PTSD and Guilt

[SoDesuKa]

Psychiatrists recognize the association between guilt and PTSD but they see guilt as a symptom of PTSD and not as a cause. They are trying to avoid the obvious - that people who do evil things in war feel guilty about it afterwards. The National Center for PTSD states:

Trauma often leads to feelings of guilt and shame. Many people blame themselves for things they did or didn't do to survive. For example, some assault survivors believe that they should have fought off an assailant, and blame themselves for the attack. Others feel that if they had not fought back they wouldn't have gotten hurt. You may feel ashamed because during the trauma you acted in ways that you would not otherwise have done. Sometimes, other people may blame you for the trauma ...

http://www.ncptsd.org/facts/disasters/fs_foa_handout.html

In claiming that guilt is the result of trauma rather than a source of trauma, they are ignoring the statements of combat veterans themselves. Veterans often correctly blame their feelings of guilt on actual guilt - how could it be otherwise?

The Iraq war was not a response to any threat to America - that was a lie Bush told to get us to sign on. When our soldiers go there and kill civilians by the thousands, they feel guilty. That feeling of guilt is traumatic.

This past June, Jeffrey Lucey, a 23-year old Marine veteran of the Iraq war, took his own life because he was unable to deal with his own guilt.

He never did tell his family the whole story of his experience in Iraq, only bits and pieces. It was horrific enough. He spoke of elderly people killed as they tried to run from Marines rolling into Nasariya.

He spoke of a small Iraqi boy, bloody and prone in the dusty street, shot in the head and the chest and still holding a small, bloodstained American flag in his hands. He spoke of his horror as an American tank lumbered down the street, how he had bolted from his own vehicle and, as gunfire rippled the sand around him, moved the tiny corpse to the sad sanctuary of a nearby alley ...

http://www.counterpunch.org/clinton10052004.html

[Tsiyu]

1. Very touching post SoDesuKa

You are correct. There is a particularly terrible position one can find one's person in: doing horrendous things because you're afraid of the horrendous things that will happen if you DON'T do those horrendous things.

Hard to explain, but when you fear for your life, the trigger of an automatic weapon is a great courage and morale booster - like a morphine pump.

Only after danger has passed can you fully assimilate what you've done. And that may not happen for many, many years.

Tonight, on Nightline, Koppeldunk asked the guest - a veteran war journalist who believes the Iraq war is being sanitized far too much ( damn but I forgot the name. Weir?) - this question: If we showed the raw reality of the Iraq war, wouldn't that ultimately lead to anarchy in the Middle East? As if the government would pull out of that Iraq war too quickly because of domestic opposition.

Why are the media so suddenly aware of their power and so afraid to wield it, when they were so goddamned cheerfully pushing all the limits to present the very same war as some sort of Sports Tournament?
Where did this sudden conscience come from?

Koppel's ending message was sent to Freepers everywhere:

"When you say we're being too negative ( in our war coverage) you don't know the half of it."

We know who you're trying to appease, Ted. Let it go. They will have a new talking point next week to fill up your e-mail inbox. Tell the truth. Show the truth. And stop asking childish rhetorical questions.