This is another in a series of looks back at Harvey, as told through the photos of its victims.
Melissa Sturgis, self-described “oil-patch gypsy,” is still angry. “My entire home. Treasured antiques, three generations back from New England, are on this curb. Furniture and collectibles from eight years overseas in Malaysia, London and Russia. It’s a crime.”
Photo courtesy of Melissa Sturgis. Her entire home, three generations of family antiques, and treasures acquired from traveling the world for eight years…all went to the curb after Hurricane Harvey.What was left on the inside of Melissa Sturgis’ home after Harvey.Melissa Sturgis, who is 5’10”, shows how high the water got during Harvey.Family heirloom warped beyond usability. Catch of the day. Fish on the floor after Harvey.Cleaning out the closet after Harvey. Harvey’s wake-up call. “Someone bring a mop.”Morning after Harvey. Melissa Sturgis’ Slip ‘N Slide Dining Room.Shattered dreams left behind by Hurricane Harvey.
Silver Lining
Melissa Sturgis lives in Alaska now and says she is not moving back, though she keeps in touch with all of her Kingwood friends.
“Harvey was devastating, but it actually had a silver lining. It shook us out of complacency and made us more resilient…taught us that life is about more than things….it’s about perfect strangers coming together to help one another. People opening their home to the five of us for several days.”
“As a side note, my brother in law, sister in law, nephew and 2 cats from Sugarland were forced to evacuate. They drove hours in the torrential rain to get to my house in KW for safety–then lost their two cars in my driveway—AND THEY NEVER FLOODED IN SUGARLAND. And my sister in law had cancer at the time….and still does.”
“Yes it was tortuous, tossing out Great Grandma’s Dining Room table onto the pile….as Grandma (who also flooded and was evacuated from Arbor Terrace in Town Center) sat on the sidewalk watching her things and her mother’s antiques get tossed. Excruciating. But we survived. I’m just grateful I am no longer there. I was in Kingwood last week visiting my mother in law and Fosters Mill Estates STILL has houses abandoned or partially fixed and for sale. Some are still being worked on. It’s awful.”
Why I’m Posting These Now
Melissa donated her pictures to the cause in the hope that they will help create awareness of the devastation that flooding causes, and perhaps, just perhaps, they may create some positive change, too. Thanks, Melissa!
Hopefully, we won’t repeat the mistakes of the past…if people remember.
If you have pictures from Harvey that you would like to share with the world, please send them through the submissions page of this web site.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/13/2019
561 Days since Hurricane Harvey
https://i0.wp.com/reduceflooding.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/IMG_4346.jpg?fit=1500%2C1125&ssl=111251500adminadmin2019-03-13 20:58:472019-03-14 08:22:45Melissa Sturgis’ Harvey Story: Three Generations of Antiques Out on the Curb
Yesterday, I learned about re-traumatization of people suffering PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) from Harvey. I had contacted Janice Costa, one of Kingwood’s leading psychotherapists to gain some insight. Keep in mind as you read this that neither Costa, nor I, have any idea how widespread this phenomenon is. However, Stephen Costello, the City of Houston’s flood czar, while speaking to a symposium on flooding at the University of Houston last year stated that 18% of Harris county’s residents suffered some sort of serious psychological distress after Harvey.
From presentation by Stephen Costello to Houston Geological Society in 2018 during a symposium on Flooding in Southeast Texas: The Science Behind the Floods. Costello said 18% of Harris County residents were suffering from “serious psychological distress” after Harvey.
I pointed out to Costa how the traffic on my site spiked when I posted The Night 11,000 Lake Houston Area Residents Became Homeless. Thousands of people have viewed it in the last week and are still viewing it. In fact, it’s my most popular flood post ever with the exception of the one with that snappy headline, Public Notice.
Trash Day in the Barrington after Harvey. Photo by Joy Dominique.
What Did I Tap Into?
