Lesson objective:

Healing, recovery, and growth are possible and made easier with specific strategies; each of us must find what works best for us, individually. We learn here about some of those strategies and the best ways to tailor them to ourselves.

Recovery, coping, and building resilience are certainly not easy tasks. 

Furthermore, the pain we and those we love may have experienced is not fair, and it is not fair that we also carry the burden of dealing with unwanted reactions, emotions, and feelings. 

So, is recovery possible?

Healing, recovery, and growth are possible and made easier with specific strategies, and each of us has to find what works best for us, individually.

Specific bottom-up and top-down strategies may help, but there are some other small practical things to consider that can help with the recovery process, including: 

• Establishing a clear and predictable routine (such as organized time for working hours, food, and visits)
• Setting clear goals 
• Living among supportive and loving community 

As each and everyone one of us moves forward after experiencing trauma, we must be gentle with ourselves.  

Coping, resilience, and recovery take time. 

And no, things may not return to how they were before. But, some things may be even better than before. Dealing with unwanted pain requires unwanted effort. The burdens we carry are rarely ours to choose.

So, as you move forward, be gentle.

You are not your thoughts. Some thoughts are just thoughts, scrambling frantically to protect you from pain, while at the same time causing pain. 

You are not your reactions. Like thoughts, some reactions are just misguided attempts to protect you from hurt. Get to know your unwanted reactions, and then begin to work on them. 

You are not your pain. 

You are able to create much good in the world. 

And importantly, you are not alone in your struggle.

You yourself, and those around you, are your hope for a tomorrow than can indeed be far brighter than any of the darkness of yesterday and today. 

There is a tomorrow, even if distant, in which your brain and body can be your intimate friend, and not your adversary. There is a tomorrow in which, you find comfort, where you know that you can do the most with what you have been given in this life.