Let this new year be the beginning of hope of healing PTSD

Wounded Times
Kathie Costos
January 1, 2015

All last night I thought about how I wanted to start out this new year on Wounded Times. It ended with the post about 12 veterans gone to suicide in six hours. I hoped it would get people to think about what far too many are not talking about. When the "22 a day" is repeated as the number of veterans committing suicide every day, no one seems to want to talk about how it is the average of 21 states.

The trouble with the report is state after state are reporting veteran suicides are double the civilian population rates. Then we also have the ones no one talks about at all. Vehicle crashes, overdoses and as homeless veterans left alone. We don't even talk about veterans facing off with police officers after they lost so much hope they were prepared for police officers to end it.

No one wants to talk about how Congress has been passing bills sold as "suicide prevention" since at least 2007 but have managed to leave the numbers higher than before they did nothing.

That's the bad news.

The good news is out there and more veterans are making it out of the valley of absence of hope and helping others up too.

It is hard to have PTSD but harder when you think you're all alone. When you think no one understands then you can't really think beyond the pain. How can you find hope if you can't see any evidence of it? But when you see others who have been there and done that, been through the worst of it and made it out to live happier lives, that is all the evidence you need that you can get there too.

A U.S. soldier helps a fellow soldier onto the rooftop of an old, destroyed building to provide overwatch for another element of their patrol in the Panjwa’i district, Afghanistan, Jan. 29, 2013. U.S. Army photo by Sgt. Kimberly Hackbarth

Being able to look at the others unashamed of having PTSD is priceless. That is why peer support is vital, not just for veterans but for families as well.

Your family members love you but they can't understand what is happening to you or what they can do to help you. It is hard to live with what you're going through because they end up blaming themselves as if they made you feel so sad. We think that love is all that we need to cure you and see you happy living with us. Then for wives, we think you just don't love us anymore.

I know because that is the way I felt in the beginning. I'd look in the mirror and think I lost my husband's love because of a thousand reasons. The worst part was that as his PTSD got worse, I already knew what it was and why he was suffering. Back then the only thing researchers weren't talking about was that it could get worse with a secondary stressor.

I spent years of failing to get him to go for help after managing to get others to go to the Veterans Centers and the VA. I spent years suffering right along side of him losing hope that our marriage would last one more year and then dreading it would without anything getting any better.

Oh, sure things were a lot different back then for families because it was harder to find others. We didn't have the internet. Somehow we all managed to get together and find others just like us when we started to talk about what our parents kept secret.

Our husbands gained strength just knowing someone they knew had suffered enough to understand and then found hope restored knowing they healed enough to be happy again. To be able to laugh as well as cry. To look beyond one moment into the next and look forward to next week, next month, next year.

Side by side it was achieved much like when they were in their units in combat. No one fought alone in Vietnam. When they tried to fight alone back home, too many lost. When they had someone as an example of what was possible, they lived, healed and then helped others.

We lasted because we had the support to do it. In September we celebrated our 30th anniversary. We wouldn't have been able to do it if we tried to do it alone. I remember those days too well and what it was like. That is why Wounded Times is here.

There is no need to feel alone. There is no need to suffer alone. There are far too many groups now you can find in your own hometowns and cities. If you don't find one you're comfortable with then you can look online to find one in other states to connect to. You can also talk to other veterans around the world going through the same thing you are.

Families can do the same. There are so many possibilities to heal if you have the nudge you need to reach for it. So think of it this way. PTSD was caused by trauma. Trauma is Greek for wound and wounds heal. You are not stuck with the change within you and you can change again. For all the veterans committing suicide there are far more living happier lives and passing on hope to others.

After all, taking care of others is what you guys do best. So take care of yourself first and then, then be there to help someone else. Let this new year be the beginning of healing of hope.

U.S. Navy sailors watch a New Year's Eve fireworks show from the flight deck of the USS George Washington in Yokosuka, Japan, Jan. 1, 2014. The Washington and its embarked air wing, Carrier Air Wing 5, provide a combat-ready force that protects and defends the collective maritime interest of the U.S. and its allies and partners in the Indo-Asia-Pacific region. U.S. Navy photo by Petty Officer 2nd Class Jacob I. Allison