Home but Still Haunted

[spindrifter]

By Donna St. George
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, August 20, 2006

There are times when Trinette Johnson's life seems to stall, when she finds herself staring at the ceiling fan in her bedroom, watching the blades spin, her mind hung on nothing -- not her receptionist job, not her fiance, not her ailing father or her four children.

<snip>

The war, of course, is always there somewhere, she said, an unseen force in her life, sometimes producing moments of blank detachment, sometimes stirring up anger like nothing she has ever known.

More than two years after returning from duty in Iraq, she has found herself yelling and cursing at other drivers on the road. Panicked in crowds. Seized with fear at the sight of highway overpasses and tunnels that might suddenly explode.

<snip>

How women are affected after combat is only starting to be probed. This is the first war in which so many women have been so exposed to hostile fire, working a wider-than-ever array of jobs, for long deployments.

<more>

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/08/19/AR2006081900353.html

[TomInTib]

1. At the risk of sounding crass..

What the hell was this woman doing in the military?

from the article:

'None of the children lived with their fathers.

"Mommy! Mommy!" her youngest daughter, then 2, shrieked during a visit in Falls Church, climbing all over her.

Johnson had been a mother since she had her son at age 14. Now she felt overwhelmed. She rose to leave.'

She was bound to suffer, war or no.

And before anyone bites my head off, I am a combat vet who is just now beginning to struggle with issues from 35 years ago.

[Monkeyman]

2. Welcome home and to the world of PTSD

Vets from our era are starting to get the nightmare and the other crap we are remembering times gone by dam TV

[TomInTib]

3. Glad to be here...

but I am fucking pissed off.

Let's just shake it loose, Monkeyman.

Thanks for that PM the other day.

Tom

[spindrifter]

4. Maybe she got cut off the

five years of public assistance she was eligible for--maybe she thought she would get training so she could get a decent job. No one is biting off heads, Tom. This is another illustration of how this administration has had its fingers in stirring up a lot of sh*t for the common people.

[AbsoluteArmorer]

5. displacement

A common reaction when returning back home from a war zone is feeling so displaced for so long. Nothing seems real. Things seems to have changed. Then those wicked triggers that does set a veteran off back in the world in it's own special ways. This lady and 100s of 1000s of future war vets better get used to it for her/their life has/will changed forever. Lets hope the VA will continue to give some medical attention for them.... not that it really 'fixes' things.