1
It's the lottery of whether one's affected I find sickeningly unfair. My grandfather served in the trenches during the Great War, was heavily decorated, and saw horrors he would never speak of - (though he did talk about the 'trench humour' that kept spirits up), he didn't suffer from shell-shock. In the Second World War I had four relatives involved. My father served in Burma, one relative fought at Arnhem, another was at the liberation of Belsen, and a fourth spent time as a Japanese P.O.W. Only the last suffered P.T.S.D., as well as the physical scars from being thrashed by bamboo canes. He never spoke of his experience, nor would he ever remove his shirt in public - even on hot summer days. It seems nowadays though, even with a greater understanding of the illness, that this lottery of suffering still exists. Personally, I think financial factors are having to much influence in matters, both in returning people too soon, some of whom may only have partially recovered, and the willingness to help them thoroughly before and after leaving the Armed Forces. Most of all, these brave people need to be listened to, and treated as THEY see fit, and not what others deem fit for them. Cost should never enter into the equation. They've had a lifetime of stress and horror thrust upon them in a relatively short period of time, is it any wonder that some naturally succumb to such illness. I have nothing but admiration for anyone who serves their country. Best Wishes to them all!.
2
Canada, well I won't say Canada, the conservatives have to treat our soldiers with more respect. My dad suffered from PTSD all his life and that was after the second world war, they should have learned to recognize and treat it by now. The truth is that in today's world once they come back, there's nothing for them here.. no meaningful support at all from this government. Must be terrible to be a member of the armed forces and then come back and have to listen to the so called experts sitting in their offices who haven't a clue as to what war is all about on the front lines. Harper just plays war when he gets all dressed up and goes over to support our troops, he can come back ... be home having supper with his family that night, they can't and what do they have to look forward in the ways of support anyway when they do return. But I'm just commenting, I don't know a thing either about how they feel, much like the so called experts who don't know that much more..
3
Both VR and repeatedly talking about the event are psychological extinguishing techniques for lessening symptoms of PTSD, not for healing the underlying dissociated trauma. The repetition of events that the survivor consciously remembers is like listening to a stuck record. It is the sensory inputs from the event that were dissociated from and never consciously experienced that are energizing the mental and emotional disturbance. They must be brought into the survivor's awareness and understood as missing pieces of traumatic experience(s) for true healing to occur. No one heals a trauma survivor, they each must heal themselves, at their own pace, and in accordance with their own internal healing process.
What society can offer is support and understanding to help them do this. Useful ways for bringing unconscious material into awareness include keeping a journal, paying attention to dreams, art such as drawing and modelling in clay, and meditation for healing, including the sweat lodge. In talking about the insights gained through such methods the record becomes unstuck, and the whole of the trauma is fully experienced and understood and reacted to. Only then can the traumatic event become a completed memory and fade with time. That is the healing process as I understand it, as I have experienced it in my own life, and as I have witnessed in helping others on their healing path. Anything less is just first aid for temporary symptom relief, no matter how well intentioned those professing to be PTSD therapists. The military is a long way from truly understanding and helping PTSD survivors, and should not be sending them back into combat. There are other duties they could be performing instead. .
4
I have never had PTSD, however, I have lost a leg overseas and spent about a year in rehab with, among others, people who were suffering from PTSD.
My belief is that PTSD in no way means an individual is weak.
Picking up children body parts after some taliban blew himself up downtown is hard to live with and some of the boys out there have more than enough memories like that to keep them awake at night.
Each person will respond differently to the same experience. I am back in school and I find school more stressing than my job was in the sandbox. So, my advice would be to never point at someone and say that they do not have a valid reason to suffer from PTSD.
If an individual can go back and help make sure that the next bomb does not make it to the market, thereby saving young children, couldn't it be easier for the individual in question to carry on with life?
Not all people heal the same way..
5
I think one reason that affliclted soldiers worry that they'll be percieved as weak is simply because
they now have an affliction that (in some cases)
inhibits them from performing to the same standard that their comrades are performing at.
Being in the combat arms of the army is a lot like team sports.
It's very physical, and merit is based perfomance.
So any affliction that affects an individual's performance is inherently going to have a correlating effect on that individual's self worth.
In the army, weakness is frowned upon.
The guy who's always getting out of PT or field exercises because he has a pattern of recurring, yet invisible injuries that always seem to flare up just before hard work comes about is regarded as a malingerer, and is ostracised (rightly so).
