I was a 22-year-old single mom with a four month old baby boy, living in a tiny room at my brother’s home when I decided to do something drastic. I had virtually no money to my name, was honorably discharged from the army before that, then worked in Baghdad as a civil contractor six months after the war started there, then found myself in a tough situation financially and back in Wisconsin. What I did ended up surprising everyone.
I sold all of our belongings when my son was only 4 months old – to move to Thailand. With the little money that I had, after selling the one thing I needed most to succeed online – my computer – I had enough cash to buy two one-way tickets to Thailand. I had an interest in making money online but wasn’t very knowledgeable in it when I decided to take this leap of faith. I lived there years earlier for 6 months as a Rotary Youth Exchange student, and thought I could afford to live there and take care of my son while starting a business online. Looking back it sounds unrealistic – but it worked out beautifully.
When we arrived, with our two suitcases in hand, we moved into a small studio apartment in northern Thailand. I faced opposition with my landlord about getting the Internet setup, so I ended up using the apartment building’s switchboard line (one of the four they had for hundreds of residents) to use an internet card and dial up. It was very difficult, but by the fourth month of doing endless learning from those who I saw as “online gurus,” I made more money than I had in the entire previous year when I had a high paying job in Iraq. I did that in one month. That is where my online marketing story began, and as a result, I wrote a book called Honest Riches. I became a published author with the online book selling over 30,000+ copies and a paperback that was published in 2009.
My life has drastically changed as a result of all the events that ensued over the years – and I feel blessed to have embarked on so many adventures with my son. We traveled the world as a result of the hard work and making money online. We went to Disneyland in Paris, met the world’s tallest man in Ukraine, went to Bahrain, Cabo San Lucas and many more places. I do not want to sound as though I am bragging, but I truly feel grateful for the way things turned out – as the first part of my life was very different. I think to really follow your dreams and your heart at times, it can be very scary but can create the greatest experiences of your lifetime. I still work online, help others and continue writing – my next book is about my time in Iraq.
Posts Tagged Iraq
Fortunate Scars
Mar 11
I don’t remember much. What I do remember is that my day started off pretty much like every other day had. It broke 100 degrees before nine a.m., I was sick of being told to cut my hair by my asshole Sergeant and my breakfast sucked. Three weeks. Not bad, despite the fact we were all trigger happy as hell. Nobody wants to be remembered as the unlucky bastard that “almost” made it home. I was already a hometown hero of sorts back in Indiana, earning the Purple Heart for my gunshot wound nearly six months prior and gracing the front page of my local newspaper. I couldn’t wait. A couple more missions, nothing major, and back to the States. I swore to myself I was going to kiss the ground the second my boots touched home turf. I wouldn’t have to worry anymore. I could let my guard down; I could burn away the death letters I had cried while writing to my family saying my final goodbyes in case I gave my life for my country. We had boarded a large troop-carrying truck, 15 of us in all, and headed thru that unforgiving country to relieve another platoon in the field protecting the roads. I checked my weapon, looked at my comrade sitting next to me, and tried to shield the sun from my eyes as my friends and I rode in the bed of our belching truck as it crossed the barren countryside. Then I woke up.
I didn’t know how long I had been out. I knew something bad had happened to me. God, I was in pain. I heard the voices of my parents telling me what had happened. A car bomb had driven up alongside my truck and detonated, killing 10 of my 15 friends sitting next to me. I was in a hospital in Bethesda, Maryland and it was a miracle I was alive. I had sustained massive head trauma, been severely burned over a large portion of my body, my spleen had been liquefied, my left kidney was destroyed by shrapnel, my left arm was nearly amputated and suffered severe nerve damage, my eardrums were blown out, my spine was fractured, my corneas were rippled from the concussion and I had metal shards embedded deep in my body. That’s a lot to take in. So set in motion the most trying time of my life, exponentially harder than any training or combat operation I had been involved in: the healing process. Military medicine is horrible. I have called on the help of my congressman numerous times, frustrated and irate at the negligence at what our government calls “medicine.” I have been forgotten about in solitary rooms with no one checking in on me, battled with drug addiction, forced to wait for months for surgeries dearly needed; the list goes on and on. The only thing I could confide in when I was alone and had no one was music.
Combat PTSD
Mar 3
This story was submitted by Sue Hannibal of Fayetteville, NC.
In September of 2006, the coordinator of our upcoming 35th high school reunion at Kenmore East HS in Tonawanda NY (outside Buffalo) screwed up the reunion website email so that for about 3 days, all of us who had registered were getting slammed with all the emails of our classmates instead of the emails going to the site.
I happened to see an email written to the group by a classmate that I never met, (checked him out in the yearbook) and his military signature line indicated he was an Army officer stationed at Ft. Bragg. At the time, I was living in Vista, CA, north of San Diego.
I was and still am in private practice as an intuitive healer specializing in the treatment of childhood abuse/trauma and combat PTSD. I sent him a quick note to say that I didn’t remember ever meeting him in HS, but that if he had any PTSD or trauma from his service in Iraq, I would be happy to treat him for free over the phone. I referred him to my web site, and immediately regretted it because I figured that a conservative military officer would take one look at a medical intuitive clairvoyant healer and probably think I was a witch or something.
To my surprise, he did call the next day and we started chatting. Almost immediately, he said the word “ambush” and got triggered. His voice got louder, he was breathing hard and I could sense his distress. I said, “you’re in it.. do you want a sample of this healing stuff I do? All you have to do is repeat what I say and tap with your fingertips on the release points where I tell you.” He said, “OK, let’s do it.”
