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I am sure this is not huge news. Probably this just shows my own ignorance as someone growing up and living in the United States. But news stories yesterday and today detail some troubling cultural attitudes in Afghanistan.

If you pay any attention to politics, you have no doubt seen the news surrounding Julian Assange and WikiLeaks. WikiLeaks has exposed a good deal of classified information, especially as it relates to the US involvement in the Middle East. Not surprisingly there are differing opinions on the group. For some, what they are doing is increasing transparency. For others, they are compromising national security.

I purposely will not wade in on this debate, but I wanted to call attention to today's news article on a WikiLeak document.

Specifically, the Washington Examiner, and other news sources, reported yesterday on the widespread abuse of young boys in Afghanistan. Apparently, unbeknownst to me, there is no worldwide consensus on the practice of pedophilia. In Afghan, boys in particular are being regularly sexually abused; hired as "dancing boys." This has placed our security forces in compromising positions due to the fact they have to work alongside these offenders. Of course, there are cultural explanations, none of which condone the behavior. Because of the way the culture has put down women, it has opened the door for what are considered more "acceptable" behaviors.

The parallel with the Catholic Church's attitudes towards pedophile priests is quite relevant, I think, here. One of the reasons why so many victims harbor negative feelings towards the Church is the way their plights were handled once they became known. In a real sense, the Catholic Church turned a blind eye to what was happening, often in plain view.

I do not want to write a long post about the article. I just thought it was worthy of attention.

To see the article, visit: Afghan sex practices concern U.S., British forces (Washington Examiner, 12/20/2010)

Last week in Utah, a federal jury convicted the kidnapper and sexual abuser of Elizabeth Smart. For those not familiar with the highly publicized case, Elizabeth was kidnapped from her home at the age of 14 in 2002. She was subjected to daily sexual assaults at the hands of an evil man proclaiming himself to be a religious prophet. Nine months later she was rescued, and has appeared as a pillar of strength ever since.

The Elizabeth Smart case has been somewhat unique in that most long-term kidnappings do not have a such a positive outcome. She has done a number of high profile interviews (e.g., Oprah and People) and was the subject of an hour-long television documentary on Sunday. While nobody can truly know her path as a survivor of horrific abuse, from what I have seen and heard, she has put her ordeal behind her with apparent ease (at least to date). In one famously retold account, the night she returned home, the family said their prayers in the parents' bedroom, then Elizabeth said she was going to bed in her own room and slept the whole night without any difficulty.

When I heard about the jury verdict last week and saw some interviews, my reaction was "Why can't I just put it all behind me?" I struggled with this for several hours. My first thought was that I was weak. But, after I regained my composure, I realized a couple of things.

First, I am not Elizabeth Smart. We are made differently and have different experiences and backgrounds. It is not the first time I have compared my experiences (and the aftermath) with others. I did it a few years ago when I heard an NPR story on the awful serial abuse of girls in Africa. I also heard the accounts of the former altar boys on the first Oprah show on male abuse and promptly downplayed my own history. Many of us get caught in the trap of comparing what we went through to others. For me, stories that show abuse, invariably end up being invalidating.

Second, after I thought about it, I realized that like Smart, I did put things away for quite a while, also with apparent ease. As a high school student, when it was discovered that something was not right, my parents tried to put an end to the relationship (with the abusive priest) and I made a counter move to minimize everything. This allowed our family to continue virtually as if nothing had happened. While we did stop going to that church, we never discussed the matter again. And I was just as happy to move on. If I were in the media spotlight, which I was not, I would have probably given similar interviews as Elizabeth. I would have said, as she has said, "Put the past behind you. Move on."

While this can be seen as a courageous message, it may have a negative impact on many survivors. For one thing, people process trauma differently. What one person can move on from, another person cannot. Plus there are the added problems of the victim's background as well as what the traumas are. While it sounds nice for Elizabeth to give advice to Jaycee Dugard to "relax," it is a statement that does not consider the different contexts: Dugard was abducted for 18 years. The problem with the "move on" message is that it does not consider the fact that it is not possible for many, thereby leading to a feeling of invalidation.

In my life at the time my abuse became known, I had already had a decade or more of "underground" dysfunctional coping to deal with what had been happening. None of that changed, especially since the abuse did not actually end when my parents intervened. My visible life just became even more separated from my non-visible life. I became more reliant on dissociative coping, though I did not think of it as dissociative at the time. It was just my life. My "normal" messed up life.

