJuly and August, we are going to
put the podcast on hiatus.

(00:46):
However, we are going tore-release some episodes from
the first season that most ofyou probably have not heard, and
so we're going to combine someof these episodes, many of which
I left off on a cliffhanger.
So back in the day, people hadto wait two weeks to find out
the rest of the story.
The day, people had to wait twoweeks to find out the rest of

(01:07):
the story.
As you're listening to what weare going to share with you
today, just keep in mind who youhear talking to you right now
and how unbelievably faithfulGod has been, because, even when
I look back to four and a halfyears ago, when I recorded these
episodes, I am such a differentperson so much healing, so much

(01:29):
hope, so much growth.
And part of that has beenbecause of this, which had
become a bit of a passionproject for me the Wednesdays
with Watson podcast but most ofit is because of my church, my
community and counseling, which,from the very beginning, became
the tagline for this podcast,along with Jesus, who is the

(01:51):
star of my story.
And so, as you listen to thesefirst set that we're going to
drop today, we will be doingthat all through July and August
, and you will know, if you're anew listener listener why all
of these things matter to me.
As for me, during July andAugust, I will be behind a
computer getting my dissertationproposal ready.

(02:12):
As some of you know, I am allbut dissertation done with my
doctorate degree in educationalpsychology, with a focus on
trauma and community care.
I'm looking forward to whatthat means for the podcast.
We have brand new content and abrand new format coming at you
in September, and so, until then, though, especially for those

(02:34):
of you that are new, enjoy thesedropback episodes so that we
can see how faithful God is, howfaithful God is.
Hey, everybody, and welcomeback to Wednesdays with Watson.
It is Wednesday, and if youhave been following the podcast,

(02:56):
you know that I am Amy Watsonand I am your host, and we
record these episodes everyWednesday, so you may be
listening to it on a differentday, but either way, thank you.
I am so appreciative of thetime that you have decided to
invest.
I've been so excited about thepodcast in general and some of
the communication that I'mgetting with people via email
and social media, and if youhang on to the end of the

(03:16):
podcast, you'll see all the waysthat you can get in contact
with me.
I am super excited about today,in this first season, our
podcast, ptsd, jesus and Me,where Jesus is the star of my
story, as well astrauma-informed counseling, as
well as my community and,speaking of community, one of
the reasons why I am so excitedtoday and this name will not be

(03:39):
at all unfamiliar to those ofyou who have been listening to
the podcast but I am so excitedto welcome our very first guest
on Wednesdays with Watson, myfriend, my sister, my business
partner, chrissy.
Hey, chrissy, and welcome to thepodcast.
Hey, I'm excited to be here.
I am so excited to welcome youto the podcast, and so I just
wanted first, before I started,into a little bit of the teacher

(04:00):
mode and then we're going tohave a conversation about why
you're on the podcast today.
We've called this Memory Keeperbecause, as I will talk about,
in some of the science of PTSD,memories are often different
than as they actually occurred,and so the Lord had placed you
in an opportunity to be a memorykeeper for me in so many ways,
but I wanted to start outbecause you are an Old Testament

(04:24):
fan, am I right?

Speaker 3 (04:25):
I am.

Speaker 2 (04:25):
You know that's always confused me about you.

Speaker 3 (04:28):
I love the Old Testament.

Speaker 2 (04:30):
I always used to say but Jesus isn't in the Old
Testament but, he kind of, is he?

Speaker 3 (04:34):
is it just looks different?
Yeah, it's the promise of himcoming.

Speaker 2 (04:39):
But early in those days, in some of the stories
that these guys have alreadyheard, you shared a special song
with me and I just want you totell us, before we start into
some of the science of this andthen after the science, the
really cool part of conversationthat we've already recorded
about how you're my memorykeeper and I'm so grateful for
that Tell me what song that was.

Speaker 3 (04:59):
So we were in the same Sunday morning class and I
got the opportunity.
I say opportunity, but really Iwas scared.

Speaker 2 (05:08):
You were terrified, I was terrified.
I was sitting next to you.
I remember that.

Speaker 3 (05:12):
I got the opportunity to teach one morning and it was
a summer in Psalms and I taughton Psalm 91 and it's always
been a favorite of mine on Psalm91, and it's always been a
favorite of mine.
Really, it hit home for me whenI was 24, and I went on a Young

(05:36):
Life wilderness hiking trip andit was a week long and you're
completely out of touch with allof humanity but certainly can't
get word out if you're introuble, and the entire week I
was extremely ill and we wereclimbing mountains, hiking 30
miles.
It was very intense and it wasgorgeous and I was sick, but

(06:00):
there was no way for my mom toknow that.
But the whole time I was thereshe was praying Psalm 91 over me
, and especially verses five andsix.
You will not be afraid of theterror by night or the arrow
that flies by day, of thepestilence that stalks in the
darkness, or of the destructionthat lays waste at noon.

(06:21):
And it was a battle day, night,noon, it didn't matter, I was
battling.
And it was a battle day, night,noon, it didn't matter, I was
battling.
And so often I feel like theseverses are appropriate for PTSD.
It's different battles.
It's the terror by night.
It's an arrow that flies by day, and so it's been appropriate

(06:43):
my whole life.

Speaker 2 (06:49):
And even more so now.
By the way, I didn't know theanswer to that question and the
fact that your mom prayed thatover you.
I might not have evenremembered that, and that's
precious for its own reasons.
But yeah, I've dubbed it thePTSD prayer because those verses
that you just read reallydescribes the day, from morning

(07:10):
to night, of a post-traumaticstress disorder patient, and so
thank you for introducing me tothat song.
I'm going to start reallyquickly and some of these things
, chrissy, you'll recognize.
I know sometimes you'll text meand go what was that again?
Because we both learned thisinitially from Dr Pettit and
then, of course, I've done myresearch.
But we're going to be talkinghippocampuses and amygdalas here

(07:33):
for just a few minutes beforeyou jump back on with me.
And the reason why I want to dothat is because the reason why,
on this first podcast, you'rehere is to help me unjumble some
memories.
On this first podcast you'rehere is to help me unjumble some
memories.
And so, in order for ourlisteners to understand why that
matters is, why do you need tohelp me unjumble those memories?
And so here I go into teachermode and then I can't wait to

(07:55):
continue our conversation.
You guys know that I loveplaying both the role of
storyteller and also the goal ofthis podcast is to educate you
about post-traumatic stressdisorder or complex
post-traumatic stress disorder.
The only difference really inthose two diagnoses is being

(08:15):
that complex post-traumaticstress disorder, as a result of
repeated trauma over a longperiod of time, is which is what
I have, but the symptoms arethe same, and so, before I bring
Chrissy on and I've got a veryspecial reason for doing that
today one of the goals of thispodcast is to talk about and
share with and bring on peoplewho have been instrumental in my

(08:38):
healing story, and that is whatthis is.
This is a healing story.
Sometimes it's hard to listen to, but I always encourage people.
You hear my voice, you can goto my website, you can see my
smile, you know that I am goodDoesn't mean life is always easy
, but that I am on the otherside of my journey with
post-traumatic stress disorder,or at least given a nice gut

(09:01):
punch and nice body blow.
As I always mention, there arethree components, and because
I'm a writer, I love analliteration, hence the
Wednesdays with Watson, and thenalso the three C's that are
central to anything that I amtrying to do here, and that is
my church, my community and alsotrauma-informed counseling.

(09:22):
So, as we've talked aboutpost-traumatic stress disorder
over the last several weeks, wehave talked about different
hallmarks of post-traumaticstress disorder, the last one
being flashbacks, butdisassociation detachment talked
about all of those things andno doubt, if you are a patient
of post-traumatic stressdisorder whether you've been
diagnosed or not you recognizesome of those things.

(09:44):
If you love somebody with PTSD,you recognize some of the
things that we've talked aboutToday.
I want to talk about somethingthat is super interesting and
super fascinating and somethingthat Chrissy brought up to me as
she was listening to thepodcast over the last few weeks,
but before I begin that storyand before I bring her on to
tell her part of the story, Iwant to be your teacher for just

(10:06):
a second.
As a kid who raced home towatch Emergency every day after
school and every medical dramaand everything, I always wanted
to be a doctor.
Took every class to be a doctor, have an undergrad degree to be
a doctor, but then sick peoplemake me sad, and so I am not a
doctor.
However, I love the study ofthese things, and so I want to

(10:27):
help you understand two things,really important things that
happen in trauma patients, andeven some understanding as to
why sometimes the same traumaticevent can affect a person and
manifest itself inpost-traumatic stress disorder.
A person and manifest itself inpost-traumatic stress disorder,

(10:47):
and then some people can lookat that exact same event and not
be affected by post-traumaticstress disorder.
This is also my opportunity toweekly remind you to remember
not to compare your pain.
Don't compare it with mine,don't compare it with your
sister's, don't compare it withyour cousin's.
Your pain is yours.
The grace that God has for youis for your pain and your pain
alone, and mine and mine alone.

(11:08):
So please do not compare.
There's two components to ourbrain that is associated with
memory and that trauma affects,and those two organs are buried
deeply in two different parts ofthe brain, so deeply, in fact,
that one of them is difficult toget to.
As a matter of fact, if you hada tumor on this, the doctors
would say to you it's better offof not digging in the middle of

(11:31):
your brain to address thisissue.
There are two parts of thebrain One is the hippocampus and
one is the amygdala.
Now, the hippocampus itsphysical location is very, very
difficult to get to, as Imentioned, but it has a bunch of
jobs in life.
But as it pertains to trauma,the hippocampus is actually the

(11:51):
physical location where memoriesare stored, and so we will
witness something or we will seesomething say like one of.
One of my favorite memories ofall time as a Jaguars fan is the
first time we went to theplayoffs and Morton, who played
for the Atlanta Falcons at thetime, mr Automatic, and all he
had to do was hit this chip shot, like this 22-yard chip shot,

(12:14):
field goal, and the Jaguars werelost.
But if he missed it, we weregoing to go to the playoffs in
just our second season.
And I will never forget where Iwas when I watched Morton
Anderson, who is now on the Hallof Fame, miss that field goal.
My hippocampus took that reallypleasurable memory and it
basically the hippocampus's job.

(12:36):
One of its jobs in life is todirect memories where to go, and
that is one of my strongestmemories.
So the hippocampus thendirected it to the amygdala, and
the amygdala is the realwarrior in the fight against
post-traumatic stress disorder,because what the amygdala does
is it took that memory and itdecided whether it had

(12:56):
interpreted it.
So it interpreted it andmanifested itself physically in
a very positive, a very happymemory.
So the amygdala is the realwarrior.
Now we know that trauma affectsboth of these organs by
shrinking them, therebydecreasing their efficacy to at
first bring in the memory andthen interpret the memory.

(13:18):
And so you'll see a lot ofpost-traumatic stress.
Patients interpret a memory astraumatic that isn't traumatic
at all, because the actual sizeof that organ has shrunk as a
result of trauma.
Or recent studies have shown,some people are just born with
smaller amygdalas andhippocampuses, which may explain

(13:41):
why some people are affected bytrauma and some are not.
Now I bring all of this up toyou because both of these are
really important in how we laydown memories and how we
interpret those memories and howwe can report those memories
back at a later date.
Trauma, without a doubt,absolutely affects both of these

(14:02):
organs.
This is where the fight orflight comes in and some of the
neuroplasticity stuff that we'lltalk about when we bring Dr
Pettit on.
But essentially, the reason whyI explained those two things to
you and those two organs to youis because they do affect the
way we lay down memories and itis the reason why, a lot of
times a trauma victim, say, forexample, will get on the stand

(14:25):
in a court of law and they willliterally not be able to
remember parts of it and theperson will get off because they
thought that they'll say theoffender, the person that
attacked him, had a red shirt onwith blue jeans, and maybe he
had white shorts and a t-shirt.
Maybe he had white shorts and at-shirt, but because of the way

(14:46):
the trauma affected theamygdala and the hippocampus,
things get left out, things getmisplaced, things get jumbled.
And so this is where I bringChris in, because emotional
memory processing is by thesetwo organs that, when they are
shrunk, when they are not thesize that they need to be
whether we're born that way ortrauma has made it that way it
absolutely makes memories weird.

(15:09):
And so, as Chrissy, who is oneof my beta listeners, has
listened to the podcast over thelast couple of weeks, every
single one of them, she came tome and said hey, this is how I
remember it.
And over the course of severalweeks, we realized that I am, in
fact, exhibiting exactly whatI'm explaining to you, where

(15:30):
both of these organs in my brain, as a result of repeated trauma
over 35 years have beenaffected, and so Chrissy is my
business partner, she is mysister, she is my friend, she is
a bunch of stuff to me and, asyou've heard on the other
podcasts, she was instrumentalin so many things and so welcome
to the podcast.
I appreciate you doing this.

(15:51):
Everybody who knows me knowshow much I love you and how much
I appreciate you and how muchthe Lord really has used you in
my life.
And I referred to you last weekI'm not sure which one is
Jonathan and David.
No, actually I know which iswhich.
You are, jonathan, because youcontinue to give me your battle
gear and you did during thosetimes and so I want to bring you

(16:11):
in on this for this podcast,for sure, and probably the next
one, because we want yourperspective.
Many people have emailed me ortexted me or interacted with me
on social media and they saidyou're helping me understand
somebody I live with withpost-traumatic stress disorder,
and right now, chris, we're inthe middle of a pandemic, we're
in the middle of racial tensions, and so there's no doubt that

(16:34):
PTSD is going to be on the rise.
You don't have to have a storylike mine to have PTSD Right now
.
You just need to turn on thenews, and so the mission, more
than ever, is to bring people onalso who love patients of
post-traumatic stress disorder,who will walk with them, because
it, like any other mentalillness, is very difficult for

(16:58):
everyone person who is notmedicated, who has not been
through the trauma.
It is hard for everyone, and so, as I was praying about this
podcast and bringing you on, Iremembered a movie that you
introduced me to that happens tobe one of your favorite movies,
and that movie is the Prince ofTides.

