Spoleto's Unofficial Ambassador Franky FRANCESCA

I fought all night to save the 13 Columbine victims from
the 2 perpetrators, they all lived but when I woke up,
this is what I looked like...

When night terrors arrive a C-PTSD sufferer will relive the violence with force while sleeping. We fight with our bodies and hands swinging and scratching to fighting off the perpetrators

In the very last night terror of this 18 month period, I in the dream managed to save the life of my girlfriend's killed daughter but this last time I had to give my life up to have her escape.

This story is dedicated to Anglea Fite

Late in October 2007 I visited my then stock brokerage firm to wrap up loose ends before running to Italy to take cover.

I felt the need to talk with the office manager about what had been happening with body memory flashbacks and telling their stories of arriving on violent new deaths,my office manager opened up and shared her daughter's finally 24 hours of life. Her daughter was Angela Fite.

I arrived in Italy October 31, 2007 and little did I know what was going to be the next six months of my life. The finally dream was of Angela. In my dream she lived. I forced her out the door and I turned and gave my life in order to slow him down from getting her. I told her to run, run go, let him have me.

As I lodged my body between the door stopping him, I turned and the axe was coming down on me. I woke up swinging my arms and screaming and was confused. This was April 1, 2008 but it took 2 months later when back in Colorado and driving up to the office, that this dream re-appeared in my eyes. I sat paralyzed in my car remembering who I had saved this night in my dreams.

It took till October 2008 before I could write her mother, my friend and tell her. Before then i was too afraid to do so. So this is just 1 example of the information arriving October 2007 and it haunted me continuously for 1 year till I saved her.

Angela's dream was the worst and the last of this 18 month nightmares. Finally my mind felt light and clean enough to be freed of any responsibility for these events I had nothing to do with.

----- Original Message ------

Received: Mon, 17 Mar 2008 12:31:27 PM MDT

From: JoyceB3955@aol.com

To: francescaod@usa.net

Subject: Re: a columbine survivor...I have a few questions

Dear Francesca:

This is Joyce from Gift From Within. I sent your email to Dr. Ochberg and he responded using our Q&A format. What I mean by that statement is that at times we receive very thoughtful questions that other people have asked even though the event and wording are different. Frank believes the issues you raise are well stated and would be useful to other people who visit our website. see

http://www.giftfromwithin.org/html/qna.html

After reading his answers perhaps you will allow me to publish this on our Q&A page and we can take out together references which will give you anonymity, and us protection i.e. like not referring to Unum a specific insurance company in a public format. Let me know which references you think we should hide. Warm regards, Joyce

Dear Joyce,

Ms. O. writes a compelling email, describing several profound traumatic events, including direct exposure to an infamous high school massacre (while caring for many elementary school children) and, approximately six years later, open heart surgery, and insurance company problems. Ms. O does not give details of other life traumas, but says there were many, that the pain is still powerful and debilitating, and that relocation to a beautiful part of Italy and the presence of an excellent therapist is helpful, but not enough. Dissociation (an altered state of consciousness that serves as a defense against overwhelming anxiety) once seemed to lessen the pain of searing memory. Meditation helps to a limited extent. There are good days. But bad days are so bad that, on those days, life seems not worth living. Ms. O does not ask for remedy, but rather for an honest prognosis. "What can I expect long term?," she asks of us.

First, thank you Ms. O for writing and for the obvious inspiration and care you have given others. You are an artist and you have guided young people. Artists often distill human experience, seeing and feeling the essence of reality, suffering when others suffer. Having an eye for beauty may not balance the experience of traumatic and tragic loss. Finding grace and meaning in nature may not erase the memory of senseless harm to an innocent adolescent. But your artistic ability is worth emphasizing. Several of my patients with complex PTSD are artists or writers or reporters. They do see into the heart of things. That talent is a blessing and a curse. Try to remember the fact that it is a gift; try to use that gift; try to identify with others who used such gifts to enlighten the rest of us. CBT - cognitive behavioral therapy- works in a simple way. When the bad days and the bad feelings are too much with us, we learn to think about the talent we have and to respect it. We may not be able to use it during a period of fear, grief or depression. But we need to know it is there and it will be there to be used when the crisis passes.

This is different from trying to be numb or from longing for respite from memory. This is saying to oneself, "I am an artist. I am more sensitive. Sensitivity is painful, but useful. Others have this condition and I respect them for it."

The fact that your insurance company (and other bureaucracies) are oblivious to your condition and appear to care more about their bottom line than your legal right to just compensation is familiar to me -and to others with complex PTSD. Jonathan Shay, in his profound book, "Achilles in Vietnam," notes that since ancient times, the traumatically injured have suffered more from injustice that from horrifying wounds. Whether the source of betrayal is King Agamemnon's greed or an insensitive insurance adjustor, we are profoundly affected by the loss of honor, justice and humanity. My team, writing the diagnosis PTSD, had no language to capture this philosophical symptom -a loss of a sense of meaning. But anyone who works with complex PTSD knows to look for that ancient wound, to give voice to it, and in so doing, to guide a person toward recovery of dignity and worth.

Your relocation from America to Italy speaks to this wound. It is not unusual to seek a different home when home has harbored trauma and injustice.

And now to the question at hand. Can this complex injury in a sensitive person be tolerated? Can the long term prognosis include substantial recovery?