When things fell apart for me in 1991, they fell apart like a house of cards. I had been successful in college, was beginning graduate school and a career in science, and it all just collapsed in a matter of seconds. Life took a dramatic turn for me. I had always given myself a huge amount of credit for "moving on," but suddenly the world came to a standstill.

It is now nearly 20 years later. My path has been long and winding, and one that I never would have envisioned. Much of it has been difficult, but much of it has also been glorious. And much of it is informed by living through my 30s and now going into my 40s. A lot changed for me when I moved out of my 20s and got married and had kids. In many ways, life became more serious. It became not just about me. That reality had implications for what my path has been and what I have had to do to heal.

Would I have it any other way? For me, the answer is absolutely no. I know that to be the husband and father I want to be, not to mention the person I want to be, I need to address the underlying dysfunctional coping. I need to address the dissociation and ways in which I live a fragmented existence. It is certainly not an easy journey, but I am glad for the journey. And I am proud of my progress. My healing path has led me to feel more authentic. Yet I know I am not done.

For decades, I had no concept of what healing meant to me. I could never put it into words. For me, healing is much more than just "moving on." Healing is accepting that the past happened and uniting the past with moving forward and living life. Our past certainly shapes who we are now. But our past does not need to define who we are to become. In many ways, healing is the integration, or resolution, of the past and present. Healing is redefining safety, inside and out. Healing is being proud that we survived. Healing is accepting personal responsibility. Healing is learning to be aware of thoughts and emotions. Healing is learning to see the joys in life. And healing is so much more.

As I asked over a year ago in My Take on What Healing Means, what does healing mean to you?

In an editorial to the most recent Journal of Trauma and Dissociation (Vol. 11, pp. 261-5), Dr. David Spiegel writes about how dissociation will likely be addressed in the forthcoming DSM5. For those of you not familiar, the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, commonly referred to as the DSM, is psychiatry's approach to standardizing mental disorders. I understand how many look askew at any psychiatric labels, myself sometimes included. But there is the reality that correct diagnoses are an important component to healing. Having a manual and common language helps to increase recognition, accurate assessment, and align treatments.

There has been some concern that the dissociative disorders, especially dissociative identity disorder, would be subsumed under other diagnoses and thereby essentially be "declassified." Even now, despite their presence in the current DSM, they are not well integrated into the psychiatric community. There are large biases against dissociation, that strangely do not seem to be as apparent in illnesses such as depression or schizophrenia. Probably this is due to the sometimes ephemeral nature of impairment. To the observer, it often appears that dissociatives can just pull themselves together, lending some credence to the belief that no real disorder exists. Yet, to the dissociative, we know there is much more to what we deal with than just being able to pull ourselves together. We know about what it means to lose our identity, to have huge gaps in memory, to have wild swings of consciousness. And, as I have said before, I believe one of the main reasons for the bias is that many clinicians and lay people are uncomfortable with the notion that an adult human being can have a fragmented sense of identity or lose control of their minds and bodies.

In his editorial, Spiegel, a member of the DSM5 Task Force, asserts that the dissociative disorders will be included in the revision which will come out in 2013. He gave a summary of what the task force is proposing. They are proposing that there be a stress and trauma spectrum section which will include PTSD and the dissociative disorders. In so doing, the DSM5 will emphasis the common etiology of these "disorders." This would be a controversial move, since the current version focuses more on description of symptoms. Even though there would still not be a diagnostic requirement of a trauma for a dissociative disorder to exist, placing dissociation squarely into a section with an emphasis on trauma etiology would be a blow to the false memory advocates. It would be a validation and positive step for those of us who appreciate that dissociative disorders do have a strong basis in trauma.

In fact, it appears that this trauma etiology will be pursued even further based on studies by Ruth Lanius and colleagues that there is a substantial subgroup, of nearly one third, of those with post-traumatic stress disorder showing mainly symptoms of dissociation which are far different from the "classic" PTSD symptoms. These clinical findings are supported by the functional MRI studies which show that the dissociative subgroup has increased prefrontal cortical activity and reduced limbic activity in response to traumatic stimuli, which is opposite of the typical PTSD response.

