I’m drunk again and for some insane reason, I’m nostalgic for (warning:YouTube links w/sound) thisshit. That’s my unit in Iraq, 4 years ago. It’s stupid. There’s no reason why I should be reliving that shit in my head, but every once in a while, it creeps up again.
It starts with a funny memory of the “remember that time when…” variety. Then it gets ugly. Things start blowing up. People start ‘vanishing’. I feel the heat of the Iraqi sun. And the worst part- I start to relive emotions from that era of my life. The longing for human connection. The exhilaration of completing some difficult mission. That smitten feeling I got with strangers on the internet (one of which I’ve been dating for 4 years!). The exhaustion after a long workout. The fear of impending attacks. The bond with fellow soldiers.
I’ll want to turn to someone and go “Hey, remember when…” and then I’ll realize that they weren’t there. No one around me was there. I’m alone in a crowd full of people. Even you guys don’t get it. You don’t know why he “comes out with pogs”, you don’t understand why it’s funny that “Route Michigan’s black”. And you probably don’t get the deeper reference in the “Google maps” line.
I’m not even sure any of this makes sense. Tomorrow, I’ll wake up sober and go “aw hell, I can’t believe I posted that.” But honestly, it’s about time I told someone, even if it’s you guys.
Perhaps your local veterans service/administration might have some resources for you to look into? Or maybe others who’ve had similar experiences, maybe not me, the world’s a rather big place, and perhaps when you wake up in the morning you might be able to find others who feel the same way, or maybe get back in contact with a few of the people who were also in your unit or perhaps just maybe talk to your local military resource centers to see if there’s someone who you can talk to and maybe better understand how you feel rather than the casual layman?
Either way, these sorts of midnight posts happen, and it’s not a big deal.
Take care of yourself, and I hope you feel better in the morning.
Thanks for sharing a little bit about yourself, and thanks for everything else as well,
-R
Stay strong brother! I know it doesn’t help much but please try to remember there are lots of good memories just waiting to be made. Don’t let them pass you by.
Funny, vid BTW. I can seed why you would miss that sort of comradery.
Those memories, good and bad, don’t ever go away. As long as they are not debilitating you shouldn’t let them “bother” you overmuch because we ALL have them. Especially on days like this it is impossible to keep one’s mind from going back to those days and nights, the good and the horrid, and the brothers and sisters we have lost. Stay strong brother, and honor their memory.
It does make a good bit of sense, to me anyways. I am not gonna try and tell you what you can do - but talking with someone, even writing it out (good start here, imho), will probably put the shit in better ‘order’ for ya. Wish I knew what to tell ya, other than…
Thank You! In all seriousness, thank you (and all the others who have ‘been there/done that’). My deepest respects (need a camo smilie-thingy here).
CS, is there anyone who *was *there that you can contact? Reconnect with, do some reliving, laugh and smile with? There’s no one who would understand it better, and I can’t imagine a scenario where he’d be upset you contacted him.
If not, try **ToeJam’s **suggestion.
Best to you - hope you feel better soon. We’re here for you if’n you need us.
If you have not already, I recommend reading David Grossman’s On Combat: The Psychology and Physiology of Deadly Conflict in War and in Peace, his treatise on the spectrum of human response to combat stress and killing in a battlefield situation. While I take issue with a few of his conclusions, or at least, the data and methodology by which he confirms them, I think his larger picture of an imposed paradox between approval for and condemnation of killing is generally correct.
We’re taught in polite society that killing is wrong, wrong, wrong, and then we send young men (and sometimes women) out into the field of battle with a gun in hand and intensively condition them to “dispatch the opposition,” and then wonder why combat veterans have so much trouble readjusting to normal society. The truth is that there is a wide range of responses to killing; some small part of the population is just fine with being directed to “terminate with prejudice”, and yet (provided they are raised in a caring environment) are not dangerous toward the normal population; and there is a fairly large chunk of the population who are reluctant to kill under even threatening circumstances, and suffers mental anguish and trauma even from the most justifiable killing, or worse yet, not acting when they “should have” acted.
Combat is a very intense experience that is emotionally polarizing, and the best way to process those memories is to relive and share them with other people who have “been there”, understand them, and don’t judge you for feeling however you feel about it. That is why group therapy works for combat trauma and PSTD, and individual therapy (with a therapist who hasn’t been in combat and can’t genuinely empathize about the emotional state) often doesn’t.