Face to the Floor

It's been a while. I'm sure there's a few questions floating around. Why haven't I been posting? Where am I? What happened to me? To be perfectly honest if you didn't hear something about me it was because I wasn't telling anyone. The last thing I need is anyone's pity. If it's a subject brought up in conversation I answer quickly and shoot it down. But, I did decide to elaborate on what's been happening since I left Iraq for my RnR leave. So, here goes nothin'. Bear with me I haven't written anything autobiographical in a long time.

Let's start on leave. Going on leave was almost more difficult than being deployed. With what had happened to me in June that year I was left with a lot of side-effects. Namely becoming something of a recluse. I tried my best to visit family and friends but all I wanted to do was sit on a chair on a porch, smoke a cigarette to the filter, drink a beer and light up another one.
The first three days back home I didn't sleep. And I had the brilliant idea of driving for 7 hours with this background energy of being awaake for so long. I made it. The drive was easy. My biggest problem was that every time I came up to an overpass I switched lanes no matter how much traffic there was. Made a lot of people angry. Made it to my friend's house by the college she's going to, delivered the table I'd agreed to transport from her parent's house and stayed for a while.

You have to understand one thing about me to get the big picture. If I don't want to show you what I'm feeling, you will never know. Truth be told I've struggled with the concept of feelings for a while now. I know which feelings I'm supposed to have in different situations, and sometimes I'll catch myself "acting out" these feelings to prove to myself that I'm still normal. But I don't actually feel anything. Sad news didn't make me depressed. Good news didn't make me happy. Seeing the faces of family and friends didn't bring me joy. But, I knew they would suspect something was wrong if I just kept a face matching how stoick I felt. So I "put on a show". I visited my extended family in Oregon, even brought a friend with me. Smiled the entire time, made jokes, laughed like my face hurt from how happy I was. But inside it was just another greyscale emotion after the next.

The only thing I really felt was surprise. Like when I went to a bingo house with my date, Alix. The entire room shouted something all at once. Something like 80 people and the sudden noise of it nearly floored me. I had to go outside because I felt like I couldn't breathe. My heartrate had jumped from "calm" to "OMFG WE'VE GOTTA GET OUT OF HERE" in less than a second.

However, I was depressed. I was feeling hopeless. So much that I admitted myself to the hospital. After a night of driving at break-neck speeds through twisting and twining roads high above the Columbia River. After nearly colliding with an oncoming semi and being shocked back into reality, realizing my train of thought had been "I hope I lose control of the wheel. I hope my truck flips over the edge and I hope I never have to deal with myself again."
I've always believed that suicide was the most selfish act anyone could ever perform. How dare a person take themselves out of God's equation. Before the deployment I wanted to shout at those people "IT'S NOT ABOUT YOU! It's about everyone you come into contact with. It's about all the lives you are going to change in the years to come. How dare you assume to know better." But all I could think of then was, "I want to feel. Why can't I feel? I want to feel. Why can't I feel?" Over and over again. I would never be able to contradict myself in such a way as to just end it all with a knife or some pills. My only solution (Foolish as it was) was to drive as fast and as wrecklessly as possible and hope to crash to my death.

Looking back on it, I still think I was being selfish. I had fallen into the category I despised most. The "Suicidal" category. I won't lie, I acknowledge the fact that some people are chemically imbalanced. I know that some people are in such agonizing self defeat that killing themselves seems to be the only rational solution. But then, there are the attention whores. The ones that tell you "I'm going to kill myself." And you get them help even though they would never have the gumption to go through with it. Pleading suicidal is a cry for help. That is one thing I have never succeeded at. Asking for help. If I couldn't do something by myself, I felt defeated and if it came to that I couldn't bring myself to ask for anyone's assistance. I was too stubborn and too proud to admit to anyone that I was inferior in such a way as to require outside support. After that incident, thought, I had to concede. I needed help. I had hidden my problems away from everyone for so long they'd piled on top of me and started to crush me. After pretending to be okay, pretending to be strong, only letting out little bits and pieces of any issues I had... all of it needed to stop. First step, hospital.

　

Most of the underenlisted in my company and even some of the NCOs believe what I did was to escape returning to Iraq. What they didn't know was that I had already tried to get help in Iraq. Tentatively, and with enough information to raise alarm. But, as the Combat Stress Counselor sat before me while I explained that every 15 odd minutes or so I was having flash images of extreme violence either done by myself to others around me or by myself to myself, that I wasn't trying to have any of these images and that they happened without prompting of any sort; She looked me in the eye and said "Oh, you just need to think more positively." According to my friend Todd (My driver) he had gotten the similar if not the exact same response after blatantly telling the woman "I'm feeling suicidal and I want to kill every motherf***ker on this post." It seems the only way to get their attention was to actually go through with what you told them, which Todd, I'm glad to say, never did. I refused to go back and be treated that way.

This is the first time I've written about all the things that happened. It's more for me than for you. If there's something you don't understand, I'm not surprised.

After weeks of inpatient hospital visits I was finally released with a bag of horse pills designed to keep me "stable". And they sort of did. To the point where I would doze off every three hours or so, making a drive from Vancouver, Washington to San Diego, California and then on to Killeen, Texas, normally a 2 day trip for me (I'd already done the exact same route twice) a six day escapade. Namely due to the fact that I had to pull over every three hundred miles because my meds were working a little too well.

I have spent the last seven months going to appointments, getting examined, being evaluated, and it wasn't until a few months ago when I took my treatment into my own hands that the medical practitioners finally admitted, on paper, that I was suffering from severe Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. The entire time before that they refused to call it as it was, and instead gave me the diagnosis "Acute Readjustment Disorder". It took my poking, prodding and generally annoying questions and galavanting to bring forward the true nature for my new self.

　

I've been attending a treatment program called Strong Star. (That's actually an acronym for something I just can't remember what it is.) The treatment program uses a method, "Prolonged Exposure", to re-program my brain almost. The idea is to revisit the memory of what gave me ptsd (The IED blast) over and over again until my rational side can start to realize that now I'm home and I don't need to be looking over my shoulder every three minutes. I have to submit myself to all the situations I've been avoiding. Going into crowds during the day, sitting in the middle of a restaurant instead of the corner or with a wall to my back, driving under an overpass without crossing into the next lane, going to places with loud noises and flashing lights, being more social... That may not sound like something difficult to you, but to me they're damn near the hardest things in the world.

Imagine when you walked into Wal-Mart on a Thursday afternoon, just as everyone is getting off work and picking up the daily necessities, that you instinctively feel you must look at every person and evaluate whether or not they pose a threat to you. Observe all of your immediate surroundings looking for what you can use as a weapon, where you can go for cover, and what ways you could exit the building should your original entrance become unpassable. To do that without prompting with that amount of people when you're just trying to pick up a carton of milk is damn near impossible. Up until a week ago I couldn't go into a Wal-Mart without having a miniature panic attack. Even now my heart rate always elevates, I feel as if I could pass out at any moment and my first instinct is to RUN. RUN NOW. Even with this little explanation I still can't convey the gravity of those effects. It's something you may never know unless you've been through a similar situation.

I do feel better now. Especially after that DUMP of information I just unloaded on you guys. I don't blame anyone who stopped reading. I don't particularly want anyone to read this anyway.

I'm tired. This is where I'll end today. Sorry for ranting.

No playlist right now.