Vietnam Veterans finally finding their way back home

Guns, grunts, guts and grief is the best way to explain how Vietnam veterans came home. Some of them were so humiliated after risking their lives by people attacking them back home they wondered if their lives mattered at all. Imagine risking your life after being drafted or enlisting and then finding out your own countrymen treat you like a target. For others, they came home to avoidance and ambivalence with family and friends wanting to forget all about where they had been. No one wanted to hear anything.

They didn't give up. They fought to have PTSD treated and compensated by the VA. Most of what we see today in psychologists treating trauma survivors came out of their courage to make it happen for combat veterans. For far too many the message was late in being delivered.

Now we have Iraq and Afghanistan veterans reaping the rewards of their battles at the same time the Vietnam veterans are slowly arriving at the VA seeking help after all these years. Sons and daughters returning from combat are finally understanding what was wrong with their Dads all these years and they are talking them into going for help. They suffered all these years thinking there was no hope for them but evidence has shown it is never too late to get help to heal.

There are parts of lives that can be restored and for what can't be there are coping skills to ease the pain. When you find a gathering of Vietnam veterans they will tell you that almost everyone of them have PTSD in some degree. There are many different levels of PTSD and while most will experience every symptom of it, some will only have a few of them, or at least, they admit to having a few symptoms. They may talk about nightmares but deny flashbacks. Family members have witnessed the moments of returning to combat as they try to deny their time travel back. Some have given up on healing because no one seems to have been able to help them.

Attitudes have changed toward PTSD just as they have changed toward the veterans coming home. Now they find support. They find comfort when they see more and more of their brothers admitting they have PTSD and going for help to heal. They also find hope that it is not too late for them to return back home all the way.

Instead of fighting battles with guns, they do it with the same guts they had in Vietnam courageously facing their fears so they can heal. These grunts have walked miles knowing each step could be their last and each day back home a little more of them became trapped by the ghosts of Vietnam. They grieved for the loss of friends, the loss of their innocence, the loss of faith in their own countrymen and the loss of themselves. Now they find strength in numbers and support to know it is never too late for them.

Current wars prompt Vietnam vets to seek help for post-traumatic stress
Thursday, April 22, 2010
By Maryann Gogniat Eidemiller

"When you leave the war zone, there's grief and guilt and traumatic bereavement over things you did that, in the heat of the moment, seemed correct. When you go back with your own family, the guilt rises and grief hits."

A handful of veterans meets on Fridays at the Veterans Affairs clinic in Hempfield to talk about the Vietnam War.

Anne Merical, a licensed clinical social worker, listens.

"When they came home, they had nothing to identify what was going on with them, as far as nightmares, anger, hyper-vigilance, addictions, triggers for flashbacks and relationship problems," she said. "Now they are talking for the first time about what they went through."

The ones who did talk to civilian and VA psychiatrists years ago helped lead to the identification of the condition known as post-traumatic stress disorder and its inclusion in the American Psychiatric Association's 1980 edition of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Illness.

After facing constant news coverage of the current wars and learning that today's soldiers are returning with similar issues, many Vietnam veterans are finally seeking treatment for post-traumatic stress disorder, Ms. Merical said.

About 70 percent of her clients are Vietnam War vets, and half suffer from the disorder. Two other Greensburg area therapists, David Johns and psychologist Andrea VanEstenberg, have treated veterans from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.



Read more: Current wars prompt Vietnam vets to seek help for PTSD