Couple starts support group for military familes

Couple starts support group for military familes
By Karen Dandurant
kdandurant@seacoastonline.com
August 01, 2008 12:55 PM
PORTSMOUTH — It’s hard for the average person to understand the severe emotional stress that some people feel after returning from a war zone.

Those people are changed forever, marred by what they experienced and saw.


That’s why a couple with local ties is starting a support group for veterans with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD). They say one way to help is for those going through it to be able to talk to people who understand.

Paul and Lauren Taylor live in Lunenburg, Mass. They do so because the benefits and help for returning veterans in Massachusetts are considered among the best in the country, they said.

Paul was a roofer in Portsmouth and Lauren grew up in Kingston. The couple had a duplex in Dover where they lived with their four children: Warren, 1; Austin, 2; Keira, 10; and Ashlyn, 11.

The family’s downward spiral, mostly told by Lauren, is one the Taylors and their four children are living with to this day. Paul is receiving help, but Lauren said he’s not quite the happy, loving man he was before he left for Iraq. Paul was deployed through the Army National Guard from 2005 to 2006.

"We’re starting to get back on our feet," Paul said. "I’m thankful for all the help we received. Without it, things would be devastating."

"I didn’t really think anything of it when he went overseas," Lauren said. "But the army told us wives they would be different when they returned."

Lauren volunteered to start a family support group for the wives and families waiting for the loved one to return home.
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