Physical Injuries And Psychological Effects: Trauma Of A Soldier - Essay Example

Physical Injuries And Psychological Effects: Trauma Of A Soldier Introduction Soldiers go through a lot of trauma when they return home form a battle front. A number of factors contribute to this trauma. The fact that their lives have changed totally through experiences in the war, physical injuries and psychological effects and their inability to fit well into a peaceful society contributes a lot to trauma. One of the most common problems affecting war veterans is the condition called Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (Gregory 34). This and other conditions result in a lot of complications which sometimes cause marginalization in the life of the affected soldier. This essay presents a discussion on the war veteran as a marginalized person. Featured in the essay is a novel, a poem and another work of art. While in battle, most of the times, the soldiers kill and physically injure their enemy soldiers. Because of circumstances they destroy the live of many human beings. Killing fellow human beings causes a lot of sorrow to soldiers. Enemy soldiers are human beings and killing them has psychological effects on the soldiers responsible. Therefore, while in war, soldiers are accustomed to witnessing the deaths of many people almost on daily basis. Besides witnessing the deaths of their enemy soldiers, they are also grieved by the suffering, injuries and deaths of soldiers in their team (Stewart 67). These situations result in depression on these soldiers. Death disturbs their minds and deprives them of peace. At the same time when they are overwhelmed with sorrow, the soldiers are bombarded by thoughts about their happy days, and years while at college or school. These memories about their happy days also bring pain to them. To add to this, they may be far away from their families and homes. Memories about their families bring grief to their hearts. Many times, soldiers feel that they want to see their family members and share their grief with them but they don’t get such opportunities because of the duty they of protecting their nation. When they guard their countries’ borders at night and during the day, they are away from their loved ones and therefore cannot experience any little joy with their family members. They do not know of any certainty that they will go back home whenever they feel like and they cannot be sure that they will avail themselves whenever their families need to see them. The deaths they face and the sufferings in the battle field heighten the emotional their turmoil (Gregory 45). This kind of constant struggle in a soldier’s emotions causes severe mental stress. Undulating emotions experienced by soldiers is a cause for constant mental strain. Such mental strain results in the Post Traumatic Stress disorder that affects many soldiers. This problem comes with things such as feelings of being detached from people and the society, nightmares, lack of sleep and inability to concentrate. Feeling homesick may bring them intense solitude feelings. Trauma is a cause for mental insecurity. The violence they witness and experience, heavy destructions and injuries cause a lot of distress (Gregory 86). Many soldiers fail to get sufficient care or concern from those responsible for that. Their inability to heed the cry of the soldiers makes their mental situation even worse. These emotional effects are worsened by because of the failure of the soldiers to get support and good medical care. The nation to which the soldiers belong has the responsibility of taking care of the soldiers. The citizens of the country also have a moral responsibility to realize that the role of the soldiers is valuable to their nation. The soldiers should have suitable medical support given to them to assist in solving their problems (Stewart 71). Marginalization Many veterans of today have become a marginalized part of our society. Collectively, their psychological problem rates are way above average. Other pronounced problems include chronic homelessness, substance abuse and suicide. An example of a population of war veterans that is synonymous with marginalization is the one from the Vietnam War. These people started suffering marginalization immediately they landed back home from the Vietnam War (Stewart 101). Veterans of the Vietnam War and those of other conflicts elsewhere have always had challenges when it comes to reintegrating into society, recovering from traumatic injuries, getting ready for additional deployment and furthering their education. All these issues become even more complex when the soldiers deal with them and at the same time they try to get treated for mental problems or problems related to substance abuse (Stewart 89). War veterans are often ignored by society. Sometimes the society does not understand their problems because it looks at them as super-humans because they take up the responsibility of defending the rest of society and solving its security problems. Soldiers often appear as if they do not live the life of an ordinary civilian and therefore it becomes hard for people to relate with them. Alienation is therefore very high especially when the soldier is vulnerable and needs help from the society (Gregory 106). Marginalization of soldiers can also result from the perception of people about their duty. For example, the Iraq war was opposed by many civilians in the US. Therefore, the fact that America forces suffered in the war may not have made some people to sympathize with them because the society may have seen them as the “aggressors.” Some veterans and war consequences are ignored quickly because some of those taking part in the war come from communities that are already marginalized, for example, the African Americans in the U.S. the society therefore insulates itself from this kind of veterans (Stewart 115). Veterans are not easily readjusted into normal civilian life because they fail to get the much needed social support. This support is forthcoming when the soldiers open up to share their experiences in the war and interact with civilians who are able to sympathize with them. This is always hard because of the continuous isolation and alienation of veterans. War veterans are often alienated because they often have problems with sharing their war experiences. This is because their narrations involve destruction, death, moral chaos and agony. Some veterans think that people can misunderstand their stories or judge them unfairly especially if the society considers soldiers as alien. Many veterans also retain their emotional armor for long after coming back to civilian life (Gregory 120 ). The silence is harder to be broken because civilians are insulated from many of the war costs which are among others