I had accidentally tapped into some powerful emotions, but I wasn’t sure what or why and hoped Costa could help. Costa said victims sometimes feel such images and stories “validate” what they went through. “Yes! See. It was that bad!”
In the case of Harvey, it’s difficult for some people to let go, because they are constantly getting “re-traumatized” from related sources, she says. The examples below represent my interpretation of what she said, not literally what she said. I added dozens of examples that people have shared with me along the lines she mentioned.
Re-Traumatization, Day after Day
As if Harvey weren’t a big enough disaster, how about these complications? Do any of them sound familiar?
Flooding, but not having flood insurance, because you thought you were safely outside the 500-year flood plain
Power outages, spoiled food, Igloo coolers and grilling in the rain
Food lines, second-hand shops and shelter life
Separation from families, not being able to find loved ones in the shelter system
Loss of important papers, tax documents, and family albums
Losing the Bible that had been in your family for five generations
Gutting your own house, often with the help of strangers
Not being able to monitor everything they dragged to the curb
Seeing your life’s work piled on the street and picked over by looters
Your first Christmas without wallboard
Family heirlooms destroyed
Showering with a garden hose
Being displaced and dispossessed
Being forced to accept charity instead of feeling privileged to give it
Finding temporary lodging with friends, family or in hotels
Moving every few weeks so you didn’t wear out your welcome
Finding a vehicle and then finding out it had concealed flood damage
Stress at work from not being able to focus on your job while you rebuilt your life
The bad performance review at work that you knew was coming
Losing a business
Kids who cried themselves to sleep every time it rained
Breaking out in a cold sweat when you hear a helicopter
Feeling guilty about not being able to thank all the people who helped you
The two extra hours a day you didn’t get to spend with your kids because they were being bussed cross town to another high school.
Report cards that showed plummeting grades because your kids were traumatized
Educational handicaps that your kids may face for the rest of their lives as a result of effectively losing a year
Living in a camper
Your insurance benefits running out before repairs were completed
Losing your job
Losing your mind
Losing your spouse from all the stress
Trying to find money to rebuild
Living out of your car
Not having a car to live out of
Battling with the insurance adjuster
Battling with FEMA
Looking for help and battling a million other people looking for help
Struggling to find a contractor
Struggling to get the contractor to show up and do the work
Giving up the family vacation to supervise a contractor who didn’t show up
The contractor who ran off with your check
Finding out that the contractor hung your new front door upside down
Shoddy repairs with inferior materials
The City inspector who said the contractor did it all wrong
Lung ailments from breathing that unique Houston brew of mold, varnish, plaster dust and Clorox
Seeing friends and relatives succumb to the stress
Friends moving away to escape the stress
Going to the laundromat and using the machine next to the guy who was washing the clothes he had on
Living upstairs for a year and a half
Using your garage as a walk-in closet
Actually beginning to think of Taco Bell as haute cuisine
Learning to cook with a hot plate and a microwave
The stress zit that looked like a third eye in your forehead
Your favorite stores and restaurants being out of business for a year … or disappearing altogether
Going to college classes in a rented warehouse
Commuting two extra hours a day because the 59 bridge was out
Draining your retirement funds to rebuild
Then finding that wasn’t enough and tapping into your kids’ college funds
Not knowing how you’ll replenish them
Gaining 20 pounds from Chunky-Monkey stress relief
Jaw and neck pain from constantly grinding your teeth
FEMA and HUD help that arrived after you’d already rebuilt your home
Discovering that you lost all your repair receipts
Aches and pains from doing-it-all-yourself
Learning to love scratch-and-dent sales
Refurnishing your house from “Flooding Kingwood with Kindness”
Losing someone to cancer or heart-disease while trying to cope with everything else
The neighbor that abandoned the house next door…affecting your home’s value
Fearing what the next storm front could bring
My apologies to anyone I omitted!
More Re-traumatization!
Now consider the political systems around you. While we struggled individually, government offered help. Then came other kinds of re-traumatization.
