Complex PTSD: From Surviving to Thriving

by Pete Walker

Grieving And Verbal Ventilation Grieving restores our crucial, developmentally arrested capacity to verbally ventilate. Verbal ventilation is the penultimate grieving practice. It is speaking from your feelings in a way that releases and resolves your emotional distress. I believe the following description of a six panel cartoon visually conveys the powerful transformative power of verbal ventilation. In the first panel of the wordless cartoon, a woman with a dark cloud over her head is talking to a friend who has a shining sun over hers. In panel two, as the first woman gestures in a way that indicates complaining, the cloud covers her friend’s sun. In panel three, the cloud emits a bolt of lightning, as she angrily purges, and her friend glowers along with her. In panel four, the cloud rains on them as they embrace, commiserating in the rain of their shared tears. In panel 5, relief spreads over their faces as the cloud moves away from the sun. In panel 6 the sun shines over both of them, as they smile and slip into pleasant conversation.