Sunday Blog 237 – 14 June 2026
I’d been at an art workshop in London, in the very early days, in 1990. When I was trying on new identities the other side of the world from my birth family. At the end of the course, a few of us decided to exchange phone numbers to stay in touch in that after-glow of positive group juju. I approached one woman who I’d had enjoyable exchanges with, and offered up the piece of paper for her to write her number on. She backed off, her eyes alight with the glint of the cornered animal.
“I don’t give out my number.”
“Of course,” I said with as breezy an air as I could manage, covering up my momentary embarrassment and puzzlement.
The bonhomie of this group died the natural death once the course had finished. We never stayed in touch but her reaction planted a seed of inquiry in me.
As the luck of my life would have it, another twelve years would pass before I’d understand her reaction.
In the early days and weeks after surviving a home invasion, this old memory resurfaced and I understood at once. She had endured some kind of trauma that had robbed her of the luxury of trust.
At the time, May 2002, I was flailing about in a soup of disordered responses. A glitch in the system meant I hadn’t had any follow up counselling after making my police statement and attending the sexual assault centre to undergo a full forensic examination. I’d made an appointment with my favourite female GP who’d known me over years. I poured out my story, and her eyes widened before she righted herself.
You’ll have post-traumatic stress,” she said.
I caught her words like a ball snatched from the air. I had something to work at with my logical mind. A raft to ride the torrents. Her clue was a gift that put the power back into my hands and I began researching and reading on the topic.
I read and read, learned that PTS can continue to affect our behaviour and well-being for months, years or even a lifetime. The acronym PTS soon rolled off my tongue, because its mastery promised to tie down and tame its complex challenges. By whatever name, PTS seemed a compulsory fairground ride I was locked into. I pictured myself clicking the safety bar in place—my privilege of a nurtured childhood, my loving family and resilience, and my reflection and research skills—and prepared to endure.
I had PTS for now—but I was pernickety and precise, and if anyone ever suggested I had PTSD, I corrected them. My reading had shown PTS can morph into Post-traumatic stress disorder, PTSD. A key part of this transformation as I understood it were triggers, or reminders of a traumatic event.
Even something safe, like the Mother’s Day coffee catch-up when I went to the toilet with Zoë on my hip, misfired a warning for me. But then I’d spontaneously experienced my body and mind talking to each other that day, coding the cafe as a safe place.
This gave me hope. Perhaps my mind in partnership with my body would be able to re-code all the danger signals, one by one? But what if I hadn’t been able to re-code that experience? Would I have barred myself from the sweet delights of a cafe visit with friends ever after? Maybe this early experience of taming my triggers would mean I’d take a side exit off the PTS fairground ride, and avoid the never-ending roller coaster of PTSD?