Almost 31 percent of Vietnam veterans are affected by post traumatic stress disorder also known as PTSD. In the book The things they carried by Tim O’brien he writes about his stories from Vietnam war. The effect of war are also heard in the television program by This American life interviewing families of soldiers and the soldiers themselves. There is also a radio interview from Frontline that talks about some of the impacts after war. In the Personal Interview I had with Steve McHale a veteran from the Operation of Iraqi Freedom he told me his experiences from war. The impacts of war are loneliness, suicide, guilt, and communication. An impacts soldiers and their families have to deal with during war is loneliness. In the book O’Brian couldn't …show more content…
In my interview with Steve McHale a veteran from the Operation Iraqi Freedom talked about how powerful communication can be. He said that whenever a soldier died all their communication was cut off. When I asked McHale “What was something that impacted you during war” he answered “ A lot of things are probably the worst was when you're off and on the phone or a computer end it gets cut off because one of your brothers in the arms died. all communication outside the country Get it off until the family of the service member are notify through proper channels.” (McHale). This shows that even though they are close to the other men in their rank they still want to talk to their families. Even though they cannot see their family in person they still want to talk to them because their family give them happiness. The problem about not having good communication is that families don't know how to help you. Rat Kiley the medic from O’Brien rank. Was talking to the other men about the girls back home and he said “they’ll never understand any of this, not in a billion years.Try to tell them about it, they’ll just stare at you with those big round eyes”(O’Brien 108). When soldiers come back home people don't know how to treat them and when they tell war stories the are shocked. Nobody knows what to say to them. In conclusion being able to not communicate can affect
Problem that the Vietnamese war veterans faced was the psychological effects which was very common for Vietnam veterans to have. The main cause of this is because it was different compared to other wars in the past like the condition that the soldiers were in. Studies has shown that a World War II soldiers experienced up to a total of 60 days under combat like conditions. A Vietnam infantryman endured on a comparable basis 300+ days therefore Vietnam veterans have more likely to develop psychological problems than a World War II veteran. (POSTTRAUMATIC STRESS DISORDER (PTSD), 2001)
PTSD is a disorder in which a person has difficulty recovering after experiencing or witnessing a terrifying event.The following three characters, Norman Bowker, Azar, and Rat Kiley in The Things They Carried exemplify post-traumatic stress disorder tremendously in the book.Additionally, they weren’t eligible to work due to the hardships of the Vietnam War. Rat Kiley starts to see people around him dying. Rat Kiley experienced a passing of his close friend Curt Lemon. Firstly, Rat’s PTSD is exemplified greatly after Curt’s death, Rat Kiley kills a baby water buffalo. Therefore, this is an excellent example of how he has PTSD. Rat Kiley mainly wanted to take his frustration and pain out on the buffalo. Norman has made it home after the war,
O 'Brien illustrates to us the necessity for each man to be connected to their old life, telling a story of Mark Fossie flying in his girlfriend to ease his loneliness (104-05). Each soldier found himself facing insurmountable barriers throughout the war, and these small effects and coping mechanisms were often the only necessity that would give them reason to return home again. They needed personal methods of coping with the war, and this primeval survival was the only way to remain a man.
Being in war is definitely one of the most life changing events a person will ever have whether it be for the better or for the worst. Soldiers will witness events that are impossible to forget or see back at home in the states. Some soldiers may have even seen one of their best friends that they’ve known for forever get blown up into pieces right next to them, or they might even get one of their own limbs blown off of their own bodies, becoming handicapped for life. As a result of seeing something so intense like that, most soldiers are usually traumatized. In matter of fact, a great amount of soldiers are traumatized from the very beginning of being in war. It’s without a doubt difficult to deal with this but there are some ways where
Introduction: In order to stop the spread of communism, America joined the vietnam war. Many young men were drafted into this war, with no other options but to go or to be arrested. Many were terrified to go into the war, and tried to flee the United States. The main problem was not even just during the vietnam war, it was after the war was over and troops were sent home. This problem was known as shell shock, or what we now call Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Throughout the turmoil and pain of the Vietnam war, many young soldiers were emotionally distraught and treated poorly in their return home, each with their own load to bear.
