🌟Sarah's Journey through the Online TIPP Program to overcome chronic PTSD

Things that I used to experience were a result of ptsd. So flashbacks. I would be hijacked by memories that would seem to be extremely real and feelings and emotions that seem to be right there right now, even though to everybody else it wasn't happening right there, right then. And my behaviour seemed unreasonable in the moment, but to me it was terrifying.

Had panic attacks. I found that certain situations would feel like I was being physically assaulted, even though I wasn't being physically assaulted. Maybe if music was a little too loud, I would feel that. And it was just what was going on in my brain and my body that were behaving in such a way. Z My body and my brain brain were telling me, hey, you need to pay attention to this. But I didn't want to do that because it was just too painful. And so I ran away and I hid any way that I could, whether that was through overeating or not eating, whether it was through working too hard, whether it was through trying to keep too busy, whether that was.

Through eating poorly or driving myself too hard. So there was a lot of really unhealthy behavior that was screaming. My body and brain were screaming and I just chose not to listen. So I was really deaf to myself. My inner compass was almost completely destroyed because I was listening to what other people were telling me. And none of that really sat right with me, but because I kept listening to them because that's the way that I believed that things were supposed to be done. I wasn't listening to myself. So I had no inner compass. I had. I kind of felt that things were right, but then I would allow them to be run over because I believed that other people knew better for me, what was right for me.

What.

I buried so many dreams to the point that when people would ask me, what do you want for Christmas? Or what do you want for your birthday? Or where do you want to go for a coffee? Or anything like that. I literally couldn't tell them because I literally had no idea my brain would freeze. And there's no other way to describe it. My brain was blank.

Even if I suggested something, I would expect that it would get overridden so.

That that was what was happening.

And sometimes I would say in anger about where I wanted to go, and then I'd get, you know, fine, man, whatever. So it was really damaging my relationships.

With a lot of people. Yeah.

So the cost, what that was doing was that I wasn't being true to myself. So I wasn't able to discover who I am and what things there are inside of me that I could bring as a gift to this world, that I could express myself in a way that is uniquely me. That.

You know, maybe I'm really good at administration or maybe I'm a really good singer, or maybe I'm a really good writer, you know, I don't know because I haven't really explored those things. And now I'm thinking I'd like to try and find out and see if maybe there is something special that's. That's me, that can be expressed in a way that's going to help other people. And even if it doesn't, even if I just, you know, sing around the house, if it brings me joy, then that can't be a bad thing. And if other people enjoy it. And when others have heard me sing, they say, you've got a beautiful voice. And I've just never really believed that. But, you know, maybe I can bring some joy to other people. And that would be really cool. That would be really cool. I don't need a stage for that. It would just be neat to be able to share with other friends who are musicians, you know, and be able to jam with them, you know, maybe pick up the guitar again. That'd be cool.

What did I wish or pray that would be different?

I just knew something had to change.

There's no two ways about it. I just knew something had to change. I knew the way that I was. I knew the way that I was feeling and thinking it just. It had to change. And it was that deep in my gut.

Yeah, deep in my gut. I've got to be there. That I went and got to see Dr. Wood.

So we.

I first met Dr. Wood at a. At the Anomaly Mindset event run by Sandra Kakowski and was part of the group there who. He had a two hour section where he spoke and he had us do a couple of exercises. And I could feel different just from doing those exercises. And from that I knew that this is what I wanted to do. That it was definitely the answer that I was looking for. And so I pursued it further. I did the online program and it took me a little while from getting the program to actually sitting down and doing the four hour session. It was worth every second of it. Yeah, I was nervous about it because I didn't want to relive all the trauma and things. I didn't want to relive the memories of things. And it was interesting because the ones that I thought I would be addressing, I didn't. And the ones that I thought would Matter didn't. And the way that he explains it and the way that he keeps you grounded and the way that he keeps you in the present is amazing. And even when we need to deal with some of the hard stuff, the way in which he does it, the way in which he approaches it, is done in such a way and with such respect that you can have somebody else with you. Even doing an online program, he alerts you to the. To the time where you may need somebody with you. And for me, it was enough to know that there was somebody else in the house. If I'd wanted somebody right beside me, I could have had that if I'd wanted to. But it was enough for me to know that there was somebody else in the house. And it was all done very matter of fact. And because everything was dealt to in the conscious rather than the subconscious, it meant that the emotions didn't overwhelm. And that, for me, was really important because once that landslide happens, there's my stopping it, as I'm sure you'll be very aware. But the way that he does it is so calm, is so clear. It just is unlike any other program I've ever experienced. And it is worth every cent to do it.

The experiences were.

Like, I could breathe again.

The traumatic memories when they were chopped up and reshuffled, when they were cleared, became something that used to terrify me to something that I looked at with the same, oh, there's a bug on the floor. Or, oh, I need to clean that dirty knife. I need to clean that dirty cutlery. Oh, I need to do the dishes. Like, oh.

That. That was really cool. And the lightness and the. The change in my stomach, I could feel it and knotting. I could feel the tension.

Releasing out of my body. And my friends who saw me have seen, you know, saw me before and saw me after, they were like, what has happened? How can you be this different in such a short time? Well, I don't. I don't know. All I know is that this program really works, and it is amazing, and it is.

Life giving.

All right, so I'm not as jumpy as I used to be. I used to be worse than a cat in a room full of rocking chairs.

I would jump at sounds. People could say something and not mean anything by it. And I would get upset about it. And.

It wasn't them, it was me. And I took responsibility for it. But now it's not happening. People can walk up behind me, touch me on the shoulder, and I'm not flattening them. Out of pure instinctual fear.