Speaker 3 (17:16):
I've always loved the Prince of Tides, which, if you
know me, it's not my typicalwatch.
It's not my typical watch.
I like Fluffy.
I really enjoy a movie that hasa happy ending.
But there's something sopowerful about that story and it
has always stuck with me, andthere are a couple of things
that are said in there that arevery true and applicable in this

(17:39):
situation.
One of them is at one point thelead character says the silence
is worse than the event thathappened to him, the trauma that
happened, and I think that'swhy this podcast is so important
.
We need to talk about it.
God meant us to live incommunity.

(18:00):
Forcing a trauma victim to besilent is worse than what has
actually happened to them.
So the first thing I would sayis listen.
And the second thing that hasalways stuck with me from that
movie is Barbara Streisand'scharacter says you were her
memory.
Even then this is her as achild and her brother was her

(18:25):
memory because once she had beentraumatized, her memories were
jumbled at best and so foreverhe had been a memory keeper for
her and I from the verybeginning, as things unfolded
with you, amy.
That movie and that line hadalways stuck with me and I took

(18:51):
it to heart, like the Lord hadsaid, that this is going to be
your role.
You will be a memory keeper,you will be her memory and you
can be helpful in that way.
I didn't understand the scienceof it, but I knew there was a
hiccup because I know you andyou're very smart, but the
lapses in memory did not makesense with the person I knew,

(19:15):
and so we have naturally, I havebecome your memory keeper.

Speaker 2 (19:20):
Even today, with little things and we'll go back
to this in a minute but you werea significant memory keeper,
better than a journal, probablybetter than things I actually
wrote right, because I waswriting things that I remember.
But what is so powerful to meabout that quote in the Prince
of Tides and we're not tellingyou what the event is, because
it's a great movie and youshould go watch it we don't want

(19:42):
to be a spoiler, but thesilence is worse than the actual
event, and one of the things isthat you, along with other
people, refuse to let me besilent.
And so, as I told that storyabout living with you, I
remember the first time I cameinto your house and I put the
key in the door and how weirdthat was, because I had come

(20:04):
from living, being married for12 years and then living in what
I dubbed as the ghetto to yourhouse, and I just remember how
weird that was.
But you really refused to besilent on the issue and I've
always appreciated that.
You have an incredible sense ofjustice, but I've always,
always appreciated that Now youand I have a really funny thing

(20:24):
going on and it's actually takenon a new life, even with our
counselor, with me being awordsmith and you having a word
budget, but we came up with aword that worked for both of us
and it basically is a ceasefirea lot of times for us.
We call it trauma-brained.
Tell them what we mean bytrauma-brained.

Speaker 3 (20:44):
If things get, if they escalate unusually, like if
you're getting in an argumentand suddenly someone's ready to
drop a nuclear bomb or push afire extinguisher off the wall,
correct or throw coffee againsta wall, right, right.
Then what I try to do, knowingthat whatever is firing in your

(21:06):
brain or could be in mine, isoff, it's off.
It's firing on a millioncylinders instead of one, right,
then I try to bring my voicedown and I think we both have
decided okay, hey, hey, traumabrain, Trauma brain, and say it
laughingly.

(21:26):
If that doesn't work, then Isay it soothingly.
We try different ways ofgetting through all those firing
cylinders that are saying Ican't handle it, throw all the
nuclear bombs.
Throw all the bombs, I can'tdeal, I can't deal Whatever can
get through.
Throw all the nuclear bombs,throw all the bombs I can't deal
, I can't deal Whatever can getthrough.

(21:47):
So, if it's calm, if I can sayhey, I think this might be
trauma brain.
Or if we need to say hey, thisis trauma brain.
Either way, whatever way we needto, the key is to hear the
person and not the argument.
And you really do need to to tobe paying attention to when,

(22:11):
especially someone who hascomplex post-traumatic stress
disorder is picking a fight to.
And by picking a fight I domean that this is not
intentional, it is a defensemechanism because their brain is
literally thinking I could die,I've got to survive, I've got

(22:32):
to survive.
Yeah, this fight or flight,right, so it is literally we
could fight over the color ofthe floor, 100%.
And we have yes and screaming,and so you've got to back
yourself out of the situationand recognize that there is
something else at play.
And we're at the point nowwhere I can say, okay, something

(22:53):
else is bothering you.
And oftentimes you're gettingto the point now where you can
say I don't know what it is.

Speaker 2 (22:59):
Right, and that's half the battle and that's huge.
Yeah, that's huge.
One of my favorite things thatyou say and I would, as Chrissy
is speaking to people who lovesurvivors of post-traumatic
stress disorder and peopleliving with post-traumatic
stress disorder is a couplethings.
One of the things that you sayto me all the time, and it is
absolute, like somebody justgave me a shot of a tranquilizer

(23:20):
because it calms me down.
Tranquilizer because it calmsme down, because one of the
issues with the amygdala and thehippocampus is everything I
don't have the ability tode-escalate stress, right, so we
just came off of we're in themiddle of a pandemic or towards
the end of a pandemic.
But what a lot of people don'tknow is, as I mentioned earlier
in the podcast, you're mybusiness partner and we've been

(23:41):
in business for 10 yearstogether and when that happened,
my brain shut down, 100% shutdown, and so it's a trigger.
And so you live, unfortunately,with triggers and I often
apologize to you, I'm sorry, orI'll say something like this is
my broken brain.
When you hand me your phone andgo in the car and go, do I turn
right or left, or north orsouth?

(24:02):
You know better, because thosethings don't happen.
But one of the things that youalways say to me that just
brings me to a place of safetyand not feeling like I'm backed
in a corner and not feeling likeI have to defend myself is you
will say you're not okay.
Just use those words.
You're not okay.

(24:24):
And first that really made memad Early on.
That really made me mad becauseof course, I was okay, I've
been okay all these years, I'msuccessful, I get up in the
morning.
I got up in the morning Eventhough I was doing some things
that weren't great.
That offended me at first, butit's such a loving thing to say

(24:44):
to me is you're not okay, whynot?
And you're really good abouthelping me back up and walk back
.
Like this trigger happened.
And it's not like the triggertriggers.
Then many times a trigger cantrigger three or four days and
down the road and so so, yeah, Ithink, deescalating the whole

(25:05):
thing and just and it reallytakes the 1 Corinthians 13 kind
of love to stick with peopleI've had people walk away and so
if you love somebody with thismuch trauma, the best thing you
can do for them besides takethem to the throne of God is
stay.
And to Chrissy's point aboutthat quote in that movie that

(25:28):
she loves so well, don't besilent.
And so you refuse to let meperform my way out of a trigger.
You refuse to do all of that.

Speaker 3 (25:41):
One of the things that is really important to ask
is tell me what's going on?
Yeah, and often you may notknow what's going on.
Even if I can say, hey, I don'tthink that actually the color
of the floor is what's botheringyou.
Can you tell me what's going on?
Tell me about your morning, andso, even going back into the

(26:04):
morning, then suddenly somethingstarts to trigger, it starts to
unlayer itself.
Well, this morning I kind ofokay, well, I got that phone
call, but that bothered mebecause yesterday I got that
email.
And then, and then, suddenly we, we unpackage and unpackage and
suddenly, well, what's reallybothering me is X, right.
So tell me what's going on is avery simple phrase, but it

(26:29):
seems to work 99% of the time.
Tell me what's going on.

Speaker 2 (26:33):
Because what I hear is I love you and I care, yeah,
and early on, I want to hear you, right, I don't want you to be
silent.
Yeah, right, because the silenceis worse than what you went
through and there were so manytimes that we actually had knock
down, drag out arguments.
Because I will never forget aprecious memory, and it must
have been about aroundValentine's Day, and this was at
when I first moved in with youand I'm air quoting again for

(26:56):
three months but we had thoselittle candy hearts that you
like so well and you just wouldnot leave it alone Like you
would not, let me not talk aboutit and we were throwing those
candy hearts back and forth tothe room and catching them and
making it funny.
But I can't stress enough andChrissy's one of many people who
do this but because I've donelife with her so closely for so

(27:16):
long, and again, we're businesspartners and we're getting ready
to talk about how we met andhow I gained a family at 35
years old and so.
But I wanted to have that partof the conversation.
And then really that's notscripted, that's organic, but I

(27:37):
think that that quote from thatmovie has has really framed you.
I think that the Lord alsoreally builds some people
different.
Well, he builds us alldifferently, but you have an
incredible sense of justice andso some of the funny parts of my
story will be, when we went tocourt, actually, and we were all
afraid that we were going toget you out of jail.
So we know that memories withcomplex post-traumatic stress

(27:57):
disorder, as well as PTSD, areaffected, right, we know that.
So one of the things that yousaid to me, in a loving voice
and a nod, that your firstpodcast sucked, amy, was.
I remember how we met a littlebit differently than you do, amy
, yes, and so, for those of youwho have been listening to all
the podcasts, you know myversion of how we met, and for

(28:18):
those of you who are pickingthis one up for the first time,
you'll hear it in reverse.
But this is a very specificexample of how my brain and
those memories get blogged up,and so we're going to talk about
two of them today, and this onebeing the first one.
So you tell us the story Now.
Before I do this, let me justsay that, for those of you who
met Chrissy, know that you willreally be hard pressed to find a

(28:40):
more shy person on the planet.
You will be hard pressed tofind a person she probably could
go days without uttering asingle word from her voice box,
and I, however, in the exactopposite of that.
I'm an extreme extrovert.
Number eight on the anagram.
I can't remember what you are,but quiet is what you are and

(29:01):
shy and introverted, and so Isay that because what's coming
next and hopefully I don'tremember it all wrong what's
coming next is nothing short ofa miracle because you are so shy
.
So tell the people your versionof this beautiful Jonathan and
David friendship.

Speaker 3 (29:20):
Well, we both ended up at the same Bible study.
That part is true.
That part is true, okay.
However, amy remembers that wemet at that time and we did not
meet at all.
We were in the same Bible study, but it was large enough that
we never actually met.
I did not know her name, I justsaw her and then the school year

(29:44):
started.
She started teaching, I startedcoaching and all of my students
players kept saying we havethis new teacher.
She's awesome, she's so cool.
Did not know a name.
I started going to Sundayschool and this person was in
there, still no name, and noname attached to the new science

(30:08):
teacher, which is what thestudents called her instead of
hey, there's just the newscience teacher, she's so cool,
it's new science teacher.
So we, the very first time Italked to Amy was after she was.
She led our group that day andI went up to her and had to wait
185 minutes for everyone elseto talk to her and I sat there

(30:32):
and I sat there quietly and thenwent up and said thank you so
much for sharing.
It meant so much.
Blah, blah, blah.
That's the first time.
And then I said I think thatyou teach and I coach and I
think we have some of the samestudents, at which point we
began to talk Sunday mornings alittle bit about our students or

(30:55):
go to a basketball gametogether or whatever.
The memory that you have wherewe really clicked was not until
that December and that part ofthe memory is correct.
That part is true, yes, but bythat point we had actually been
friends for a while.
Sorry guys.
But that memory stuck and itwas a pivotal moment because we

(31:19):
talked about football and aboutMaine and you had just gotten
out of the hospital.

Speaker 2 (31:28):
And let's talk about that just for a second.
That was not the psych ward,that the story that people have
heard.
I was having some heart issues.

Speaker 3 (31:35):
Yeah, and so I knew there are some things that I'm
good at, even in my shyness, andthat is that I can dive in, and
so when it's a deeper topic, Iknew that I had some things I
could talk to you about, and soafter that you said let's go to
lunch.
Once we had lunch, it was gameon.
We became friends, and so thatwould have been December,

(31:58):
january, and from then on, fromJanuary through May, was our
epic California road tripAwesome, which was so awesome.

Speaker 2 (32:08):
Chris drove the PCH Highway and I didn't die.
Yeah, it was amazing, it was sobeautiful.

Speaker 3 (32:13):
So in those five or six months is when we really,
really bonded.
And it was at that time that Isaid I did call my mom and I did
say hey, I'm thinking aboutasking Amy to come move in with
me.
And she said great, make it aset amount of time three months

(32:34):
for her sake as well as your own, so that you don't hurt your
friendship.
And so I did.
I invited you to move in forthree months, fully knowing that
it was not going to be justthree months.

Speaker 2 (32:44):
I kind of remember it was a passive ask.

Speaker 3 (32:46):
It was.
That part is an absolutelycorrect memory.
It was a.
Hey, I was just thinking, maybejust for the summer, you know,
just for a couple of months.
It would just kind of get youon your feet again.
Why don't you come move in withme?

Speaker 2 (33:02):
So I so it wasn't.
I did think we met that nightat the Bible study, but I, you
know, clearly we met a littlebit later and I remember a
little bit about hearing aboutthe cool volleyball coach and
the JV and I had some of thosekids and so it was.
It was really quite miraculousof how we came together, and
your favorite subject on theface of this planet which makes

(33:25):
me honored to be your friend andit makes me honored that you
wanted to be my friend that dayis your depth in Jesus, and
that's one of our C's is there'sno way that I would be here,
there's no way you would havebeen equipped without Jesus, and
so I really am so grateful tothe Lord for, you know, the

(33:46):
opportunity to teach into thatBible study.
That really is kind of whathooked you.

Speaker 3 (33:50):
You're like I want to be her friend.
Yes, because she loves my Jesus.
Yes, absolutely yeah, 100%.

Speaker 2 (33:56):
And yeah, we were 100% inseparable and I was just
remembering probably what maybeyou experienced as the first
quote air, air quote trigger forme is when we went to san
francisco.
I already had a camera and youbought a camera, but I bought a
really expensive lens.
Yes, because of the time changeand all that stuff, I was kind

(34:16):
of out of it.
Anyway, make a long story short, we went to a restaurant after
that and I broke the lens and itwas a disproportionate response
to breaking the lens to, to saythe very least.
Do you have any memory of that?
Because I think it speaks tosome of this hypervigilance when
things like that come up inresponse to stress yes, it was.

Speaker 3 (34:35):
I mean, honestly, it was such an overwhelming, almost
a fear, and I think that it wasso close to the domestic
violence that that would havebeen.
I think that I knew at thatmoment that I needed to do
whatever it was to help solve itfor you.

