I, too, am not a veteran of war. I am a 38 year old woman who was raped over and over again when she was five. He was sixteen and it happened for 180 days...a full school year. I repressed all of those memories until I was twenty-two. Everything that you wrote about in the article is true. I still deal with the images, the smells, the sounds, the textures of what happened to me as a child. I am also suffering from Bipolar I Disorder. In my manic episodes I become hyper-vigilant and the flashbacks and nightmares come flooding back. Sometimes it feels so real that I lose my breath and my heart feels like it is going to pound out of my chest. I can't sleep; I can't think. Fear rules me; my concious and unconcious mind.The artilce made me realize that what I feel and have experienced is real and that I am not alone. For that, I thank you.