Boston Marathon Bombing: A Victim's Story

Jim Davis, Board Member of PTSD Relief Now and founder of the largest Event photography company in the US, Chappell Studio and Marathon Foto, was taking photos near the finish line of the Boston Marathon on April 15, 2013. He witnessed the damage, destruction, and deaths from one of the bombs at close range and even had temporary hearing loss. Jim, a long term TM practitioner, explained in a recent radio interview how that horrific event impacted him then and since.

Needless to say, I never expected to be in the middle of a war scene, but in essence that is what it was…. I saw things that I never expected to see in my life. I was right next to the explosion. It was loud.

Jim:  One of the things I mentioned is that in my business we photograph marathons; people finishing races that are meaningful in their lives. They have set goals, they have achieved something great and they want to have a memento of that. We were taking photographs to provide that memento.  

This event happens to be the premier marathon. The longest continuous running and most famous marathon in the world is the Boston marathon.  This is the most elite marathon in the world. Because this is the “biggie” it is televised not just in the US, but world-wide. All of the TV stations are there. 

For that reason, April 2013 at the Boston Marathon, when people brought backpacks with bombs into the crowd, it was all on international television, because international TV was there to cover “the biggie.”

And if anyone watched the coverage, there were two different views on television that showed me in them. One you can see me just outside of the fence from where the first blast went off. And I picked up a little stool that I was sitting on and my equipment and I run out of the frame of the picture because it was right there.

Needless to say, I never expected to be in the middle of a war scene, but in essence that is what it was.
[Before the bombing] it was a happy moment.  People were cheering. It was a sunny day. It was as joyous an event as you can think of.  They had had a wonderful conclusion of the top men and women and wheelchair athletes earlier in the day. There was somewhere between ½ million and 1 million spectators along the whole route. There were 10’s of thousands there at the finish line watching this event. And, in the middle of that, some people brought backpacks with bombs in them.

I saw things that I never expected to see in my life. I was right next to the explosion. It was loud. I wasn’t injured personally except for some short term effect on my hearing. I felt very grateful afterwards that I wasn’t hurt. Besides the immediate impact of the explosion, then there is that thought: “a few feet closer and I would have been one of them (who were injured). 

So it gives you a perspective on life. For some time afterwards there were some residual effects. I don’t think I had nearly the level of PTSD that most people experienced that day, but I think a lot of that was because of the resiliency of practicing the TM technique for all of those years before that. 

A few people asked me: 'what was it like? Was it horrific?' Yes, on one level.

It was a good testament to the effectiveness of practicing this technique because the stress of this event went away very quickly.

A lot of it then is looking to the future. And you say: “OK, I’m still here and I’m not harmed. I’m still alive. What am I doing in the future?” It gives you more of focus on what am I going to do. 
That ties into: I had known David Shapiro with African PTSD Relief and I had helped work with him in founding the organization. It sort of reinforced my dedication to try to do something. It was not just helping people be more relaxed with TM. I realized now to some small level what they with PTSD were experiencing.