I served with Bravo Company 367th
Combat Engineer Battalion.
I had a fiance right when I got back and
ended up getting married.
And I had known her for a while before.
But I think that with my deployment, I became a little
bit of a different person and just maybe had a different
view on life.
And maybe what we had in common before we didn't
necessarily have in common after.
But we never really took the time to, I think, get to know
each other again, which is I think something you almost
have to do.
And so, unfortunately, we got married.
That didn't work out.
And so, I think it was probably about right after
that time that everything kind of compiled up, if you will,
in terms of just maybe some anxieties and everything.
It was around the summertime, and there must have been a
commercial or something about fireworks or something.
And of course, the noise they decided to play on the radio
was the whistling sound, which is very
similar to an incoming.
Obviously, it was just background noise, but heard
that noise.
The hairs on my neck stood up, and I was getting ready to
jump into a corner.
After the fact, I almost had to laugh it off.
Luckily, there wasn't anybody around to see.
But just a little embarrassing, but also a
little piece of reality, which made me realize that, yeah,
I'm still--
I'm definitely not adjusted.
And there's still something up here that I've been trained to
do or how to react.
And that was still in there.
When I decided to go back to college and try and finish up
my schooling, I went to go check in with
one of the main buildings.
And I remember seeing--
what it was was a couple of wires that were running along
the front steps of this main building to a garbage bag.
And I mean, instantly it's like, I'm looking around
wondering, where are these wires coming from?
And what's this plastic bag?
I mean, that's the exact definition of what we were
trying to avoid or take care of.
And I went into the building immediately to the front desk
and was like, there's a couple of wires going
to a bag out there.
Has anybody checked that out?
And the guy was like, oh, it's just some sort of card reader
for book sales or something like that.
On the VA side of things, they help me out a lot with the
schooling, I guess to go back to that.
When I did decide to go back to college, the VA was there,
and I did utilize, obviously, those
resources, which was great.
That helped take a lot off of maybe the financial side.
And also, just mentally figuring out, OK, I do have
some other options for my future in terms of a career
after the military.
Look for whatever help and get whatever you can.
I mean, both in terms of education--
it's one of the reasons or one of the benefits that are there
because we join.
I mean, it obviously shouldn't be the main reason.
But the VA is there to help both on the education side and
obviously on the mental health side.
It's not a bad thing to talk to others and to get that
support that you need.
Because we're human.
There's only so much that each of us is only meant to bear on
our shoulders alone.
And so that's why we have each other.
So whether it's friends, family, or
a VA support counselor.
I mean, for me, it was faith as well as family and friends
that really truly helped get me through.
Obviously, it's not like everything's cured or better
all at once.
But it gets you on that path.
And that's a start.