Veterans' Remorse

We are all familiar with the term "buyer's remorse" because most of us have regretted buying something at one time or another in our lives. We believed what the salesman told us. We believed we were getting a good deal. We believed we really "needed" it to be happy or to make our lives more comfortable. After the rush of feeling giddy subsides the consequences of being wrong set in. What we thought we were getting turned out to be more costly than it was worth.

What about doer's remorse? When you do something because you believe it is the right thing to do then end up paying for it afterwards, you forget about the good feeling doing it gave you in return and become reluctant to do anything for anyone after that. The expression "no good deed goes unpunished" pops into your head. This feeling I know all too well and I can tell you it sucks the impulse to act right out of me.

There is a more deeper sense of remorse and it is something that comes after buyer's remorse as well as doer's remorse. They believed the price they were paying was worth it just as they believed the receivers of their selfless act would appreciate what they had done. There is "Soldier's Remorse" when they regret what they had to do.

The memory shall forever plague the soldier’s conscience

soul to have killed from necessities cause

This is from "Soldier's Remorse" A Poem by Richard J. Panizza I found online.

Remorse is an emotional expression of personal regret felt by a person after he or she has committed an act which they deem to be shameful, hurtful, or violent. Remorse is closely allied to guilt and self-directed resentment. When a person regrets an earlier action or failure to act, it may be because of remorse or in response to various other consequences, including being punished for the act or omission. In a legal context, the perceived remorse of an offender is assessed by Western justice systems during trials, sentencing, parole hearings, and in restorative justice. However, it has been pointed out that epistemological problems arise in assessing an offender's level of remorse.
A person who is incapable of feeling remorse is often labeled a sociopath (US) or psychopath (UK) - formerly a DSM III condition. In general, a person needs to be unable to feel fear, as well as remorse in order to develop psychopathic traits.

Yet it is not as simple as remorse for the people killed in war or what they had to do. It is more pain inflicted when they come home and are forgotten by the rest of the country and abandoned by the government at the same time they are the ones in need of help. It cuts even deeper when they turn to spiritual leaders seeking to heal their souls but their cries for help are ignored. They wonder where God is or if there is a God at all when so much evil is allowed to go on. So many questions pop into their minds. "How could a loving God allow so much?" "Why did God let it happen?" "Why did God let my friend die?" "Why did God let me live?"

Telling a combat veteran what they had to do was not their fault does not work. They have convinced themselves it was. Even if you can get them to understand it was either kill or be killed, you still have to get them past the rest of what came into their lives. Veterans' Remorse comes with all of the above but the pain is increased when no one seems to care. They try to get over it first, then discovering it is only getting worse, they finally turn to the government for help. When they are faced with months or years of waiting for a claim to be approved, denials from the VA basically calling them a liar because they did not prove their claim, more battles to prove it and have the claim approved, they regret more.

They went where they were sent and did what they were told to do. They put their lives on the line and each day prepared themselves with the knowledge it could be their last day. They survive, come home and just when they think their suffering has come to an end, they discover they still have to fight for their lives as they see their families fall apart, incomes vanish while bills pile up and friends forget about them.

The reason they went had not changed. The completion of their duty was still done. What had changed was them. The shock of service being disregarded changed them more. Instead of saying with pride, "I'm a combat veteran" they say these words with remorse because the country did not pay them back for all they did for us.

We do not take care of their wounds or readily replace the incomes they lost because they can no longer work. We do not help their families to take care of them. We do not make sure there is a place for all veterans to go so they will not be alone or sleeping in the streets. We do not make sure they all have clothes to keep them warm or dry any more than we make sure they have food in their stomachs. Whatever remorse they carry home, we add to it instead of helping them feel the appreciation they truly earned.