Tag Archives: fear

Memories and Afghanistan

My memory is horrible. It has been for a while. I missed my most recent appointment with my psychologist because I forgot what day it is. Forgetting what day it is happens to me frequently, but missing an appointment, or even being late, is absolutely not normal. It’s not just days, but also months and years. I sometimes have to confirm what year it is because I’m not sure. Not long ago I was at my kid’s school filling out a form for one of them. I filled it out, signed and dated it, and gave it back to the lady at the desk. She looked it over, handed it back, and asked that I correct the date before she put her notary stamp on it. I looked at the date I wrote and asked was it not the 21st? She said, “It’s the 21st. It’s just not September.” It was February. I had no idea why I thought it was September.

I’m not sure why, but I can remember things like numbers, movie lines, songs, years that something significant happened in history, baseball statistics, directions (most of the time), and a bunch of other trivial nonsense. I would make some money on the game show Jeopardy. But other things in my memories seem to escape my mental grasp. For some things it’s like a blank slate. It annoys me, but I’ve gotten used to it. It has become part of my new normal.

In the last meeting with my psychologist I remembered something that I had previously completely forgotten. The memory was triggered when we were discussing an event that happened between therapy sessions. An event that had me pissed off to the point that I almost got into a physical altercation with someone. I wanted to. I really wanted that guy to get out of his car and give me a real reason to get out of mine. I would have likely done permanent damage to the individual. I just needed him to start the physical aggression. He had already started the verbal attack. But I didn’t let myself get baited into it, even though I really wanted to. Short of the story was this guy was trying to exit a one lane, one-way, entrance only driveway to the school, as school was ending. Imagine the traffic piling up on the road behind me as I had no place to go. It was getting chaotic, especially in my head. Being trapped like that isn’t the best scenario for someone with PTSD.

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The memory that was brought on by this event was something that happened in Afghanistan. I was in Kabul, going from my base to one called Phoenix with the USFOR-A chaplain team (my unit eventually stopped letting me go on missions with them, but that’s a whole different story). I was in the front passenger seat of an up-armored NTV (non-tactical vehicle). It was only me and the driver in the lead vehicle and two others in the rear vehicle. The driver and I were having a normal conversation like we usually did. Probably talking about going to Green Beans or Pizza Hut. Our base didn’t have those kinds of things, so when we traveled we always talked about what we were going to treat ourselves to. Here’s how the conversation ended up going:

     Driver: “Shit, we took the wrong road.”

     Me: “Maybe this one comes back out where we can get back on the other one.”

     A few second go by as we come around a curve to a pickup truck in the road with 8-10 pissed-off-looking dudes in the back with AK-47s.

     Me: “Turn around, man. Turn the fuck around!”

     Driver: “I’m trying, there’s no spot.”

     Me: “Make one!”

     The men took notice of us, although they made no aggressive moves. We immediately made a place to turn around. They probably thought we looked stupid and laughed after we left the area.

     Driver: “I don’t think they’re going to bother us, they would already be coming after us by now.”

     Me: “You think they’ll give us directions?”

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I had completely forgotten about that event until my therapy session a couple weeks ago. I wonder what else is trapped in my head that I don’t remember. It was a weird feeling to have that memory come back like that. I clearly remember that day now, but for the last couple years it’s like it never existed. It’s not uncommon for most of the Afghans to have AK-47s. But to see a group of men in the back of a truck that looked like they were organizing for something and ready to go, on a road we weren’t supposed to be on was a bit unnerving at the time. It certainly can lend some explanation to me feeling uncomfortable in stand-still traffic. As long as we’re moving, I’m ok. But long stops with a lot of other vehicles around makes me nervous. That’s what happened with the jackass going the wrong way out the entrance, I felt trapped.

I have thoughts in my head that I’m not sure sometimes if they are part of a memory of an event or part of a dream I’ve had. Maybe both. But I know I miss my memory. Well, I think I do. I guess I don’t really know, do I? LOL. I make a lot of jokes about my memory not being so great anymore. I can’t remember shit sometimes, but at least I can laugh about it. I’ve rescheduled my appointment with the psychologist for next week. Don’t let me forget.

Thanks for reading. Good day, God bless.

Dave

Helicopter Ride

I’ve had two deployments, one to Iraq and one to Afghanistan. Those two deployments could not be more different from one another. My Afghanistan deployment (2013-2014) was exciting, dangerous, and filled with travel all over the country. My Iraq deployment (2008-2009), on the other hand, was relatively boring. I spent the majority of my time behind a desk or visiting with troops on the base. There was very little excitement at Camp Bucca, which at the time was the largest Theater Interment Facility in the world. Besides going home on leave for two weeks about half way through the deployment, I only got to leave the base on one mission. Only one. It was a boring deployment, but in some respects that’s not a bad thing. And only once during my time in Iraq did I think that it might be possible I could die over there. Here’s that story.

