NEW_327-Recovering from the Trauma of a Natural Disaster

In the podcast episode titled "Recovering from the Trauma of a Natural Disaster," hosts Terry and Dr. Anita Sanz welcome Tara Pyfrom, who shares her harrowing experience during Hurricane Dorian in 2019, which devastated her family’s home in the Bahamas.

Tara recounts the terrifying moments when she and her family (she, her wife, their 6-year-old daughter and 5 dogs) sought refuge in their attic as rising floodwaters threatened their lives.

Tara has faced significant challenges in dealing with PTSD and depression in the aftermath. She emphasizes the importance of finding ways to process trauma, including writing and therapy, which played a critical role in her recovery.

While still grappling with the impacts of her experience, Tara shares that she has found happiness again, illustrating that healing from trauma is a gradual journey that requires patience and continuous steps forward.

The episode encourages listeners to acknowledge their struggles, seek help, and embrace creative outlets as tools for healing.to follow.

A link to Tara's website with information about her book: https://tarapyfrom.com/about-me

Transcript

327-Recovering from the Trauma of a Natural Disaster

Terry [00:00:04] Hello and welcome to the Giving Voice to Depression podcast brought to you by Recovery.com. Each week we profile a guest who shares intimate details of their mental health journey. They share because they understand that when people don't talk about their depression or other mental health conditions, those of us who struggle with them can feel like we're the only ones, that there's something wrong with us, instead of understanding that we have a common and treatable illness. I'm Terry, the creator and co-host of this podcast. 

Anita [00:00:32] And I'm Dr. Anita Sanz, a licensed clinical psychologist with more than 25 years in clinical practice. I know from both personal and professional experience how significantly mental health and other disorders can impact not just our lives, but those around us as well. By speaking openly and with the wisdom of lived experience, we help normalize conversations that are often avoided due to shame or stigma. Our episodes are honest and real, and we keep them hopeful because there truly is hope. Despite what depression tells you. 

Terry [00:01:07] This podcast is brought to you by Recovery.com, whose mission is to help each person find the best path to recovery through a comprehensive, helpful network of treatment providers for both mental health and addiction treatment worldwide. 

Anita [00:01:26] (Hello,Anita).  Hi, Terry. If you look up the risk factors for depression on a site like Mayo Clinic's, for example, you'll find a list that includes certain personality traits such as low self-esteem and being too dependent, blood relatives with a history of depression, bipolar disorder, alcoholism or suicide, Serious or chronic illness, and traumatic or stressful events. 

Terry [00:01:51] And when our guest share about those events, their traumas, their stories are often told quietly, sometimes hesitantl.  Because Big-T Traumas are really hard to talk about. They're messy, often intensely personal. And there can be fear of how they're going to be received when exposed. 

Anita [00:02:10] But this is different. This week's guest tells her story with such vivid detail that it sounds like she's describing harrowing scenes from a movie that would make your heart pump fast while watching it. And maybe that's because it centers around a natural disaster so there's less stigma, shame or risk of retribution in sharing the details. But the impact is similar and long term and requires hard work to get past. Please take this as a heads up that if you have lived through a natural disaster trauma, this episode could be a trigger for you. It may also be helpful though, to know that you're not the only one who is surviving something like this. So please listen as Tara Pyfrom gives her voice to depression. 

Terry [00:03:04] Tara's family is no stranger to hurricanes. 

Tara [00:03:07] My wife and I were born and raised in the Bahamas. Lived our entire lives there. Our families go back 8 or 9 generations. Island people are used to weathering storms. But we've never experienced a storm where we felt that we were in danger, where there was fear for our lives. We've only ever had minor damage from even some of the worst storms that have hit the Bahamas. So when Hurricane Dorian in 2019 kind of became a blip on the radar; okay, time to get ready again. We know where to put the patio furniture. We know to go fill out the gas tank. We know to get the food, like we know all the things. It's just a checklist at this point. 

Terry [00:03:52] Even as Hurricane Dorian grew to a level-5 status, the highest it gets, her family took comfort in the fact they were in a newer house with an elevated foundation. They felt ready. 