The money from the drainage fee that wasn’t there when the City needed it to jumpstart flood mitigation projects
Being told you could build a firewall around drainage fees by approving the same leaky-bucket, Prop-A language that led to the problem in the first place
Learning that it took FEMA, the SJRA, Montgomery County, Harris County, and the City of Houston a year to fund a $2 million San Jacinto watershed study.
Wondering what that portends for the future of other flood mitigation projects
Watching that wonderful feeling of post-Harvey bipartisanship degenerate into political bickering while you…
Fear what the next storm could bring
The Lifeboat Mentality
In my opinion, people are looking for help and seeing hurt ahead. Many SAW the flood bond as a lifeboat. It buoyed their hopes and dreams for a return to safer shores. They were counting on the mitigation projects in it to protect them. Now, they feel thrown overboard by the struggle over prioritization of projects, i.e., who gets theirs first.
Our county judge called it “class warfare.” Fox News called it “bait and switch.” I call it maddening. I think residents rich and poor would agree.
Residents who suffer from PTSD, have suffered re-traumatization – so severely, so many times – that they may feel there is no escape. Political jousting just re-traumatizes them.
No one is telling them that more than half of the flood bond projects have started already.
Meanwhile, depression, anxiety and related illnesses are starting to surface. One of my dear friends lost her home to Harvey, her husband to cancer, and now is struggling with cardiac issues as she tries to rebuild her home. Alone.
Turning Negatives into Positives
Costa did offer a ray of hope. Some people have managed to find something positive in the flood experience, she said. For instance, those intent on remodeling might suddenly have the insurance money to do it.
One of my dreams is that Republicans and Democrats find a way to work together again. Maybe, collectively, we’ll find a way to create a functioning government that reduces flood risk and restores a sense of order to our lives in time to handle the next big hurricane. I think that would be a positive outcome from all of this. For all of us.
Posted by Bob Rehak on March 7, 2019 with help from Janice Costa
555 Days since Hurricane Harvey
https://i0.wp.com/reduceflooding.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/03/Screen-Shot-2019-03-07-at-3.13.11-PM-copy.jpg?fit=1500%2C913&ssl=19131500adminadmin2019-03-07 16:09:052019-03-07 18:52:14PTSD, Re-Traumatization, a Lifeboat Mentality and Flood-Bond Politics
Eighteen months ago, approximately 11,000 Kingwood, Humble and Atascocita residents went to bed thinking they had escaped the worst of Harvey’s wrath. Hours later, they woke up to find water seeping through their windows, doors and walls in the dark of night. Without any warning. Thanks in part to the release of 80,000 cfs from the Lake Conroe dam.
However, rumor has it that one or more members of the board want to present a petition by Lake Conroe boaters to NOT lower the lake level this year. To everyone who signed that petition, I dedicate this photo essay.
Water Sculptures by Julie Yandell. Taken during evacuation. Yard decorations take on an ominous feeling in the flood.The flood cut off Woodland Hills Drive, a major escape route for people in Kingwood Lakes, the Barrington and Kings Cove.Trash Day in the Barrington after Harvey. Photo by Joy Dominique.Siding from home washed downstream during Harvey. Photo by Dan Monks.Water skiing, anyone? Photo by Sidney Nice of Atascocita Point after Harvey.Sidney Nice’s kitchen after Harvey flooded the house to a depth of 63″.Sidney Nice’s house in Atascocita Point during Harvey.Rebecca Johansen’s front door shows how deep flood waters got in her home … 40 inches.Townhomes on Marina Drive in Forest Cove. Concrete and steel were less effective at preventing erosion than blades of grass.Elderly residents of Kingwood Village Estates trying to escape as Harvey’s floodwaters rose. Twelve residents later died: six as a result of injuries sustained during evacuation and another rise as a result of stress from losing their homes.Marilyn Davenport: Home Damaged During HarveyFrom Ann Crane: “We had over 70 people helping to clear and clean our house. The Kingwood community coming together.”Jennifer Manning: “What 18 inches of floodwater can do to your home.” From Walden on Lake Houston.Jennifer Manning: “We lived in Kingwood from 1992-2012 before buying a house in Walden that was ‘built above the ’94 flood.’ We finished our rehab in June.” Ten months!The Kelsey Seybold Clinic has also been vacant since Harvey. 44% of all businesses in the Lake Houston Area Chamber were damaged. Some will never return.Picture by June Ledet of Harvey flooding in Kingwood. Corner of Kingwood Drive and Forest Garden. Flooding here cut off escape routes for thousands more.