(34:56):
So the first thing was we'll gobuy a new one.
It's no big deal, it's not aproblem, it's no big deal, we'll
just buy a new one.
But as we looked at it, werealized that the only thing
that had broken actually wasjust the UV protector on it and
it turned out that it was notbroken and that was a gift.
But in that moment the onlything I could do is take it out

(35:17):
of your hands.
You're okay, I'm okay, we canget another one, it'll be all
right.

Speaker 2 (35:24):
Anything to sort of to break through the moment and
neither of us had a clue whatPTSD even was at that point, and
you barely knew me.

Speaker 3 (35:34):
I knew you had suffered.
It didn't take a diagnosis forme to understand that you had
had a lot of hardship, and so Iknew that the best thing I could
do for you was help youunderstand that this is not the
end of the world.
This is a lens.
We can get a new lens or we cancry over this one, but it's

(35:58):
okay, you are not in trouble.
And I think that was the key isthat no one's?
angry.
No one's upset with you.
You didn't do anything stupid,you're not an idiot, and those
were the things that I wastrying to get.
Breakthrough is I felt like you.
You were a afraid and bethought I'm so dumb.

Speaker 2 (36:21):
Yes.

Speaker 3 (36:21):
Yeah.

Speaker 2 (36:22):
I was so mad at myself because that lens was so
expensive and, yeah, I think,looking back on it now, yeah,
the response from my ex-husbandwould not have been good,
clearly, you know, and so Ithink that was maybe one of the

(36:49):
first times that.
But what I've always wonderedand this really, I've asked you
this question over the years inso many different forms and I
don't know that you canarticulate it, because there's
some things that the Lord justdoes and we say, okay, you know
Some of the people listening tothis and some people that we
both know and love, who aremutual friends of ours if at all
you could articulate why me,why did you choose me?
Why me, why did you choose me?
In the 13 years that I've knownChrissy, I've never asked her

(37:11):
that question.
Her response to me didn'treally surprise me, but her
response to me deserves moretime than we would have in the
podcast, as I want to berespectful of your time.
The verse that I referenced inmy conversation with Chrissy is
John, chapter 15, verse 13,.
Although I'm sure it's found inthe other three Gospels, where

(37:31):
the Bible says greater love hasno man than to lay down his life
for his friend.
And of course we know thatultimately Jesus laid down his
life for us, friend of sinners.
And so sometimes when we readthat verse, we think of literal
laying down our life for us,friend of sinners.
And so sometimes, when we readthat verse, we think of literal
laying down our lives for ourfriends.
And certainly that isdefinitely a friend, without

(37:52):
question.
I think we all would agree withthat.
But laying one's life downoftentimes means carrying those
person's burdens along with them, and I feel the importance to
mention this to you, becausewhat Chrissy did for me and the
parts of the story that you'vealready heard and parts of the
story that you haven't heard isa little akin to if you were on

(38:14):
a hike with a friend and youboth have backpacks and your job
is the goal is is to pick upunique rocks.
And you're hiking up themountain and one friend sees
that the other friend isstruggling, and so they start to
put their rocks in theirbackpack just for a little while
.
And that is really a snapshotof living out, laying down your

(38:38):
life for a friend.
During a time when I stillneeded to hike, I still needed
to live, chrissy was the personthat God called to take my rocks
and put them in her backpackjust for a little while.

(39:00):
I do think it's important tonote that it is super risky for
lack of a better word insituations like this, because we
have an enemy who does not wanthealing to occur and certainly
doesn't want us helping eachother heal, and so it's really
important in close friendshipslike this that you guard against
the enemy.
You guard against leaning oneach other too much, making sure
that Jesus is still the star ofyour story, making sure that

(39:23):
you are pointing each other toJesus, and so, while Chrissy
very practically came alongsideand continues to, even to this
day.
She is not more important thanthe star of the story.
She happens to be a player thatthe director, the great
producer, jesus, has decided toput into my life, but it is
super important, and somethingthat we make sure that we do,

(39:47):
just in the way of taking careof our friendship, is making
sure that we're staying on theright side of that.
I think in situations with PTSD, and particularly with stories
like mine, there can be atendency and I hate to use that
word because I don't feel likethat's true here but there can
be some opportunity forcodependency to enter in on

(40:08):
either side.
So it is really important forthose of you under the sound of
my voice who are walking alongwith someone with PTSD, or even
if you are the patient, that youremember that that person is
put into your life to be aplayer, but not to be the star,
and it's really important thatyou guard against some of the

(40:30):
things that the enemy wants tobring into the story, thereby
really destroying all the goodthat has been done.
Chrissy will be with us for twomore podcasts.
We thought that it would onlybe one and then two, and it
turned into three, and the Lordreally just continues to be in
the place of telling this storyand helping people with PTSD.
As always.

(40:51):
Please hit that subscribebutton on your favorite podcast
platform streaming service.
If you are so inclined.
Leave us a review.
Those are always helpful.
Throw us a couple stars ifyou're so inclined.
All of those things help uscome up when someone is
researching this topic,particularly if they're
researching a Christianworldview on the topic of

(41:13):
Days get lost in time.

Speaker 1 (41:32):
Wherever you go, you will always know I'll walk with
you to the other side.

Speaker 2 (41:40):
Hey, everybody, and welcome back to Wednesdays with
Watson.
By now, you know that my nameis Amy Watson and I am your host
, and this is our first season,our inaugural season of the
podcast that we have called PTSD, jesus and Me.
This is a story of my journey,my diagnosis and my healing,
even today, so that we canprovide hope for those of you

(42:02):
out there who are suffering fromPTSD or love someone who is.
I continue to focus on the starof my story, which is none
other than Jesus and the waythat he has provided for me and
the three C's my community,obviously, my church and
trauma-informed counseling.

(42:24):
Today, we're going to focus alittle bit more on that
community portion of it as wesneak back into a conversation
that Chrissy and I had over thecourse of about two hours.
We've named these episodesMemory Keepers, because one of
the hallmarks of PTSD is theinability to remember things
clearly, congruently, conciselyand sometimes correctly.
Congruently, concisely andsometimes correctly.

(42:49):
And so welcome as we join backin to the conversation that
Chrissy and I had where we leftoff last week, as Chris was
explaining some of the moredifficult portions of loving
someone with PTSD and thenecessity to do some hard things
, including seek help yourselfas the person who is in support
of the patient.
So sit back, relax and sneakinto this conversation with

(43:13):
Chrissy and me.
If at all you could articulatewhy me?
Why did you choose me?
Why?

Speaker 3 (43:23):
I think that at this point you recognize that the
Lord gives me some instincts,100%, and I can't say that it's
me at all.
It's only the Lord.
So there's no sense in braggingon it, other than to say he's
given me a gift of instincts andI just knew.

(43:45):
That's really all I can say.
Sometimes there's just thatinstinct and and I felt like
that's exactly how our wholefamily was I don't remember
anybody talking about hey, amyshould be part of the family.
It was just, she's just part ofthe family.
There was never a conversation,it just happened, and I think

(44:08):
that all of us just felt thatrightness and that this was part
of the Lord's story.
You just naturally fit in andthat's so highly unique and
improbable and all of thosewords.
It could only be the Lord.

Speaker 2 (44:27):
And now some of those people would pick me over you.
Yes this is true.
On any given day, on any givenday.
I do agree that you've got thatgift of instinct, but I know
that you know what's so preciousto me about this and about
Cheryl and about Chris.
Now, you and Cheryl were newright, so y'all come onto the
scene in my heart in this partof my story, probably more

(44:51):
prevalently than people who hadalready been on the scene, but
it feels like even talking aboutit 12 years later.
It feels like the biggest hugfrom Jesus, Like you know what I
got you and I'm going to usethe church and I'm going to use
the community and they're goingto be the body.

(45:11):
As I mentioned in the lastpodcast, I moved back to
Clearwater where I went tocollege, and I didn't have a
family, and so it'd be one ofthe first things I'm going to
ask Jesus after that Mercy Mesong.
I can promise you one thing Iwill say is why me, I don't feel
worthy of this family, of thislove and of this unconditional

(45:33):
friend who has been through somuch with me.
And so it's a good transitionfor us, because perhaps one of
the most traumatic things forall of us involved you, me and
Cheryl combined is thatadmission to the psych ward, and
so I had only lived with youfor about three weeks at the
time, Two, 14 days.
Back to the memory issues.
I had only lived with you for afew, for a few weeks.

(45:54):
Did you, had you, did younotice anything different during
that time that I lived with you, those two weeks from the time
when we were friends that summer?

Speaker 3 (46:03):
Yes, so when you moved in, one of the first
things that I had noticed that Iwould come over and just in the
morning say, hey, how are you?
And everything.
And you would say, I'm havingflashbacks at night.
And I really was like, oh, I'msorry.
I didn't know what a flashbackwas, other than I thought,

(46:24):
basically what I heard is I'mhaving nightmares, which was
like, oh, okay, well, me too isI'm having nightmares, which was
like, oh okay, well, me too.
And then the only other thingthat I very specifically
remember you saying is some daysit's hard just to get dressed
and get ready for school and youdon't tend toward the

(46:49):
depression, and so that wasunusual and that was probably
the actual only warning flag Ihad because, again, I thought
flashback meant nightmare.
So to some degree I pushed thatto the side.
The only clue I had was that Iwas like well, is she tired?
Is she struggling?
That was it.

(47:10):
And it was like two days laterthat you were in the hospital.
So you did have one counselingsession, as you mentioned, with
Dr Pettit prior to beinghospitalized, and I do remember
you coming to me after thatfirst session and saying that he
said it would get worse, wayworse, before it got better, and

(47:33):
one of the reasons I rememberthat is because I was shocked I
had no idea.
You thought counseling wasgoing to fix it all.
Yes, I thought that, like havingsurgery, the healing would
immediately begin.
And once you got the antibioticor whatever this counseling,
and once you got the antibioticor whatever this counseling,
once you started going, lifewould get good, and not just

(47:56):
good.
Great, it would all get better.
And that it would get worse wasso.
So you started the three-monthcountdown.

Speaker 2 (48:07):
At that point my mom was right she only needs to stay
Three months.

Speaker 3 (48:12):
But that was a Friday and on Wednesday you were in
the hospital, so it was thatfast.

Speaker 2 (48:17):
So let's set this up for a second.
I posted a picture on myFacebook page of Cheryl and me,
which, ironically, we didn'thave any, so she brings my
memory.
I'm pretty sure this part isright.
I went down to talk to Aaron,the assistant principal, and he
brought Cheryl.
She shows up with me to getsome clothes before they take me
into the hospital and tell uswhat she said to you.

Speaker 3 (48:39):
She, she's pulled me aside and said did you know?
And I, I, there were a lot ofthings going through my head.
One was, of course, of course Ididn't know.
If I knew, I would have toldsomebody.
But the that the real thoughtwas oh man, should I have?
Am I stupid for not knowing?

(49:01):
And so for other people who are, are are living with people who
have post-traumatic stressdisorder, or even if your friend
is in a domestic violencesituation and you didn't know,
it's okay.
It's okay, don't feel stupid.
The key is let's move forwardand help one another.
But I felt so dumb that Ididn't know.

(49:24):
I had no clue.

Speaker 2 (49:25):
Well, and you're a fixer.
I'm a fixer.

Speaker 3 (49:28):
But, more importantly , I cared.
I couldn't believe I didn't seeany warning flags, and I didn't
.
I didn't see one.

Speaker 2 (49:35):
We didn't know each other.
I mean, we had known each otherfor about.

Speaker 3 (49:38):
I mean like, but it's really honestly, there have
been times over the years thatI've known you for years and
there were things that justthere are times you just don't
know, and it's okay to just missthe clues, right?
Sometimes we're just going tomiss the clues and that's okay,
and again, why we're doing this?

Speaker 2 (49:56):
Yeah, because we want people to know, you know, we
want you to at least ask thequestion internally and because,
while we're all born evil, I dobelieve there are more good
people in this world than bad interms of wanting to help, like
you, like you did, and so sothere are some of you out.
There are more good people inthis world than bad in terms of
wanting to help like you did.
And so some of you out there aregoing to be listening and the
chances of you coming uponsomebody with post-traumatic

(50:19):
stress disorder is going to behigh and everybody's going to
operate differently.
You were called to a veryspecific part of my life Now you
came to see me every day in thehospital and that was
interesting.
Yes, the hospital was, yeah, inthe hospital and that was
interesting.

Speaker 3 (50:31):
Yes, the hospital was .
Yeah, it was hard.
It was hard.
Talk to us about that a littlebit.

Speaker 2 (50:36):
And some of this I'll hear for the first time.

Speaker 3 (50:38):
When I would come in there.
It was just hard.
But it was about the fifth dayand I and I knew they had said
all you had to do was eat.
And I said, go eat and they'lllet you out of here.
And they did, and that was theday you came home and again,
being the rainbows andbutterflies, I was like well,
we've been to the hospital.

Speaker 2 (50:59):
It's all going to be good from here, yeah.

Speaker 3 (51:02):
One of the things that that has been coming to
mind for me in in community isit's not just the person with
PTSD who is going to betraumatized, amen.
So I I equate it to if, um, ifyou're a parent and your, your
child is raped, um, the child isclearly the one who has been

(51:26):
traumatized, but as a parent,you, you're traumatized too.
So recognize that and get yourown help.
Get help.
One of the things that has beenso helpful for us is that we
did have the same counselor,right?
If that isn't possible, at thevery least I would recommend

(51:51):
that you do some joint sessionsso that you can discuss and
understand what are some thingsyou can do to communicate better
, to understand the situation.

Speaker 2 (52:05):
So so far none of my memories have been lies or
inaccurate or made up or any ofthose things, as is sort of
somewhat common.
Particularly in younger kids.
They'll remember it differentlyand it really sometimes just
never happened.
So the last podcast I talkedabout going and filing for a
domestic violence order ofprotection and leaving at sunset

(52:26):
and driving over a bridge justbecause everybody can use a
laugh.
Why don't you tell us what Idid in that situation?

