When I first spoke to the psychologist in the hospital after my accident I remember one thing she corrected me on and continued to correct me on until I said it right. I kept calling my self a burn victim and she would always stop me and say “survivor not victim”. I at first was not very keen on this wording. To me the fire had taken everything from me and had victimized me. The truth of the matter is I had survived an event that most die from and I was a survivor not a victim.

It took me a long time to come to grips with this fact. Even after I left the hospital and sat on the couch questioning my existence. It creeps into my mind still to this day and causes me so much personal angst. What did that fire do to me and why me. I know I am speaking about a fire but let’s be honest any sort of trauma can have this stigma to it. None of them should be taken lightly and no one’s story is worse than anyone else’s. Everyone has a different weight they can hold and expecting others to hold the weight of your trauma versus the weight of theirs is not even something that should cross your mind.

Honestly for some the physical trauma like mine would destroy them and the mental trauma of others would destroy me. For example, I couldn’t deal with cheating spouses. If my wife cheated on me that would be the end of it all for me. That trauma is to much for me, the whole fire and destroyed body is easier for me to deal with. Thus why I say do not judge your trauma in weighted measures to others trauma because maybe that trauma is all they can bear and your still thriving though your trauma is “worse” than theirs.

Now back off my sidequest, The day you set aside the victim title and start taking on the Survivor title is not the end but just the beginning of your journey. I stopped calling myself a victim and really stopped thinking about myself as a victim somewhere in the middle of my first season coaching. It was on that field that I realized I would never be who I used to be as a man and that I had survived the fire and need to show that fire that it would never win.

So many of us that live through trauma may originally “win” the beginning battle with our traumatic event (in my case the fire) and eventually lose the war. Who wins if I spend the rest of my life on my recliner in a half zombie state from all the pills to suppress the pain? OR even worse take my own life in response to the pain and trauma? Well the fire does! Its not even a question if I give in to the trauma I will forever be a Victim.

Instead I chose to Survive that fire and live on as a better person than the guy that fire killed off. This may look different for many but finding a way to not just live but win after your trauma is the hardest thing for any trauma survivor. Many fall into depression and let “the trauma define them. ”

Speaking of which that is a term I hate because no matter what the trauma is going to define you. I let it guide me daily in the fact that I wake up early and start my day off to be a better person than yesterday. Before the fire I woke up around 9am mad to be awake, just trying to make it to the first time I could smoke a bowl that day or have a drink. Now I have let the trauma define me as trying to be a better man than the one that was taken in the fire.

Back to the subject, it is important to not let trauma take you into a dark place because then you didn’t survive you are still a victim of your trauma.

Becoming a survivor does not mean forgetting your trauma or “getting over it” because then you didn’t survive it, you just deleted it. It means becoming a better version of the you that was taken away from the world that day or days. It means conquering your trauma and letting it define you in a better way.

The person I am today is somebody I am proud to tell others people about. The person I was July 19,2022 I wouldn’t have told anyone the truth of who I was. I am not saying I have conquered my trauma because unlike living through the event, Surviving the event is a daily race. Jesus said to take up your cross and follow Him daily and thats the equivalent of what I try to do is pickup my cross, which has my trauma on it too and follow Him to the best of my ability. Some days its only for a few minutes before I get tired and fall back down but I strive for the days that its all day long without losing focus or falling off the course.

Each of us has a race to run in life and some of us juat get blessed to carry a huge boulder of trauma with us but for some this just opens up easier ways to talk to people. Last night I was able to witness to a man that had also been burnt purely because we were talking burns and surviving the experience. Not many people would have the ability and learning to use it and survive with this boulder of trauma is my mission.

Learn to be a Survivor Not a Victim. Take it on yourself to win each day and not let that trauma win in the end. That fire may have been put out years ago but everytime I let the depression or the anxiety left by it win for even a second it sparks back to life and thats not something I ever can let happen because I refuse to be a victim I WILL SURVIVE!