PTSD Ghosts:They sit around his bed and stare at him

Living with the traumas of war
By Matt Precey
BBC News



An increasing number of British servicemen are seeking help

If Corporal John Meighan has not been taking his sleeping pills, the dead Iraqi soldiers come to visit.

They sit around his bed and stare at him.

"One of them used to come up to my face but he had lips and no eyes, just sockets and they were badly burnt", he recalls.

Without the sleeping tablets, the British serviceman would be up several times a night with these nightmares - often waking up screaming.

Cpl Meighan had 10 tours of duty during his 14 years in the army.

He witnessed the consequences of allied bombing on the so-called Highway of Death, the road out of Kuwait City where retreating Iraqi columns were decimated during the first Gulf War.

It was when he returned home from this campaign that the nightmares began.

He is one of the 260 regular clients of retired Sqn Ldr Steve Pettitt, the east of England's Welfare Officer for Combat Stress, the ex-services mental welfare charity.
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