Invisible Wounds

Apr 17

“Everyone who comes back from deployment fills out a form. It’s a standard psychological evaluation. It asks about drug use, sleeping habits, things like that. We filed a Freedom of Information Act to see Stephen’s. He checked a box that said he thought about suicide. And they sent him home. The counselor just scheduled a sleep study and sent him home. And he hung himself with an electrical cord. Stephen should have never been a soldier. He was a happy, go-lucky guy. We used to go camping all the time when we were little. He disappeared from the campsite once and we found him in the woods with chipmunks in his hand. He never wanted to hurt anything. If there were ever ants in the house, he would take them outside. He never told me about the war. I don’t know how it affected him. And I can’t say what caused his death. Personally I think it was PTSD. But his wife had recently left him. He’d gotten demoted. But it doesn’t matter. He told them he thought about suicide. He checked that box. And they still sent him home. So whether it’s right or wrong—I do blame them. If someone says they are thinking of suicide, you need to listen.”

“We celebrated my Dad’s 50th birthday two weeks before. It was a surprise party. I wanted to borrow Stephen’s truck to help pick people up from the airport, but he wouldn’t let me. He tried to stop me in the driveway. But I took it anyway because I’m the older sister. He was livid. That truck was his baby. He ignored me for the entire party and we never spoke again. My last conversation with my brother was a fight. I can’t change that. My mom said that Stephen called her during those last two weeks and forgave me for taking his truck. But I think she’s just telling me that so I won’t feel so responsible. I’m not saying that the fight caused his suicide. But we could have talked it through. We were eighteen months apart. We used to drive to school together every single day. If I hadn’t fought with him, he would have felt comfortable calling me. And we could have talked it through."

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“I understand that it’s not sexy to talk about treatment. But the maddening thing about PTSD is that it’s completely fucking fixable.”

“The military is mostly filled with people who genuinely desire to do the right thing.”

“We met in college. Mark had long hair and a beard. He was class president so there were posters of him hanging up around campus.”

“I don’t feel good about it. It will bother me for the rest of my life and honestly I’m happy about that.”

“I have professors at Columbia who view me as a terrorist for fighting in Iraq.”

“I don’t think it’s possible to be a medic in a conflict zone and not have something stay with you.”

“I was inside an armored carrier with my platoon commander. He tried to open a pressurized fuel container and it sprayed across the vehicle and hit a camping stove that he was using to make hot chocolate.”

“Everyone who comes back from deployment fills out a form. It’s a standard psychological evaluation.”

“I was in charge of 250 Marines during my second deployment. We were assigned to a district called Sangin.”

“We got called out one day to assist a fuel convoy that was being pinned down by gunfire.”

“My brother went to Harvard. He’s ‘Good Will Hunting’ smart.”

“I didn’t fit in too well in training. I came back from drinking one night and I was three minutes after curfew.”

“My father was a platoon sergeant in the Pennsylvania National Guard. But nobody ever thought I’d join the military.”

Adam Parks https://apollocreativeco.com