A little bit about me…

For some who live with PTSD, the deep unseen wounds do eventually heal. For others, the damage never completely disappears, despite the best efforts and intentions of loved ones, family, and both traditional and not-so-traditional interventions. After many inconceivably long hard years of bitter struggle, agonising trial and error, failure, and disappointment ... I finally came to comprehend that I needed to 'think outside the square' if I wanted to survive and make the most of my life. What does work, what might work, and what does not work? I found a way through the PTSD minefield by integrating alternative/complementary concepts and ideas into my recovery. It was only when I came to truly understand why I was the way I was ... why I acted and reacted the way I did ... not because there was something fundamentally wrong with me ... but because of what happened to me growing up and as a young adult ... that I was able to 'begin' working towards the self-acceptance and self-love that would ultimately set me free ...

I did not get the best start in life. My father was 'old school' when it came to discipline. He was a professional soldier with the rank of Regimental Sergeant Major (RSM). He was a hard, emotionally damaged man, who at age 16, had run away from a state-run orphanage to join the army at the start of World War II. He ran our household like it was a military barracks. He thought the best way to 'bring me up and make a man out of me' was to break me down through physical and emotional abuse. The physical abuse stopped sometime after my 16th Birthday... but the emotional abuse never stopped. I was also sexually groomed and abused by an older cousin between the ages of 9 and 12 years.

I left home to join the army before my 19th Birthday. On the outside, I was a big, athletic, strapping, and confident-looking young man. On the inside, I was a frightened, lost little boy with severe impulse control and emotional regulation issues. I did not know who I was, what I was, where I began, or where I ended. Somehow I managed to attain the rank of full corporal in the role of what in today's military language is known as either an AT (Ammunition & Explosives Technician) or EOD Tech (Explosives Ordnance Disposal Technician). After my military service, I worked for a few years as a private security contractor protecting 'National Key Points' for an international organisation. During this period some really bad stuff went down and my perception of life, the world, and my place in it became so fragmented and distorted that by my 25th birthday, enjoying a normal, happy and stable life was something inconceivable to me … it was something that 'other people' enjoyed and experienced. I was terrified of the world I found myself in and consumed with fear, self-doubt, and suppressed rage. I trusted no one, and sadly the most destructive part of my trust issues was that I did not trust myself. I did not believe in myself, hell I didn't even like myself, not one little bit! I decided the safest course of action would be to remove myself from mainstream society and escape into the African bush to pursue a career as a wildlife conservation ranger and professional field guide.

I spent many years living and working in some of the most beautiful, pristine, and remote wilderness in Southern Africa. I was privileged to experience a side of life that most will only ever see on the big screen, TV wildlife documentaries, and nature-related programmes. I revelled in the excitement and anticipation of working up close and personal with some of Africa's more famous animals, reptiles, and insects … and notwithstanding numerous hair-raising close calls, including a life-and-death struggle with cerebral malaria courtesy of the female anopheles mosquito, I feel incredibly blessed to have experienced such awe-inspiring encounters with such truly magnificent animals! I met some wonderful inspirational human beings along the way, from all levels of society and all corners of the globe. I also met some 'not so inspirational' people along the way … one of whom almost killed me … intentionally … and then held me at gunpoint while I was gravely injured. However, sadly, despite the apparent overall success I was experiencing in my 'African bush life', I could not find the inner peace, self-acceptance, or happiness I so desperately craved. I still felt like a worthless failure on the inside. I became very good at hiding what I perceived myself to be and wanted no one else to see … that I was, in fact, a fraud, an 'accomplished pretender' who did not deserve happiness, success, or love …

When I first arrived in New Zealand in 2003, I had somehow managed to stay sober for a few years and despite having been homeless for almost a year and a half in South Africa (living in my car, showering at the local gym), I thought I had figured things out and finally made peace with my past, my demons, and myself. I was sober which in itself is a miracle because alcohol dependence and abuse had been a nasty ugly lifelong issue for me… from the age of 13! I felt entirely ready to take on the world with the new, improved version of myself. But undiagnosed CPTSD and other stress-related issues, in ‘collaboration’ with new levels of dysfunctional alcohol and drug abuse, slowly but surely brought me to my knees and hell opened up with a renewed vigour for my soul.

During this 'hell on earth' experience, I watched my beloved mother slowly wither away and when she passed, helped to place her in a body bag. I became dependent on powerful opiate painkillers [by default] after struggling with a degenerative spinal condition that required two major surgeries between 2007 and 2009. This progressive condition required the removal of 4 cervical discs that were replaced with two titanium/ceramic artificial discs at the C3/4 and C4/5 levels; and fusion at the C5/6 and C6/7 levels. I was also extremely lucky to escape a devastating house fire 11 days after the February 2011 earthquake in Christchurch that took the lives of 185 people. I woke up coughing and spluttering in the dead of night as smoke swirled around my room. Raging flames had engulfed the front of the house and the wooden deck outside my bedroom. I grabbed my emergency backpack and laptop and dashed up the stairs to the next level of the house with angry flames chasing me up the stairs and out the back door in only a pair of boxer shorts. I lost everything that I owned. I had no insurance as I could not afford the premiums at the time. My life became so overwhelmingly hard and dark that ending it all became a very real and attractive option for me. I just could not see any other way out of my tormented existence. Thankfully, my attempts to leave this world failed! Somehow, someway I hung in there and with the support of close family, a few progressive 'outside the square' thinking health professionals, and one or two good friends, I am still around to tell this story.

In 2009 I started an applied Bachelor's Degree (Addiction Studies) and in 2010 began to work with people who presented with addiction and mental health issues. I continued working/volunteering in the addiction/mental health sector while I was studying and completed a Post-Graduate Diploma (Environments and Health). However, my thirst for knowledge and desire to help others who struggled with PTSD was so strong that I continued studying and was awarded a Master of Health Sciences (honours) specialising in Men's Health through the University of Canterbury in 2017. I have completed specialised training in Psychological First Aid/Crisis Intervention and Moving Forward: Overcoming Life's Challenges. Furthermore, I endeavour to keep up to date with the latest research/breakthroughs in PTSD and addiction treatment approaches and I undergo regular professional clinical supervision!

Over the years I have fought, lost, and won many ugly battles with my inner demons, alcohol, and drugs; dysfunctional relationship after relationship, job after job, failure after failure, painful experience after painful experience, seemingly drifting from one catastrophe to another, from one country to the next. Thoughts of suicide and black depression were constant companions as I did everything that I could do, repeatedly, to pick up the fragmented pieces of myself and put them back together again.  My journey of self-discovery and the impact treatment-resistant CPTSD and other stress-related issues have on people has taught me so much and given meaning and purpose to my life … to help and support others in the healing process who are feeling overwhelmed trying to find answers and solutions, and just a way to get through the day. When a person cannot see a way out of the miserable situation they find themselves in, they are consumed by the overwhelming anxieties of life's unrelenting demands and pressures. They lose hope ... and with no hope, the individual cannot envision a future and without a future, some give up believing there is a way out of their misery.

I am a fighter. I am a survivor. I have survived 100% of the worst that life and my PTSD could throw at me, including a good few 'kitchen sinks'. I still experience ugly, dark, and difficult days but not as many as when I began this journey where life and everything in it seemed too hard to face. I no longer fear these days or where my mind wants to go. I know it will pass; I am not afraid; I have made friends with this darkness. I have found self-acceptance and purpose. I have found coping strategies that work ... and because of this, I have found a way through my darkness …

Russell T. Blackney