Tara [00:04:05] And then Hurricane Dorian hit. And within a matter of hours, there was no "ready."  We had a 185 mile per hour winds plus gusts. So we're talking over 200 mile per hour winds. So our living space, we estimated to be about ten feet above sea level, above the high tide mark. By 4:00 in the morning, the water was inside our house. It started out as an inch and then it was two inches and then it was ankle and then it was knee. And then we were sloshing through the house thinking we were going to save photo albums. You know, we're going to put them up on the high shelves. We'll be fine. But the water didn't stop. And it kept rising. 

Terry [00:04:49] Tara, her wife, their six year old daughter and five dogs climbed on to their kitchen counters to stay dry. 

Tara [00:04:56] Eventually, the water became high enough that the countertops were not dry anymore. There was no dry. And of course, a six year old, she's she's terrified. We're trying to pretend like, it's okay. Yeah, it sucks to be wet. No big deal. Meanwhile, my wife and I are both, you know, completely freaking out and trying to have whispered conversations with our six year old five feet away about should we should we try to swim to our neighbor's house? Like our neighbors are, you know, a few hundred yards away. Should we try to swim? They have a second story. Maybe that's safer. Should we go outside? Should we climb on the roof? Should we tie ourselves to the top of our car? All of these very ridiculous ideas of what are we going to do if the water doesn't stop rising? And it didn't. 

Terry [00:05:50] Tara says fear and clouded judgment took over as all the worst case scenarios now seemed quite possible, if not likely. They decided to leave their house. 

Tara [00:06:01] We actually swam out of a window onto our back porch, which was covered but open and kind of huddled with floating patio furniture and a cot mattress as a raft, with extension cords tied around our waists to keep us all together. We were outside for a grand total of 30 minutes-- the longest 30 minutes of my entire life. After the second time that my head went under and I inhaled water, we kind of made the decision that inside was better than outside. 

Terry [00:06:41] Inside and as high up as they could possibly get. 

Tara [00:06:44] Our attic space is not does not have any exterior access. There's no dormer windows. There's no way out. Once you're there, there's no other way out but the way you went in. So we had a small attic access that had a ladder, and we went up into the attic, got the dogs into the attic. When we took the last dog into the attic, I had to dive under a doorframe to get the dog with me into the attic, to the stairs that was in like a closet area. 

Terry [00:07:17] And there they sat in total darkness and fear, just waiting. 

Tara [00:07:22] Waiting for the water to get that high. Waiting for the water to trap us there. Waiting for the water to drown us in our attic. Waiting for the roof to rip off at any minute. Feeling the the beams and the wooden bracing and the roof moving with the wind. Terrified that there was going to be a tornado and would be even more wind. And then it would just pull us all into the abyss and we would all die. Thankfully, none of those what-ifs waiting for to die for 24 hours happened. 

Terry [00:07:54] Tara says the ocean peaked at the nine foot ceiling of their home, a structure that was already elevated another ten feet for flood protection. By morning, they were able to gauge by the only available measure that the ocean was starting to recede. 

Tara [00:08:10] We were counting the ladder steps. Right, so oh wait, that ladder step we couldn't see that before. That means the water's going down. Now we can see two ladder steps. Now we can see three. And that was the moment where it was like. Okay, we survived. We're alive.  It's starting to get safer now. The storm is leaving. We had to wait another six hours for water to go down enough to get out of the attic. 

Terry [00:08:36] Almost none of their possessions could be saved. But they were. Within minutes of coming down from the attic, and long before official rescue efforts began, they were picked up by a friend with a boat who knew they needed help. 

Tara [00:08:49] We made it to a shelter point, and then from there we made it to acquaintances that were able to put us up until the storm was passed. And about 48 hours later, we were able to evacuate the island by plane. And I can't tell that story, and I haven't been able to tell that story in the five years since the storm without extreme anxiety, without my heart beating in my chest. When I am finished with you this afternoon, I will have a migraine. Every time I tell this story, every time I do a podcast it's guaranteed. 

Terry [00:09:23] I'm sorry. 

Tara [00:09:25] And. But I still do it. (Yeah.) Voluntarily. 

Terry [00:09:30] So you go through a trauma like that and obviously this is a depression podcast. So how did that affect your mental health? 