The impact of the Vietnam War upon the soldiers who fought there was huge. The experience forever changed how they would think and act for the rest of their lives. One of the main reasons for this was there was little to no understanding by the soldiers as to why they were fighting this war. They felt they were killing innocent people, farmers, poor hard working people, women, and children were among their victims. Many of the returning soldiers could not fall back in to their old life styles. First they felt guilt for surviving many of their brothers in arms. Second they were haunted by the atrocities of war. Some soldiers could not go back to the mental state of peacetime. Then there were soldiers Tim O’Brien meant while in
Tim O’Brien wrote many novels including the mysterious fiction novel, In the Lake of the Woods but is mostly known for his most popular novel The Things They Carried. In the Lake of the Woods is a novel about a couple who recently rented a cabin that is near a lake to get away from everyone and everything that is wrong with their lives. John Wade, who was running for U.S. Senate, lost the election due to his past actions in the Vietnam War at My Lai. Kathleen Wade is the spouse of John Wade, who supported john in every way for his dream of becoming a U.S. Senate. The story shows the struggle a Vietnam veteran has to go through to live a normal life. O’Brien, once again, brought the repugnant Vietnam War back into one of his novels but this
According to Bender, about 470,000 of the approximately three million men who served in Vietnam are current cases of PTSD. Women who served as nurses, about 7,000 of them have also been found to suffer from this disorder (Bender 147). It is beyond imaginable the magnitude of how many men, women, children, and Vietnamese that have been affected by this one war. In recent research findings conducted by the National Center of PTSD, four out of five veterans struggle with PTSD twenty to twenty-five years later (Price).
The findings showed that Vietnam Veterans with PTSD: Got divorced twice as much, were three times more likely to divorce two or more times, and tended to have shorter relationships. (VA Partners). Family Violence also increased in spouses with PTSD
It doesn't just stop at physically injuries, many were also affected by mental disorders.. Over 10 thousand people was affected with some kind of mental disorder during vietnam, with one of the most common ones being PTSD (posttraumatic stress disorder). PTSD affects the way people experience life after experiencing dramatic events, like war. It affects people differently, and our triggered by different things. Loud noises, flashing lights, are just a couple examples of things that can trigger people that have
Many American soldiers who returned home from the Vietnam War had psychological damage, which today is commonly referred to as PTSD. In an interview one such soldier, Larry Colburn, he mentions his experience when seeking
As the Vietnam War began preventative measures were being taken to decrease the psychological impact of war on soldiers. Unfortunately as the war ended soldiers were often met with hostile demonstrations by anti-war activists and society offered little acceptance of Vietnam veterans even years after the war. This is when early studies on PTSD and the effects on military families began being documented. Early research showed that PTSD can have devastating, far-reaching consequences on the patients functioning, relationships,
T. Stecker, J. Fortney, F. Hamilton, and I. Ajzen, 2007, address that mental health symptoms have the likelihood to increase within post deployment for military veterans, especially for the ones who have seen combat. An estimated quarter of recent war veterans who are currently receiving care in the Department of Veteran Affairs (VA) Health Care System have reported mental health problems. Soldiers who have served in Iraq come home suffering from depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). The Statistics of Iraq soldiers meeting the criteria for depression, anxiety, and posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) is greater than the soldiers who served in Afghanistan. The mental health symptom rates for soldiers who served in Iraq were as high as 20% for PTSD, 18% for anxiety, and 15% for depression.
“When I was in serious danger I was almost completely paralysed by fear, I remember sitting with a coffin (a fellow soldier) on the fire-step of a trench during an intense bombardment, when it seemed certain that we must be killed”(The Psychological Effects Of The Vietnam War). Our soldiers that we send to war to protect us against the countries trying to harm us are put into dangerous situations that affect them physically and mentally and leave them with permanent damage to their minds and bodies. The server damage that our military soldiers faced when returning from war is PTSD which stands for post traumatic stress disorder and is the most common disorder that returning soldiers are diagnosed with , but a more tragic diagnosis from war
A study conducted by Johnson, Lubin and Rosenheck (1997) on Vietnam War soldiers concluded that stress experienced from loneliness ,angry and resentful feelings had a causal effect on soldiers diagnosed with PTSD who felt detached from the society.