Transcript
One of my big triggers is driving.
I don't have very many triggers
with my Posttraumatic Stress except for when I'm in the car.
And it was about three months ago, I was driving.
So in Seattle, we have these stop lights when you're ready
to get on to the freeway during rush hour they try
to regulate the flow on there.
And so I was sitting at the stop light.
It was my turn to go and this lady just cut me off.
And I blew up and I postured my car to cut her off
and she wouldn't yield to that control.
And I got angry and I rolled my window down and just as I was
about to start yelling things out I realized, "Timm,
this is exactly what you don't need to be doing right now.
You need to deescalate the situation.
You need to take a breath.
There's something more important going on here
than just this lady trying to cut you off."
And so, in that kind of moment, I realized that it was okay
that I didn't have control over the situation.
I was able to understand that I was being triggered.
This isn't Iraq.
This isn't Afghanistan.
This is Seattle.
And so once I did that, once I started taking a couple
of breaths, I was able to deescalate that
and pretty quickly actually.