But at the same time,
the guy that doesn't participate in the hard work one day becuase he clearly has a cast on his leg from when he shattered it taking that trench last week is not looked down upon at all.
I suspect that the sense of shame harboured by some PTSD victims comes from a sense that their injury may be suspect, and that they may be seen as a malingerer, which is a source of shame.
The unfortuante part is that this sense is exacerbated by the fact that there is a prevalence of flase "PTSD malingering" going on in the CF - people who could not possibly have PTSD as they were never exposed to traumatic stress, yet claim to be afflicted, either for attention, or for monetary gain (despicable, but it's a sad fact, there are people out there who will take advantage of anything).
These people largely come from areas of the military that don't come anywhere close to the action.
I know one individual for example, who never left KAF, and claims PTSD based on his attending ramp ceremonies alone.
6
This is pure BS. Myself being a child WWII PTSD victim I speak from experience. I am now 73 years old and still facing the effects on a regular basis as do e.g. the remaining holocaust Israelis. I am convinced that the US people (and Israel) after three or four generations of military involvement (conscription) trapped in generational PTSD making it virtually impossible to 'start over'. They are doomed to staying the war course until their bitter end.
THIS IS WHY CANADA MUST NEVER BECOME A MILITAIRY NATION LIKE HARPER DIRECTS IT TO!
Our soldiers should never be allowed to serve more than one tour of duty..
7
PTSD. It is something that you have the rest of your life. It is a
fracture of the mind. If affects everything you do and most you don't do. Every day for some of us is like reaching for a string or thread to hang on to life. A way to make it though the day against the
enemy inside of you that wants you to destroy yourself.It never goes away, medicated or not, it is merely sedated at best. (...)
PTSD had been the result of tours for many men/women. For decades now and back as far as the great wars.
Soldiers have gone places that Canadians do not know about, these were of an era pre Internet.
The public had no idea what was happening to soldiers. Many of them are on the street or in the brush hiding still.
Many more have taken their own lives.
For those who are so ignorant as to put a soldier down and are claiming to be tough... go ahead join today, don't wait until some need arises... big boy..
8
This is something that really, really unnerves me. I have several acquaintances who live with PTSD, either as a result of experiences in the military or as foreign correspondents, having covered grisly events such as the Rwandan genocide. PTSD is rarely, if ever, something you live with and suffer from for a few years and then get over like a bad physical injury. It stays with you for decades.
Although it's totally possible to undergo treatment and live a "normal" life, I figure that means a total realignment of duties within the military (desk job) not being plopped right back into the traumatic situation or one similar to it.
If the affected person has managed, through their own hard work and some therapy, to greatly improve their quality of life...then BANG, all that hard work is being undone when they are redeployed into combat.
Roméo Dallaire has been quite public about his experiences as an officer with PTSD. I'm very, very curious what he thinks about this. CBC, give him a call perhaps?
9
How can some people think that PTSD is for the weak?
If I was lying in a foxhole, ranger grave, or whatever you want to call it, and all around me things were exploding, my friends were dying and I could hear them screaming, and I was thinking that I was about to die at any second.
I think there might be some lasting effects from that. Especially if you had to do it repeatedly.
Now this scenario isn't Afghanistan but
if I was in a country where I had to assume everyone wanted to kill me, everyone has weapons, anyone could be wired with explosives, and at any time as you are driving down the road your vehicle could explode, I don't think I would be exactly the same when I came home.
Like it or not I think every one of them comes home different. Some will be far worse than others, and most will be able to deal with it, but I don't think any are the same.
Assuming you would be perfectly fine because your a big man at your computer talking about how those whining soldiers should man up doesn't prove anything.
Try spending a day in their boots. If you aren't willing to stand behind our soldiers feel free to stand in front of them..
10
A study of Vietnam vets found that unlike those who recovered from combat trauma, more than 90% of those who developed PTSD had experienced overwhelming trauma as children. Adults carry dissociated sensory inputs from such early trauma in their minds as irrational fears, bodily sensations, and weird thoughts that they learn to live with and to regard as normal. They continue to have the ability to dissociate when faced with trauma as adults. They are also attracted to danger that reminds them of the dissociated trauma like moths to a flame, so often go into professions such as police, fire fighting, paramedics, and the military.
