Iraq, Afghanistan War Veterans Struggle With Combat Trauma

Adapted and excerpted from the Huffington Post, 7/4/2012

Before her life fell apart, before suicide began to sound like sweet release, Natasha Young was a tough and spirited and proud Marine. …

She went to war twice, the last time five years ago in western Iraq with a close-knit team of Marines who disabled IEDs, roadside bombs. It was nonstop work, dangerous, highly stressful and exhausting. Six of the Marines were killed in bomb blasts, each death a staggering gut-punch to the others. After they returned home the commander took his own life. Staff Sgt. Young broke down, too, spent physically, emotionally and mentally. Eventually, she was diagnosed with post traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and, last October, was medically discharged from the Corps.

Having been a strong warrior, now she simply couldn't function. "I was ashamed of myself," she says in a whisper at her home in Haverhill, Mass.

Young is one of a generation of 2.4 million Americans who fought in Iraq or Afghanistan, many of whom are coming back profoundly changed by what combat veteran andauthor Karl Marlantesdescribed as the "soul-battering experience" of war.

The shock of war, of course, is hardly new. But now the cascade (large number) of combat veterans from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars is forcing mental health practitioners to a new recognition: the effects of combat trauma extend far beyond the traditional and narrow clinical diagnoses of PTSD and traumatic brain injury (TBI). The current crop of veterans is at risk of a "downward spiral" that leads to depression, substance abuse and sometimes suicide. …

Like others leaving the ranks, Natasha Young's struggles with her psychological and emotional storms were compounded by the sudden decompression (release) from the intensity of combat service. No one back home in the civilian world understood what she had gone through, or what she was going through.

"Out here," she says, "you realize how different you are from people who haven't served."

How to express the rage and sorrow of survivor's guilt — that a soldier couldn't save a wounded buddy, that a squad leader didn't bring all his guys home safe?

How to share the agony of a Marine platoon leader who is severely injured and … [is removed] from the men he had vowed to protect?

Outside the Marine Corps, severed [separated] from others with the same experiences, Young [fell apart]. She was 31, a single mom, and sick. Her Harley gathered dust in the garage. She stopped writing poetry. "I couldn't cope," she says. "I felt so scared.”

"I think my son kept me from clicking off ‘safe' more times than I'd care to admit," she confides, referring to the temptation to turn off her weapon's safety mechanism and end her life.

On the chart below, compare the experiences of the fictional character, Charley Goddard, and Natasha Young, a real-life veteran of the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan.

Charley Goddard / Natasha Young
What was the war experience like for each?
Why were they sent home?
What happened when they came home?

Natasha Young states that when she returned from war, “she couldn’t cope” and that having been a strong warrior, she was “ashamed of herself” because she couldn’t function. She had the feeling that no one “realized what she was going through.” This caused her to have suicidal feelings.

How do Mrs. Young’s feelings help us to understand why Charley decided to kill himself? What do you think led Charley to end his life?