Classroom building at Lone Star College/Kingwood flooded during Harvey after SJRA release. Six of nine buildings flooded causing more than $60 million in damage. The College just fully reopened this month.
Milan Saunders home in Kingwood LakesThat’s all, folks! Harvey flipped the baby grand piano and broke to legs off the heirloom.Repairs to IH-69 took about 10 months and $20 million, disrupting all traffic into and out of the City for hours each day.The mother of all walk in closets…Amy Slaughter’s garage.
Home of a single mother who had just lost her job.
When sewage treatment plants flooded, toilets began flowing in reverse.
So please, Lake Conroe boaters. Let’s keep this in perspective. We understand your inconvenience. Please try to understand ours. Help us recover our lives.
To see more examples of how Harvey affected the lives of Lake Houston Area residents, please see the Submissions Page of this web site. It contains images submitted by residents affected by Harvey. If you have images you would like to share, please send them in via the Submissions Page.
Posted by Bob Rehak on February 28, 2019
548 Days since Hurricane Harvey
https://i0.wp.com/reduceflooding.com/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/IMG_0082.jpg?fit=1500%2C1125&ssl=111251500adminadmin2019-02-27 21:53:092020-01-17 10:14:23The Night that 11,000 Lake Houston Area People Became Homeless
Melissa Sturgis’ Harvey Story: Three Generations of Antiques Out on the Curb
This is another in a series of looks back at Harvey, as told through the photos of its victims.
Melissa Sturgis, self-described “oil-patch gypsy,” is still angry. “My entire home. Treasured antiques, three generations back from New England, are on this curb. Furniture and collectibles from eight years overseas in Malaysia, London and Russia. It’s a crime.”
Silver Lining
Melissa Sturgis lives in Alaska now and says she is not moving back, though she keeps in touch with all of her Kingwood friends.
“Harvey was devastating, but it actually had a silver lining. It shook us out of complacency and made us more resilient…taught us that life is about more than things….it’s about perfect strangers coming together to help one another. People opening their home to the five of us for several days.”
“As a side note, my brother in law, sister in law, nephew and 2 cats from Sugarland were forced to evacuate. They drove hours in the torrential rain to get to my house in KW for safety–then lost their two cars in my driveway—AND THEY NEVER FLOODED IN SUGARLAND. And my sister in law had cancer at the time….and still does.”
“Yes it was tortuous, tossing out Great Grandma’s Dining Room table onto the pile….as Grandma (who also flooded and was evacuated from Arbor Terrace in Town Center) sat on the sidewalk watching her things and her mother’s antiques get tossed. Excruciating. But we survived. I’m just grateful I am no longer there. I was in Kingwood last week visiting my mother in law and Fosters Mill Estates STILL has houses abandoned or partially fixed and for sale. Some are still being worked on. It’s awful.”
Why I’m Posting These Now
Melissa donated her pictures to the cause in the hope that they will help create awareness of the devastation that flooding causes, and perhaps, just perhaps, they may create some positive change, too. Thanks, Melissa!
I’m posting these now for several reasons:
If you have pictures from Harvey that you would like to share with the world, please send them through the submissions page of this web site.
