Fall from grace showcases need for PTSD care

The military always knew what they were doing getting high school kids to sign up. The part of their brain controlling emotions is not fully matured. This is why they feel they are so invincible. The nature created by their youth allows them to be able to be trained to follow orders just as it allows them to rush into combat because someone told them to. For now, set aside the aspect of patriotism, loyalty, honor, courage and the connection they feel to the men they serve with. This is about what comes with the whole package.

Frontal Lobe

It has long been known that some patients with frontal lobe damage have significantly changed personalities. What is important about the study is that it helps families, friends and caregivers of the patient to appreciate and understand a very important reason why this occurs. This deficit in mentalizing can affect social cognition which is important in everyday human interactions. For example, patients with damage in the specific frontal area are often less empathetic and sympathetic, and they miss social cues which lead to inappropriate judgements.

http://www.neuroskills.com/tbi/pr-frontal.shtml


The frontal lobes are considered our emotional control center and home to our personality. There is no other part of the brain where lesions can cause such a wide variety of symptoms (Kolb & Wishaw, 1990). The frontal lobes are involved in motor function, problem solving, spontaneity, memory, language, initiation, judgement, impulse control, and social and sexual behavior. The frontal lobes are extremely vulnerable to injury due to their location at the front of the cranium, proximity to the sphenoid wing and their large size. MRI studies have shown that the frontal area is the most common region of injury following mild to moderate traumatic brain injury (Levin et al., 1987).



http://www.neuroskills.com/tbi/bfrontal.shtml


One of the most common characteristics of frontal lobe damage is difficulty in interpreting feedback from the environment. Perseverating on a response (Milner, 1964), risk taking, and non-compliance with rules (Miller, 1985), and impaired associated learning (using external cues to help guide behavior) (Drewe, 1975) are a few examples of this type of deficit.

The training I've taken over they years points to this as reason number one why so many veterans develop PTSD at such a young age. The very part of them that allows them to do what they do in combat, is also what is mostly responsible for what happens to them after it.

Read reports of most of the veterans with PTSD and you'll find the same description of what they were like in their youth, before combat, and what they changed into after. The Frontal Lobe does not fully mature until the age of 25 yet it is always 18, 19 and 20 year olds the military wants to recruit the most. This is the outcome of it.

This is why we see so much PTSD among the under 25 year olds deployed for the first time and then time after time after that. This is why they change so much. This is also why they are flocking to seek treatment considering this is also the generation of the instant answers using the web to find what they are looking for. You would have seen a lot more Vietnam veterans seeking help a long time ago if they had the same resource available to them instead of suffering all these years.

They are wounded because of their age, the kind of trauma they are exposed to and the number of times they are exposed, they are wounded because of their character as compassionate people, but it is also the way they are treated after this exposure that will predict the rest of their lives. The longer help is delayed, the deeper PTSD will cut into their character and we will have many more stories of crimes, suicides, divorce and homelessness.

First Coast veteran’s fall from grace showcases need for PTSD care
The First Coast man is featured in a documentary about life after service.
Posted: May 4, 2010 - 7:21pm

By Timothy J. Gibbons
Jamie Keyes remembers how different her son was when he returned from a second tour in Iraq.

“He just wasn’t the same person,” she said from her home in Statham, Ga. “He had had this awesome sense of humor. That was gone. He was very stoic. The fun Nathan was gone.”

Former Army Spc. Nathan Keyes was drinking more, avoiding social contact, struggling with nightmares. He left his wife and attempted suicide.

Those changes came to a head in St. Augustine one night in August 2008. While driving to the movies with his girlfriend, Keyes displayed a gun to another driver and later fired several shots.

A police chase followed and Keyes was arrested.

Now about halfway into the resulting prison term , Keyes has become the focus of a documentary made as part of “In Their Boots,” a series about the impact the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan have on people back home.
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Fall from grace showcases need for PTSD care