Knowing only that he was ambushed, I led him through a healing procedure to release the terror, anger, anxiety, etc. inherent in that experience. It took about 5 minutes of acupressure tapping, ie ” Iraq–the ambush–they tried to kill me– they tried to kill all of us–I thought I was going to die that day– but I didn’t die– they didn’t get me that day– all of a sudden they were everywhere– they hit us, etc. ”
After 5 minutes of tapping, (see YouTube from 2004, title Erase Combat PTSD with EFT) we stopped and after a moment he said, ” do you mean to tell me that I’ve been going to the VA twice a week for 2 years for nothing? It’s gone. What did you do to me?” His anxiety and explosive anger over that ambush and the death of a good friend was released and has not returned.
He came out to San Diego to meet me over Christmas/New Years 2007. We fell in love and were married in August 2007. So far, we’re living happily ever after. He is going to deploy to Afghanistan in January 2010 and I am continuing to treat combat vets for PTSD.
Written by Kanani Fong. Read her blog at The Kitchen Dispatch.
“He must have discipline and high morale and understand the core values that make our Army great and the Infantry the “Queen of the Battle.” He must have heart and he must not quit. He is not inherently superior, he is not born with these things, he must be taught. The education of a man is more than a piece of paper; we teach lessons in life as well as lessons in combat. We demand that Infantrymen be led to a higher standard.” – US Army
“Everyone has been made for some particular work, and the desire for that work has been put in every heart.” – Rumi, 13th Century Sufi Poet and Mystic
My life has been greatly enhanced by a daily practice of yoga. And so, the recent addition of my life as a writer to that as an active duty military wife has been Help for Veterans With PTSD made a lot easier because of it. An early-morning web search of others in the military with like minds led to Army veteran Eric Walrabenstein, who has developed a program that mixes yoga and psychology for veterans. After a few emails, I had the former Amy Infantry Officer on the phone.
When I asked Walrabenstein if he saw any disparity between his life in the military and that of a yogi, his answer was an emphatic no. “I loved the military because it was service to something bigger than myself. It was selfless. Service to humanity through yoga is the same,” he says.
From 1985 to 1989, Eric Walrabenstein served as an Infantry Officer at Fort Lewis, and later in the 2nd Battalion Reserves as the Basic Training Commander at the Presidio in San Fransisco. It was during this time that he had a chance meeting with a woman who told him about zen. Ever curious, Walrabenstein followed the leads, which led him to several years of study at the San Fransisco Zen Center, which then led him on the Yogic path. It was as if his life’s work had found him. “It was fate,” he says.
Walrabenstein’s path took him to Phoenix, where he founded a thriving studio named Yoga Pura. There, he and his staff guide others to more balanced lives through yoga. In addition, he also trains people not only in the usual poses (often mistaken solely as exercise), but in the philosophy that is the core of yoga, through a teacher-training program.
As with most veterans though, there was that nagging question of how to connect his old life to his new one. “I wondered, how can I help? How can I take these teachings beyond these four walls and help someone with significant and immediate problems?”
What he found, after meeting with other veterans, is that other than the DOD and the VA, the resources for them are scant. Many live in areas where they don’t have access to these services, and many more are reluctant to step forward to get help because of the stigma of mental health issues. “One veteran who contacted me said that the he’d been taught to fight and kill for three years. But when he left, all he had was a three hour out-processing,” says Walrabenstein. So, the question he posed to himself was: how best to reach people on a broad scale?
His answer was the creation of Thrive (note: the name will be changing), which employs modern psychology, yoga, and relaxation techniques. “Thrive is a seven-week program in a box,” he says. “It’s designed to be done at home with a CD, a DVD and a book. Participants are asked to evaluate their lives, find any unhealthful tendencies or thoughts that make their stress worse. Each week the participant will read a different lesson. It’s a self administered program that takes up about an hour a day.”
For warriors who might be skeptical and associate the practice of yoga with tinkly music and skinny girls in tights, Walrabenstein differentiates between the popular perception and the reality. “Yoga as the phenomenon sometimes creates spiritualized egos. Unfortunately, in some instances, yoga has become people trading one point of view for another. However, yoga is about transcending point-of-views altogether.” Walrabenstein puts veterans at ease by making sure they know that yoga isn’t only about stretching and bending. Yoga in its totality is to help take people beyond the stress, tension and conflict they experience in their day-to-day lives. “It’s a science of the mind,” he says.
The pilot program, which will start September 21 in Phoenix, is open to 50 people, and so far they have a combination of Vietnam veterans and those from the more recent wars. “There’s still room,” he says. Participants will be asked to rate their stress levels by filling out a questionnaire every week. They’ll be led through various exercises to help them train the mind in various relaxation techniques. “It’s not only what happened to us, but it’s how we process the experience and how we relate or respond,” he says.
Once the trial is over and adjustments have been made, Walrabenstein has a larger goal in fulfilling his vision to give back. He has a vision, and with the precision one might expect of a former Army officer, he has a plan. “My goal is to put half a million of these out into the hands of those who need them by deploying the kits directly to their home, free of charge. The cost will be covered by a combination of private and corporate donations. In other words, you don’t have to ask for help. It’s going to come for you,” says Walrabenstein.
Just like fate. There’s no doubt that Thrive will reach those veterans ready for the yogic path who don’t even realize it. But once they do, there’s no doubt that one day, like Walrabenstein, they’ll work to help others as well.
