When my husband first came home from Afghanistan, he couldn’t even sleep in a bed. He was based at a remote location and they often slept on the ground or stretchers, so a big soft mattress was a huge adjustment in itself.
There are also the noises that we get used to, such as a car backfiring or a balloon popping or a helicopter or plane flying over or a door banging. These noises make him jumpy and uncomfortable. Crowds of people would make him uncomfortable and he still cannot visit a shopping centre, festival, football stadium or any crowded venue … so in turn this makes life harder for not only the veterans, but their families because you start to avoid situations that can create stress or anxiety.
The army trains their infantry soldiers to have a high fight reaction to situations (fight or flight response) and this then creates a heightened aggressive behaviour. When you spend nine months living on edge and with this reaction to situations it is something that you cannot simply switch off when you return home. They train them to go overseas but do not train them how to adjust back to normal life.
These men are also exposed to horrendous traumas and experiences such as witnessing a comrade, enemy or even civilian shot, killed, maimed or blown to smithereens by an IED (improvised explosive device). They are not prepared to see children or women or their close mate killed in these ways and then they have to come home with these images trapped and repeating over and over in their heads as flashbacks.
They try to pretend that they are not affected because admitting you are not coping is a sure way to be discharged from the military and no matter what anyone says, there is still a huge stigma attached to it. Even though the Vietnam veterans went through terrible cases of post-traumatic stress disorder when they returned, the Australian Defence Force still has not learnt from the past and they do not understand the big picture. It is not just the veteran who is affected, it is also the families.
“He is a 26-year-old man who, when I met him, was happy, fit and confident to the point of being cocky. Now he is a broken shell of a man.”
I have a domestic violence order on my husband because he would get violent and then threaten suicide. We have two small children so the DVO was enforced by the police for the safety of me and our children. My husband has started smoking again — two packets a day. When he drinks he drinks to a point where he is incoherent and dangerously intoxicated. I have had to hide the keys to the cars and motorbike because he told me one day that he rode the bike as fast as he could hoping to kill himself and he is not sure how or why he managed to make it home.
We have only been married for five years, but we now sleep in different rooms because of the constant night terrors. He has unintentionally tried to attack me several times because of a nightmare. He flinches a lot and yells out loud but is sleeping. The medication only controls his anger: he is putting on weight, he now snores and it has also affected our s-x life. He is a 26-year-old man who, when I met him, was happy, fit and confident to the point of being cocky. Now he is a broken shell of a man. He has aged far too early and his outlook on the future is bleak. We try to do our best and take it one day at a time but it is hard to see any light at the end of the tunnel right now. I am seeking regular counselling and am on anti anxiety medications just to hold it together.
I worry for our marriage, for his health and for the impact this has our our children. It is such a hard task, but I made a commitment to this man when I married him and I took my commitment very seriously. Unfortunately it has been much harder than it should be, but this is not my husbands fault… it is the army.
I wish I could have the man that I married back, but I don’t think that this is a possibility. The trauma of war has taken its toll and like Major General John Cantwell explains in his book Exit Wounds the trauma he has witnessed is “like a splinter on the skin of his soul”. He will never be that carefree man again.
* Free, confidential counselling and support is available from the Veterans and Veterans Families Counselling Service for Australian veterans, peacekeepers and their family members. VVCS can be contacted 24 hours a day on 1800 011 046. For non-military help or information visit beyondblue.org.au, call Lifeline on 131 114 or visit this page for a detailed list of support services.
Related stories:
- Part 1: Fighting the ADF’s warrior culture on mental health
- Part 2: Fighting on ‘until you’re about to put a rope around your neck’
- Part 3: How the government treats broken soldiers
- Part 4: Breaking PTSD stereotypes
- Part 5: How angry young veterans rewrote PTSD treatment
- Part 6: Why soldiers should kill with drones not guns
- Part 8: Veterans and their families respond
I grieve for your family and hope that improvements occur and proper support is given.
I have personal experience of PTSD and it is real and not a sign of weakness. My refusal to seek help because I was ashamed of my “weakness” only exacerbated the problem and delayed its amelioration. How stupid are we tough mach males?
You have been heard and my fervent wish is that at least this is of comfort
I can only admire your strength. All your fears, and now all in the family suffering PTSD,, hyper-vigilance, anxiety and helplessness. Appalling circumstances to contend with. I wish you and your family well and can only hope for a positive outcome with counselling and support. None of your family will ever be the same, but a new and satisfying dynamic, are possible. Be selfish you and your children first, if you go “down” all go down.
My father was a WWII veteran who came back from the jungles of New Guinea and suffered shockingly with PTSD for the rest of his life. A TPI, he was misdiagnosed by Veterans Affairs as suffering with paranoid schizophrenia, even though he never displayed any of the classic symptoms of that mental illness, and mistreated by them, being given nothing but mega doses of anti psychotics which worsened rather than improved his mental health. Even in 1984, when Veterans Affairs doctors conceded that he did not have paranoid schizophrenia, his treatment regime remained intact until his death in 1992. Having dragged up my father’s Veterans Affairs files through FOI, I am appalled by the utter contempt expressed against and about him by those who had a duty to care. One telling example was when during a routine physical in a Repatriation hospital in 1991, his treating doctors took but never looked at his chest x ray. If they had, they would have seen a developing malignant tumour on my father’s lung. 18 months later he died from lung cancer. We can delude ourselves that in the present Veterans Affairs treats our veterans with compassion and humanity but I would suggest that if we look beyond the hype we would discover that little has changed since my father and his kind came back from war.