Burned by Chaos - Finding Resilience through Disfigurement

Burned by Chaos - Interview with Lise DeGuire Calming the Chaos welcomes Lise DeGuire, who is a clinical psychologist in private practice. She is the lone surviving child of gifted, unsettled, and iconoclastic parents. After being severely burned in a fire when she was a small child , Lise spent most of her childhood in the hospital, undergoing countless surgical procedures. She is the award winning author of her memoir, Flashback Girl: Lessons on Resilience from a Burn Survivor. In this interview, Lise tells us about her story, and helps us learn how we can develop resilience through the chaos of life. Lise introduces herself and states her goal, which is to help people have “resilient and beautiful lives” after trauma 3:37: Lise describes her story, beginning October of 1967 – A family Barbeque gone wrong, resulting in Lise having 65% of her 5-year-old body covered by 3rd degree burns. “I was hideous.” A long and incredibly painful journey of recovery from burn care followed through Lise’s childhood 5:21: There were many sources of chaos that came from the fire, and her family 6:01: Lise describes her parents as “Iconoclastic” and presents the definition here. She also describes the love she has for her brother. “He was my best parent.” Chaos happened from all sorts of different perspectives that day, and beyond 8:30: Lise has been through a lot of chaos…and…she has survived! Her book was written to deliver that message to everyone in the world who has been through horrendous trauma such as she has: • Neglectful Parents • Bullied • Years of medical trauma, being alone and scared • Multiple untimely deaths in her family due to suicide 9:18: “And yet here I am, many decades later. And I have the kind of life that most people would be like, ‘I’d like her life!’” 9:56: Lise describes some steps people can take to move through tragic times with limited resources • Having the hope that you can recover, it can get better and things can turn out okay • Pain is inevitable….suffering is optional • Fin