Battle With PTSD Toughest Fight To Win

The toughest fight: A Soquel soldier’s battle with post-traumatic stress disorder 
Santa Cruz Sentinel
By Stephen Baxter
POSTED: 06/20/15

Therapy and medications can treat PTSD, but there is no easy cure.

Former Soquel resident Steven Husong sits on the steps outside of the Santa Cruz County Courthouse on June 13. Husong is dealing with post-traumatic stress disorder, which came from military service in Afghanistan. (Kevin Johnson -- Santa Cruz Sentinel)

SANTA CRUZ
Steven Husong has some vivid, violent dreams from his past.

The former Soquel resident and Army National Guard sergeant said one recurring dream dredges up memories from Camp Doha in Qatar, when a young colleague of Husong’s became depressed after more than three months at the base. The man’s wife at home was pregnant, and Husong sent him to a firing range to try to clear his head.

Later that day, the man was back at the base carrying a loaded M4 Carbine rifle when he entered a trailer with a bank of phones to call home. In the phone room, he shot himself in the head.

Husong rushed to him, and in his dream he relives the smell the gunpowder and the copper scent of the man’s blood.

“I slipped on his blood when I tried to give him CPR. It was very messy and very horrible,” Husong said. “I felt like it was my fault. It really (expletive) me up.”

Husong, now 50, lives in Napa. He suffers from post-traumatic stress disorder, which often includes flashbacks and nightmares, according to the National Institute of Mental Health. Sufferers often feel tense, can’t sleep and dive into depression and guilt. Therapy and medications can treat PTSD, but there is no easy cure.

Since then, he has thrown himself into volunteer work. He facilitates a weekly group of PTSD sufferers at Travis Air Force Base in the Solano County city of Fairfield and runs an Alcoholics Anonymous group at the Mare Island Veterans Affairs Outpatient Clinic near Vallejo. He also participates in a care-package service called Operation: With Love From Home and works as a veterans’ liaison Rep. Mike Thompson, D-St. Helena.
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