I believe it can. I have seen it happen in cases that included the murder of ones children and the destruction of ones platoon due to incompetence of leadership. It never happens easily. Some denial of reality is often part of the path to tolerance. Shakespeare's line in Lear was not unreal: "As flies to wanton boys are we to the gods; they kill us for their sport." But reality is as beautiful as it is ugly and meaningless. The capacity to experience that beauty comes through deliberate acts of seeing and knowing. You cannot avoid seeing the tragic, whether it is the past, present or future. But you can learn to see the sources of hope and love. That does come back and it does prevail, despite cruelty and incompetence and indifference, which are the sources of complex PTSD.

Recovery is never absolute. We do not reach a life that is free of sadness. But the sharp pain of traumatic memory does reduce in amplitude and surprise. You may need to work with a specialist who uses the counting method or EMDR or some form of re-exposure, if that has not yet been part of your therapy. You may need to work with someone who uses CBT as I suggest above, tailoring this CBT to your unique set of skills and losses. A good therapist is always wise and supportive, but a specialist may be needed to help deal with debilitating aspects of complex PTSD. With time and distance, new sources of fulfillment and meaning should emerge. One can't escape the past without a present and future that holds promise.

There is every reason to believe that you will find those sources of fulfillment, and can say to yourself:

"I may never forget, but I need not constantly remember." Shakespeare didn't write that line. I did. And I based it on many, many life stories.

My very best to you, Ms. O.

Dear Joyce,

Subject:	a columbine survivor...I have a few questions
Date:	02:28 PM MDT, 03/16/08
From:	"Francesca Owens" <francescaod@usa.net>
To:	<JoyceB3955@aol.com>

I googled Columbine PTSD to see if I could find any one else suffering from PTSD. I found your and Dr. Frank Ochberg's Q & A. My name is Francesca Owens and former Littleton, Colorado resident. Currently I am living in Umbria Italy because I can't handle the USA any more.

April 19th, 1999 three parents, 2 elementary school teachers and 60 6th graders went on a field trip. We walked from Leawood Elementary school through Columbine High School grounds to the Columbine Public Library. We were the first responders after the event. The high school students fled the school running to the closest open building, us.

The librarians, three parents and two teachers were the beginning of the command post. The police showed up with military, firefighters and then media. We supported the police the whole day until they allowed us parents to leave at about 6:00 p.m. One of the mothers and I with our kids walked on the school grounds that day after the event not being current on the news as we only saw from within our windows what was going on. It wasn't till we got home that we saw the full story on the news ands that there were bombs in the field we walked across after the event.

I am suffering from severe complex ptsd and can barely handle it any more. I have a wonderful therapist here. I am currently out on disability with a private policy from Unum insurance company. They do not believe me and contact with them is just an extension of abuse for me, though maybe I am not in reality.

I have a life long list of trauma and was a high profile functioning person in society till I had open heart surgery a 1 1/2 ago at 44 yoa. New trauma in ICU came back 9 months later in horrible flashbacks.

I know therapy is a must. I have done some PTSD. I do some meditation. I am an artist, and ex stock broker now. I search the Internet endlessly looking for that magic pill for fix this all.

When the pain starts, I want out. Good days are good and some can be great. Though bad days are horrible and horrible days are on the edge of not wanting to live. If this is my furture, flashbacks and ghostly memories of all I have seem or experienced, I can not say I am going to make it long term.

Logically I want to understand why the pain is sooooo bad and will it ever go away?

I was disassociate for most of my life but the trauma in ICU brought the fear and feeling together for the first time in my life. Ever since them I can not stuff the pain. I lived with PTSD most of my life but know I can't seem to shake it. I want some one to be real honest with me. If my severity is at an 7 to 8 out of 10, with 10 being the worst, what can I expect long term?

Thanks, Francesca

Modigliani: Man and Myth

by Jeanne Modigliani

Translated from the Italian

The Orion Press / New York

This book has been on my coveted book list for years, but the price has been the deterring factor. It has been out of reprint for too long and in the used market it can cost up to $300. Finally last week after buying a 1 year online membership to "questia", I was able to done load it and read it.

I have been ever fascinated by the love story between these two and the driving forces to allow their sole surviving child be orphaned. The facts are recovered her by their child as she learns of her parents' true identify and their tragic ending.

I feel most her for little Jeanne, the orphaned daughter that neither parent could think about to care enough about nor the maternal French grandparents. If it was not for the grace of this child's Italian family their entires stories and little Jeanne's life could be riddled with more mis-truths and pains.

What I hope to find and what I found was quite different in this book. The orphaned daughter did not write from her pain, her loss, her perspective but in the larger scheme she wrote from the factual perspective to speak for her parents legacy... again she placed herself last among the three to preserve their story... for this... I admire little Jeanne the most and want to honor her!

Spoleto's Unofficial Ambassador Franky FRANCESCA

Sunday, May 15, 2011

my first tiger painting & there after

nano second escape OCT 07: Resignation 9 years of Colorado Public Service

dr.OCHBERG'S response to a columbine survivor's (me) questions march 2008

my 9 cat lives - a plate of perfection

franky's picks: "modigliani - man and myth" his life story told by his orphaned daughter

franky's picks: maybe I'm crazy but maybe you are too!