My first PDOC told me this at my first appointment: You have several disorders and they are for you, and no one else, to manage. Don't expect those out there to stop what they are doing so your stress level is reduced. Think of it like a hearing impairment: you are to listen up, make eye contact, get a hearing aid, manage your own disability rather than expect the world to speak up. No one cares about you like you do.

She went on to say she doesn't wade through past trauma; go to a counselor for that if you want one-on-one attention. PDOCs job is to manage the chemistry of my medications. So, she advised, stop doing whatever you have been doing to create stress in yourself, like watching scary movies, or bungee jumping, or commiserating with those in your family who contribute to your trauma, etc. You job, says she, is to bring down your adrenaline levels not rev up the levels because that is what you are habitually used to. She went on to say, I'll work with you on the chemistry, but you have to work with me, too, so don't expect a pill to solve all your woes.

Then she told me to look into mindfulness-based stress reduction because there is obvious evidence I do not know how to calm myself without expecting others to do so. They won't be able to calm you because it is not their job to make your world calmer--it's your job.

That took about 50 minutes, and then she got up and walked me to the door, and said "get busy, you have a lot of new stuff to learn." And charged me $350.

I thought, What a toad! Where was the empathy? And yet I can look back and say that she gave me the best counsel of all. She knew before I did that there was a calm voice within me yet to be discovered, but she couldn't do the work for me. I had to follow directions in a new way (not my strong suit) and in the course of it, I would be able, like everyone else, to park the hyper (analytical) side of my brain while activating the calm chemistry just by doing something as simple as concentrating on my breath. She knew that my being able to manage my breath would reset brain chemistry. The calm me was the manageable me.

PDOC was right. Eight years later I am off meds, without anxiety or depression, sleep well at night, happy and contented and at ease. I NEVER thought I would be off medication so had resigned myself to it with much gratitude. I am as surprised as anyone that I am now off medication.

That original PDOC transferred out, a new PDOC came in who specializes in meditation as well as medication and together we decided I no longer needed the meds.

Go figure. I will forever be grate to the first PDOC who heard my calm-voice-me wanting to get out from under and within the tangled ball of strings of a tattered life and told me the way to get there though I felt offended at her directness. She, in essence, saved me from myself and gave me the way, which was the reason for my being there, only it didn't end up looking like what I thought it would.

The common thread is being grateful for the light of hope, which is not from one's own making for it is something that has to be received--and has nothing to do with fixing the past.