What the Past Means to Me

In his Shannara series, in Book One, The Sword of Shannara—Terry Brooks once wrote “the future was inextricably tied to the past, an interwoven tapestry of events and ideas that would never be entirely severed”.

The words Brooks wrote describe my past in its entirety.

So, if my future is entangled with my past, and the trauma in my past can never be overcome or left behind me, then my life would be a lost cause! I know I am not the only person to ever feel this way or to look for ways to cope with my distress.

I watched my parent’s inability to deal with issues in their everyday life and learned that, as a child, I shared their traumas to an extent. Sure, my dad was the one who had experienced life in a WWII work camp. He was the one who experienced horrible deprivations. But I was the one to witness the cracks in his psyche. My mother coped with life in a Nazi occupied town for five years during that same war. Again, I was the one to react to her ever present over-vigilance concerning any pre-conceived threats in her subsequent life.

As a child, I was a nervous wreck! I was traumatized by my parents’ evident distress in certain situations in their lives. I cannot un-see, un-witness what I am privy to.

Can I not leave this behind? Is Brooks right? Can the adult never escape the past of a disturbing and painful childhood? My trauma was not abuse of any kind. But others may need to escape a past of some other form of trauma which left them vulnerable. Both types of victims need to heal.

I think I have managed to heal. But it has taken almost my entire life. It all began with many years trying to admit to myself that I had “inherited” my parents’ PTSD.

There was no support for my mother and father. There was no comfort for me. PTSD was not diagnosed nor its symptoms established until well after my parents’ traumatic young lives had skewed their perception of the world. They survived PTSD on their own but not before their delicate mental health changed the very sense of who they were. PTSD dragged them down, beyond repair. And, even though I witnessed their support of one another, I now realize that there was no support for me as I fell into a childish rhythm with their issues.

I did realize, eventually, that I needed to cut my ties with the past my parents had lived and learn to survive on my own, in my life. I realized that I had trauma of my own and needed to separate myself from their torment—I had to save myself just as all sufferers of PTSD, no matter what the events they suffered and which caused their mental issues, need to do.

What does the past mean to me?

My past means that I needed to record what happened to me. I needed to admit that my past left me raw. My past means that I had to find a way to heal. I am devoting this blog to all of you who are looking for a way to heal. I hope you find something here that helps.

BUT, if this does not always work for you, go to www.ptsd.va.gov or [Wounded Warriors (Canada)] and find out what clinical treatments are available to you. I hope this helps.

Read my book, Adytum, which will launch at Friesen Press in January 2025. In this book, I share how I came to know PTSD and how my parents learned to cope with it. How I coped with it.

Mary Cools