“When I’m at war all I think about is home, When I am home all I think about is war,”- That is a quote I’ve heard several times since returning home from downrange and it is 100% accurate. Once your foot touches American soil, immediately you go down the checklist of all the things you dreamed of doing while you were in the shit. Women, beer, food, fishing, football, and family. The list can go on forever. And you enjoy every minute of it because for most of us we really didn

Ancient Greek mythology told a story of a man who had to carry a boulder up a mountain and once he reached the top, the boulder would fall back down for him to carry up again. This was the story of Sisyphus. There could be many analogies drawn between Sisyphus and the constant battle of PTSD, but there would be something missing - you (owner of PTSD). You are capable of changing the depth of the boulder's fall down a mountain. All people suffer from something every single

Do not shut down. Do not block yourself out. PTSD is winning right now. You fought. You stepped over dead bodies. You were shot at. You struggled with loss. Noises were loud and your brothers' and sisters' lives needed protecting when those noises came. Thunderous explosions, alarms, screams, shouts, cries, smoke, and everything in between made the evil and horror of war real.  But this is the greatest contradiction because.. It was the most alive you've ever felt. You fe

A quote from a book I am reading - 'Warrior's Return: Restoring the Soul After War' - states: "In Norse mythology, the king-god Odin gave an eye for wisdom. What if this wound (PTSD) is the eye we pay for wisdom and the path to it? Can we understand traumatic wounding not as unjust and horrible occurrences that victimize us and should not have happened? Rather, can we understand it is a pathway to initiation and transformation that, in spite of our suffering, can become our g