LIAM CORLEY: Hey, I overheard you guys were having a discussion about how

war veterans can overcome their trauma. Would you guy’s mind if I joined in on
this? I am a war veteran myself and I find it hard to fully heal from my traumatic
experiences.
JANIS HASWELL: Absolutely not! I was talking about how as a teacher who had
many students with connections to people who fought in the vietnam war, I have
come to the understanding of how powerlessness has had a huge effect on
trauma.
LIAM CORLEY: Actually I struggle from that feeling of powerlessness all the time
and I think that is one of the main contributors to the trauma I’ve developed. My
deployment into Afghanistan was very conflicting. I had absolutely no control
over my actions and was forced to follow the orders I was given rather than
follow my personal beliefs and values.
JANIS HASWELL: That is what I’ve been hearing very often and to that, I
recommend focusing on controlling the situation now through writing. Do you
enjoy writing at all or implement it into your daily life?
LIAM CORLEY: Yea I actually do! To help relieve the effects of trauma, I turned to
poetry and almost immediately after incorporating this into my life, I felt that I had
found a means to explore my murky depths. Poetry’s compact form satisfied my
hunger for meaning and my impatience with triviality.
JANIS HASWELL: That is exactly why we are having this discussion. We all
believe that writing is one of the best possible things to do to find yourself and
relieve the suffering that trauma inflicts upon us.
MARK BRACHER: Through my studies, I have seen that literacy is so beneficial
because it causes veterans to avoid further shaming of what they’ve done by
providing recognition of their hardships. It also helps reduce the remembrance of
such memories inflicting the trauma and helps strengthen one’s self identity.
LIAM CORLEY: I agree, these poems have helped me achieve a voice that does
justice to my thoughts and allows me to express myself in ways where I feel I can
restore my identity. I am also an author so by being able to fully express my
thoughts and feelings to past events, it makes me feel better to be recognized
and reach out to those who face the same struggles as me.
JANIS HASWELL: See, through writing and rewriting the events that traumatize
you, you can manipulate the words on a page to articulate to yourself and others
the emotional truths of your past.
NEIL BAIRD: I have actually looked deep into this topic of manipulating one's
past and I believe this is called mythologization and it is one of the three
strategies that author Kali Tal offers to cope with traumatic events.
JANIS HASWELL: Oh is that so?
NEIL BAIRD: Yes, my research suggests that Mythologization is a common
strategy people use that works by reducing a traumatic event to a set of
standardized narratives. It helps turn traumatizing events from a frightening and
uncontrollable event into a contained and predictable narrative. This in turn
reduces the negative feelings towards these traumatic events over time.
NANCY MILLER: Oh wow that's interesting! Kim Phuc who was the girl depicted
being burned by napalm in the napalm girl Photograph utilized that concept of
Mythologization to completely change the way she was perceived.
NEIL BAIRD: This strategy of Mythologization is actually especially common in
lots of other cultures and it is how people like to confront serious accidents like
the one inflicted upon Kim by the military.
NANCY MILLER: Yup, Kim turned her image of an innocent little girl suffering
from being burned into a story of forgiveness. Through her work, She was able to
show people her life, her positive nature, and her love for her child while still
displaying the scars that war has left on her physically.
JANIS HASWELL: That's absolutely beautiful that she was able to overcome her
trauma and turn that silent girl war icon into a maternal voice for peace.
NANCY MILLER: She claims that her biographical memoir’s purpose is to tell her
story for the sake of her son so he can see her personal transformation of how
she overcame her hardships from war. Despite the trauma she endured from
such an event, she still made the effort to overcome her adversities through
rewriting her past with a more positive outlook.
JANIS HASWELL: So Mr. Baird, you mentioned the fact that there were three
strategies to cope with trauma, what were the other two?
NEIL BAIRD: The other two strategies that Tal offers is medicalization and
disappearance. Medicalization is focused on the idea that trauma is considered
an illness that can be treated by medicine and psychiatry. Disappearance is the
refusal to admit the existence of a particular kind of traumatic event.
JANIS HASWELL: Oh, so to go back to the idea of rewriting one’s past like
mythologization does, this strategy of Disappearance kind of plays a role in this
too?
NEIL BAIRD: Yes, Tal notes that these three strategies work in combination to
codify individual trauma. So Disappearance works by forcing oneself to
undermine one’s own credibility. If they can do that, they can get over
remembering certain events because they don’t believe that their recollection of
their past is accurate.
MARK BRACHER: Ah I see, so this plays a part into what I was saying earlier
about how literacy helps avoid further shaming. Disappearance helps reduce the
amount of guilt that veterans carry by allowing themselves to think into multiple
perspectives of how their actions can be viewed rather than having just one
stone cold, harsh mindset.
NEIL BAIRD: Yes exactly, some people have this trauma because their mindset
basically makes them perceive certain situations in ways that are way more
severe then what it actually was. And by acknowledging this, Veterans can slowly
self heal through moving into a better mindset. This is the way that they can start
coping with the trauma.
LIAM CORLEY: So as you were saying earlier Mr. Baird, is trauma able to be
cured by any sort of medication?
NEIL BAIRD: Although trauma itself isn’t necessarily a medical condition, in
almost all cases it does lead to conditions like PTSD, adjustment disorders,
Depression, etc. But there is no definitive cure for these conditions that result
from trauma.
LIAM CORELY: Oh so what is the point in the strategy of medicalization if there is
no cure?
NEIL BAIRD: Well although medication can’t cure the effects of trauma, it can
work in combination with psychiatry and self-care techniques to provide relief
from symptoms associated with trauma.
JANIS HASWELL: Oh, so what you're saying is that in addition to using literacy
to help alleviate the effects of trauma, veterans can also incorporate medicine
and book appointments with therapists and psychiatrists to help them heal?
NEIL: That's correct.
LIAM CORLEY: Wow this was very eye opening to me and it gave me a lot of
information on what I could do in my personal life to overcome the adversities
I’ve faced from war. Thank you all for allowing me to be a part of your discussion!