Huge difference between PTSD and CPTC

Huge difference between PTSD and CPTC
Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
January 25, 2014

Post Traumatic Stress Disorder is not new and while we may want to think it is, think that we are just learning about what it does, the truth is horrible. Research has been going on for over 40 years now.

That research began because Vietnam Veterans came home from combat and pushed for it.

Experts began studying combat veterans and they helped the researchers to find ways to help anyone after traumatic events. So why are they the last to really benefit from what they started?

The answer is too many researchers do not understand the differences between what caused PTSD. The Mayo Clinic has combat at the top of the list.

Kinds of traumatic events

Post-traumatic stress disorder is especially common among those who have served in combat. It's sometimes called "shell shock," "battle fatigue" or "combat stress."

The most common events leading to the development of PTSD include:

Combat exposure
Rape
Childhood neglect and physical abuse
Sexual molestation
Physical attack
Being threatened with a weapon
But many other traumatic events also can lead to post-traumatic stress disorder, including fire, natural disaster, mugging, robbery, assault, civil conflict, car accident, plane crash, torture, kidnapping, life-threatening medical diagnosis, terrorist attack and other extreme or life-threatening events.

The best experts out there have been trying to explain that while there are different levels of PTSD, there are also different types of it based on causes. For Combat Veterans, PTSD is a lot different and has to be treated differently.

Never Forget Price Paid

This T-shirt was designed from this.

Combat is at the top of the list and everything else is being a survivor after being a victim.

Police officers and firefighters are the closest to combat because they are not "victims" of the event but responders to it. They willingly risk their lives to help someone else. They need to be treated differently as well.

For veterans, they were changed by combat. An average young adult, trained to think differently, physically change and that training pushed them to be different from average citizens. Or, should I say more different considering they were not like average citizens in the first place. Average citizens are not able to subject themselves to dying for someone else. When they do, we acknowledge how remarkable they are and treat them like heroes.

Tyler Doohan was just 8 years old when he died. "Authorities in the town of Penfield, just east of Rochester, say the boy alerted relatives to the fire early Monday morning inside his grandfather's trailer home, and that six of them escaped. They say the boy died while trying to rescue his grandfather, who used a wheelchair and crutches after losing a leg." His story rightfully made headlines across the country.

There was some other death reported that should have made national news as well. A young Air Force husband and wife, serving in Afghanistan together became a lonely widow escorting her husband's body back home "Capt. David Lyon, who died Dec. 27 in Afghanistan, had been with his wife, Capt. Dana Lyon, just days earlier."

Some want to pass off deaths like this as part of the jobs they do. After all, they knew the risk so it becomes easy to just ignore the basis for them being willing to do it. Some fail to understand that the cause of the wars they fight change with time and reasons but they remain committed to one single objective. Save as many lives as possible even if it costs them their own life.

That is the huge difference between victim PTSD and combat post traumatic change. CPTC is the best way for me to describe it because healing it is not impossible. They changed when they entered into the military, changed again serving in it and they can change again to heal the wounds no one else can see.

There is an Army of volunteers across the country doing the healing since 1984. Point Man International Ministries, which I am very proud to say I belong to, has been helping veterans heal and working with families so they will heal as well. We're all committed to helping veterans see that none of this is all there is. They are not destined to suffer forever.

There are three parts to healing CPTC. Mind, body and above all, spiritually. It is not about taking out psychologist or physical therapy. It is about taking care of the whole veteran and helping them remember why they did it in the first place. They forget that they were willing to die for someone else. When we read in John 15

9 “As the Father has loved me, so have I loved you. Now remain in my love.
10 If you keep my commands, you will remain in my love, just as I have kept my Father’s commands and remain in his love.
11 I have told you this so that my joy may be in you and that your joy may be complete.
12 My command is this: Love each other as I have loved you.
13 Greater love has no one than this: to lay down one’s life for one’s friends.
14 You are my friends if you do what I command.
15 I no longer call you servants, because a servant does not know his master’s business. Instead, I have called you friends, for everything that I learned from my Father I have made known to you.
16 You did not choose me, but I chose you and appointed you so that you might go and bear fruit—fruit that will last—and so that whatever you ask in my name the Father will give you.
17 This is my command: Love each other.

Wars are evil things but those who fight the wars are not evil because in the end they were willing to die for someone else. They should need to be reminded that all that goodness is still inside of them and there is nothing they cannot be forgiven for because God knows their heart even if they forgot what compelled them to serve. They are different from the rest of us and have to be treated accordingly. Point Man has been doing this work for 30 years because we understood what too many experts never understood.