Tara [00:09:38] So PTSD almost right away. We evacuated the Bahamas, we went to Florida. We had a place to stay there, so we were temporarily stable. But the United States immigration is not terribly helpful for folks that are not U.S. citizens. So for our time in the United States was limited. We were not prepared to go back to the war zone that was the Bahamas at the time. So with three weeks of planning, we threw our hands up and said, Right, we're going to move to an end, another country that we've never lived in before. All while PTSD, not sleeping well, excessive overwhelm, not really prioritizing mental health. We prioritized our daughter's mental health over ours. Like we got her into therapy right away. And we were like, we'll get to us eventually once we're stable, once we have a place to live, once we do all of these checklist things. But by the time we prioritized our mental health, depression and hopelessness and I'm never going to feel any better than I am right now had set in. 

Terry [00:10:58] And how long was that the case for you? 

Tara [00:11:01] It was a few years of. We we both my wife and I spent time in therapy together and separately. I found talk therapy very helpful. But it was a very slow process. So I'm processing the PTSD. So there was a lot of this is this is what life's going to look like now. I'm just going to spend the rest of my life with the pain and the trauma of Dorian being carried around with me like a, you know, genetic disease. This is just my life now. The belief that I would always feel angry, that I would always be sad, that my wife would always be sad, that this was just this was just going to be life now. And it was like that for a few years. a good three, three and a half years. 

Terry [00:11:51] It's worth noting here that no matter how uniquely ours, our story and the challenges, traumas and diagnoses we face are, they can all lead to that same hopeless this-is-just-my-life-now  belief. For Tara, two very specific things helped her shift from that stuck place. 

Tara [00:12:10] One was that my therapist, as soon as she found out that I was an amateur writer/poet, okay, we're going to use that to help you process. You're going to write it all down. And every time you write it down, you're going to read it to me. And you're going to read it to me again and you're going to read it to me again. And it's going to be desensitization and processing emotions. And that was super helpful. And I got very, very focused into wanting to put it down on paper so that I could explain to my therapist exactly what had happened minute by minute. 

Terry [00:12:48] The other big catalyst for healing actually emerged from conflict and deep self-reflection. 

Tara [00:12:55] And so at one point, I just sat down on my okay, I'm not happy. I have everything  I'm supposed to have to be happy. What do I need? I don't know what I need. When was the last time you were happy? What did that look like? Where did what did that feel like? What What was what was bringing that happiness then that you don't have now?  And that kind of started the conversation in my head about, okay, well that's that's something I can, I can get that, I can, I can do that. And then maybe that's maybe that's the key. Maybe that's the next goal. 

Terry [00:13:27] Tara and her wife realized they needed to build a new home to replace the one they'd lost. A space that was uniquely theirs and uniquely them. 

Tara [00:13:37] And so the process of focusing on that and focusing on the happiness that that was going to bring us was really, for me, what kind of pulled me out of that hopelessness. Like this is this is a goal. This is a step-by-step process. And seeing what we had created together was was the happiness -that kick- that I needed. 

Terry [00:14:02] Tara says while their trauma has hardly evaporated, finding and using tools-- both literal and metaphorical in their case  --has made a huge difference. 

Tara [00:14:13] When we're in the middle of trauma and process and and depression time stops, because everything just feels hopeless and tomorrow is not going to be any better. And the day after that is not going to be any better because the last three days and the last three weeks weren't any better. And so looking forward, you know, doesn't feel like I'm getting anywhere. I feel like I'm stuck standstill. But then when you look back at the amount of time that you process and where you were three weeks ago and where you were three months ago. Well, yeah, I am. I am a little bit better. And so time is a funny thing and time has been a funny thing for me over the last five years. But really it's it's really been about we take the time to do the things that will help you get better and maybe focusing on the future, but also really looking at where you've come from the past. 

Terry [00:15:11] When we're in it, we think we'll never get out. So how did you keep like, if I do this, if I if I keep taking this step, steps forward, if I continue with therapy, if I write, if I build, I will get somewhere better. Where did you pull that from when I know that depression saying throw your hands up, it's over, you're stuck, you know. 

Tara [00:15:32] But for me, what I could control was what am I going to do today? What am I going to do tomorrow? These are the steps. And just this belief that there there has to be something better.  This can't be it. There has to be something. There has to be something better. And if I just keep doing today and tomorrow and the next day, I'm going to get there. I don't know when I'm going to get there. There were lots of lots of times where I thought that that next step that I was moving towards was going to be The Step that's going to be the one that's going to make me feel better. That's going to be the one that's going to make me feel stable and less hopeless and more excited about life. And so I kind of tricked myself into believing that every step was the next step. And then I'd get there and it it wasn't The Step. Okay, well, what am I going to do now? Okay. The next step is going to be The Step.  And so it was just just keep moving forward. 

