Solving the Post Traumatic Stress Brain Injury Puzzle

"I was blindsided. That's probably the best way to describe how it felt, as a perfect storm of forces was brewing, never before experienced by any of us, and descended it's wrath that day...and changed everything." - Linda Green, September 12, 2015. Linda Green was the Incident Commander on the devastating Valley Fire, which destroyed almost 2000 structures as it burned across 76,000 acres in the CAL FIRE Sonoma-Lake-Napa Unit, and the heartbreak of lives lost. But in the months that followed this life-altering traumatic event she refers to as "her fire", she knew something was very wrong, even though life seemed to be marching on as always...until it wasn't. The nuances were there immediately but were masterfully disguised by her well-worn habits of performance and responsibility. She didn't yet realize her free fall had begun into her own personal "hellfire". Linda was diagnosed with a Post-Traumatic Stress Injury just months before her retirement in 2016. Like millions of First Responders who are called to serve on the front lines, she dedicated a 32-year career to the safety of others. She was now called to accept her most important mission yet; as a First Responder to herself. Her own Post-Traumatic Brain Injury diagnosis would become an intricate and confusing puzzle to solve, and she would need to find the courage to be curious and create a roadmap to recovery. She now shares this roadmap to teach others so they too can find the courage to be curious about solving their Post Traumatic Brain Injury puzzle too. Throughout her own research and first person recovery and healing, she now believes that Post-Traumatic Growth is a theory in dire need of awareness and attention as well as Emergency Response Exhaustion Syndrome. While Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder - PTSD - has been an accepted diagnosis since 1980, she is one of a growing number of leading experts in this field, who believe in it's reclassification from Disorder to Injury. Linda is now a Certified High Performance Coach who uses her strategic principles and wisdom to guide other First Responders pre and post diagnosis through the discovery and recovery process. Her journey continues to teach her that the only way to get back up is to grab hold of a hand that will reach out to you as you fall. It is her genuine hope that her book acts as that hand reaching out to anyone who needs it. Author Linda Green served 32 years with the California Department of Forestry & Fire Prevention. She holds a B.A. in Business Management from the University of Phoenix and an A.S. in Fire Science from Fresno City College. With her broadened spectrum of service as a writer, author and Certified High Performance Coach, she uses her strategic principles and wisdom to guide other First Responders through the discovery process with unique puzzle-solving strategies pre and post diagnosis to create their own recovery roadmap. Linda and her husband Curtis recently celebrated their 31st wedding anniversary and live in a quiet town in northern California with two dogs.