Do you Know the PTSD Signs,Triggers and Coping Strategies For IRAQI/AFGHAN COMBAT VETERANS ?

PTSD affects everyone differently, there is no cookie cutter signs / Issues / coping strategies

@dded; If you have not been over there you could not understand the stress of worrying about mortar rounds, rockets, VBEDS making it on base or some haji wanting to blow himself up and taking you with him on base. They have been able to get explosives in side the wire, All be it there is less chance of being killed on base in the war zone but it is possible.

Has previous person said it affects everyone a bit differently and is treated differently. Some factors that play into it are experiences, what occupation they had in the military, what was traumatic for them, what (if any) phobias they might of had, and such. For example, a soldier who was driving his humvee down the street and got hit by an IED that was covered by a dead animal might be set off by dead animals on the side of the street. From what I've heard, PTSD can sometimes make sense and sometimes be completely random with the triggers.

I haven't been in the military, but I have many relatives who have/had some form of PTSD. Usually what triggers it can vary, but it somehow it has to do with something related to what happened to them.

Coping strategies can also vary from the postive to...well....kind of bad. For example, all of my grandpa's (also a marine) friends were all killed on Okinawa. He copes with it by talking about it. He seems to want to, but I can tell that it still bothers them.

On the other hand, one of my grandma's brothers coped with his PTSD with drinking, because he had to liberate many concentration camps. It actually caused his death.

In the end, I think that we should give support to those whose suffer from it. We need to be able to understand that they have gone through hell and that we need to help them cope from it in whatever way possible so that less soldiers/marines/sailors/airmen have to resort to what my great-uncle did.

What sucks is when you know you got PTSD, but since it's not once episode that plays back, then it doesn't fit their oh so perfect criteria. Gah.