Speaker 3 (52:34):
When we left the hospital on day five, it was not
sunset.
There was no bridge.
I think she's wrong on that,guys.
No, it's absolutely correct,because I know where the
hospital is.
There are no bridges.
We drove home in traffic.
It's not a pretty part of townnecessarily, it's just so.

(52:54):
What do you suppose I'mremembering there?
I think that your memory wantsto paint some positive to what
is a hard memory.
Wow, that's powerful.
So putting it at sunset over abridge, as I'm telling you the
very hard news is your brain'sway of saying here's some hope
in some very horrible news.

(53:16):
I was supposed to keep a secretfrom you and it did not work.

Speaker 2 (53:19):
So let's talk about what's secret for those of you
that might need to go backwards.
And so, on day five, when wefinally decided that if I ate,
they'd let me out of thehospital and, by the way, this
is a nice, good place for me totell you that oftentimes, eating
disorders are also thebyproduct of post-traumatic
stress disorder, something thatI still struggle with today and

(53:41):
so, when they let me out on dayfive, you had some information,
along with Cheryl and Michelle,and I had reached out to them,
so I got me some emails.
So tell us how you found thoseemails.

Speaker 3 (53:56):
While you were hospitalized, you didn't have
any electronics Right, and soyou had said can you just keep
an eye on my emails and makesure that I'm not missing
anything major?
As I did that, I got thoseemails.

Speaker 2 (54:08):
And so the emails that she's referring to is.
I had been divorced for about18 months and they were awful
emails.

Speaker 3 (54:15):
Yes, they were systematically more and more
threat.
So I I reached out to Cheryland Michelle and said, okay,
what do I do?
And the first thing they saidis okay, well, amy's in the
hospital, hospital.
So the only thing we would sayfor sure, don't tell her.
Don't tell her the second shegets out of the hospital.

(54:38):
At least give her a chance toget home and get settled and and
I mean this has already beentraumatizing enough for her and
I was like absolutely good point, I will not tell her
immediately.
I'll let her get home and getsettled and and sleep, sleep and
eat and just sort of getsettled in and feel okay.

Speaker 2 (54:58):
We left the hospital we crossed the bridge at sunset
when we left the hospital.

Speaker 3 (55:03):
Yes, the fake bridge in the non-sunset.

Speaker 2 (55:05):
As soon as we left, there's pouring down rain and we
were on the mainland so.

Speaker 3 (55:09):
So it's not 2.5 minutes later and Amy looks at
me and goes okay, what's wrong?
Because I have zero poker faceand Amy who is just coming out
of the hospital and they'veprobably given you a handful of
drugs already.
Oh for sure, already recognized.

Speaker 2 (55:27):
For the ride home, dude over the bridge.

Speaker 3 (55:30):
With my horrible poker face.
Even amy could tell that I Iwas holding something back.
And of course, then I justblurted out and john sent you
these threatening emails, so Iwas not able to keep the secret
from you.
Uh, it was not that day that wewent to the, it was the next.

Speaker 2 (55:49):
It was the next day.

Speaker 3 (55:49):
It was the next day.

Speaker 2 (55:51):
Jumbled memories right Jumbled memories Now it
doesn't help that John Watsongave us plenty of memories to
get mixed up, To combine.
So the next one, we go home andI'm not sure if I sleep that
night or not, I don't rememberwe knew that we had to go file
for a restraining order the nextday, and I've also had to do

(56:17):
that three times.
And so in the last podcast Icombined some memories, One of
the things and I want to makesure that this is an accurate
description that I do rememberabout.
That first time in PinellasCounty so in Clearwater, not
where we live now they made mefill out paperwork and in that
paperwork, from childhood tothat day, I had to tell them
every time I had been sexuallyabused, physically abused, and
then certainly there was a wholeother sheet where I had to talk

(56:40):
about the marital abuse, and Iremember that stack of paper
being fairly thick.
But the thing I remember beingthe most traumatizing about that
is every.
They wanted me to document,every hit, every punch from John
.

Speaker 3 (56:52):
Yes, that part I do remember specifically because it
took a lot of time and it wasvery difficult and you did have
to be very specific and it wasimportant for the case that you
trudge through and do itdiligently.
And so I sat there with you andcontinued to prod you.
Hey, you got to tell.
Is that every time you have tokeep telling more stories?

(57:16):
And that was very hard.

Speaker 2 (57:19):
Yeah, because there were words that I had to use on
that paperwork, like rape, thatyou don't anticipate in writing
in context of a marriage Correct, and so I remember leaving
there fairly traumatized.

Speaker 3 (57:33):
Again, again, after having just been in the hospital
, yeah, after just being in thehospital.

Speaker 2 (57:37):
And then about that time is when I received the
phone call from David Kilgorewho said hey, you know, teachers
have decided to give you enoughtime, so you can take another
30 days off.
And then this was the Octoberthat my car insurance went up
exponentially because I hadthree car accidents.
Am I remembering that?

Speaker 3 (57:53):
properly.
That is, that is correct.
Now the the paperwork that wefiled.
That was all that's all correct, but the person who was rude
was not there I blame the wrongperson.

Speaker 2 (58:04):
That was another time when.

Speaker 3 (58:05):
I had to file Another time and a different person, so
this person was pretty nice.
It's a different process there,and so I do not remember a
person at all.

Speaker 2 (58:13):
I just remember handing in the paperwork and
then we went away for a couplehours and they came back and I
was granted the restrainingorder and a court date
Temporarily.
Yes, yes, yes, the temporaryrestraining order and a court
date, which, of course, thecourt date for those of you who
are listening who may haveexperienced domestic violence.
That's traumatic all in itself,and so about that time after

(58:34):
filling out that paperwork andthem making me effectively write
with my hand and my memoryevery time, over 12 years, that
I had been hit, knocked, punchedout, and all of those things
was incredibly traumatic.
So I go into 30 days ofintensive outpatient therapy, I

(58:55):
have three car accidents and nowis the time when I would
normally tell the listenersabout the court date.
We went to court.
So we went to court and it wasyou and me and Krista Witt and
Michelle and Mama Bootsy.
I think that was all that wasthere.

(59:16):
We filled up pretty much awhole bench and we walked in and
again this lady walked up to meand said hey, I'm an advocate,
do you have any questions?
And I didn't feel realsupported by her at all.

Speaker 3 (59:28):
I didn't think we needed support.

Speaker 2 (59:30):
No, we didn't know what we were doing.

Speaker 3 (59:32):
I mean it felt like cut and dry.
He threatened your life.
Yeah, I win.
Right, right, yeah it felt likewhy am I even here, can I?

Speaker 2 (59:40):
not just phone this thing in.
You know they didn't let usphone it in, right, you know
that time anyway.
And so, um, so we went to court.
We didn't know that they go byit.

(01:00:03):
First of all, the people withattorneys get heard by the judge
and then they go through thealphabet.
So we're sitting there and ofcourse, john at the time is a
slam dunk.
He's a wuss, he's all bark, nobite, he's not going to show up,
we're good.
And had my name been Adams,that might be the case, because
we were sitting in that benchand I will never forget hearing
those court doors open and Ilooked back and saw him for the

(01:00:26):
first time since I left him.
I have a lapse of memory at thatpoint which you can fill in in
a minute.
I remember just being like itwas a seriously old crap moment.
And then it was my turn to goup to the and I couldn't hear
the judge, and so he was way farfrom me and I couldn't hear him

(01:00:46):
.
Michelle went with me, hadgrabbed my hand.
She's sobbing because she crieswhen she's mad.
I'm terrified, I'm shaking.
The only time I've ever been tocourt was to watch my mom's
parental rights get taken away.
So, yeah, I was terrified.
But John?
So John walks in with hisattorney and I know this is not

(01:01:07):
going to go well.
We've got very little memory ofthe interaction between John
and his attorney and the judge.
All I remember is he kept.
The one word I kept hearing thejudge say was we're going to
reschedule this because this islike a Zamboni, this is not a
level playing field.
You need to get an attorney.
I had no idea what a Zamboniwas, but he told me I needed to

(01:01:28):
get an attorney.
Yes, and then I don't know whyyou got so mad and we had to
pull you down because youliterally popped up like the
bailiff was going to come getyou.

Speaker 3 (01:01:40):
My memory of that is the Zamboni reference was that
he said we need to level theplaying field.
Okay, it's not fair.
So the Zamboni clears the ice.
Right, need to level theplaying field, it's not fair.
So the Zamboni clears the ice.
So him having a lawyer and younot.
He wanted to level the playingfield.
It was actually to your benefit.

(01:02:01):
So it was a good judge, it wasa good decision that day.
The thing that had reallyticked me off is a he showed up
at the last minute, sauntered inand then his attorney was
belittling, was basically sayingI was overreacting, little lady

(01:02:24):
, she's, she's overreacting.
Yeah me, thinks me, thinksthey'll protect too much.

Speaker 2 (01:02:30):
That's Shakespeare.
The Shakespeare quote yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:02:32):
He put that in the actual rebuttal yeah Right.
Paperwork, whatever you want tocall that.
And it was even morecondescending when he got up
there, so everyone had exitedthe room for the most part.

Speaker 2 (01:02:47):
And he said the judge said go get an attorney.
Yes, and so, and John had towait while I followed the
attorney and the bailiff out tothe judge's chamber to get the
date.
So you were in.

Speaker 3 (01:03:01):
I don't know what made me other than all of you,
the smirk on his face.
I remember you saying he wentby, yes, and I think he smirked
and I jumped up because I wasjust, I had had it, I'd had it.
And yes, bootsy, chris,everybody was pulling me down
Chris offered to see me in jailif I ended up in jail.

Speaker 2 (01:03:23):
And Mama Bootsy said I'm claustrophobic so I'm not
coming to see you.
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:03:28):
I was just so angry.
I was so angry because we hadjust gotten through so much and
he had no idea and I was ticked.

Speaker 2 (01:03:39):
Yeah, and only love can produce that kind of anger
for somebody that you didn'tknow for for a long time.
And so I know that this is afriendship that the Lord put
together.
And I remember laughing aboutthat and I remember Mama Booty
saying she wouldn't come see you, so court was rescheduled.
By that time I was going backto work and the way I remember

(01:04:02):
that restraining order goingdown so that temporary
restraining order, because I'mgoing to end this on another
hallmark of ETSD, which issilence, because I got silenced
in this situation.
This on another hallmark ofETSD, which is silence, because
I got silenced in this situationand the court date came and you
were kind enough to lend memoney to hire an attorney and
the attorney was willing to goto bat, and I can't remember

(01:04:23):
whether John broke therestraining order, but somehow
he got through to me and saidplease don't do this, and so I
dropped it.
Yeah, tell the people from yourperspective.
And so I dropped it.
Yeah, tell the people from yourperspective why you think I
dropped it.

Speaker 3 (01:04:36):
I think that when someone who is supposed to love
you, who's taken a vow beforeGod to love you, has harmed you,
it makes you question your ownvalue.
It makes you question your ownvalue and in that moment I think
it might've been a last ditcheffort to make him see you as

(01:05:00):
valuable, precious.

Speaker 2 (01:05:03):
All the things he had not.

Speaker 3 (01:05:05):
Exactly Because you were giving him it was more than
just dropping a restrainingorder.
He said I can't get a job, I'mgoing to lose everything.

Speaker 2 (01:05:14):
I can't find somewhere to live you had an
opportunity to give himeverything, basically you held
all the cards here and youexplain it like that is really
like, if I can, if I can dosomething.
In that case, like you weretalking, I was able to do
something for John in terms ofhe was making it very clear that

(01:05:35):
he couldn't get a job and thathe didn't have anywhere to live,
and so, yeah, I think you'reright.
I don't know that I would haveanswered it that way.
One of the reasons why I do thebehind the mic video is because
I want people hearing thedifficult things on the podcast.
When you hear my voice itsounds like, hey, she's great.
I want them to see the healingthat's occurred.

(01:05:56):
But you've had a front row seatof all of it.
In particular, you've had afront row seat of this issue of
value.

Speaker 3 (01:06:03):
It is the first battle.
Am I lovable?
Is there something wrong withme?
I don't know that.
You know that that's the target, that is the biggest bullseye
for Satan.

Speaker 2 (01:06:14):
Right, yeah, because he doesn't want me to know who I
am, or my value in Christ as animage bearer Correct, or just
because I exist?
Right, because you exist.
We as human beings are createdfor community.
We're created to be heard andto be known and to be seen and
to be valued.
If you would have asked me thatquestion, why do you think you

(01:06:35):
would draw up the restrainingorder?
Because it's approach,avoidance.
I don't like conflict, but I dothink at its core it was value
and it was one last ditch effortfor me to say to John by my
actions, I love you and Iforgive you and hoping that he
would move on, but value issomething that might be

(01:06:57):
something that I fight for therest of my life.

Speaker 3 (01:07:00):
I wonder if it is something that we all will fight
all of our lives.
I don't know a lot of peoplewho have a really, really good
grasp on their value,intrinsically from God Right,
not from their job, not fromtheir family, not from being a
mom, a sister, just because.

Speaker 2 (01:07:19):
God made you and Satan to your point.
This is the thing that he willattack, and he does not want us
to understand that we are madein the image of God, which
itself is valuable period in thediscussion.
And so you know this is ahallmark of the human condition.
Really, value is the last thingthat we pay attention to, and

(01:07:41):
it should be the first, becauseit's the only way I can own who
I am in Christ, and so I'm soglad that you brought that up.
Let's talk a little bit moreabout the reality of flashbacks
and night terrors, probably themost prevalent hallmark of
You're unable to differentiatebetween time and space, and so I

(01:08:03):
would wake up and sometimesstill do wake up and it's 1978
in that dark room with thatserial killer abusing me, and I
have, and when you have, whenyou're in early parts of healing
a post-traumatic stressdisorder, I was unable to say
it's 2008.
I'm at Chrissy's house inClearwater, Florida.