One of the proposed changes to the criteria for dissociative identity disorder I think is a step back. It states that the disruption of identity "may be observed by others, or reported by the patient." Detractors of dissociative identity disorder will say that there is no clinical input. On the other hand, there are clearly disorders where there is primarily patient reporting. Depression comes to mind. The onus would then be on the clinician to determine whether the self-reporting of the patient is consistent with the rest of the criteria for the disorder to warrant the diagnosis.

Complex PTSD, as proposed by Judith Herman in 1992, is not addressed in the current DSM and appears not to be addressed in the DSM5. I think this is for good reason. To do so, would confound matters. The commonly understood symptoms of complex PTSD are basically PTSD symptoms plus overlap with many other areas (such as anxiety, personality, and dissociative disorders). I think we all, patients and clinicians alike, need to appreciate that the DSM will always have limitations. The manifestations of all of these disorders in practice are almost always more complex than any manual can ever hope to capture. But the goal of the manual should be to make a best effort and provide a guidepost.

To learn more about the recent studies showing the dissociative subgroup of PTSD, see the home page of Dr. Ruth Lanius at the University of Western Ontario. She does not have her most recent journal articles listed. If interested, check out: Emotion Modulation in PTSD: Clinical and Neurobiological Evidence for a Dissociative Subtype (in American Journal of Psychiatry). To read the Spiegel editorial, see Dissociation in the DSM5 (in Journal of Trauma and Dissociation).

I am taking a one month break from the Expressive Arts Carnival. The next activity will be posted on November 1. If you are interested in finding out more, check out the home page or drop me an email.

It is difficult not to pay attention to the stream of news regarding clergy abuse in the Catholic Church. It is on all the major news sites I frequent, plus the Survivors Network of those Abused by Priests issues daily e-mail press releases.

I really do not want this blog to become about clergy abuse. That is not at all my intention. My focus here is squarely on understanding trauma and dissociation particularly as they relate to my own healing.

But I do have to comment when I read something that begs for comment. I feel like it is sort of my public duty. So let me hop onto my blog soapbox for a moment.

The latest news is that Pope Benedict met with clergy abuse victims during a trip to Malta and 'weeped.' The news story included a press statement from the Vatican, which was telling:

One does not need to know much about any facet of this ongoing saga to know that everything said in that statement, after "he prayed with them," is demonstrably untrue.

It is also interesting as to who these "victims" are. They were undoubtedly hand picked and expected to say things like "[I am] trying to regain my faith." But those seeking to restore faith through the Catholic Church do not represent the vast majority of those abused. What about those whose faith has been shattered? Whose spirituality has been twisted by conflicting messages, teachings, and actions? How can that spirituality possibly be truly restored within the walls and constructs of an institution with such weight as the Catholic Church?

I struggle. In my head mostly. And I write. And I talk. And I pay attention. And I draw and paint.

The image above was done as an art therapy directive last week right after leaving the hospital. The directive was to "paint about something lost and something gained." What I lost is a spiritual direction. What I gained is a family, and an ability to ground and contain, and heal.

I know that someday these two sides will have to intersect. I cannot imagine that now, but perhaps they already are. I have had experiences of spirituality not tied to any religion. If you look at the early posts on this blog, you will read about my "consciousness" or "enlightenment" experiences. I also know that parts of my internal system have had similar wondrous experiences that were tied to religion. They were protected for those parts. But as I do the hard work of looking at myself as a whole, I cannot help to know they were really taken away.

That reality poses a huge dilemma for me. It is also one of the big questions that those of us with dissociative disorders have to face.

It could be asked in this way: How do I integrate parts of myself that were protected with parts of myself that were not without going crazy?

Or it could be asked in a much simpler way: How do I heal?

Perhaps this journey, partly documented here, is my spiritual path. Perhaps I am meant to heal. Perhaps I am meant to live.

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On Good Friday, the Catholic Church, through the pope's personal preacher, compared the current scrutiny of both the pope and the church to the historical suffering of Jews. Rev. Raniero Cantalamessa said, "They know from experience what it means to be victims of collective violence and also because of this they are quick to recognize the recurring symptoms." To make matters worse, these words were spoken during the homily of the Good Friday service in St. Peter's Basilica, while the pope looked on.

I can understand that the church feels under siege. It is and should. Everything that is happening now is a direct result of the church's own doing, and as I have said before, none of this is surprising when seen in its proper historical context. The responses are typical, and sad—that facts are being misrepresented and that the church itself is the victim.

