Personal Narrative: Post Traumatic Stress Disorder

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Dealing with anxiety and disorders is by no means a walk in the park, personally as an Army veteran I have been exposed to view many horrific war situations which have affected my husband I and others who continue to fight this daily battle. A common disorder that affects many Soldiers is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, also known as PTSD, which is a disorder in which a person continues to experience fear and related symptoms long after a traumatic event. Of the many situations I encountered while fighting in Operation Iraqi Freedom, two experiences in particular are relived daily.
To begin with, even though it has been ten years since I fought in Operation Iraqi Freedom, certain situations constantly haunt my memory as if it happened just
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My husband was dealing with so many psychological issues that contributed to excessive feelings of anxiety and worry. Evidence of alcoholism began to arise after our last deployment in 2008, when I began to find empty bottles of liquor in our home. At first I couldn’t understand or make sense of why there were so many empty bottles hidden, some that were in closets, drawers and throughout our garage. In April 2009, I gave birth to our son, and what was supposed to be one of the happiest times in our lives seemed to be the darkest. I feared my husband would not be capable to handle caring for our son when he began to drink and I began to notice that he would frequently make trips to our garage, returning a bit more relaxed and heavy eyed. My son and I were victims of his uncontrollable wrath, and the next day he would have no recollection of his actions or being drunk. In November 2010, a month after the birth of our daughter, I gave my husband an ultimatum, to either seek therapy for his PTSD and alcoholism or I would file for divorce. Learning soon after that the contributing factors to his alcoholism were not only to mask his PTSD from deployments, but also of his childhood. Events in his childhood had been so severe that he was fighting to understand why he even existed. In couple’s therapy my husband revealed that soon after our last deployment his mother who not only neglected him, physically, and emotionally revealed that his grandfather was actually his father, and that the father he thought he had resented him. My husband says that he feels he doesn’t know how to be a good father, or how a normal man should feel like. He greatly fears of becoming his father or succumbing to continue to be the victim of alcoholism. My husband finally “hit rock bottom” two