The Greatest Gift we can give to 1.4 billion PTSD sufferers; is 12 step recovery; starting with the ACOA program.

How we treat and have been treating Past Trauma Memories, hasn’t been and still isn’t working, when we see how the numbers of sufferers keep growing rather than reducing. 1.4 billion sufferers is a crying shame and it’s time all of these victims of a broken health system, be empowered to self healing through the 12 step model of recovery.

Chief amongst these 12 step programs is the fellowship of ACOA. Here we learn about The Adult Child. Fundamentally we learn we didn't suffer these past events, rather we are carrying memories of events that happened to Past Aspects of Ourselves, The Inner Child that lives and intrudes upon our lives : this Adult Child.

Whether our Inner Child is an aspect of ourselves from our childhoods, or it is in fact from an older aspect of ourselves, doesn’t matter. The truth is, this event caused us to Lose a Part of Our Innocence and it is this Loss of Innocence that cannot be recovered, healed or fixed by man-made solutions, therapy, medication or hospitalization, neither can it be achieved through righteous anger, rage, resentments, justice or vengeance.

We need an empowering Spiritual Solution, where we address and treat the true victim of these memories.

This means using the 12 steps to give back ownership of this baggage that 1.4 billion sufferers are enduring that isn't theirs to begin with.

We learn that we can become our own personalized therapists by becoming our own Loving Parents.

We become part of our own therapy groups by attending fellowship meetings of like minded fellow travelers who are also treating themselves.

We don’t travel this path alone, not only do we work in groups together but we also look for and find an individual fellow traveler that is willing and open to walking this path of recovery side by side, with us .

We learn about the challenges we face as long as we continue to attempt to carry baggage that doesn’t belong to us. Until we find a way to give this back to the rightful owners, we will continue to suffer from what is commonly referred to in ACOA as:

The Laundry List

We became isolated and afraid of people & authority figures.

We became approval seekers & lost our identity in the process.

We either become Alcoholics, marry them or both, or find another compulsive personality such as a workaholic to fulfil our sick abandonment need.

We live life from the viewpoint of victim & we are attracted by that weakness in our love and friendship relationships.

We have an overdeveloped sense of responsibility and it appears easier for us to be concerned with others rather than ourselves, this enables us to not to look too closely at our own faults.

We get guilt feelings when we stand up for ourselves, instead of giving in to others.

We become addicted to excitement.

We confuse love with pity and tend to ‘love’ people we can ‘pity’ and ‘rescue’.

We have stuffed our feelings from our traumatic childhoods [past] and have lost the ability to feel or express our feelings because they hurt too much[denial].

We judge ourselves harshly and have a very low sense of self esteem.

We are dependent personalities who are terrified of abandonment and will do anything to hold onto a relationship in order not to experience painful abandonment feelings which we received from living with sick people who were never there emotionally for us.

Alcoholism is a family disease, and we become ‘para-alcoholics’ and took on the characteristics of the disease even though we did not pick up the drink.

Para-alcoholics are reactors rather than actors.

There is Another Laundry List that shares a further 14 traits or behaviors we are compelled to use and abuse, in our attempt to manage to live our own lives, whilst carrying and enduring this baggage we carry that isn't ours to carry.

But this is a Spiritual Solution program & here we learn many empowering attitudes and practices to enable us to recover from a seemingly hopeless state of mind and body.

Becoming your own loving parent is a process.[the loving parent guidebook ACA publication, page.1].

You may struggle at times & face resistance, but the process is ultimately liberating. Consistent Reparenting will help you:

Discover who you truly are and live more often from your true self

Learn to give yourself the safety, trust, care, guidance & unconditional love you needed as a child to know you are enough just the way you are

Learn how to recognize, allow, and feel all your feelings & honor your needs.

Free yourself of codependent behaviors and rely less on The Laundry Lists.

Recognize and reframe distorted thinking.

Relate in a radically different way to the things you cannot control, such as *the Critical Parent.[page.11]

Learn to effectively set boundaries & develop other skills suited to your adult needs and interactions.

Foster healthy relationships in the outer world.

Experience more joy, fun & creativity.

With regard to the Critical Parent, each and everyone of us are aware of that voice in our heads which seems to think we are never good enough in different circumstances. This is old learned behavior. I had to take the action of doing all of this work if I truly wanted to heal. With this in mind, my intention is to point you in the right direction and you too will feel empowered in a desire to also take back control of your own mental, emotional & physical well-being, through embracing a Spiritual Solution that will work for you.

The great thing about all 12 step programs, is that fundamentally we are all on the same page but as individuals, we can pick and choose which path we should best follow.

This for me was my primary path, which in turn led me to other paths of recovery.

It is my fervent hope; this post will encourage all 1.4 billion of you, to a path of self healing; that is available to all of us; once we put our minds, hearts and souls into it.

To Know The Past Does Not & Should Never Define Us, is The Path to Freedom in The Present.