These statements, from which the Vatican has since backtracked, are merely a public admission of what is the predominantly held belief of the church hierarchy. A belief that is the foundation of all that is wrong with the church. A core belief that has put so many children in danger for so many years. A core belief that has led to the suicides of so many clergy abuse victims. A core belief that has been a true obstacle to healing of physical, emotional and spiritual wounds of untold thousands.

What do such statements say to those who were sexually abused by deviant clergy and whose abuses were covered up for decades? I will tell you what I heard and felt: That we survivors are demons. That we survivors mean nothing. That we survivors merely incite violence.

The irony of these statements by the church is that in reality they do not apply to church suffering at all, but to the suffering of victims of clergy abuse. In fact, this is a parallel I made in Jews.

Whenever I think there is hope that the message I heard loud and clear as a child and teenager and adult is now different, I am given a dose of reality that it is not. These statements have served, in my mind, to nullify any prior or future statements of empathy or support for the abuses and cover-ups that have occurred. The Catholic Church does not have the right to say one thing one week, do nothing at all in its deeds at the highest of levels, and then say something so appalling and unholy the next week on one of the holiest days of the year—and expect to retain any shred of credibility.

I am certain Jesus does not at all approve of what the church has become, supposedly built around his life and teachings. If Jesus were giving the Good Friday homily, I would suspect he might repeat Matthew 21:13 in which he said: "My house shall be called the house of prayer; but you have made it a den of thieves."

On Good Friday, the hours of 12 noon and three are known as the Three Hours' Agony, representing the last three hours before Jesus died on the cross. Tradition holds that these hours are for specific prayers and acts of reparation for Jesus' suffering; acts meant to repair the sins against Jesus. For me, this year, I spent these hours in a psychiatric hospital, tortured by internal conflicts about religion, God, Jesus, and Satan. When I read these statements spoken on Good Friday, precisely in the middle of these three special hours, I could not help but have the immediate reaction that I should die. It was then not easy to stay safe, and eventually I found myself sleeping in a hospital Quiet Room.

But I fought.

A couple days removed, I have gained some perspective.

In Galatians, Jesus said that we are all sons of God. My interpretation is that these acts of reparation are meant to acknowledge all of God's children who have suffered in the name of religion.

Instead, in St. Peter's Basilica, we are not reached out to; only the church is the victim.

Unfortunately, this leads me to conclude that the words of the Catholic Church are clearly not the Words of the Lord.

Related Posts:

• Holy Week, Church Visit, Scandal, and Miracles (March 29, 2010)
• Thoughts on Catholic Church Abuse Reports (March 15, 2010)
• Ireland's Church Abuse Scandal and Personal History (May 24, 2009)

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I knew the Christian season of Lent was going to be challenging this year. It always is. But I had a number of important clues for why this one would stand out from the rest. For one, I have a level of internal awareness now that I have not ever had before. For another, internal parts that have dealt with religious issues have been active to a degree I have not experienced in well over a decade. I have had to attend to them, and since things are different now, the way I attend has taken on new significance.

This religious season did not start out well. And I was quite discouraged. On the very first day of Lent, Ash Wednesday, there was a self-harm event that completely caught me off guard. I had somehow not remembered the importance of that day, even though we had talked about it several times in therapy. But parts inside clearly remembered. I then rededicated myself to do better and work more collaboratively to keep "all of me" safe.

My therapist and I have been planning for Easter beginning back at the turn of the year. And, in fact, one of the steps we discussed was going back to the church where a lot of my childhood abuse happened (see photo above). We knew this was a huge step, not to be done without careful consideration. But specific parts were very vocal in asking for it. We talked about all the pros and cons and thought it through carefully. And we waited and resisted the temptation to do it impulsively. We went together a couple weeks ago. The experience was validating, but there were all kinds of different responses. For the first few days, it was all seen as only a healing experience. But then one younger part thought it meant we can now go back to that church and even participate in the ceremonies (presumably as an altar boy). Other parts, particularly those who dealt with the more extreme conflicts about religion, were not heard from for at least a week. That troubled me. When I did finally hear from them, they were not happy, which is the mildest way I can describe their responses.

