“I can’t breathe” isn’t always about air.

Sometimes it’s about pressure.

Sometimes it’s about survival.

Sometimes it’s about trauma living in the body.

In this episode, I speak on what it feels like when PTSD shows up physically — tight chest, racing thoughts, shaking nerves, paranoia, and the constant feeling that something bad is about to happen. When your body reacts before your mind can explain it. When fear feels wired into your system.

“I Can’t Breathe” explores:

• PTSD stored in the nervous system

• Panic and paranoia as survival responses

• Environment keeping the mind trapped in alert mode

• Habits used to escape pressure that only tighten it

• Feeling stuck in cycles you’re trying to outrun

This episode is about moving through the same streets, the same corners, telling yourself you’re in control — while slowly breaking down inside. It’s about fear living in the body and trauma refusing to leave.

In the PTSD Facts Outro, we break down:

• Why PTSD can feel like suffocation

• How environment traps the nervous system in survival mode

• Why paranoia and distrust are learned protection, not weakness

If you’ve ever felt like the world and your thoughts were closing in on you — this episode is for you.

You’re not broken.

You’re responding to what you survived.

Original Section Podcast

Hosted by Kariem Ali

Where the streets meet the mind.

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In this episode, Kariem Ali walks through the quiet war that happens inside the mind — the kind nobody sees, the kind most people suffer with alone.

“Traveling With My Demons” is a raw reflection on how trauma follows you, how pain changes shape, and how survival can slowly turn into paranoia. This is not just a story about struggle — it’s about the moment you realize the thoughts you’ve been running from have been sitting beside you the whole time.

Kariem speaks on reckless living, self-medication, intrusive thoughts, and the “sunken place” many people with PTSD know too well. He breaks down how alertness becomes paranoia, how demons feel real even when they aren’t, and how numbing the pain can pull you deeper instead of setting you free.

This episode isn’t meant to scare — it’s meant to reveal.

To let someone out there know they’re not crazy, not alone, and not beyond healing.

In this episode you’ll hear about:

• Living with thoughts you didn’t ask for
• How trauma turns into paranoia
• The dangerous cycle of self-medication
• What PTSD really feels like from the inside
• Finding strength while still in the dark

3 Facts About PTSD & Paranoia Shared in This Episode:

1. PTSD creates internal “demons” — intrusive thoughts and memories that feel alive because the trauma never healed.
2. Alertness turns into paranoia — your brain stays in danger mode even when you’re safe.
3. Self-medication intensifies the spiral — numbing the pain often feeds the fear.

From the Episode:

“PTSD doesn’t ask permission.

It doesn’t knock.

It builds itself quietly

until one day you’re living in a mind

that doesn’t feel like yours anymore.”

If any part of this story feels familiar, this space is for you.

Original Section is where pain gets a voice,

where silence learns how to speak,

and where healing starts one truth at a time.

🎧 Available on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, and all platforms

🎙 Created & Written by Kariem Ali

WE IN THIS TOGETHER!

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There’s a place I don’t talk about often.

A place I call the bottom.

Not just a basement…

but a state of mind.

In Episode 6 of the Original Section Podcast, Kariem Ali takes listeners inside the emotional space where fear, trauma, and self-doubt collide — the place people end up when life feels too heavy, growth feels too dangerous, and the mind becomes louder than the world.

This episode explores what it feels like to be stuck between who you are and who you’re trying to become, when PTSD creates “freeze mode,” fear of failure becomes fear of growth, and even success feels undeserved.

Through raw reflection, quiet moments, and honest truth, this story speaks to anyone who has ever felt trapped at the bottom of their own mind.

🧠 In this episode:

• The psychology of feeling stuck

• How PTSD creates freeze mode

• Fear of growth & self-doubt

• The quiet battle between protection and progress

If you’ve ever been afraid to move…

If you’ve ever felt trapped in your own thoughts…

You are not alone.

🎧 New episodes of the Original Section Podcast explore trauma, healing, growth, and the unseen battles we carry.

WE IN THIS TOGETHER.

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In this episode, Self Hate, we explore the quiet war many of us fight when no one else is watching — the one that starts with the mirror.

This is a conversation about reflection, trauma, and the environments that shape how we see ourselves.

