PTSD and Everyone Else

The funny thing about insanity is not what it does to the insane, but what it does to those around them.

As I said in PTSD and My Father his disorder caused me to be the way that I am, but what I did not say is what his disorder as well as mine did to everyone else around us.

My mother has taken the brunt of this. She has had to put up with me and my father when we were drinking to much and when we found ourselves in legal trouble.

I asked my mother if she knew that my father had PTSD when she married him. She said, “No, I didn’t know what PTSD was. I just thought he was not very social and had a short temper. He got much, much worse when you went to Iraq.”

I asked her when she realized I was changed. She said, “When you got home from the service. You were totally unmotivated. You did not do well in college even though you were G/T all through school. You drank too much.”

Despite all of this she has dealt with it rather well. She has been here for the both of us the entire time. She has paid for our legal bills for the three DWIs between us and my assault charge. She has encouraged us to get treatment and stop drinking in the best possible way.

However the stress from all of this has affected her badly. She has grown tired beyond her years from all of it. She does not deserve what we have put her through.

She still remains positive about our futures and continues to support us no matter what happens.

My mother has dealt with this well because she had to, but others around us have not.

I began dating a girl shortly after I came home from the army. We quickly fell in love because we were of like minds. We enjoyed the same things and generally loved being together. Unfortunately it all turned bad because of my PTSD.

She wanted more of me than I could give her. I was very distant even though I felt the way I did about her. Even though I cannot imagine myself with anyone else.

We got in a fight one night and I lead her to believe it was over between us even though that was not my intention. She could not stand to live without me, so she did not. The next morning her mother discovered her body in her apartment. She had killed herself because I could not give her all  of me.

All she wanted was for me to show the same affection for her that she showed for me. My PTSD would not allow it. I kept my distance and it killed her. I will forever regret who I am because of it.

PTSD has ruined many marriages, relationships, and families. The National Vietnam Veterans Study found that 40 percent of Vietnam veterans have been divorced at least once, my father being one of those. USA today found that in the year prior to June 8, 2o05 that there were approximately 10,000 divorces among officers and enlisted men and women in the military.

The VA National Center for PTSD said that 75 percent of OIF and OEF veterans have reported at least one family readjustment issue.

These numbers speak volumes about what PTSD does to those around those suffering from the disorder. It changes people, makes them distant and takes a part of them. Some can deal with the changes of these veterans, but some cannot.

With help these problems can be addressed and hopefully be taken care of, but for the most part these veterans will never be the same. Their families and friends are the ones who have to understand and deal with it.

PTSD and My Father

Unlike the war I came home from my father came home from a war in which people not only were against the war, but many of them were against the troops. When he got off the plane he was greeted by people protesting him and those with him.

He first discovered that he was different when he found that his girlfriend had another man coming around. He took the man aside and explained to him that if he saw him again he would kill him. He knew that he meant it which made him realize he would never be the same again.

The Department of Veterans Affair’s National Center for PTSD says that 30 percent of Vietnam veterans will have symptoms of Post Traumatic Stress Disorder in their lives.

The 10 percent difference between veterans from today’s wars and Vietnam veterans is largely due in part to the political differences stateside between the wars. People during Vietnam looked down on veterans.

My father said, “I kept it quiet that I was a Vietnam veteran and tried to forget about it. Society did not treat Vietnam veterans well. Girls didn’t even want to date us.”

It is a shame that veterans were treated this way. My father did not even list his service on job applications. Society did not allow him to be proud of his service like they do for veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan.

He said, “I am culturally alienated and socially disaffected,” which is a problem for me as well, but for different reasons. He was forced to be this way. I am this way because I was raised by him and going to war brought it to the forefront of my mind.

My father was for the most part able to control his PTSD for a long time, but when I went to Iraq, a war which he felt as pointless as Vietnam, he lost himself. He began to drink heavily and get in fights with those who supported the war in Iraq.

He finally let out the anger with which he had been living with since Vietnam. He could no longer control it. He could no longer continue to work and therefore retired before his time.

Up to this point he had never sought help for his disorder, but when I came home from the army he was determined to make sure I got help. In doing so he finally got help for himself.

He is now taking medicine prescribed by his VA psychiatrist. He no longer drinks as heavily and he stays out of bars and bar fights.

The problem is that once it starts it never goes away. He will never be the same man as he was before when he was able to conceal the disorder. He will never again be able to deal with society the way he did when he had to support his family.

He may have made me more susceptible to PTSD by the way he raised me, but against his wishes I joined the army and went to Iraq in turn bringing out the PTSD in him.

I guess we are even.

PTSD and Me

When I returned home from Iraq, where I served as a gunner on a Humvee and a rifleman in an airborne infantry company from 2004 to 2005, I automatically knew things would never be quite the same, but it was not until an incident while on leave that I realized the extent of it.

My best friend walked up behind me and pinched the back of my neck. I immediately turned on him and threw him across the room knocking over a table and chairs. I knew who it was, but I could not stop myself.

I told myself that this was only temporary and that it would go away. I was wrong. It only got worse.

I became angrier and more paranoid than ever. I began fighting all the time and on several occasions pulled my knife on these people. Fortunately on these occasions my friends were there to stop me from killing someone.

I am not the only one like this. A Marine who had served in the War on Terror got in a bar fight in 2007 and killed a Rice University basketball player by stabbing him with a pocket knife similar to the one that my paranoia will not let me be without.

Violent incidences involving war veterans occur more often than one might think. Maybe not to the degree of killing someone or even almost killing someone, but fighting happens all the time. I already have one assault charge on my record from a bar fight and could easily have several more.

Most of the returning vets I know drink heavily which can lead to many types of violence. On the website ptsdcombat.com it is reported that 25 percent of the nation’s suicides over the time of these two wars have been veterans.

These things are caused by Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. According to the Department of Defense 1 in 6 returning veterans return with symptoms of PTSD. The Department of Veterans Affairs’ National Center for PTSD says that as many as 20 percent have or will develop symptoms of PTSD.

Since, according to ptsdcombat.com, over 1.4 million troops have served in either OIF or OEF,  this is a staggering statistic especially since most who serve are in support positions and never leave the base or see any combat. Those who do see combat have a much larger risk of PTSD symptoms.

I have seen this in many of my friends. Even in the ones that think they are the same. To some extent we are all different than we were before going to war.

Everyday I feel a little worse, and this is the way it is for many OIF and OEF veterans.

I have worked with doctors at the local Veterans Affairs hospital on finding a way to fight against this disorder which every veteran needs to do. I have tried several medications of different quantities. Presently the ones I am on seem to control severe depression and anger, but the problem is that they control my other emotions as well. I may not be angry and depressed, but I feel nothing at all.

Most of the time I no longer feel happy, sad, hate or love. I am emotionally numb. I have no desire to date or make new friends. I do not know if that is a symptom of PTSD or if my pills are causing it. Either way it is a problem I would not have if I had not been to war.

On a positive note my hopes and dreams keep me alive, and I am about to start a new pill regime that is supposed to combat my lack of feeling. I am very positive that these next pills are the right ones.

Veterans of war who saw combat need to seek help for what they went through just as I have been. They need to understand that it may take awhile to find the treatment that is right for them, but they need to keep hope alive because we deserve to find a peace that is absent in war.

We have come home from war, and there is no reason to stop living now.