Friends at the Daily Kos,
Just a short thought tonight. It has been eight years that I stepped back in country and returned from my tour in Iraq. I have written much about that tour on my site Padre Steve's World so I won’t spend any time recounting those experiences and just share a couple of observations that come from my struggle with PTSD and other maladies associated with that tour. In fact the on Wednesday of this week I fell out of bed as during a nightmare I rolled to escape attacking enemy soldiers. Sadly, this is nothing new, at least this time I escaped unhurt.
It has been a terribly difficult eight years as in addition to my own struggles I have watched friends who also served in Iraq and Afghanistan, struggle as they have tried to readjust to life out of the sandbox. Of course there are those who never came home, friends and comrades killed in action, as well as those that either died of illness or wounds incurred during their tours, and others who sadly took their lives after their return. Likewise, there is the cost born by spouses, the broken marriages, substance abuse, and so many other issues.
No wonder two-time Medal of Honor winner, Marine Corps Major General Smedley Butler noted, “What is the cost of war? what is the bill? “This bill renders a horrible accounting. Newly placed gravestones. Mangled bodies. Shattered minds. Broken hearts and homes. Economic instability. Depression and all of its attendant miseries. Back-breaking taxation for generations and generations. For a great many years as a soldier I had a suspicion that war was a racket; not only until I retired to civilian life did I fully realize it….”
I have spent years trying to make heads or tails out of my own struggles and I finally have come to the realization that I am probably about as good as I will get. I do not trust the military mental health system, even though there are some very good doctors, therapists and other providers in it. While I have had some very good therapists, all were civilians, I cannot see any of them here and to try to get back into the system is often dehumanizing. I have someone managing my medicines, for PTSD and my chronic insomnia and the combinations are working better than other attempts so I am not going to complain.
I have a wonderful wife who has neither divorced nor killed me, though she probably would have been justified a number of times. I have two wonderful little dogs who incredibly comforting. Likewise I have friends, some in the military, some at my work at the Staff College, and others at the Gordon Biersch Brewery Restaurant, my version of Cheers. I don’t know what I would have done without these wonderful people. So I am grateful, and as I said, things are about as good as they will get.
One of my favorite actors, James Spader, plays a character named Raymond Reddington on the television show The Blacklist. During one episode he told another character something quite profound, something that I began to embrace last year, and though some might find it odd, I find it comforting.
“There is nothing that can take the pain away. But eventually, you will find a way to live with it. There will be nightmares. And every day when you wake up, it will be the first thing you think about. Until one day, it’s the second.”
Have a great weekend,
Peace,
Padre Steve+