War Vet: I Served 40 Months in Iraq, After Which I Didn't Want to Go Back Home

[babylonsister]

War Vet: I Served 40 Months in Iraq, After Which I Didn't Want to Go Back Home

By Anonymous, New America Media. Posted December 24, 2009.

Veteran with PTSD: "I don't feel comfortable at home anymore. My threat tolerance and response to perceived threats is so finely tuned that I felt safer in Iraq. "

Editor’s Note: A former Marine re-ups 24 years after his discharge and volunteers for four consecutive combat tours. Now he’s at home fighting the war within. “Anonymous” wrote this for the Veterans Workshop, a New America Media writing project for combat veterans.


Since Iraq, I might go several days without sleep. It's hard to function like that. When I do sleep, I often wake up after a bad dream and all I want to do is put on my gear, grab my weapon and hurt someone. On nights like that I can never fall back asleep.

I was in Iraq for almost 40 months straight, so long that all of my neighbors at home moved away. I came home with post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and a traumatic brain injury (TBI). What follows are some of the thoughts that have been bouncing around in my head since my return. But it’s hard to focus. TBI can do that to a person.

I joined the Marines in 1977 and served in the infantry until I got out in 1981. I went to work for a major transportation company, eventually rising to a management position. But as I saw the war in Iraq dragging on, I decided in 2005 to re-enlist. I was too old at 46 to get back into the Marine Corps, but with a waiver I was able to join the Army National Guard.

I volunteered for the next unit deploying to Iraq, and reached the combat zone in late 2005. I knew that I was filling a slot, and I hoped that because I had deployed that a soldier who did not want to go to Iraq was able to stay home with his family. I felt that I was contributing more in Iraq than I had during the previous 24 years as a civilian. I truly enjoyed being in Iraq and doing an important and dangerous job.

I volunteered to stay in Iraq for four consecutive tours. I stayed because I felt that I was doing something worthwhile, regardless of the politics of the war. I felt that the younger soldiers deserved experienced leaders. I knew that they needed someone who would stand shoulder-to-shoulder with them by choice, not because he was ordered to. I know that I had a positive impact on the soldiers in all of the units that I served with.

I stayed in Iraq because I knew that I was good at my job. I enjoy the infantry, the core fighting unit of any armed force. Not everyone can handle the conditions we suffer and the environment we operate in. Infantrymen share a brotherhood and pride that excludes other units.

And I stayed in Iraq because I adjusted so well to the environment there that I did not want to come home.

more...

http://www.alternet.org/world/144746/war_vet%3A_i_served_40_months_in_iraq%2C_after_which_i_didn%27t_want_to_go_back_home

[Hydra]

1. Wow, he saw so much

And yet, so little. That could have been me.

[HereSince1628]

2. An sad example of how self-assessment of mental health can fail

". . .I stayed in Iraq because I adjusted so well to the environment there. . ."

[LiberalFighter]

3. How many end up like him?

[Sarah Ibarruri]

4. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder - this has been the result of all wars

It's just that wars of the past the fact that war might be causing traumatic damage to the emotional self of human beings wasn't even considered.

War, past or present, is a horrific thing and it *always* leaves permanent damage, I don't care what anyone says. I read somewhere that in the past, a large number of men who came back from war ended up killing themselves.

War is horrific. Always.

[tblue37]

5. He wrote:

"We got the country back on its feet after we bombed it back into the Stone Age. We did a lot of good, and our efforts were not all wasted."

The irony in the juxtaposition of those two sentences just astonishes me.

[Hydra]

7. That's what I was commenting on

I wondered why it is that we think we should carpet bomb people into "the stone age" and wonder why they don't like us when we can't even get them their sewer system back up afterwards...beyond the point that we probably killed several of their family in the process.

[donco]

6. This smells fishy to me….nt