(01:08:25):
I'm 36 years old, I'm safe.
I know that you were hearing meor somehow you knew I was
having PTSD.
I was having flashbacks.
I don't know that.
We knew what they were and thehospital had diagnosed me with
PTSD, but I still didn't believethem.
I asked them years.
I asked Dr Pettit years later.

Speaker 3 (01:08:42):
I understood it.
At this point I'm cluing in, soI'm in denial.
So you're still in denial.
I'm cluing in and I'm talkingwith.

Speaker 2 (01:08:50):
Dr Pettit, are you?

Speaker 3 (01:08:51):
researching.
So you're talking to Dr Pettit,I'm talking to Dr Pettit about
it and trying to understandflashbacks, how do I help and
those types of things.
And so I started out with mydoor open and it was a split
design.
The house was, and so we wereacross the house from each other
, but I left my door open tolisten for you to go help.
And then I ended up in theliving room to try to be closer

(01:09:13):
so I could hop up and help andby the end of it I ended up in
your room.
There was a recliner in thatroom and and there was just no
way for you to heal withoutsomebody literally there.
There was just too many yearsof trauma.
At the point I, you it wasreally 35 years of pretty solid

(01:09:35):
31 days or 31 years of trauma.
Right.
So there, and you had.
You had hit a rock wall by thetime you had gone to the
hospital, and so we were in themiddle of you dealing with it.
I'm not saying that everysituation is going to call for
somebody being in the room.

(01:09:55):
However, if your child hasrecently been harmed, it's
highly likely this may be yoursolution.

Speaker 2 (01:10:03):
Certainly and my case is there's more trauma than
normal.
I also want to know, for peoplewho are listening clearly you
leaned on the Lord, clearly youleaned on the wisdom of your mom
and Dr Pettit, yes, who kept itreal for you.
At one point, dr Pettit said toyou, chrissy, I only want her
to have to breathe, eat andhydrate.

Speaker 3 (01:10:27):
But your job was only to breathe.
But your job was only tobreathe.
My job was to help you eat, tohydrate you, to do your laundry,
to gas up your car to take youplaces, Literally at that point,
it was life and death.
Yeah, 100%.
We were at that point.
It was an extreme situation andcalled for extreme measures,

(01:10:52):
which meant your brain was sotaxed that, literally to get
everything to calm down, therequirement was hey, her job is
just to breathe, just keepbreathing.
And so I was able to do that.
I mean, for me that's easy.
You've been preparing yourwhole life for that, right?

(01:11:13):
So I, I did everything else,and and and that was fine, were
you?

Speaker 2 (01:11:18):
leaning on people in our life group.

Speaker 3 (01:11:22):
Yeah, I would say that one of the hard things in
these situations is still thesilence on my part.
I didn't feel like there were alot of safe places for me to
share.
Wow, that's good.

Speaker 2 (01:11:39):
I mean that's not good, but that's a good word.

Speaker 3 (01:11:42):
Yeah, I think that it's not easy stuff to talk
about.
It wasn't mine to share, Right.
So I had a big problem.
I couldn't share your storywithout your permission and at
that point I didn't have yourpermission.
You didn't want clearly to goblast out to everybody what was

(01:12:05):
going on, clearly to go blastout to everybody what was going
on.
You were barely making it, youwere just breathing.

Speaker 2 (01:12:14):
Were you ever scared that I was not going to make it
Absolutely?

Speaker 3 (01:12:27):
Every day.
I assumed for the first andhonestly I would say, the first
year of our friendship, sopost-hospitalization that next
year, every day, I assumed thatyou would not make it.
I assumed that this was a gift,that I had a short-term
friendship with you and that theLord had given me a moment, a

(01:12:47):
moment with you and that itwould be very short-lived.
I did not think he would makeit.

Speaker 2 (01:12:52):
And, you know, looking you in the eye, which of
course they can't see, butlooking you in the eye, that's
hard, and the first words that Iwanted to say were I'm sorry,
but what I am going to say isthank you.
Perhaps one of the coolestthings about doing this podcast

(01:13:17):
is experiencing conversationslike Chrissy and I are having
and you are actually getting tohear.
It was a conversation where wesat down and really just tried
to organically chat through someof these things that both of us
have been through in thisjourney with PTSD.
What's so cool about it is toactually see personal growth,

(01:13:42):
whereas I'm able to thankChrissy for helping me instead
of apologizing or feeling like Ineed to overcompensate for it.
We mentioned value quite a bitat the end of this podcast, and
that is something that we willprobably devote an entire
podcast to.
But Chrissy's answer to thatquestion was interesting to me,
and my response at first wouldhave been a response of a couple

(01:14:06):
years ago, where I apologizedfor putting her through some of
the things that she walked withme, but instead I got healthy
enough to thank her for walkingwith me through it.
I got healthy enough to thankher for continuing to remind me
of my value and I'd like toremind you of yours too.
Next week will be the last andfinal podcast where Chrissy

(01:14:28):
joins us, at least for now,never gonna let you down.
Hey, everybody, and welcomeback to Wednesdays with Watson.

(01:14:51):
By now you know that I am yourhost, amy Watson, and we have
called the inaugural season ofthe podcast PTSD Jesus and Me
Definitely seeing the evolutionof the podcast and even the
evolution of some healing for melike stuff that I never even
anticipated.
And so, with that being said,the last few podcasts we have

(01:15:13):
had a guest on who is back withus today.
Welcome back to the podcast,chrissy.

Speaker 3 (01:15:18):
Thanks for having me.

Speaker 2 (01:15:19):
Thank you for doing this.
I know that this is a littlebit outside your wheelhouse, so
I do have a question for youbecause I have fielded this
question for about 10 days nowand I'm tired of answeringhouse.
So I do have a question for youbecause I have fielded this
question for about 10 days nowand I'm tired of answering it.
So I didn't put you on the spotbecause I know better than that
.
But one of the questions, sinceyou know you have been on the
podcast for the last I guessthis is the third week and some

(01:15:43):
people keep saying to me anddifferent versions of this
question is how did you get themost shy person on the face of
the earth to do this?
And so I tried to answer it.
My guess is that you will beable to give them a better
answer to how this is actuallyhappening right now.

Speaker 3 (01:16:00):
I am shy, I am introverted, but, uh, when
things matter, I, I, I want tobe one who speaks up and I felt
strongly that I should lend myvoice, because I hope and pray
that if there are others outthere in my position as kind of

(01:16:23):
a caregiver to someone with PTSDor in other situations, that
perhaps by speaking up I couldhelp them, and I hope that
people out there there'll besomebody who says oh my gosh, me
too.
I feel that way and that'shelpful for how to be the person

(01:16:44):
living with someone who isstruggling with PTSD or any
number of things For sure.

Speaker 2 (01:16:53):
So yeah, and that's been my experience and really
some of the people that asked methe question asked it a little
bit in tongue-in-cheek, becausewe all know that about you is
that when it matters, you willspeak up, and so one of the
things that I think hassurprised both of us is how hard
this has been.
I have spent the better part ofmy life pretty much putting

(01:17:15):
myself out there.
My story is fairly phenomenal.
I say phenomenal, what I meanby that is phenomenal that I'm
still breathing and that goesback to that that.
See, jesus, my church is thereason why that is still
happening.
But, all that to say, westarted doing this and then you
and I started talking about itand I've been surprised about

(01:17:38):
how hard it's been.
Has that surprised you at all,like this part of the experience
and talking about some of this?

Speaker 3 (01:17:44):
It has been.
I really feel like when westarted talking I thought, well,
this isn't so bad, we're justchatting.
But the after effect of talkingabout these, these hard times
both dredging it up and dredgingis the wrong word but

(01:18:04):
revisiting those days has beensurprisingly hard.
But then there is this momentof feeling like, oh my, that's
out there for the world.
And I just realized that,beyond being shy and introverted
, I'm a private person and sothis has been hard.

(01:18:24):
And yet I am just as passionateabout making sure that this
podcast gets out there, BecauseI do think it's important.

Speaker 2 (01:18:34):
And so there has been some discomfort, I think, for
both of us for sure, but it'sit's worth it if it helps
someone Some of my- is yeah, Iagreed with you there and I
think that's the whole reasonwhy I'm doing this.
You know, I started this, thispodcast, in the middle of the

(01:18:55):
right.
Now, today is July of 2020.
But whenever whoever islistening to this has started
this podcast during the pandemicof 2020.
And really I just needed acreative outlet.
I didn't know what it was goingto do, but I've always wanted
to be a good steward of thispain.
I think what has beensurprisingly difficult for me,

(01:19:15):
and even where we left off onthe last podcast, as you were
explaining to me, we weretalking about the reality of
flashbacks and night terrors andsome of the things that were
necessary for me to make it toliterally make it and not end up
back in the hospital when I wasthinking back at those times
and I ended the last podcast bysaying I want to say to you I'm

(01:19:38):
sorry, but what I will say isthank you.
And I was really shocked at howhard that moment was for me.
When I recorded the behind themic video on our new YouTube
channel.
I actually got emotionaltalking about this.
It hurt my heart to hear thedepths that you were sent when I

(01:20:00):
asked you that question Wereyou afraid that I was never
going to make it?
And so the Lord continues to dohealing in this story, and we
initially called these podcastsMemory Keepers.
I think today we will start aseries called A Trenchmate's
Perspective, and here's why Istill want to continue to tell
some of my story, but I thinkthat we have identified the

(01:20:22):
importance of your voice in thisprocess, as difficult as it has
been, of your voice in thisprocess, as difficult as it has
been.
As I mentioned, I continue toget emails from people that are
sitting in your position,chrissy, where they or or they
want, or people like me want tohelp people like you and their
lives understand more, and so,because of that, I want to first

(01:20:45):
, in this podcast, we're goingto drop back into this
conversation that you and I hadabout six weeks ago, and then
there's going to seem to be alittle bit of an awkward break
where we're going to continue totalk about that same subject,
but let's sneak back into wherewe left off last time and then
we'll pick up from there, andthe first words that I wanted to

(01:21:07):
say were I'm sorry, but what Iam going to say is thank you,
and I know that we're not allrainbows and butterflies now.
You still live with triggers.
I'm so grateful to the Lord,who just found a way to bolster

(01:21:36):
you up, to be there during sucha time as this or that, because
I would not be here, and Ialways talk about my desire to
be a good steward of the pain,and that's why we're sitting
here doing this.
We're going to play these fewpodcasts and we've got harder
stuff to tell.
I want to encourage people outthere that don't have a Chrissy
though.
You're going to find it in acommunity.

(01:21:58):
Go to meetings.
You're going to find acommunity.
There's hope.
But I want people listening tothis because this is an
extraordinary story.
This is an extraordinary story.
This is an extraordinary story.
Most people listening to thismay be tempted to be discouraged
and say but I don't have a.

Speaker 3 (01:22:16):
Chrissy, but neither did we.
So I didn't have an Amy untilthe day I showed up for that
Bible study and then showed upfor Sunday school.
I didn't want to go, I'm shy.
Sunday school, I didn't want togo, I'm shy, I didn't want to
go.
But I showed up and this iswhat the Lord did.
And so today you may look andsay I don't have that in my life

(01:22:41):
.
But you went, but I went andyou don't know what story the
Lord is going to tell.
And this is a miracle.
This story is a miracle and Godcan tell a billion more in a
moment because he's able to.
And so just because you don'thave it today doesn't mean that

(01:23:05):
God isn't going to provide thattoday doesn't mean that God
isn't going to provide that whenyou showed up in Clearwater
after leaving John, you didn'thave a job, a church or me, a
family.
And God showed up.

Speaker 2 (01:23:21):
Boy did he right, right Boy did he.

Speaker 3 (01:23:23):
But for people who are listening and don't
currently have those things, mylogical brain immediately goes
well, I don't have it, it'llnever happen.
That's not.
That's not giving god a chance.
Give him a chance, trust him,start showing up.

Speaker 2 (01:23:41):
Don't be silent either, even if you're the
person who has suffered becauseit's worse than the event yes or
the person who has sufferedBecause it's worse than the
event, yes.

Speaker 3 (01:23:48):
Or the person who is living with someone who is
hurting.
You're living with it.
Get help too Huge.
If you're a caregiver in someways, if you are walking through
this, you need a place to talkto and a place that's safe to

(01:24:10):
say.
This is hard and I don't knowhow to deal with this, or I keep
triggering these things.
How can I help?
You need a safe place too, andthat feels weird to say, because
really you're the one who'sbeen through something.

Speaker 2 (01:24:29):
Well, it's the whole.
Put your oxygen mask on first.

Speaker 3 (01:24:32):
Yes, I needed a safe place as well, and I had that in
Mama Bootsy and in a smallgroup of friends and in Dr.
Pettit and in my faith, yeah,but it's imperative for both
parties to make sure that youare taking care of yourself and
that you have some safe placesto share.

Speaker 2 (01:24:51):
And this is really safe places to share.
She, she, huge, so huge.
I had spent a lifetime of lyingto protect myself, and so you
would ask me a simple questionlike how much did you spend on
that bike that you shouldn'thave?
And you just really, reallywanted to know how much was that

(01:25:14):
bike?
You didn't care, you weren't incharge of my bank account, but
I would lie to you about thatAbsolutely.
And so how did you stick withme?
You forgave me over and overand over and over, and it
doesn't matter why I lied,because you've said two things
to me over the years, and one ofthem is you often remind me,
give yourself grace for thosefew good decisions you made to

(01:25:37):
get a Chrissy Lothridge in yourlife.

Speaker 3 (01:25:39):
And.

Speaker 2 (01:25:39):
I got up one Wednesday night and went to that
Bible study.
I got up one night, one day andwent to that Bible study
Cheryl's life group.
I accepted the invitation toteach there.
And that's not all me.
That is that old footprints inthe sand.
Jesus picked me up and carriedme and said you're going to go
here, here and here.
But you also had to forgive mea lot and so can you speak to.

(01:26:02):
Yes, you need a safe place, butI had to have hurt your
feelings.