Immediately after going to the church, the clergy abuse scandal in Europe escalated. This was not any surprise to those of us who have dealt with this for a long time. But it has been big news for the scandal to reach the steps of the Vatican. The news has seemed relentless to me. As I wrote in Thoughts on the Catholic Church Abuse Reports a couple weeks ago, I know bringing abuses into the light of day will lead to healing and increased safety of children. But such news has always been destabilizing for me. That it comes right in the middle of the holiest time of the year, makes it even more so.

On March 19th, Pope Benedict read publicly a letter apologizing for abuses in Ireland. Last year, he read a similar letter during his visit to the United States. But the words were typical, saying some bishops made some "errors in judgment." And there were only words, not action. Then on March 24, the New York Times broke a story that the pope, then a cardinal, was the person who stopped church investigations of a Wisconsin priest who was accused of abusing hundreds of boys at a deaf school. The Times article said:

Swiss President Doris Leuthard has called for a central register of pedophile priests in her country. We would do well to have one in the United States as well. In fact, I would go so far as to say that there should be a special offender registry in the cases of any civil action of child abuse (in any church or organization, such as the Boy Scouts). There currently exists none. And in the Catholic Church, since civil cases were filed and settled with the Church, there are no civil authority records on most all priests. Most are listed by the non-profit group Bishop Accountability, but that is not the best solution for protecting children. I believe our sex offender registries are a bit of a joke, since someone can be on it for misdemeanor lewd conduct having nothing at all to do with a child, yet a defrocked, civilly sued, pedophile priest with dozens of victims, is not on the registry. That inequity is not in the best interest of protecting children. So, our governments must hold some responsibility in all of this and need to step up.

To slightly change the subject, but to give an idea of how disconnected the Catholic Church is from reality, Pope John Paul II's track to sainthood is being questioned. The former pope died five years ago. One requirement for sainthood is that there needs to be two attributed miracles. Here's one miracle in his file: A nun in France, had prayed to the pope for relief from what was believed to be Parkinson's disease. Two months after the pope died, she had a medically unexplainable cure. That's probably a miracle to someone, but how is it attributed to him? Recently, there has been news saying that she may not have suffered from Parkinson's at all, but rather another neurological disease which can be cured. Talk about misplaced priorities!

So much is happening at the same time for me. I am being inundated with Catholic Church news, which normally I do not pay much attention to. Inside feels like it is all rushing to a head coinciding with Easter. I have, as a result, been losing lots of time to dissociation, orders of magnitude more than usual. I know I have been psychologically switching self states like a revolving door. I also know that most of the time I am able to show to outsiders (including family) that I appear to be totally normal. This is validating in a sense, because it makes me realize how it was possible for most of my youth. That ability, really, is what dissociation was designed to do (and I will write more about this later).

In the process, safety—that overarching responsibility of mine—is being severely tested. I am trying my best to navigate through all of this muck. I am utilizing all my grounding and coping skills. But I am acutely aware that all of my best efforts may not quite be enough this week.

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If anyone had the impression that the Catholic clergy abuse scandal, which erupted in Boston in 2002 and spread quickly throughout the United States, was limited only to this country, they were mistaken. There was clergy abuse elsewhere, of course, and scandals at other times, including here in Boston a decade earlier, in Ireland last year, and in Germany and other parts of Europe right now.

I admit I have not ever paid close attention to clergy abuse news. It has been just too personally triggering for me. I do not search out news on the clergy abuse websites (e.g., The SNAP Network and Bishop Accountability). In fact, I avoid them as best I can because it does not help me to know everything. I also am well aware that I was completely destabilized in 2002. The constant stream of news at the time triggered my second round of collapse and then recovery. As I have written before, my first round was in the early 1990s. While it was known then that there was institutional cover-up and deflection, its scale was not known. I felt a certain sense of peace that came from all of this not being too publicly prominent.

However, I now know that public awareness of child abuse leads to accountability and makes children more safe. The Catholic Church thrived on secrecy. Left to their own devices, I am convinced there would be no pressure to change. For an institution with Jesus Christ at the center and guiding influence, I find their behavior unconscionable. But I can understand it. All institutions—and governments—want to avoid scandals, many even at the cost of innocent lives.