Terry [00:16:32] Do you consider yourself happy now? 

Tara [00:16:35] I do. I do. But I can't say that there aren't days when the darkness kind of tries to creep in again. If I, you know, try and sit too deeply in some of the emotions that are still there, it's it's not good for me. And I know it isn't. And I try to avoid sitting too deeply with it too much. But yes, I can five years later, I'm. I'm back to happy. I'm different than I was before the storm. But happy. 

Anita [00:17:17] Terry, This was such an intense episode listening to Tara. I have a lot of respect for survivors of national disasters. I've worked with many Hurricane Andrew survivors here in Florida, clients who still have a resurgence of their PTSD symptoms and depression when hurricanes look like they're bearing down on the state. And I myself in 2004 as sort of a new resident to Florida, I went through four hurricanes in one year. Really not anything that was anywhere close to the devastation that Tara talked about. But it was my first time and I had a four year old daughter, and I was very, very afraid. And to this day, if I go through one of those automatic car washes, when those big blowers at the end, the those huge airplane engine fans that blow off and dry your car, those still will make my heart race because that sound of howling wind is something that I experienced for 12, 18 hours on end. And it being my first time and not realizing, you know, what could or would happen, it is extremely frightening. What what Tara and her family went through would absolutely have caused the level of symptoms that she talked about with the PTSD. 

Terry [00:18:37] And Tara tells her story in spite of the fact that she says it gives her a migraine to do so because a) she wants some good to come from her family's trauma. And b), she really wants people to understand that even from terrifying events, you can one can it is possible to find the strength to find ways out. And she is an example of that out involving and including true happiness. 

Anita [00:19:07] And it was it was also something that reminded me of the episode we did a little while back where there was that poetry quote that you have to move the pain that's inside of you, out of your body. Yes. And she embodied that when she was working with her therapist in terms of her writing and poetry. But art and dance and movement and singing and creating. And what Terra also did, building moving the pain out of your body so that it doesn't just live there is so powerful, is so therapeutic.  And so many of the so many of the recommendations for how to successfully treat PTSD now do involve movement. The emphasis on moving your body in safe ways, moving that trauma outside of yourself in safe ways. 

Terry [00:19:58] She moved it out in words, and she described her journal pages that she was writing for therapy as shaky. But she has actually converted that information and the details of it into a book, which when we spoke, she had just sent off to her publisher. So she's trying to get her message and story out to an even wider audience. 

Anita [00:20:17] That's really going to be very helpful, I think. You know, Tara lived with really, really troubling and in some ways kind of disabling symptoms for years before she was able to successfully find those routes to moving that that pain and that trauma outside of herself. And it's just important, I think, for people to know that you don't get over something like this quickly. You don't get over depression really quickly. You don't get over PTSD quickly. And you're not failing and you're not doing anything wrong. It could be years that you're living with those feelings, those thoughts, those symptoms. It doesn't mean you're not getting better. It doesn't mean that they're things are aren't going to be different some day.  And you're not doing anything wrong that it's taking so much time. 

Terry [00:21:02] Yeah, I really liked how she said just kept taking the next step. She just kept doing the next thing, even when it was like, that. That wasn't "the step" Capital T capital S, But looking back, it was like, I am in a little different place than I was. And and any forward motion is forward motion, right? 

Anita [00:21:18] Even when you sometimes can't register that it is forward motion until more time has passed. 

Terry [00:21:25] Yeah. So thank you. Thank you, Anita. And thank you very much, Tara. I hope that when people hear your story, that they understand that wow, people survive all kinds of really terrifying things. 

Anita [00:21:46] We truly hope that our podcast brings a little more understanding, helps you better articulate and reflect on your own experience with depression, or better understand how to support someone else who is struggling. 

Terry [00:22:00] If this episode has been of comfort or value to you know that there are hundreds of others like it in our archive, which you can easily find at our website. Giving voice to depression.com. And remember if you are struggling, speak up. Even if it's hard if someone else is struggling, take the time to listen.