Speaker 3 (01:26:06):
And again you go back to the safe place, but you know
I would lie to you about theprice of a bike.
The lying, of course, for me,being a true speaker is the
hardest part and will probablyalways be the hardest part for
me, because we still strugglewith this.

Speaker 2 (01:26:27):
I don't bold face lie , but if I feel backed in a
corner, absolutely.

Speaker 3 (01:26:31):
And that took years for us to realize that if you
get backed in a corner you'lllie.
And so then I have to.

Speaker 2 (01:26:38):
I would frame the question in such a way that you
were out of the corner, well,and I felt safe to tell you the
truth.

Speaker 3 (01:26:44):
So I would say something like man if I wanted a
bike, I'd spend a milliondollars on it.

Speaker 2 (01:26:50):
And then you'd tell me the truth.
You'd be like, well, it wasonly 1.4.

Speaker 3 (01:26:52):
Right, right, so then it became a win, right?
So any way that I could reframeit so that you weren't looking
like a bad guy, I knew I'd getthe truth out of you.
Well, I sure would eat a wholebox of cereal instead of having
the broccoli that I was supposedto have for dinner, and then
you'd say, yeah, that's what Idid too.

Speaker 2 (01:27:10):
And so we still fight this because we still have an
enemy who does not want thismessage out there, and I
everybody thinks he's the fatherof lies for a reason and
confusion.
And confusion.

Speaker 3 (01:27:24):
Yeah, and lies especially.
You will find it with PTSD andwith domestic violence,
especially because you'velearned to survive on lies and
with the childhood you had, youlearned to survive on lies, and
so to change that patternovernight is it's not possible,

(01:27:51):
barring a miracle.
One of the things I want tomake sure that I say at this
juncture, because you asked aspecific question, is why did I
stick with it?
It is 100%.
I saw the person.
I saw who you are person.
I saw who you are, Just likeany person.

(01:28:12):
If you're looking at them andseeing their sin and not seeing
the person, then you're missingout.
You've missed the whole point.
I saw you.
I didn't see your lies, I sawyou.
I saw my friend.
I saw this amazing, amazingdeep faith.
I saw this amazing, amazing,deep faith, wonderful outgoing
person, and so I wanted to digin and get rid of the lies or

(01:28:37):
any other problems, as we werefacing different issues.
If I stepped on a landmine, Iwanted to find out what I had
stepped on and why, and how canwe get better, how do we find

(01:28:57):
healing so that you could be thebest version of you?
Because I knew from the day Imet you you had a voice and that
you could preach the gospel andthat others might gain the Lord
because of your story, but,more importantly, because of you
.
So, while you're telling yourstory on this podcast, the more
important thing is you're not asuperstar because you've

(01:29:18):
suffered so much.
You're a superstar because ofwho God made you, and don't miss
that.
I do miss that, and don't missthat.

Speaker 1 (01:29:27):
I do miss that and I think that a lot of people want
to.

Speaker 3 (01:29:30):
It is hard to not make a big deal about what
you've been through.
You were babysat by serialkillers.
Ba-ba-ba.

Speaker 2 (01:29:41):
Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:29:43):
It's hard not to make that a headline, but who God
made you is a big enoughheadline, and it's enough, it's
enough.

Speaker 2 (01:29:53):
It's more than enough .
Yeah, like, even if I didn'tfinish the book, which we all
know I'm struggling to do, evenif this was the last podcast,
it's enough.
So, yeah, that was, chrissy, atthe end of that original
conversation that you and I hadabout six weeks ago, that I
don't know about you, but we'vewe've edited this and listened

(01:30:14):
to this so much.
I'm not sure, actually, whatwill actually land on people's
phones.
So we landed on, if I didn't doanything else with my life, if
we didn't do another podcast, orI never wrote another word or
whatever, that I am enough andthat that enough conversation

(01:30:34):
came out of a very organicconversation that was unexpected
, quite frankly, about and youand I have been trying to find a
way to explain this but theunintended, the negative I
wanted to use the wordconsequence, but side effects,
yeah.
So so some of the negative,because they really are negative

(01:30:57):
side effects of PTSD, becausewe went off kind of on this
organic conversation about oneof the issues that you, as the
person walking along closestwith me, had to deal with was
dishonesty and lying and andthings of that nature, and so
that really sat with both of usand we thought, huh boy, we need

(01:31:18):
to.
We need to spend some more timewith this, wouldn't you agree?

Speaker 3 (01:31:21):
Yes, and I, I think, re-listening to it six weeks
later, I wanted to make surethat it was abundantly clear
that your lying was not acharacter issue.
It wasn't who you are.
It was a sin, and todifferentiate, because there are

(01:31:44):
times that you may meet someoneor be in a relationship with
someone who is toxic I'm airquoting or harmful or malicious
or all of those things, and youmight need to extricate yourself
from the situation.
This was not that situation,and I just want to make sure
that people can understand thatwe're all sinners, so all of

(01:32:12):
your friends at some point aregoing to hurt.
You probably lie to you, and ifyou were to toss them out and
say, well, you lied to me, I'mdone, we're done, you're a liar,
you're going to miss out.

(01:32:32):
You're going to miss out oneverything that the Lord has for
you in that friendship and thatrelationship, and so it really
takes some discernment to knowthe difference between someone
who is sinning versus someonewho is a blank, whatever it is.

Speaker 2 (01:32:55):
And there's an obvious reason like that kind of
thing.
Some of these things and we'regoing to talk about them some of
these things are out ofcharacter for that person and I
think that we've talked beforealready about the importance of
you had some people speakinginto your life that you trusted

(01:33:16):
and who would have told you toexit right and exit quickly in
the event that it was bad foryou.
But one of the questions I amgetting a lot on social media is
how do I help my personunderstand?
And one of the things that I'dlike you to say a little bit
more, because I can actuallyvisualize this in myself, is you

(01:33:39):
talked about a PTSD patient,particularly somebody with
childhood trauma like I had as awounded animal.
Somebody with childhood traumalike I had as a wounded animal,
and it's very difficult to dolife alongside wounded people in
general.
But you've talked a little bitabout that.
How can?

(01:33:59):
So when I get these emails, Iwas like how can I help my mom
or my sister, my aunt, my friend, understand me?
Talk to me a little bit aboutthat, because that I heard you
and I felt that as a PTSDpatient when you talked about
the wounded animal analogy.

Speaker 3 (01:34:22):
Yeah, I think you know.
The more I think about it, themore you know.
You really do realize that thatis a lot of what's going on.
The first problem with awounded animal is you can't
communicate, and similarly, Iwas not communicating with you
effectively to say I am safe, Iam here to help, and so a lot of

(01:34:47):
the hard work is figuring outhow to communicate and how to
let the person know this is asafe place.

Speaker 2 (01:35:01):
And I will say we.
So we're going to start talkingabout page turners, and we've
got a lot of pages to turn inthis story that only the Lord
can tell.
Just like everybody else'sstory out there, my story is no
more phenomenal or importantthan yours, and I say it all
this idea of doing life with theperson and really what you're

(01:35:31):
signing up for when you do that,because there are behaviors
that exhibit themselves, andthis dishonesty thing for me was
one of them, and when I felt so, you, you, we laughed, and I
can't remember whether thisactual audio actually made it
onto the podcast or not at thispoint, but we were laughing
because you're like well, itonly took us 185 years to figure

(01:35:54):
out that if I backed you in acorner, it only took us that
long to figure that out, and sothat's what I want people
listening to.
This is like as somebodywalking alongside with somebody
who has a negative side effect,like feeling like I'm backed in
a corner, I need to protectmyself, so I'm going to lie
about the price of a bike.
How can you help that person?

(01:36:16):
Because I can tell you from mystandpoint, when I stopped
feeling judged by you, whetheror not you were judging me or
not, but when I stopped feelingjudged, when you came alongside
and I can't remember whether youactually said it or I just knew
it like this isn't who you arelying about the price of that

(01:36:36):
bike.
So what's really going on?
Kind of like that old versionof what really happened to you
when I stopped feeling judgedand you came along.
I'm a sinner too, or I lie too,or I do this, that too, then,
and only then could I go.
This is a problem.

Speaker 3 (01:36:56):
Yeah, and I think that that is what needs to
happen in anyone's situation isfind those key elements.
What is the root of the issue?
I knew for you one of themearly on.
I did figure out was you feltlike if I said that's a lie,

(01:37:19):
that I was saying you are a liarand it was a character attack,
and so I would immediately say Iam not attacking your character
, I don't believe this is whoyou are, but this is not
truthful.
The judging came later, where Icould specifically address hey,

(01:37:40):
I'm not trying to judge you, Iwould do the same thing or I
would do something similar inyour situation too.
But let's talk about what thetruth is, or however you word it
.
But the key is to find out whatis the deeper thing that is

(01:38:01):
really haunting the person.
This really goes for everybodyIn any situation.

Speaker 2 (01:38:06):
If somebody is behaving out of sorts, if you've
punched someone's buttons,stepped on a landmine, in
general there's a reason, and ifyou can figure out what that is
, we're talking about theunintended side effects of PTSD

(01:38:32):
and one of them for me was slashis, you know, this desire to
protect myself by way of nottelling the truth when I didn't
feel safe, when I didn't feelsafe and so.
But I want to continue to talkabout some of those and really
bleed that into a little bit ofwhat happened after.

(01:38:52):
Right, so I had gone back towork and was not doing well.
That ministry that is, thatchurch and school, about 45 days
out said, hey, you know what?
You're not, okay, go home.
And they honored my contractand I went home and we continued
to really struggle with some ofthose night terrors and things

(01:39:15):
that we talked about.
But I knew that I needed to.
I had to have a job and in theclassroom, as much as I loved,
it was not going to be that jobfor me because of some of the
stuff that I was going through.
And really the Lord justextricated me from that
situation because, quite frankly, that classroom, those kids,

(01:39:36):
that ministry had become an idolfor me and had become a
deterrent for me to not addresssome of these things that we're
talking about, and one of thembeing the dishonesty.
The other one is performance,and I had spent my whole life
performing my way out of thepain, and so one of the things

(01:39:58):
that we can weave into every oneof these unintended side
effects of PTSD is we can tie itback to.
I had no ability to understandmy value.
About 99.9% of the people thatjust heard that sentence also
has no ability to understandtheir value.
And I go back, chrissy, toStacey and her birthday verse,

(01:40:22):
and when I met her in the psychward and the verses said when I
met her in the psych ward andthe verses said you are more
valuable than many sparrow andhow I.
Just at that point in my life,and even most days at this point
in my life, I didn't get that,but I knew that after I healed a
little bit.
So I spent that summer prettymuch healing, and we had already

(01:40:43):
talked about what would, whatwould be next.
I knew that the, that the, theclassroom, wasn't going to be
the place for me, and so I hadto find a job.
We had been talking aboutstarting a business before I
moved to Clearwater and taught.
I had done this exact samebusiness for about 12 years, and

(01:41:05):
so after that summer, westarted our business, watermark
Management Group.
And do you remember, chrissy,how we named the watermark?
You remember how much fun thatwas?

Speaker 3 (01:41:17):
Yes, yes, we didn't know what we were going to name
it and we just used a iPod andhit shuffle.

Speaker 2 (01:41:23):
Yeah.
So we hit shuffle and we saidthe first song that speaks to us
.
That's what we're going to namethe business.
We were starting, a businesswhere there was all kinds of
opportunities for redemption,based on how I had spent 12
years of my life and my careerin that domestic violence
marriage, and so starting thisbusiness really was an

(01:41:46):
opportunity to redeem thoseyears.
But it also fed one of theseunintended consequences slash
side effects of PTSD which I wasusing as an analgesic.
I was using it to cope with thepain, because even the handfuls
of medications still weren'tgetting that done for me, and so
this was an opportunity toperform.

(01:42:06):
But we were riding down theroad and the song came on by a
group called Watermark, andthese are the lyrics that made
us name our business WatermarkManagement Group.
Because of who you are and who Iam.
In you, you make all thingspure.
Because of who you are and whoI am.
In you, you make all thingstrue and who I am.

(01:42:30):
In you, you make all thingstrue, you make all things new.
And of course, everybody knowshow much I love that verse Joel
2.25, where the Bible says thatI will restore the years that
the locusts have stolen from you.
And so, chrissy, I want tothank you for talking today, and
we're going to really make thisa springboard off into these
unintended side effects of PTSD,because I continue to get

(01:42:51):
messages from loved ones, and sowe will pick up in a couple
weeks, continuing to talk aboutsome behaviors that some of you
may be seeing and the peoplethat you love, and then this
Trenchmates perspective.

(01:43:29):
I'll walk with you to the otherside.
Hey everybody, welcome back toWednesdays with Watson.
If you have been followingalong with this journey by now
you know that my name is AmyWatson and I am your host.
I am so excited to be back herewith you today.
We have named this season ofthe podcast PTSD Jesus and Me,

(01:43:49):
and today we are mid-season, andthat is so hard to believe.
I am so grateful for those ofyou who have spent time with me
on these podcasts, who havemessaged me, and even for those
of you who have shared it andhelped get the podcast out there
.
Sincere gratitude to you.
But we are mid-season and, guys, we talked about the podcast

(01:44:11):
evolving at the beginning andcertainly it is doing that.
We are learning, we are growing.
One thing I can tell you isthat today's podcast is for 100%
of the population of planetEarth, and so I want you to kind
of sit back and drop into thisbeginning of this conversation.
These two words are on mywebsite, and they are on my

(01:44:36):
website and they are two wordsthat are so important to me, and
I want them to be important toyou because they are true.
This is the first podcast ofthe you Matter series, because
you do matter.
Let's go, guys.