The ability to dissociate from their feelings and bodies can make them fearless and reckless and able to carry on despite wounds; in other words heroes in the face of life threatening danger. But such actions also add to the dissociated traumatic material in their subconscious minds, and can trigger subsequent full blown PTSD episodes. Current treatment for PTSD is primarily symptom relief, not permanent healing, because that would require understanding the symptoms as pieces of a chain of traumatic experiences that often goes back to early childhood, and employers will only pay for therapy for damage caused in the workplace.
Sending such patched up veterans back into combat without healing the underlying dissociation may result in exemplary acts of bravery and selfless performance, at the cost of recurring and worsening episodes of PTSD that can impair the quality of the rest of their lives. I do not think Canadians want their soldiers or other emergency workers regarded as expendable, and those with subclinical PTSD taken advantage of in this way.
11
We had a relative who suffered from PTSD in WW2 He served with the Edmonton Regiment at Ortona Italy AKA 'little Stalingard"
He was treated along with others, as cowards, as PTSD was not known or accepted at the time. There was stigma that vets suffered from. He fought in close quarter fighting, in a tank killing section with the infantry. He never got over it really.
Near the end of his life, the military finally recognized the condition, which really are wounds suffered in combat. The government never did pay him for 50 years of unpaid disabilty pension though for the wound suffered in combat.
I hope the military treats our vets better nowadays. .
12
Fundamentally, PTSD is like a bad phobia to an intrusive thought.
What wears people down, of course, is that, unlike spiders, or public speaking, or going on an airplace, or standing on the observation deck of the CN tower, an uncontrollable intrusive thought is not something that is easy to avoid.
And when you get people whose modus operandi is to be fearless (or at least not show it), and here they are at the mercy of fear they can't control, it can have a tremendous demoralizing effect, and certainly an impact on self-esteem, and precipitate depression.
At least regular phobics get to feel competent, as long as they stay away from public speaking, tall building, etc.
People with PTSD don't have that luxury.
13
There are a lot of people on here that treat people with PTSD as if we are some kind of fragile flowers or a disease to be gotten rid of.
Some people will never make it back however that doesn't mean you just quit or worse don't even try.
It makes me angry when people suggest that a career soldier just get another job. I have been doing this job (if you call it that) for 14 years I have a lot of effort, education, and even self worth tied up in this career. I would say it is not like a civilian job where I can quit and just go to another one. Imagine abandoning all your experience, training, and even what has become your normal. Truth is yes some will not make it back however they should not be Forced or have someone not let them try "For their own good".
14
as a fellow soldier with operational experience I can fully admit that a large majority of soldiers return to Canada with some form of PTSD.
The thing about PTSD is that just because a soldier has it, does not render him/her useless which is what the media and the arm chair generals would like others to think.
People deal with it differently, some lean on their families, both civilian and military, to deal with it, others turn to hobbies, some turn to a destructive lifestyle which is what normally makes the headlines.
It really is a shame that people right away think that they are experts on this issue, while in reality they know nothing about.
When I returned from Afghanistan the best treatment that I could give myself was to surround myself with my military family, my fellow soldiers that I had lived and soldiered with.
Yes I love my family but they simply cannot put themselves in your shoes when it comes to a topic like this. I can't stress how important that was for myself and others to be able to sit down and talk about the various things that had happened during the tour with my peers. There's no doctor or psychologist that can replace that.
Another thing that has really hurt this topic is that every soldier returning from theatre hears the same thing, right from mental health, the public, the media, the government, families etc. that it's "ok to be screwed up."
In short these soldiers are being told that it's ok for them to freak out in a large crowd, have anger issues, hate life in general, it's normal to be always switched on and in the game and engaged.
Soldiers should not be hearing this time after time after time, it breaks their spirit and sets the conditions for a long and rough road to recovery.
IMO, It's ok to be ok!.
16
it is not only the soldier who has to go through training to make sure they are mentally fit, but also the families need to meet with Padres to make sure that they are capable mentally and emotionally to survive a tour.
*
CANADIAN MILITARY REDEPLOYING SOLDIERS WITH PTSD. POST-TRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER
Jun 14, 2011
CBC News
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/story/2011/06/14/ptsd-soldiers-redeploy.html
Image. http://www.cg47.org/archives/Expositions/14-18/catalogue/081-Fonds-Garrigue-0008.jpg
