Tim O'Brien writes how throughout the war, "They carried all the emotional baggage of men who might die. They carried shameful memories. They carried the common secret of cowardice barely restrained, the instinct to run or freeze or hide" (O'Brien, 21). Having to return to normal society after experiencing the hideous faces of war was not an easy task. For many veterans it proved to be more than they could handle.
PTSD Analysis Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is a hot button topic in today’s world because many soldiers come home from war and do not receive the proper health care they deserve. Each day normal human beings encounter stress; it is inevitable to avoid it. For Brendon Burgess, a member of our United States Army, he experienced a whole new level of stress that we can not begin to imagine, now called PTSD. Upon many soldiers, like Brendon, returning to “normalcy” back home is easier said than done. He and his fellow soldiers encounter many physical and mental problems while transitioning back from combat into our environment.
“For centuries we have seen casualties of war; soldiers who have had various physical injuries and scars that last a lifetime (Stan Tian).” This can tear a soldier’s life apart and even his family and that’s a huge struggle that some veterans must go through every day, it’s not just physical injuries but mental illnesses as well. “Yet until the 20th century little was known about the emotional effects of war on soldiers and it wasn't until soldiers were studied psychologically that we began to understand what had happened to them” ( Stan Tian). Tian explains how war can affect you and he gives a lot of information on the topic of physical and mental disabilities in regards to combat. Stan Tian is a psychologist and studies mental health and helps people cope with and understand about the effects of war such as PTSD. Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a psychiatric disorder in which someone experiences something that is life threatening, a serious accident, terrorist attack, sexual assault, etc.
The emotion that probably weights the most on these men is fear. This fear comes from many sources. The men are constantly haunted by the fear that they may die. Ted Lavender’s death and how the men react to it show it is impact on the soldiers. Kiowa expresses the sense of weight that the threat of death has on the men when he describes Labander’s death, “Boom Down, he said.
All Quiet on the Western Front is a novel dictating a view of World War I from the German’s side. Paul Baumer was the original narrator until the final page in which he passes. Before his passing the book showed a detailed account of his psychological hardships. The book shows these hardships in many ways, but the three that stood out to me were his time at the front, dealing with the new recruitments, and the many deaths of the soldiers. In all actuality “the front” seemed to be the most difficult for Paul to endure, it brought about several pains that burdened his mind and changed his outlook on life.
For example, when soldiers come back from war, 22% of these soldiers suffer an unrecoverable long term phase of PTSD and sometimes the inability to work or function normally ever again. In his text A Long Way Gone, Ishmael Beah shows how the cost of surviving war often requires the dismantling of one's humanity, and what it takes to recover it. He displays this through his use of character development and flashbacks. But despite his notion, he doesn't address what happened to those who didn't make it back either physically or mentally and why it is that he could recover but they could not. How Beah develops his written characters allows the reader to see clear images of the changes that they have gone through via the war experience.
As they re-emerge into civilization, they struggle to establish a personal identity or a place in society because they lack the proper education or job skills. In addition, there are no supportive groups to help them find their way, which makes them feel even more isolated, unappreciated, and exploited for serving their country. This scenario is similar to what many Vietnam veterans have felt in their transition from battle to home, and as a result, they faced many struggles in their post-war lives. War has always had a profound effect on those who
Plodding blood from lungs that once you had the chance to laughter, talk, kisses. Many of the sights which will hang the soldiers are not what the officials have ordered them to do but what they have done to save their own lives. It is the tragedy of war that you are not able to stop to help a dying man. What do you expect, it is a war. Millions of people are involved in armed conflicts in the world today.
Joshua Wiggs Mr. Wellen English 3 18 November 2012 The Effects of War There are men dying today that do not even know what they are fighting for or why. Fighting for your country is an honorable thing but the government officials sitting behind their desks do not understand the sacrifices like the soldiers do. In the novel Johnny Got His Gun by Dalton Trumbo, the main character Joe Bonham is faced with the grim reality of suffering the effects of war. He is in critical condition in the begging of the book and is left with no limbs, deaf, blind, and mute. Throughout the book he continually tries to fight the pain of the lonely feeling.
Although the veterans had extensive training that prepared them for the war, no amount of training could ever prepare them for the emotional consequences that followed the war, including adjustment back into society. Majority of veterans suffered traumatic stress, often having flashbacks, and nightmares of killing people, seeing their fellow soldiers die, the loss of lives, and the pain and