War and the Soul: Healing Our Nation's Veterans from Post-Tramatic Stress Disorder - Paperback

by Edward Tick Phd (Author)

War and PTSD are on the public's mind as news stories regularly describe insurgency attacks in Iraq and paint grim portraits of the lives of returning soldiers afflicted with PTSD. These vets have recurrent nightmares and problems with intimacy, can't sustain jobs or relationships, and won't leave home, imagining the enemy is everywhere. Dr. Edward Tick has spent decades developing healing techniques so effective that clinicians, clergy, spiritual leaders, and veterans' organizations all over the country are studying them. This book, presented here in an audio version, shows that healing depends on our understanding of PTSD not as a mere stress disorder, but as a disorder of identity itself. In the terror of war, the very soul can flee, sometimes for life. Tick's methods draw on compelling case studies and ancient warrior traditions worldwide to restore the soul so that the veteran can truly come home to community, family, and self.

Author Biography

Edward Tick, Ph.D., is an expert on post-traumatic stress disorder. A practicing psychotherapist for more than 30 years, he is a nationally recognized authority on the psychological, spiritual, historical, and cultural aspects of war in the healing of PTSD. Dr. Tick specializes in transformational work with war veterans, survivors of severe trauma, and all those in need of deep psycho-spiritual healing. Dr. Tick has extensively studied both classical Greek and Native American healing traditions and successfully integrates those methods into his modern clinical practice. A writer, educator, and overseas journey guide, Dr. Tick holds an M.A. in psychology from Goddard College and a Ph.D. in Communication from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute. He is a clinical member and has held various officer positions with the American Academy of Psychotherapists and the American Holistic Medical Association, as well as many other professional organizations. He is also an ordained interfaith minister. Dr. Tick began treating Vietnam veterans in psychotherapy in 1979 before PTSD was a diagnostic category. Since that time, he has treated veterans and survivors of WWII, the Holocaust, Korea, the Vietnam War, the Gulf War, Central American conflicts, Lebanon, the Balkan wars, the Irish civil and religious wars, the Greek Civil War, the Middle East conflicts, and the Iraq War, among others. He has also served as a consultant to numerous community, church, and organizations on the treatment of veterans and the training of staff for such work. Dr. Tick's extraordinary work takes him on healing journeys, spiritual tours, lectures, educational classes, and workshops around the globe. He is cofounder of the Sanctuary International Friendship Foundation, a nonprofit agency that directs and raises funds for projects to help heal war-torn Viet Nam. He resides in Albany, New York, where he and his wife Kate Dahlstedt are directors of Sanctuary: A Center for Mentoring the Soul and Soldier's Heart(R), a non-profit program designed to create veterans' safe-return programs in communities across the country. Dr. Tick's last two books are entitled The Golden Tortoise: Viet Nam Journeys and The Practice of Dream Healing: Bringing Ancient Greek Mysteries into Modern Medicine (Quest 2001). His first book, Sacred Mountain: Encounters with the Vietnam Beast, was published in 1989.