I was on my way back to Iraq, returning from being home on leave for two weeks. I was delayed in Kuwait for two or three extra days waiting on transportation. It wasn’t the best place to be stuck, but it was almost relaxing to be able to recover from my time off before having to get back to work it in Iraq. I slept a lot between checking with the travel team responsible for getting people from Point A to Point B. If I remember correctly, we had to check in once a day at a certain time. If there wasn’t any transportation to where I was going, I would go back in 24 hours. Boredom set in pretty quickly, but that was cured with naps.

Finally, after a couple days of waiting, I had a helicopter flight going to Camp Bucca. It was actually three CH-47 Chinooks, which we affectionately called Shithooks. All three helicopters were filled to capacity with personnel and gear.  All of us were going to the same place, a direct flight. I was in the last helicopter of the formation. We took off and headed north. I love flying in helicopters. It’s one of my favorite things I’ve done in the military.

The helicopter I was on didn’t seem to keep up with the other two. I could see the other two flying higher. I could feel mine ‘slipping’ like it was not wanting to stay in the air, like it would drop a few feet then go back up. I watched the tail gunner leave his position, talking to the pilots through his radio. The tail gunner opened a side panel above a passenger across from me and looked inside. He fiddled with some gadgets and reported to the pilots over the radio. All the while I could feel the helicopter doing its best to stay in the air, slipping and climbing, slipping and climbing. The guy next to me was fast asleep.

The tail gunner then moved to the center of the aircraft, climbing to the top off all the duffle bags and opened another panel in the ceiling. He banged on some pipes and fixtures with his fist, shook his head, and kept talking to the pilots over the radio. I could see just the slightest concern in the tail gunner’s face, but nothing alarming. I could see the other two helicopters were considerably higher than mine. I guess the good news would be that we would not fall as far from our lower position. The bad news would be that we were in closer range for small arms fire if there were anyone out there that wanted to take a shot. I watched all this, taking it all in, repositioning my body so that if we did have to make a hard landing or crash, my spine might not be broke in two. All this while the guy next to me slept peacefully.

Eventually we made it to our destination, the helicopter I was on did land somewhat hard, just short of the landing pad, then rolled up on to it. We gathered our gear and exited out the rear of the Chinook. I had to wake up the guy next to me and let him know we arrived. The other two helicopters took off after  being emptied of passengers and gear, but the one I was on stayed on the ground. It would be there until the next day when a repair crew could take a look at it. I don’t remember the exact statistics, but I do remember that most U.S. military deaths involving helicopters in Iraq during that time were due to malfunctions, poor maintenance, or weather, as opposed to enemy engagements. I’m glad I didn’t get to see that play out.

I wasn’t worried about dying, but I was aware that I was in a position that it could happen, even if only remotely. It didn’t bother me, it was more surreal than anything, watching the tail gunner lose a little confidence in the aircraft. This is actually one of the stories I like to tell, probably because the rest of my deployment to Iraq was so boring. The one thing I kept thinking about during the flight was whether or not I should wake up the guy sitting next to me. If we were going to crash, would he want to know in advance? Would it freak him out? Would he be upset if we crashed and I hadn’t woken him? Yep, those are the things that went through my mind during the time that it was possible we might fall out of the sky. It’s kind of weird, right? Would I want to wake up in that situation? Would you? I feel like that situation for me was more of a moral dilemma than a life or death situation. Did I have any kind of duty to the guy next to me to wake him up? I still don’t know the answer to that. But that does remind me of a funny story of being at Bagram, Afghanistan, in a tent, half asleep. In my groggy state I heard a whining generator or truck or something along with large shipping containers being moved and banged around. I woke everyone else up in the tent thinking we were under attack again. False alarm.

My different doctors and counselors over the last 9 months agree that my PTSD most likely started in Iraq, but I am certain the helicopter ride is not the genesis of it. There were other things far worse in Iraq than that helicopter ride that I can trace my PTSD to, images that sometimes are front and center when I close my eyes, even though I try to not remember them. Then add to that all the excitement from Afghanistan. I spent years denying I suffered from PTSD. I know now how bad that was for me. Bad for me that I wouldn’t admit to suffering from it. It almost cost me my life last year. I wouldn’t say I necessarily embrace having PTSD, but I definitely embrace the freedom I feel from talking about it, writing about it, and accepting it. I can’t change it, I can only learn to live with it and continue to tell my story.

Thanks for taking the time to read Story of My Life. Good day, God bless.

