PTSD, A Lesser Known Kind - Surviving Religious Dogma (Paperback)

'PTSD, A Lesser Known Kind: Surviving Religious Dogma, ' 2013 (formerly titled 'PTSD of a Lesser Known Kind: An Allegory, ' 2011), re-titled its new name in the spring of 2013, is a very unusual and complex hybrid of fiction and nonfiction. Coming from a violent, loveless upbringing, Alan, aka Tokee, took to interstate hitchhiking and train-hopping at an early age. Every city, every town, every village he came upon, deep within his soul there was this tantalizing expectation that maybe this is the place or maybe that is the place where he can finally fit, where he can finally feel the security of true parental love. Oh did he long for that frustratingly elusive love. Ironically, it was that hunger for love which made the young traveler so vulnerable. As the unloved inner child incessantly groaned in screaming silence for love and found it not, Alan, as he was called for most his life, reverted to the thing he had always turned to as a child when violated by his parents, by his uncle and thereafter by sadistic attendants in an institution for boys, namely FANTASY. Truly, fantasy had become Alan's sole refuge, his unfailing source of comfort, his safe haven from the strange cruelness he had known. The insecure 19-year-old hobo then surrendered to the greatest fantasy of all, Christianity. It was a fantasy readymade with a father, virgin mother, supernatural son---the whole fam'. At last Now he had found his place Now Alan had found what he yearned for all his life, family acceptance, and infinitely more, loving parental figures from another world who loved him unconditionally. Yet there is no such thing as 'unconditional love' in the elaborate illusion that is Christianity. Quite the contrary, it is based upon very specific, very conditional demands which absolutely must be met if one is to continue finding family acceptance with "God." When Alan began to recognize that conditional love is not love at all---i. e. "do this or else "---he became overwhelmed with hurt and rebellion. And the more the lies of Christianity became exposed, the angrier he got. This went on till an implosive, irreconcilable end came. The tumultuousness of that severing also resulted in Alan's suffering a form of PTSD, A Lesser Known Kind. This is the fictional lead of this tale. The nonfictional side, roughly half of this book, is the animated polemic against Christianity by the author. And that, rest assured, speaks in no uncertain terms for itself.