When living is like dying

It can happen at any moment. This they know in combat. They know the next time they could be the next one put into a box to be sent back home. They know they could be next to get blown up or shot. This is a weight they all carry.

When this threat is fulfilled by "friendly" hands, there is no one left to trust.

Afghan policeman kills six U.S. troops

By Joshua Partlow and Javed Hamdard
Tuesday, November 30, 2010
KABUL - An Afghan border police officer opened fire on U.S. troops during a training mission in eastern Afghanistan on Monday, killing six of them in one of the worst such attacks in the past year, according to Afghan and NATO officials.

The shooting occurred along the border with Pakistan in the Pachir Wagam district of Nangahar province at a facility to train Afghan security forces, according to Ahmad Abdulzai, a spokesman for the provincial governor. A senior police official said the shooter had been recruited into the border police two years ago.
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Afghan policeman kills six U.S. troops

Six US soldiers are dead because of a man they thought was on their side. For two years he worked as a member of the border police in a position of perceived protection of others. He decided to kill instead.

When we talk about PTSD the normal suspects causing it are any life threatening events but this type causes more damage. All the witnesses will wonder if they can ever feel trust again. This spans across all deployed troops who will have it in the back of their own minds when they encounter another "friendly" they are not so sure about. This lack of trust will be brought back home with them. They will live as if they were going to die at any moment.

Each day will bring either an increased sense of safety as the shock wears off or fear will increase to the point where there is no turning back to "normal" as the only safe emotion to feel is anger. When you can trust no one, barely trust your own family, you begin to build a wall around your soul to protect you from more pain.

PTSD comes after one traumatic event in civilians yet we seem unable to understand why it happens to soldiers deployed into combat exposed to traumatic events on a repeated basis. With Vietnam veterans deployed for one year, and in most cases, only one year of service, we saw hundreds of thousands of them diagnosed with PTSD. With these veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan, they have been deployed multiple times and it has begun a lifetime of suffering.

Each night they sleep with dreams of what has been and days of what may happen. They are followed by the ghosts they feared in combat. The IED in the road as they drive on their own city street. The suicide car bombers can show up in a traffic jam. They don't sit with their backs to a door because someone can walk in with a weapon. They don't go to movies because they have no defense in the dark with a bunch of strangers sitting behind them.

They can't trust their families because they knew them as they were before and they are afraid to tell them what changes have happened inside of them out of fear they will no longer be loved. This same fear causes them to push their families away. They don't want to hurt anymore so they kill off their emotions by drinking or doing drugs. They want to get numb.

In the process of killing off bad feelings they prevent good feelings from touching them. When this happens, it makes healing almost impossible.

PTSD spreads out to every part of the veteran's life like an infection. It needs to be treated as soon as possible to prevent more damage done to the survivors before it has a chance to take over everything.

It is the only way to stop living like they are dying.