When Pain Smiles

Living with Intermittent Explosive Disorder (IED) is crippling, embarrassing and misunderstood. Its rage is extreme, unpredictable and unsafe. Learning and adopting navigation skills are essential.

I am an adult child of an alcoholic

who has suffered through abuse.

I had a traumatic brain injury

and been ignored and abandoned and reduced.

--excerpt from ME

Intermittent Explosive Disorder is a mental disorder often caused by a traumatic brain injury (TBI), which alters the brain's capability to provide insight, judgment and impulse control.

The brain's overreaction to the simplest of situations is explosive and dangerous and entirely out of proportion to the circumstance at hand. The brain misfires, rage is triggered, and an episode ensues where madness unleashes in a second.

Despair. Hopelessness.

Infinite distress.

Wrath. Rage.

Wretched abyss.

- excerpt from DAMNED

This collection of poems outlines in explicit detail a lived experience of facing and navigating the episodic rages of IED. A personal journey of ultimate acceptance of what can't be changed, emotional growth with healing, and spiritual discovery through recovery are presented to offer hope and guidance.

All wrapped up with a wrinkled bow.

A threshold of fear to surpass.

Armed with bravery, hope and prayer.

IED's not me. It's a part of who I am.

- excerpt from ALL WRAPPED UP