Michael Eubanks: Using Art to Combat Fear

About this Episode

Michael joined the military at the age of 16. By the age of 31, with a three-month-old daughter, Michael was let go from the military in what the armed forces calls a reduction in strength. He was sent back to the United States with his family, with no understanding of life as a civilian for the past 15 years.

“I panic," Michael explained. "I experience a lot of stress. We were trained to not recognize stress. We didn’t talk about stress. We didn’t talk about trauma. So you’re outprocessed--in other words, you come through this process of coming back to what we call ‘the block.’ And I would say you try to hold your head up, you try to be proud. You try to be an adult. You try to play the male role but you are in a nether world. Even though you’re back with the family that birthed you and raised you, you’re back with a whole different mindset, a whole different paradigm of what life’s about, and you are disconnected. You suffer from disassocation disorder. You’re out of your element, your’re out of your sphere. You don’t know what to do.”

Michael graduated with honors from the UA Little Rock Masters Social Work program with a concentration on community and family therapy. He works as an education specialist in a program at UA Little Rock with an office from the Department of Education. He also plays once a month in Hot Springs and performs several times a month for veterans with dementia, VA staff, and veterans in the day health care program.

⁠—
Find more of Michael's work:
Website - www.michael-eubanks.com
Email - [email protected]
Arkansas Arts Council Directory - https://www.arkansasarts.org/aie-artists/michael-eubanks
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/michael.eubanks.315
LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/michael-e-eubanks-71800043/

⁠—

Sustaining Craft is a project of Hew&Weld Writing. There are no fees for artists and craftspeople to participate. Each episode is only possible with the help of friends: Jim Ciago (Seven Second Chance on iTunes and Spotify & Nomad Neighbors in the Denver area most weekends) and Joshua Kurtz.

Patreon - https://www.patreon.com/sustainingcraft

Find more from Hew&Weld:
Each episode of Sustaining Craft comes with a companion article - hewandweld.com/news
Facebook - https://www.facebook.com/hewandweld/
Facebook Group - https://www.facebook.com/groups/1355556997945302/
Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/hewandweld/
Podcast Instagram - https://www.instagram.com/sustainingcraft/