death, post traumatic stress, long deployments and other frustration experienced by veterans. Everyone has the responsibility to try and bridge the gap and reduce the alienation of war veterans. There are cases where veterans are willing to talk about their war experience. What they need are people to listen to them. Because of the gap existing between the soldiers and the society, the veterans often have a very prolonged personal war. Soldiers have to learn how to cope with the pressure of civilian life and how to handle traumatic memories of war. In the last few decades, military suicide has been growing. For example after the launch of the Iraq war, military suicide cases went up to 80 percent (Stewart 90). The alienated soldiers are always a lone in their world of suffering and torment. The soldiers often feel that nobody cares yet their problems started because they were fighting to defend the same uncaring society. This often contributes to cases of suicide. The events of effects such as Post Traumatic Stress Disorder come back to the soldier at a later date via nightmares, intrusive memories, flashbacks and hallucinations whose trigger is anything that looks like or brings back the trauma. Because of societal neglect, the veterans may have many symptoms including exaggerated responses, irritability, troubled sleep, poor concentration, anger and hypervigilance. Veterans feel depressed, estranged and detached, intensely anxious, guilty and panicked among other bad emotions. Such veterans feel that they have very little in common with their civilian peers and issues to do with family and friends are always very trivial to them especially after war. In their alienation, the veterans feel the horror of war only later because of daily life activities which trigger back the memories (Stewart 56). Novels and a poem This section features a poem and two novels all about the experience of a soldier during or after the war. Artists who in some instances are themselves soldiers have written about the alienation of soldiers and their experiences relating to war. My Sweet Old Etcetera is a poem by E. E. Cummings which helps to reinforce the theme of alienation of soldiers. It is more of his own experience because when he went to war he was still young. This separated him from his girlfriend and made him battle with many feelings about her. As he sleeps he begins thinking about the girl especially her smiles, knees and other things on her body. This poem shows the emotional torture of soldiers torn from their loved ones. Cummings cared little about the war because his hormones were driving him crazy yet nobody cared about that. He felt removed from family and traumatized by the whole experience of being away from his sexual partner for a long time. The poem is flirty and uses loose language showing how unplanned the thoughts were. Cummings remembers relatives, and his lovers in his day dreams so that he can keep away the horrors and experiences of war. This is the typical life of a traumatized soldier (Stewart 51). In Faulker William’s As I Lay Dying, Darl had an experience with the Great War which left negative impacts on his mental health. The experiences and horrors of the War traumatized him to the point that his mental problems caused alarm in his family. This novel presents a story of a veteran suffering from the trauma of war. Even though Darl’s mother is dead, it does not seem to shock or grieve him. This is probably because of the impact of the war on him (Gregory 34). He tells Jewel that even though their mother is dead, the horse he loves is not dead. For setting the Gillespie on fire so that his mother’s remains are incinerated, Darl is declared insane and fit to join a mental institution. This insanity is a consequence of his participation in the war. Another piece of art relevant to veteran trauma is Soldier’s Heart by Gary Paulsen. It is a story about a 15 year old boy by name Charley Goddard who served in the Union army during the American Civil War. He fought at Gettysburg and at Bull Run from where he went back home traumatized and suffering from the condition known as ‘soldier’s heart. This novel is helps the reader to understand the impacts of trauma resulting from war experiences on a war veteran. Goddard realizes that joining the war was not a good thing. These thoughts are triggered by his experience of a fellow soldier whose head was severed by a cannon ball. This brought him a lot of trauma which ended in him vomiting. He falls down and faints in the fear that his life is ending (Paulsen 67). After leaving the war he cannot walk well because he was shot in the knee. He has bad feelings. Although he is young in age he feels very old emotionally. His trauma cannot allow him to think about other pleasant things because he is haunted by the memories of the war. Because of intense trauma, he confesses having waited for death as a way of escape yet he was only 21 years old. He knew too much from the war and he was numbed by the violence in the war. He would have liked to study marriage and raise children but it will never be so for him. The author notes that Charley was hit and injured badly at Gettysburg and his mental trouble and wounds failed to heal properly. After the war he tries holding jobs but it proved hard for him. He died shortly after winning the county clerk election because of the stress and wounds sustained in the war while only 23 years old (Paulsen 88). Trauma therefore results in many deaths of soldiers. Conclusion In conclusion, this essay has examined the trauma and alienation of war veterans. Soldiers experience horror and shocking experiences in war, which haunt them later. They kill, inure, maim, displace and are themselves killed, injured and maimed. They also witness the same things on their fellow team members. These things bring a lot of trauma to them which sometimes combine with disabilities caused by war injuries. Because of this state, returning to civilian life for them is always hard. A rift exists between the soldiers and the society which both the soldiers and the society have a responsibility to fill. Two novels and a poem have been analyzed to reinforce the facts presented in the first part of the essay. War leaves permanent scars in the lives of soldiers. These soldiers should therefore get the most cooperation from the society for them to get integrated into proper civilian life. Works Cited Gregory M. Thomas. Treating the Trauma of the Great War: Soldiers, Civilians and Psychiatry in France. LSU Press 2009  Paulsen Gary. Soldier’s Heart: Being The Story of the Enlistment and Due Service  of the Boy Charley Goddard in the First Minnesota Volunteers. Random House Children's Books, 2011. Stewart Elizabeth. War Wounds: Medicine and the Trauma of Conflict. Exisle Publishing 2011  Read More