It really is not the abuses that bother me the most. Data shows that there are more offenders, by percentage, in schools. And, percentage of abuse of children by males in the general population is also higher. What is most hurtful to me personally was the cover-up, lack of empathy, and treatment of child abuse victims, and their families, as "disposable." I told I was being abused in the 1980s as a high school student, and though I greatly minimized what happened, the situation was resolved by our family moving to another church and not talking about it. The place we called our spiritual home for four generations was taken away in the bat of an eye, and the pedophile priest who had only been there for a decade, and who was attacking children, remained.

Obviously, I did not know much about justice back then or how to find it.

In Boston, the church did make efforts in the early 1990s to "reach out" to victims through internal investigations. But that was a case of "too little, too late." For me, a decade of silence had gone by, and I was in the midst of a complete psychological collapse. I simply could not trust the church. And I had good reason not to. Even through these investigations, they did not move to isolate pedophile priests and protect children. The only recourse for victims was to come forward and press criminal charges or file a civil lawsuit.

The focus of the church was always about its image. And since the church was "above the law," at least in practical terms, they had the upper hand. In many cases, there are voluminous records (see Bishop Accountability) clearly documenting abuse and acknowledgement by church officials that abuse occurred. However, this information was never disclosed to victims who came forward. The message from the church, through their lawyers, was never about validation and support, but about making the barriers to justice higher and higher.

Now, in 2010, the collective voice of survivors from all over the world is exposing the truth. We seek justice. We seek healing. But we also seek to stop abuse against children wherever it exists.

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The news today reveals a telling commentary on where our society is at. I thought it was untrue when I first heard about it. But, apparently, it is quite real. Or, not real, depending on how you look at it.

Leave it to sex to sell multiple personalities. Yes, the world's first sex robot, Roxxxy, is not only anatomically correct and functional, but comes complete with five personalities. The owner can choose which personality he wants to interact with. And the personalities are customizable and can be programmed wirelessly over the Internet, even allowing owners to share their personality programs with others.

The inventor says his goal was to develop a companion, to help shy people and those with sexual dysfunction.

So, having lots of personalities is good, right? That makes me feel so much better. I can now stop therapy and resume where I was when I started.

I'm not sure if the inventor thought of this, or did his research, but what happens when the programming gets more complicated and the personalities start fighting with each other, or acting out?

We are now entering "Star Trek" land folks. I do remember several Next Generation episodes about this, almost always situated in the holodeck.

I'll wait for the holodeck, thank you very much!

News Story: Roxxxy the sex robot makes her world debut (AFP, 1/9/2010)

It is not my intention for this site to be a news source. But I do occasionally read things in the news that I feel may be important to share with others. This may be triggering, so please read carefully.

In many ways this story is a validation of the abuses which do occur in this world and in the USA in particular. It is a repudiation of those who say such horrible abuse cannot occur. Or who say that sex offenders are misunderstood (as I posted in Forced Confrontation last month).

News stories:

• Kidnapped woman hidden in CA backyard for 18 years (AP News)

• Alleged kidnapper launches bizarre defence (UK Telegraph)

• A world of nightmare (The Observer)

I have a small memory of being a young boy and captivated by a Major League Baseball All-Star game. I can only remember that one time and the feeling of awe as the players were announced. That same surreal feeling struck me at many sporting events, including the 1975 World Series, which the Red Sox lost to the Reds in 7 games, and the 1984 and 1986 World Championships, which the Celtics won.

Sports were always a normalizing experience for me, whether I was on the field or court myself or I was watching professional games on television or firsthand at the Boston Garden or Fenway Park.

So tonight, for some unknown reason and for the first time since that childhood experience, I'm watching the All-Star game. I'm surprised because I just realized that the game was played at Fenway in 1999 and I didn't make any attempt to watch it. At least I have no memory of it.

The reason I'm posting any of this here is that as part of the pre-game festivities, MLB and People magazine sponsored "All-Stars Among Us". Thousands were nominated and 30 were selected (one from each team) representing citizens who have made special contributions to their community.

I wanted to single out one individual, Mark Kunz, for his relevance to this site.

His description reads: Matt Kunz's stepbrother Chris committed suicide in 2007 after returning from Iraq with undiagnosed Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder. Matt made it his mission to ensure that all National Guard Troops in his home state of Montana receive adequate PTSD screening. He continues to campaign for PTSD awareness and screening for all veterans.

I see "all-stars" everywhere, including all survivors of trauma who are all-stars in my eyes.

For more information, visit: All-Stars Among Us.