(01:44:57):
2 am, that is the magic time forme.
My body seems too light to wakeme up at that time and any
horrible thing that can happenor that I can remember.
I guarantee you, if I look atthe clock, it's 2 am and it was
about 2 am right before or,excuse me, about two hours after

(01:45:19):
the last podcast recordactually dropped and I woke up
with full-on flashbacks and I,as very common with flashbacks,
don't remember what they were,but I was also so riddled with
shame I literally put my head inmy hands and I thought to

(01:45:40):
myself what have I done?
I just basically laid my soulbare out there for the world to
hear.
The voices of shame wereshouting and a lot of them
sounded like my voice and theywere telling me Amy, you are
your mistakes, you are thatperson with those unfortunate

(01:46:04):
negative attention-seekingbehaviors that come with PTSD.
Shame was telling me that night, in the middle of the night
that's who you are and you justtold the whole world that you
have an attention-seekingbehavior and you plan to
continue.
So I just kind of laid therefor a few minutes and I wondered
wow, can I unpublish thispodcast.
I looked at the stats and onlyone person had listened to it,

(01:46:27):
but I didn't actually even knowhow to unpublish it, because I
don't publish it my, my, myproducer does and so I was like,
well, um, okay, well, I can'tunpublish it.
So maybe I should try to startstop getting my heart from
pounding Like it's racingsomewhere really quickly, cause
it was just pounding from theflashback and from this sense of

(01:46:48):
shame that I heard and that Ifelt.
I laid there and I thought what, seriously, what have I done?
What have I done?
Also, I kept hearing variousmostly well-meaning voices from
my childhood, their voiceactually saying you should be
ashamed of yourself, and I was.

(01:47:08):
I am indeed ashamed, but I alsoknow that that's the game and
we can't lose that game, and soI want to fight.
Here's a spoiler alert, by theway Jesus wins in the end.
I knew when I started thepodcast that I have dubbed my

(01:47:31):
pandemic podcast that PTSD wasan important topic.
Jesus is so important to thestory as it's his, not mine, I
know that and you know that, andI say that hopefully on every
one so important that I put hisname in the title.
But this middle of the nightflashback was as bad as I had
really had in a long, long time.

(01:47:52):
You know, as Chrissy and I satand chatted for hours in that
closet.
It was fun, it was a blast, welaughed and had lots of good
memories and it was cool toreflect on the faithfulness of
God.
But we did that for hours andit stirred up all kinds of
emotions.
So I got up that night afterthe podcast had been up for

(01:48:12):
about two and a half hours atthat point and jumped in the
shower.
The cold water in the middle ofthe night woke me up a little
bit and kind of reset me to somedegree.
But I walked out on my porch.
My back porch is screened in.
It's one of my favorite placeson the planet and the summer air
just kind of helped also wakeme up from that panic, because

(01:48:35):
it was it's July in Florida andthe air is thick and it's heavy
and I couldn't help but thinkthat the climate matched that of
my heart.
I was so mad at myself fortelling you guys about my
attention-seeking behavior onthat podcast that took that
unintended turn with Chrissy.
The one that we talked aboutwas dishonesty on the last

(01:48:57):
podcast of the night.
Remind me who is actually incontrol.
And then I just remember thewords of this song that I love
so much If you gave your lifefor them, so will I.
If creation seeks to praise you, so will I.

(01:49:20):
And so, if you hear my voiceright now, you are them to me.
You are them to me, I will.
I will lay down on this and wewill keep fighting just for one
of you.
So now it's like 3.30 in themorning.
I walk back into my house andfinally just relented and took

(01:49:43):
some medicine and finally fellback asleep.
But those voices of shame wereloud.
They were telling me that I wasworthless.
They were telling me to stopdoing this podcast, to stop
writing.
They were telling me to stoptelling the world that you don't
have to live in shame and guilt.
I hoped a few more hours ofsleep would reset me.

(01:50:05):
Sometimes that happens when youfall back asleep Because I
planned to leave the podcast up,because I knew it to be
obedient.
But I also understand that I'mgoing to be working through this
shame thing and it's here tostay.
It wants to take my value.
It wants to take yours too.
So what we aren't going to dois quit, because you matter and

(01:50:28):
I matter, and so we're going tocontinue to stay with this,
we're going to continue toevolve, we're going to continue
to heal, because I started thispodcast to give people hope hope
that you can heal fromunspeakable trauma.
And, yeah, mainly this seasonis for PTSD patients, for people
who love them, for people whominister to them.

(01:50:48):
But this very podcast, as Isaid in the intro, is for 100%
of the population.
I have started, as I justjokingly said, I've started
calling this my pandemic podcast.
Apparently, it's a prettypopular thing, as you can't even
buy a mic on Amazon right now,but anyway, I started this
podcast at a time you know whoknows where we are in this

(01:51:10):
pandemic the beginning, middleend but I started it and right
now, on this day that I'mrecording it is at a time when
hope seems to be at an all-timelow.
I firmly believe that hope isthe bond that we all seek for
the pain, but we always seek itin other things.
And then hopelessness, whenleft unchecked, is tragic and

(01:51:30):
leads to all of theseattention-seeking behaviors that
we're going to talk about and awhole lot other things.
The Bible says that hopedeferred makes the heart sick.
It's so true.
It's so true for all of us.
I know that because I getmessages from people all the
time now who have questions andare seeking help, and I'm way in
over my head because I knowthat I'm only qualified to tell

(01:51:53):
you my story and things thatwork for me, but the message is
the same from everyone whomessages or emails they are
running low on hope.
2020 has drained us of ourearthly hope Every single person
on this planet and dimmed ourlight, and so everyone is
feeling a little needy.
In some ways, that isn't a badthing.

(01:52:13):
Needs drive us to solutions.
I think it's the solutions thatwe need to watch and we will
definitely be talking about that.
So, because this podcast is for100% of the population, here's
what I want to make sure that Iwant to continue to repeat over

(01:52:33):
and over in this podcast is weall want to be seen, we all want
to be known, we all want to beloved, we all want to be heard,
we all want to be valued.
And here's the great news, guyswe are all of those things.
I am no different, and as aresult of even sitting behind

(01:52:54):
this microphone and the feedbackthat I get from it makes me
feel those things, all thosethings that I just mentioned
Seen, known, loved, heard andvalued.
But as much as I love my people, I have learned the hard way
that my eternal hope and valuedoesn't come from people, but
from God.
And so I want to bring shameback into the conversation,

(01:53:17):
because shame can't take it,because shame didn't give me my
value.
God gave me my value.
Did you guys know that it onlytook 25 verses in the Bible?
So Genesis 1.26 addresses ourvalue, where God says that we
are made in his image.
25 verses into the Bible, valuegets addressed.

(01:53:41):
We are made in his image, whichis so amazing and so unable to
be comprehended.
Psalm 139 describes howprecious we are in his sight and
that we are formed in his imageagain.
But it only takes six versesfor the psalmist to acknowledge
that.
Whoa, this idea of value is way, way in over my head.

(01:54:06):
Depends on which translationyou're reading, but it is
everything from.
You know it's too lofty for meto understand, it's too much for
me to understand.
But Genesis 1 26 does tell usthat we are made in that image,
equally loved by him, with aspecial purpose, with special
giftings and, yeah, with specialpain, special, unique pain.

(01:54:35):
That word unique is there onpurpose to remind you not to
compare your pain with mine oranyone else's.
In my sphere of influence, Ihear a lot of horror stories,
especially as it pertains todomestic violence, and even I'm
tempted to compare my stories.
Don't do it, guys.
It's a dark road and it justmakes shame grow, grow, grow,

(01:54:56):
grow.
Shame grows in the dark, andthat's a dark road.
I wasn't given any of thethings that you need to walk
your road and you weren't giventhe things to walk mine, and
that's why we don't compare.
But we can help each other andthat is the point.
Community it's one of the threeC's Because, besides me wanting

(01:55:18):
you to know the peace that onlycomes with knowing with Jesus,
my biggest wish for you is thatyou get connected with a
community.
Please go, get connected with acommunity, I beg you.
Chrissy is one of my communityRide or Die members and, as I
mentioned, we had a blastrecording those three podcasts.

(01:55:38):
Those conversations are simplytoo much to recap and so I would
certainly encourage you to goback, but it was really fun and
interesting and painful and allkinds of weird emotions.
That experience of herunjumbling some of my PTSD
memories was all of those things.
I already mentioned severaltimes now the shame that I felt

(01:56:00):
after hitting the publish buttonand by that I mean my producer
hit the publish button.
But that podcast was alsofraught with other issues.
We had so many audio issuesthat everything that you can
imagine happened.
So I knew that it wasn't anaward-winning audio experience.
But the last part of thatconversation took that
unexpected turn and the contentwas too anointed for me to

(01:56:23):
reproduce and so we left it.
And I'm telling you guys, Istill regret it this very moment
.
I'm fighting y'all.
I'm fighting.
I've been working through theshame because on that podcast we
began to talk about what youwill hear me refer to a lot in
the next several podcasts asattention seeking behaviors, and
in that particular podcast,chrissy and I had some hard

(01:56:45):
conversation about one of my ownattention-seeking behaviors
which I had battled most of mylife, and especially in the
early days of my friendship withher, by way of dishonesty.
Certainly, I have and continueto work through some of these
things in counseling andobviously I understand why I use
dishonesty to deflect to ensuresafety, especially in the

(01:57:08):
middle of my domestic violencemarriage.
Or because I was this honestyto deflect to ensure safety,
especially in the middle of mydomestic violence marriage, or
because I was just needing tofeel seen, known, loved, heard,
valued.
I don't know that even thistime last year I would have had
the emotional health to do whatwe did by hitting publish on
that podcast, or evenunderstanding this idea of

(01:57:29):
attention-seeking behaviors andwhy we have them.
And so I often think that Psalm139.6 was written just for me,
because that whole concept ofvalue is way too lofty for me to
understand.
My real enemy and your realenemy, the father of lies,
confusion and chaos likes tomake us all forget our value,

(01:57:50):
and you're not going to be anydifferent from me, whether you
have PTSD or not.
When we forget our value, webegin to exhibit
attention-seeking behaviors,which often turns into the shame
that I keep talking about whenwe forget our Genesis 126,
status made in the image of God,attention-seeking behavior has
the opportunity to abound and Iwant you to remember that, that

(01:58:13):
community that I keep talking toyou about here's something that
you really need to do.
You need to make sure that thatcommunity also looks like
accountability.
You need to make sure you havesome people in your community
that will call you out and thatwill call you higher and that
will make you mad to the pointthat you will evaluate.

(01:58:33):
So make sure your community,some people in your community,
looks like accountability.
As I've mentioned three timesnow, this podcast is for 100% of
the population, because even ifyou don't have PTSD, you have
attention-se seeking behaviors.
That just makes you human.
Now, shame drives some of this,for sure, but then it's the

(01:58:54):
hamster wheel.
Where shame becomes comes froma variety of attention seeking
behaviors and it just becomesnormal to feel shameful all the
time.
What also becomes the norm isour is our complete inability to
take care of ourselves and allthe things that we do, with
things that we value, when weforget our image-bearer status.

(01:59:14):
We really have this inabilityto remember that we are seen,
known, loved, heard and valued.
I know the devil loves darkcorners.
He likes us to live in thisguilt and shame and, most of all

(01:59:35):
, he is a master salesman.
He convinces us of needs thatwe don't have and then he gives
us ill-fated solutions to needsthat we actually do have.
These are the kinds of thingsthat nobody talks about, but
they're common to every singleone of us.
Most of us just go to sleepwith it on our minds at night,
and I've decided to tell theworld hit record and have it
published and then fight theshame and the inability to

(01:59:58):
remember my value after it.
But I am doing that because I'mtired, guys, so tired of
watching.
I'm tired of doing this and I'mtired of watching it, of living
in guilt and shame, because itdoes not have to be that way at
all.
I am going to continue to keeplocking myself in this closet

(02:00:19):
and I'm going to keep doing thisbecause he gave his life for
you.
The least I can do is shareauthentically with you, even
when it brings the opportunityfor my own shame.
I spent so many years frustratedand so loathing about this idea
of attention seeking behaviors,and never really more so than
when I was just 14 years old.
When I was 14 years old, I hadbeen living with foster parents

(02:00:43):
for about 18 months parents forabout 18 months and on June 6,
1987, those foster parents whohad taken care of me when the
state removed me from the stateof Florida but from my mom.
They took care of me for 18months, but they had their own
ministry and their own family,were good people and because of
some of these attention-seekingbehaviors I needed more help
than they could give me.

(02:01:04):
And so June 6, than they couldgive me.
And so June 6, 1987, I found my14-year-old self standing
underneath a sign that saidFaith Children's Home.
It was just another abandonmentin my mind at that point.
It was a day that still makesmy heart beat fast and my voice

(02:01:26):
tremble because, even thoughthose were the best years of my
life, that was a hard day.
So my foster parents left and itwas lunchtime and I made my way
into the main building whereall the children were housed,
and it was because it waslunchtime, as I mentioned,
everybody was there, huge, thesetwo huge rooms with these big,

(02:01:48):
long wooden tables whereeverybody sat, and two big rooms
, one of them where everyone ate, and then a big kitchen,
obviously an industrial sizekitchen, because you know there
were a lot of kids to feed, andso I.
They were eating shrimp orsomething that was donated from
Taco Bell, and that's a wholenother story for another day.
All I know is I didn't want anyTaco Bell shrimp, and so I

(02:02:12):
found a place to hide in betweenthis industrial size
refrigerator and this cabinet,and there was a little red chair
in there, almost as if it wereinviting me to um to sit, to sit
there so that the new kid couldhide.
And so I did.
I kind of sneaked back there alittle bit and it was dark and I
could hear all the goings-on ofwhat was happening, and I

(02:02:35):
certainly didn't understand howI could hear the laughter of
children, but I did.
I heard all of those things.
So I'm just kind of processingall of this in this little dark
space that might have been afoot long, where I could just
barely kind of shimmy myself inthere.
I was not who I am todayOutgoing gregarious will take

(02:02:56):
over a room.
I was very shy, very woundedand really didn't want anybody
to see me, so pretty much thecomplete opposite of what I am
today.
And so when this head popped inmy little oasis, there I was.
My eyes probably were the sizeof saucers and it was the
whitest hair I had ever seen inmy life, with a southern accent

(02:03:20):
that I couldn't reproduce if Itried this.
She said, well, hello.
And I just stared at her.
I didn't even answer her backand she had the, as I mentioned,
the most southern accent ofanybody I've ever heard in my
life.
She hailed from Maggie Valley,north Carolina.
She said to me has anybody toldyou today?

