Canada: Beyond Trauma Documentary on PTSD

Yes, there are more civilians with PTSD than veterans, but there are also more civilians than veterans. Percentages are a different story. Plus you would also have to consider the difference between "civilian PTSD" which comes with surviving trauma, and occupational PTSD, which comes from putting your life on the line on a daily basis, topping off all the other causes that can include you in the group.

Illuminating Canadian documentary puts spotlight on PTSD
MONTREAL GAZETTE
BILL BROWNSTEIN
Published on: January 13, 2017

Nary a day goes by without hearing a story about someone suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and its tragic consequences. Too often, the public hears the story of a traumatized soldier returning home and unable to come to terms with the horrors witnessed in war thousands of miles away.

Just last week, Canadian veteran, retired corporal Lionel Desmond, 33, still shaken by a tour in Afghanistan, is alleged to have shot and killed himself, his wife, their 10-year-old daughter and his mother at their family home in Nova Scotia.

On that note, the timing of the world broadcast première of PTSD: Beyond Trauma, Thursday at 8 p.m. on CBC’s Nature of Things, couldn’t be more auspicious. The sad reality, however, is that PTSD has been around for far too long and is becoming ever more prevalent.

Among this documentary’s fascinating findings are that PTSD affects more civilians than soldiers. The doc also notes the disorder affects twice as many women as men. Written and directed by award-winning filmmaker Patrick Reed (also the producer of Shake Hands With the Devil: The Journey of Roméo Dallaire), PTSD: Beyond Trauma makes for disturbing yet most compelling viewing.

One of the subjects Reed came into contact with while filming last year was Steve O’Brien. As it turns out, the soldier was based at the same New Brunswick outpost as Desmond, but didn’t know him personally. Ironically, while O’Brien had done several tours overseas, his PTSD is actually the result of dealing with an air crash in the Arctic that left seven people dead, including a young child whom he had uncovered.
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