I am sleeping better than I was. Okay, I'm not sleeping yet right through the night, but I'm still sleeping better. When I sleep, I'm not.

I don't wake up with.

The terror that I used to wake up with, and that didn't happen every night. But there were nights that I would wake up and my heart would be pounding out of my chest and I would be drenched in sweat and I wouldn't want to go back to sleep because I would just be too afraid to go back to sleep because.

You know, the monsters would get me or whatever it was that my brain was trying to cope with stuff.

What else have I noticed?

There's a lightness in my step. There's a joy in my heart that isn't forced anymore. There is an enthusiasm for the day that I can bounce out of bed and go, woohoo. You know, I'm not thinking, ugh, you know.

Life happens. And now I know that it, that it's okay. It's just life. And it's not good, it's not bad, it just is. And it's so much easier to.

The phrase comes to mind is roll with the punches. But, you know, I mean, stuff happens, you get a flat tire. So what?

You know, it's not the drama that it used to be. You know, the stress levels aren't there and it feels really good to be in my own skin. So much better than it used to be. And you know, actually I'm kind of a cool chick. I really enjoy my own company.

So I sat down to do my monthly bills as I do every month, and I've been tracking some time paying off debt and I had a plan and it's all on my calendar and I knew exactly what the plan was going to be and. And my financial situation changed somewhat and.

So I was looking through the bills thinking, well, you know, how am I going to pay this and what am I doing? And so I was going through all the bills and I realized that I'd overpaid some. So I was in credit, but quite a few. So I kind of shuffled things around a little bit and was able to step up some payments on other things that I hadn't realized that had fallen behind a little. I was still paying them, but I hadn't realized that I needed to be paying them a bit more. So that was three hours worth of shuffling around and I realized.

Hang on a second, this is weird. I'm not freaking out about this. I don't have a dry Mouth, my stomach isn't in knots. I don't have a headache, My back isn't sore.

I'm actually laughing and talking with these people on the phone as I'm explaining, you know, this is what my situation is. I need to reduce these payments. It's going to be a little bit longer and like, that's fine. We're absolutely okay with that. Thank you for letting us know. We appreciate you getting in contact with us. No worries. Sure. We can halve the payment. It's not a problem. And other places are like, well, that's really cool. Sweet. Yeah, we'll take extra money. And the insurance company was like, well, actually you're paid through till January next year, so you don't actually need to pay us anything. I'm like, excellent. And it was so cool because I wasn't stressed about a financial situation that I had been handling well. But it always used to really freak me out and I really used to hate doing it. And I used to have to, you know, it took a couple of days or, you know, even a week or so to think, you know, okay, we can do this, we can do this, we've got this, we can do this. And so I didn't have all the, you know, I got to do this, I got to do this. And that was a huge change for me and I was really stoked to find that happen. Yeah.

And the other really cool thing is that by the end of December, I am completely debt free apart from the mortgage.

So my youngest son.

Is recognizing that I'm starting to stand up for myself. And because I'm estranged from his dad, he's finding, he was finding it really difficult to be able to talk to me and figure out how we were supposed to have mother son relationship. And one day I hiked off up to town and spent some time with him. And I said, actually, you know what? Nobody gets to tell us how to work this relationship except you and me. We get to work it out for ourselves. So if you don't want to see me, that's okay. But nobody gets to tell you that you don't get to see me. That's something that we work out for ourselves. So text works both ways. You can text me if you want to. It's not just up to me. You can ring me if you want to. It's not just up to me. And there is an ease in our relationship now that there wasn't there before. And my 23 year old daughter, you know, she has expressed her disgust at the way that My relationship has ended with her father and said, you know, it really stinks. And I'm like, yeah, actually, it really does. Whereas before I would have defended myself and tried to explain everything and so on. But I just allowed her to sit with her emotions and her feelings and allowed her to be safe to express them with me. And that was a really cool feeling.

Being able to say, no, no, I don't think I can do that for you today.

Or, oh, my goodness, I'm so sorry. I forgot.

And just accepting that I'm human and that I am not expected to remember everything all the time, I do what I can to honor the things that I said. I set things up in my diary to remind me. I have time, you know, reminders on my phone to remind me of what I'm doing and where I'm going. But, you know, sometimes I forget to put things in and when people ring, you know, it's only happened once.

In the last.

Three, four months that someone rang me yesterday and said, are you coming? And I was thinking, am I coming where? Are you coming to see me? Oh.

Oh, my goodness. I'm so sorry I didn't put it in my diary. I will be there in 10 minutes.

It wasn't a time sensitive thing and I felt awful about it, but I didn't let it derail my day. Whereas it would have derailed my day, I would have continued to hurt myself. I would have allowed the inner critic and the inner mean girl to still be nasty and to be abusive and to be hurtful and unkind. And those are the things that I'm noticing.

When somebody has a problem, I don't rush to fix it for them. I'm not taking responsibility for other people's problems, and that's really cool for me. But it's also really cool for them because they're allowed to take ownership of their problems. And so now I'm not the bad guy when it goes wrong for them.

I'm owning my problems and I'm allowing other people to own theirs.

Oh, my goodness. If you know that there is a better way of being.

If you have anything that you struggle with, don't you dare let that inner mean girl or that inner critic talk you out of doing this. You know, you're absolutely worth it. I don't care whether you.

Missed out on something that you really wanted. If you feel that that's a traumatic experience for you, then you get hold of this program and you release that memory that's holding you stuck from reaching out for the things that you really want. Or if you're someone who has suffered.

The kind of stuff that nobody should ever have to experience. This will be a great tool in your toolbox. It will help disarm the trauma. It will help disarm the memories and allow your brain the respect it deserves to heal. You're absolutely worth it. Believe in yourself. I believe in you. You're worth it.