(02:03:41):
Again just staring at her, buthad been taught enough manners
to go, ma''am, she said, hasanybody told you today that they
love you?
I'm quiet here for a secondbecause I remember in that
moment I had the.
My foster parents certainly hadtold me they love me, but there
was something different aboutthis.

(02:04:01):
So I just looked up and said,no, ma'am.
She said, well, I love you.
I'm Mama Gowan looked up andsaid, no, ma'am.
She said, well, I love you.
I'm mom McGowan.
That day, even though it wasn'tovernight, created an incredible
bond between mom McGowan and me.
She and dad had started thechildren's home that day, that
day where she just gave me whatI just wanted some attention,

(02:04:24):
some attention.
She saw me, she loved, she sawme, she heard me, she valued me,
she knew I was there, I feltknown, I felt all those things I
keep talking about, and so itcreated a bond that I had not
known up until that point, butit also created a bit of a

(02:04:46):
monster.
A couple weeks ago I gave anexample on substance abuse where
one is too many and 10,000 isnot enough, and so in some ways,
when I got attention from MamaGowan, it was like that I sought
to fill all of those pains andthat abandonment and all that
stuff that I had gotten to at 14years old seven abusers, you

(02:05:07):
know, abandoned by my mom,really every kind of abuse that
you can think.
I was seeking to fill thoseempty spaces with her, and it
didn't matter how much attentionshe gave me.
I wanted more.
My lies to her were kind of likethey were to Chrissy.
They were just lies that wouldget me attention, lies that
would physically put me in herproximity so that I could be

(02:05:29):
around her.
But when I would exhibit thoseattention-seeking behaviors and
in that case a lie and I'd layin bed at night and our room at
the children's home had six twinbeds and there were sort of
five other people in the roomwith me, me and so we learned to
cry silently and I would laythere at night feeling guilty
about, about lying, because Iand I was so convinced that I

(02:05:55):
was worthless, because I neededher attention and that
frustrated me so much that Ineeded that attention.
I didn't understand that Isimply had unmet needs, that I
was doing whatever I could do tomeet them.
Just a human condition, notnecessarily just a PTSD one.

(02:06:17):
I don't know how many of you atnight put your heads down and
feel some of this emptiness thatI'm describing, or feel guilty
about whatever form ofattention-seeking behavior you
had that day, or feel guiltyabout whatever form of
attention-seeking behavior youhad that day.
But I know that I have spent somany years self-loathing and
not living to my potentialbecause I simply could not
understand this need forattention from other people.
Why couldn't God be enough?

(02:06:39):
Perhaps I was just too brokenand I really did believe that
Until recently, recent years, mytribe and my community have
locked arms with me and usheredme to him through simply living
their lives and making sure Iwas at least attempting to live
mine, making me feel all thosethings that I am valued, loved,

(02:06:59):
seen, known, heard.
And so those were nights as a,as a young Amy, that I didn't
understand this need forattention, and so this attention
seeking behavior came out inways to put me near her.
But it didn't matter how muchattention she gave me, because I
didn't understand my value.

(02:07:21):
What mattered was the attentionthat she did give me, so the
amount of attention didn'tmatter, attention that she did
give me.
So the amount of attentiondidn't matter.
But what mattered was theattention she did give me drove
me to the cross and to Jesus asthe only person who can even
sort of make this pain bearable.
And we would have these greatlean-in conversations, and I
love some lean-in conversations.

(02:07:41):
I still have them with MamaGallen and we still have that
bond.
I do love a lean-inconversation and that is why I
love community so much asChrissy and I were unpacking a
little more of these sideeffects or consequences of
post-traumatic stress disorderdepends on which one of us you
ask.
I say consequence, she says sideeffects.

(02:08:01):
We realized that some of themare certainly pronounced in
people with trauma.
But, as I've mentioned, I thinkfour times now, if everyone
were being 100% honest, we allhave times, places and spaces
where we just need and becausewe're resourceful human beings,
we will do what we have to do tofill those needs, like I did at
the children's home, even asworthless as it made me feel
those nights in that twin bed.

(02:08:23):
Think about it, though.
From a very early age we arebuilt this way.
This is evidence like if youwatch a baby throw their bottle
on the floor, only for you topick it up and hand it back to
them.
That will go on for as manytimes as you will pick the
bottle up and hand it to thebaby.
There's no malicious intent onthe part of the baby.

(02:08:44):
The baby just wants to be seen.
A tent on the part of the baby.
The baby just wants to be seen,known, heard, loved and valued.
Same with us we're justgrown-up babies throwing a
bottle on the floor, but whenthe parents actually pick the
child up and hug them and lovethem, now they feel valued.
The need is met.
I don't need you to pick thebottle up off the floor for me.

(02:09:07):
So as Chrissy and I were talkingabout this and we have these
lean-in conversations all thetime, like I used to have with
mom Miguel and as we weretalking about this, she said
something that stopped me in mytracks.
She was actually talking atthat point about her own trauma,
some of which she has agreed toshare in due time, but I was
literally leaning into thatconversation.
But then she said somethingthat made me sit back in my

(02:09:27):
chair, and this is what it was.
She said what if I am toobroken to fix?
What if your listeners feel toobroken to fix?
So I kind of just stared at herand got up and left, to be
honest with you, because I knewthat she was trying to spur my
creativity.

(02:09:48):
But I also knew that she wantedan answer from me, somebody
that she trusts as her own rideor die community.
So I thought as I walked backover to my house, because
Chrissy and I are neighbors, man, I started this podcast for
Susie Smith and Mary Wright andnow one of my best friends in

(02:10:08):
the whole world, withtear-filled eyes, has just asked
me if she was too broken to fix.
So I walked into my door and Iwas like, yeah, I know that
feeling.
I remembered it from that twinbed at the children's home where
I thought it was worthlessbecause I craved Mama Gallen's
attention, mama gallon'sattention.

(02:10:29):
I remembered it from the shameI felt early in the years of my
PTSD diagnosis as I continued topile attention seeking behavior
on top of attention seekingbehavior.
We're going to talk about quitea few of those, by the way.
I remember feeling too broken tofix.
I remember wishing I were toobroken to fix because that meant
I could live my life withplenty of excuse and zero
purpose.
But the reality is as hard as Itry.

(02:10:50):
I know that I love a God whoredeems the years that the
locusts have stolen.
I've stopped asking why hestole the years and I look
forward to great anticipation towatch him continue to grow and
restore the years and purposeand if you hear my voice right
now, you are my purpose.

(02:11:11):
This being too broken to fixconcept, coupled with the
unintended side effects of PTSDor negative consequences or
whatever we're calling it, orjust being human in general, can
be lethal and I knew that.
And I knew that, like I said,while she was trying to spur on
my creativity, she just wantedan answer to my question.
So, yeah, I left her house, butit sent me directly to

(02:11:32):
scripture because I wanted to beable to tell you, to tell her,
hey, I wanted to be able to tellmyself that I'm not too broken
to fix, because, remember, I'mstill feeling shame, because
I've told the world about someof my shame or some of my
behaviors that made me feelshameful, about some of my shame
or some of my behaviors thatmade me feel shameful.
I remembered the story in theBible of the lady who was healed
simply because she touched thehem of Jesus's robe.

(02:11:52):
So I went searching for thatstory and I found it in Mark,
chapter 5.
She was a lady with a bleedingdisorder, and the Bible tells us
that she had been healing,seeking healing from this order
for about 12 years.
It is thought that she spentall of her money and all of her
resources trying to fix thisbleeding disorder that was
probably gynecological in nature, and so, as we know, in that

(02:12:13):
region, especially during thattime, women basically were to be
seen and not heard None of thethings that we're talking about
today.
It is thought that her bleedingdisorder, as I mentioned, was
gynecological in nature, and sothat would have put her even
more of an outcast, bringingmore opportunity.
For here's that word againshame.
I bet she also felt broken.

(02:12:33):
I bet she didn't feel seen,known, loved, heard or valued.
Here's the thing that stopped mein my tracks, though, because
she made a decision one day toget up, leave her house and find
Jesus because she heard he wasgoing to be in town.
Now he wasn't coming in town tohang out, he was en route to
another miracle.

(02:12:54):
She just knew he was passingthrough.
I bet if I could have asked,she probably would have phrased
her question just like Chrissydid.
She had been seeking a solutionfor her brokenness for 12 years
.
Am I too broken to fix?
And a solution for herbrokenness for 12 years?
Am I too broken to fix?
But what was so amazing to me,and I want it to be to you too,

(02:13:14):
is that, in a last-ditch effort,she made a decision to go
looking for Jesus.
Think about that for a minute.
Think about what would happenif, in your darkest days whether
they're PTSD days or human daysyou got up and went looking for
Jesus.
The Bible says that when shetouched the hem of his garment,

(02:13:36):
jesus felt the power go out ofhim.
He said who touched me?
And when she answered, it wasme.
He said to her your faith hasmade you whole.
I was sitting on my porch thenext morning and I was reading
the passage again, the way Jesuschose to answer that question

(02:13:56):
your faith has made you wholeinfers that she was broken,
doesn't it?
Certainly we are all broken.
It is the human condition and,as I mentioned, ptsd only
pronounces that.
I think about this decision,this lady's decision to go find
Jesus, and how that decisionchanged everything for her.
I could relate to that too,because I was reminded of those

(02:14:19):
early decisions to seekcommunity, to go to church.
I wish I could say that Isought Jesus the way that lady
did in her brokenness, butbecause I made a few decisions
to seek community, jesus camewith them.
So as we move on with the secondhalf of the season, I want to
say that I say to Chrissy and Isay to any of you asking the

(02:14:40):
different form of her questionno, you're not too broken to fix
and the best way I can seegetting air quote fixed is to go
looking for community and value.
If you lay your head down atnight and think about the things
that you did that day to garnerattention of another, you need
to feel very normal, especiallyright now in the middle of a

(02:15:03):
pandemic, but also know that youdon't have to feel that way.
Your faith can make you whole.
Our mission here is not done.
I am not quitting.
I'm going to keep telling youshameful behaviors.
I have spent this entirepodcast setting up the rest of
the season.
The next few podcasts, willcontinue to feature consequences

(02:15:23):
of post-traumatic stressdisorder as they exhibit
themselves in all sorts ofattention-seeking behaviors.
Because, as Maya Angelou said,when you know better, you do
better, and knowledge puts shamein its most famous
representative and the brightlight of revelation.
So I want y'all to come with mebecause we're going to do this

(02:15:44):
thing together.
Those of you who feel like I doright now, like your shame
defines you and you can'tremember your value, I want you
to stay with me, because we aregoing to be straight up, real
and raw.
We're going to be transparent.
We're going to be true.
We can have PTSD.
We can love people with PTSD.

(02:16:05):
We can minister to people withPTSD.
We can be human.
We can love people with PTSD.
We can minister to people withPTSD.
We can be human.
We can need attention, we canneed hope, but none of that has
to rule us.
So we're going to call it out ofthe corner.
So shame has been defined asthis.
I am a mistake, not I made amistake.

(02:16:28):
So we are going to call shameout of the corner.
We're going to legit call itout of the corner, we're going
to shine light on it and, like Isaid, we're going to be real.
We're going to be raw, we'regoing to be transparent, we're
going to be truthful, and soover these next two weeks, I'm
going to be praying for everyonewho hears this to know that
shame is not who you are.
Shame is not who you are.

(02:16:50):
You, my friend, are far from amistake and shame has no game
with you or with me, anddefinitely has no game with the
one who made you.
You matter.
It's been on my website since Iopened it.
You matter.
Do not forget that.
Keep fighting, keep praying,keep remembering you're made in

(02:17:14):
the image of God.
Don't feel weird when you can'tunderstand that concept.
You can borrow my faith rightnow if you don't have any of
your own Great song by BeboNorman.
I am looking forward to beingback with you guys in two weeks
where we will dive deep backinto these attention-seeking
behaviors.
Chrissy will be back, so youdon't have to hear two versions

(02:17:35):
of stories.
Until then, I want you to liveloved.
I want you to live chosen.
I want you to live courageous.
More than anything, I want youto remember you are seen, you
are known, you are heard, youare loved and, most of all, you
are valued.

(02:17:55):
You are a precious child of themost high God.
Hey guys, it's me again and weare still in 2024.
Thank you for listening tothese throwback episodes of the
Wednesdays with Watson podcast.
We would love it.
If you subscribe to the podcast, you can do that right there in
your app, Wherever you are.

(02:18:16):
You can follow as a checkmarkat the top right hand corner of
Apple podcasts and then justright in other apps you can just
follow or subscribe and helpthe show grow.
As we go into September, we'llbe having new content, as I
mentioned at the beginning ofthe show, and a new format as
well, as I get closer tofinishing my doctorate degree.

(02:18:36):
One more thing by means ofhousekeeping, if you are so
inclined.
The Patreon link is in the shownotes, and so if you want to
support what we're doing here,which is to help people who
cannot afford counseling, pleasejust click on that link and you
can support us for as low as $5a month, as many of my
listeners do.
And so until two weeks from now, when we bring you some more

(02:18:58):
drop back episodes I don't wantto say drop back there when we
bring you some more throwbackepisodes.
I want you to remember what Ialways say, and I never leave a
microphone without it.
You are seen, you are known,you are heard, you are loved and
you are so, so valued.

(02:19:18):
And ask yourself today can youanswer the question in the
affirmative, just like I can?
Has he been faithful for all?

Speaker 1 (02:19:28):
of your life, when your weary soul needs a hand to

(02:19:49):
hold.

Speaker 4 (02:19:57):
Ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh,
ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh,ooh, ooh, ooh, ooh ooh ooh ooh
ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh oohooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh

(02:20:21):
ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh oohooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh
ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh ooh oohooh.

Speaker 1 (02:20:28):
Never gonna let you down, Never gonna let you down,
oh, as the years go by and thedays get lost in time.

(02:20:57):
Wherever you go, you willalways know I'll walk with you
To the other side.

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