News From the Cause
PTSD: one soldier's story(statesman.com)
December 07, 2010
Central Texan describes a harrowing night in Iraq and the kind of long-lingering effects shared by countless other veterans.
Our lives, our minds, and our souls were forever changed in those days of war. Once we managed to learn how to live in an environment and thrive with the daily threat of death, we came home. We learned to live without our families, and they learned to live without us, and in an instant, we had to learn how to live together again.
Readjusting to the real world wasn't easy. We met people with cynicism and suspicion. The tenderness and calm of a friendly smile was greeted with an accelerated heart rate at the fear of the unknown malevolence that lurked behind the smile. Life lost the meaning it once had. What we once found enjoyable and captivating now was dismissed with apathetic disregard. We became utterly and absolutely disconnected. There is an intoxicating desolation when we hug our children hoping they will never learn of our violent past.
We are often victim to debilitating depression, devastating guilt, and irrational anger. We stay awake to search for anything that will distract us from haunting images, and we don't go to sleep to dream... click here to view
