Many of us spend a lot of our time looking for love and understanding in the wrong places. These places are people who are only out for their own interest or who simply are not capable of being the person’s we need them to be. They are dry wells....

  Here is a link to an informative video about the 2017 Trauma and Dissociation Conference hosted by the Ivory Garden DID Support Group. CEU’s are offered and the speakers are at the top in their field. This conference is not just for professionals, but also for survivors and...

I recently was honored to present a speech for NAMI (National Alliance of Mentally Ill) at the public library in Champaign, Illinois on Dissociative Identity Disorder (once known as Multiple Personality Disorder). It went very well and I was featured on Fox Illinois News the following day. I have...

How we see ourselves is the way we believe deep inside and determines whether we will succeed or fail in life. This is a fundamental fact when it comes to overcoming any obstacle in life, and is especially true when recovering from any type of mental challenge. I can...

  One of the truly hardest things I’ve had to face in my life has been taking responsibility for who I am and not continuing to hide behind the abuse of my childhood or my mental health diagnosis as an excuse for bad behavior. I lived at one time...

  This morning I was surfing a social media website when I ran across someone’s post that broke my heart. This person, a woman, was saying how much she wished she could love herself but that she hated everything about her life, her personality and her past. In effect,...

  Then one day they spin a cocoon about themselves and hide away from the world for a time. Inside the cocoon a miraculous process takes place called metamorphosis. The body of the caterpillar is being rearranged. One can only imagine the enormous amount of energy and determination to...

  Recovery, a very important word. It means many different things to different people. My take on it may or may not agree with what you may define it as, but basically to me it is the ability to overcome some obstacle and live a powerful life. As a...

  “To live is the rarest thing in the world. Most people exist, that is all.” Oscar Wilde   We are all the culmination of our experiences and fears. The experiences that leave us gasping for breath and injured in our souls can damage our ability to enjoy life...

  I once belonged to a twelve-step group trying to come to terms with my mother’s alcoholism when I was growing up and which continued until she died. One of the slogans from this group went as follows, “If you always do what you always did, you’ll always get...

...

  What is inner peace? The dictionary defines it several ways one of which is “freedom of the mind from fear, anxiety and annoyance”. Is there ever a time when our minds aren’t full of one of these things though? Can I have inner peace even in the midst...