About how self-hate doesn’t come from nowhere… it grows from what we were taught, what we survived, and what we were forced to become.

From neighborhood pain to generational wounds, this episode connects personal struggle to community trauma — and breaks down how PTSD rewires the mind to turn pain inward.

We close with three powerful facts about PTSD & self-hatred, and a reminder that the fight for self-love is not something you walk alone.

If you’ve ever struggled with your reflection…

If you’ve ever felt like the world taught you to hate yourself before you could even speak…

This episode is for you.

We in this together.

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There was a time when I wasn’t really living — I was fading.

In this episode, I speak openly about addiction, trauma, and the quiet ways people disappear inside themselves. About using substances not to get high, but to stay numb. About how sobriety can feel more frightening than intoxication when your mind is filled with unresolved pain.

Faded explores self-medication, identity loss, and the truth behind addiction — not as a moral failure, but as a survival response to trauma. When healing feels out of reach, some people become their own doctors, diagnosing and medicating themselves just to make it through the day.

This episode also closes with three important facts about PTSD and addiction, breaking down how trauma fuels substance use, why identity loss is real, and why addiction is often the symptom — not the root.

If you’ve ever looked in the mirror and didn’t recognize yourself…

If you’ve ever stayed numb because feeling hurt too much…

If you’ve ever felt like you were slowly disappearing…

This episode is for you.

You’re not weak.

You’re not broken.

And you’re not alone.

WE IN THIS TOGETHER!

🎙️ The Original Section Podcast

Where stories of pain, survival, and healing finally get spoken.

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Episode 3 — The Pain That Turned Into Silence

There came a point where the pain stopped being spoken… and started being carried.

In this episode, I open up about the kind of trauma that doesn’t scream — the kind that hides in silence. The moments where words no longer feel safe, where smiling becomes a mask, and where surviving means holding everything inside.

This is a story about emotional suppression, grief, and the quiet ways PTSD shows up in everyday life. Not everyone breaks down loudly. Some people disappear inward — and the world never notices.

We also close this episode with three grounding facts about PTSD, exploring how silence becomes armor, how emotional detachment is a form of protection, and why so many people look “fine” while carrying storms inside.

If you’ve ever felt unheard…

If you’ve ever said “I’m fine” when everything wasn’t…

If you’ve ever survived by staying quiet…

This episode is for you.

You’re not weak for being silent.

You’re not broken for protecting yourself.

And most importantly —

you’re not alone.

WE IN THIS TOGETHER!

🎙️ The Original Section Podcast

Stories where pain finds language, and silence finally gets heard.

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'LIVE FROM THE SECTION'

Episode 2 explores what happens when pain is met with pressure instead of guidance.

This episode reflects on being told to “be strong,” “toughen up,” and “handle it,” without ever being shown how. Through spoken-word narration, Kariem Ali shares how masking emotions, suppressing tears, and forcing toughness led to self-medication, addiction, and vivid intrusive memories.

The story dives into using substances to numb pain, attempting to erase both good and bad memories, and realizing that trauma doesn’t disappear when avoided. Instead, those memories return — replaying until they are acknowledged.

This episode also highlights two key PTSD responses woven into the story: self-medication as survival, and the mind’s tendency to relive trauma through thoughts, dreams, and flashes.

This is not about failure.

This is about surviving the only way you knew how.

If this episode feels familiar, you’re not alone.

We in this together.

Written by Kariem Ali

Narrated by Kariem Ali

Edited by Kariem Ali

Produced by Kariem Ali

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"LIVE FROM THE SECTION "

Episode 1 introduces the foundation of this podcast — a story rooted in repeated loss, emotional numbness, and living with trauma at a young age.

Through spoken-word narration, this episode reflects on growing up losing loved ones back to back, avoiding funerals, suppressing emotion, and carrying last conversations that never stop echoing. What begins as imagination slowly reveals itself as memory — trauma replaying in real time.

The episode also breaks down five real PTSD responses woven into the story, including emotional numbness, avoidance, fear of emotion, escaping reality, and intrusive memories that replay both day and night.

This is not fiction.

This is not imagination.

This is trauma speaking — PTSD in real life.

Episode 1 sets the tone for the season and opens the door to deeper conversations ahead.

We in this together.

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