Posted by Bob Rehak on 3/13/2019
561 Days since Hurricane Harvey
PTSD, Re-Traumatization, a Lifeboat Mentality and Flood-Bond Politics
Yesterday, I learned about re-traumatization of people suffering PTSD (post-traumatic stress disorder) from Harvey. I had contacted Janice Costa, one of Kingwood’s leading psychotherapists to gain some insight. Keep in mind as you read this that neither Costa, nor I, have any idea how widespread this phenomenon is. However, Stephen Costello, the City of Houston’s flood czar, while speaking to a symposium on flooding at the University of Houston last year stated that 18% of Harris county’s residents suffered some sort of serious psychological distress after Harvey.
I pointed out to Costa how the traffic on my site spiked when I posted The Night 11,000 Lake Houston Area Residents Became Homeless. Thousands of people have viewed it in the last week and are still viewing it. In fact, it’s my most popular flood post ever with the exception of the one with that snappy headline, Public Notice.
What Did I Tap Into?
I had accidentally tapped into some powerful emotions, but I wasn’t sure what or why and hoped Costa could help. Costa said victims sometimes feel such images and stories “validate” what they went through. “Yes! See. It was that bad!”
In the case of Harvey, it’s difficult for some people to let go, because they are constantly getting “re-traumatized” from related sources, she says. The examples below represent my interpretation of what she said, not literally what she said. I added dozens of examples that people have shared with me along the lines she mentioned.
Re-Traumatization, Day after Day
As if Harvey weren’t a big enough disaster, how about these complications? Do any of them sound familiar?
My apologies to anyone I omitted!
More Re-traumatization!
Now consider the political systems around you. While we struggled individually, government offered help. Then came other kinds of re-traumatization.
The Lifeboat Mentality
In my opinion, people are looking for help and seeing hurt ahead. Many SAW the flood bond as a lifeboat. It buoyed their hopes and dreams for a return to safer shores. They were counting on the mitigation projects in it to protect them. Now, they feel thrown overboard by the struggle over prioritization of projects, i.e., who gets theirs first.
Our county judge called it “class warfare.” Fox News called it “bait and switch.” I call it maddening. I think residents rich and poor would agree.
Residents who suffer from PTSD, have suffered re-traumatization – so severely, so many times – that they may feel there is no escape. Political jousting just re-traumatizes them.
Turning Negatives into Positives
Costa did offer a ray of hope. Some people have managed to find something positive in the flood experience, she said. For instance, those intent on remodeling might suddenly have the insurance money to do it.
One of my dreams is that Republicans and Democrats find a way to work together again. Maybe, collectively, we’ll find a way to create a functioning government that reduces flood risk and restores a sense of order to our lives in time to handle the next big hurricane. I think that would be a positive outcome from all of this. For all of us.
Posted by Bob Rehak on March 7, 2019 with help from Janice Costa
555 Days since Hurricane Harvey
The Night that 11,000 Lake Houston Area People Became Homeless
Eighteen months ago, approximately 11,000 Kingwood, Humble and Atascocita residents went to bed thinking they had escaped the worst of Harvey’s wrath. Hours later, they woke up to find water seeping through their windows, doors and walls in the dark of night. Without any warning. Thanks in part to the release of 80,000 cfs from the Lake Conroe dam.
The Harris County Flood Control Damage Map shows that on the West Fork:
Ironically, Thursday, February 28, the San Jacinto River Authority will vote on whether to continue lowering the level of Lake Conroe seasonally. The measure was designed to help reduce downstream flood risk until mitigation measures can be put in place.
However, rumor has it that one or more members of the board want to present a petition by Lake Conroe boaters to NOT lower the lake level this year. To everyone who signed that petition, I dedicate this photo essay.
So please, Lake Conroe boaters. Let’s keep this in perspective. We understand your inconvenience. Please try to understand ours. Help us recover our lives.
To see more examples of how Harvey affected the lives of Lake Houston Area residents, please see the Submissions Page of this web site. It contains images submitted by residents affected by Harvey. If you have images you would like to share, please send them in via the Submissions Page.
Posted by Bob Rehak on February 28, 2019
548 Days since Hurricane Harvey