Dave

The Fear in the Eyes

During my time in Afghanistan I went on almost thirty missions from my home base. Sometimes to other bases within Kabul, sometimes to the opposite end of the country. We traveled in a variety of ways, including up-armored, non-tactical vehicles (NTVs), helicopters, and airplanes. On one mission that was very close to our home base, we walked. That was a wonderful experience, despite almost being run over by a motorcycle. I recorded the whole walk my camera that I strapped to my body armor. I found out later that the unit I was part of was not authorized to walk outside the gates. That caused quite a stir, eventually brining on policies and memos that everyone in our unit was made aware of, which ultimately changed the procedure by which our unit traveled when leaving the base. Some people work on policy change, I actually caused it.

For almost every trip we went on there was always some cause for concern. Travel is dangerous enough in Afghanistan, not to mention some of the places we visited were more targeted by the enemy than my home base. My home base was actually fairly safe compared to most other places over there. Most trips that took us out of Kabul resulted in taking shelter in a bunker at some point, sometimes on multiple occasions each day. The most explosions I heard in any one attack were seven, at a base in the far western edge of Afghanistan, not far from the Iranian border. Trips to Bagram would often also include hearing small arms fire coming from somewhere off base, usually in the evenings.

Very few things I experienced over there bothered me at the time. There was something normal about it. We were there to do a job and the enemy would try to kill us, if that’s normal. To be honest, I miss that normal, it was easier than my new normal. But there was one event over where that it occurred to me that I might possibly not make it home in one piece. During one attack when I was at Kandahar Air Field, the explosions were getting close. The first one shook the building pretty good that I was in, but not the closest boom I had ever felt. Soon after, the second one came in, shaking things off the shelves making a mess on the floor. That one, at the time, might have been the closest boom I ever felt. I ran outside, still getting my gear on, headed for the bunker. The third explosion was close. Most definitely the closest explosion I have ever felt. The enemy was ‘walking them in.’ From the mountains, they would fire, watch where it landed, then fire again, getting closer with each munition launched. I remember thinking that if there were a fourth one coming in, it would be right on top of me.

Even in that experience, I was ok for the most part. I don’t think it bothered me until much later, after I had returned home. Yes, it was a little scary. But even that was not the worst fear I experienced in Afghanistan. Without giving classified details, my home base was second on the list of a very credible threat within Kabul. The top target on the list was across the street. If the threat ended up being manifested and carried out, our base would have been wiped out completely. It was just another day to most of us. There was always some threat from somewhere about something, and always aimed at us. It was the life we lived, we got used to it. It was our normal and this threat didn’t really bother me any more or less than any of the others.

What did bother me is how leadership reacted to the threat, one person in particular. I always resisted wearing my body armor when I could get away with it, unless I didn’t have a choice. I always felt more comfortable being able to move around if needed. I also didn’t wear my seatbelt in the convoys unless we were still on a base. There was just something calming to me about being able to move without restraint. One evening, during the colossal threat, I was walking back to my room, without my body armor on, of course. One of our leaders asked me why I wasn’t wearing my gear. I explained to him my desire to remain unencumbered. When he ordered me to wear my gear if I were to be outside I could see fear in his eyes. The man seemed to have no confidence. I could hear the distress in his voice. I had never seen him like that before and to be honest, I lost a little respect for him. He was a good man, had always had an air of confidence about him, and was a good leader. I liked him. But you cannot be a leader at that level and show that kind of fear. His anxiety about the threat was so obvious that it had a more negative effect on me than any of the other life threatening things that we encountered in Afghanistan. If he wasn’t confident, how could I be? It was psychological. Seeing his fear was more daunting to me than any physical harm that I might have faced. Being scared is normal. But when you lack any confidence and it shows to that extent, you have failed as leader.

Other people watch you and their emotions can be persuaded by how you handle a situation. It’s ok to be scared. It’s ok to admit when you’re scared. But when you let fear control you, you fail. Bravery does not mean you don’t get scared, it means you do what you have to do with confidence anyway. To me, it was a lot easier to manage my fears in Afghanistan than it was after I got home. I knew what to be fearful of there. At home my own mind had become my biggest fear. And I let my fear of my thoughts consume me and it almost cost me my life. I was scared of myself, for good reason. I now have a whole new set of fears that I never experienced before. But I’m getting my confidence back in myself and learning how to deal with it. It’s a bumpy road, but counseling is helping and writing has become my best therapy.  Don’t let fear destroy your life.

Thank you for reading Story of My Life. As I said, I write for my own therapy, I share in case it helps someone else. Feel free to share this. Follow this blog for weekly updates if you want.

Good day, God bless.

Dave