A Future With PTSD
As he drives down 610 in his big Ford Truck, with all cars and eighteen wheelers around him, he feels at ease for the time being. The sun is shining in the clear blue sky and as he brings a smirk to his face, he knows very soon he will be entering the Heights area, where his one year old son and father live. But his mood takes a complete 180, when he sees an old, dirty van pull up right next to him on the busy highway. Just the sight of the vehicle starts to make him hyperventilate and that’s when his mind is consumed by yet another flashback. He remembers a similar van in Afghanistan with a man opening the side door and shooting back at him and another soldier with a machine gun. He then looks to the other soldier next to him, who now has a reconfigured face. He awakes from his flashback and pops an anxiety pill into his mouth and tries to collect himself, so he doesn’t have a wreck.
With Specialist Max’s PTSD, he has had to succumb to taking many medications like Paxil, Zantacs, etc., each prescribed for either his insomnia, depression, or anxiety, along with the Ultram (a pain killer) he uses for his knee and back pain. Still he remains hopeful that his future will not be dampened by the endless amounts of meds he will be taking for, more than likely, the rest of his life.
What keeps Specialist Max positive about his future are two things. One is being able to raise his son again the other also finally having the opportunity to attend college.
“I want to go to college, I want to meet the expectations of my family like my brother did,” Specialist Max said. “Now that I am on the verge of being medically discharged, hopefully I’ll be starting school this fall semester at UH. I’m looking forward to getting back to the path that I’ve always wanted to take.”
Once at the University of Houston, Specialist Max hopes to get a degree in teaching, preferably becoming a history teacher like his father. Though his mindset is pointed in the right direction, he still worries about his PTSD getting in the way. Namely his anxiety, which makes it difficult for him to cope with big open spaces and crowds of people, two things that a university consists of.
“I can’t stand being in a room with more than ten people,” he said. “But that’s where my Paxil (anxiety medication), comes in.”
Paxil, an anti-depression medication that he takes for both depression and anxiety, is more or less helping him with his PTSD. Along with the countless other meds that he takes, he feels he has become a “walking pharmacy,” as he put it. Taking over ten pills a day just so he can get through something as simple as going to a class or to a grocery store. Though the pills are helping him control the flashbacks and night terrors that come with the territory of his PTSD, he knows the meds will never actually cure this disorder.
“According to my doctors, I will be like this for the rest of my life,” he said. “I was in Afghanistan for fifteen months and the PTSD will be by my side till the end.”
Specialist Max will more than likely have to see a therapist for the rest of his life as well. Right now he sees a therapist each week. Each of his sessions leads to more medications, as does his visits to his regular doctor, who prescribes him pain killers.
The combination of all of the medications will at times cause him to be drowsy. Turning him off to reality at times, Specialist Max becomes unattached when he is forced to take a lot of meds at the same time. Basically he has to make a choice when it is time to take his meds for the day. Whether to go through the day drug free but also run the risk of having an anxiety attack out in public, or succumb to taking his medications and become an emotionless person, who is more like a zombie really. But according to him, he prefers meds over freaking out any day of the week.
“Zombie is working out pretty good for me,” he said with a little smile.
For the years to come he knows things won’t be easy, especially as his son gets older and sees what the war has done to his father. He has even contemplated what he would say to his son, if someday he thought of joining the army.
“Hell no,” he said. “I wouldn’t be able to bare that burden.”
