No, I don’t know her. I don’t have to know her. The fact is I can probably fill both hands with soldiers, sailors, and Marines who have created a self-induced death (a.k.a. suicide). Not all the stories are the same, every individual has different experiences and different mindset, different reason for deciding to do this to themselves and their loved ones.

The above picture is linked to her story. One thing I find in common with many of the suicides of military veterans comes down to friends and families who’ve been left behind saying “I didn’t see this happening.” , or “I should have checked in on them.”, or even “I just talked to them yesterday and they seemed life was doing great!”

Fact about suicide

A fact that remains, no matter how much you check in with a battle buddy, a friend, a loved one, fact is that it was THEIR decision, not yours. It’s not IN your hands, and it’s not your responsibility to eliminate all suicide single handedly. YOU did not kill them.

I point this out because it’s an issue I’ve dealt with personally. Someone else’s death becomes my fault. I shoulda… I coulda… why didn’t I… all of these come to those of us left behind. Even if all the coulda, shoulda, woulda’s had happened there is still no guarantee we could have stopped them from killing themselves.

Let’s be honest with ourselves. As grown adults and as veterans we really know how to push the bad shit down and appear normal and happy. These same people who made their choice to kill themselves might have never accepted our help and might have purposely appeared to be loving life. It’s the same as those personality tests that we know what the “right” answer is and we know what “our” answer is so we respond with the “right” answer.

So what’s the point of trying?

The point in trying at least, is the fact that yes, there ARE some people who we could change their mind about suicide. My daddy always said to me “son, you miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.” Meaning I’ll still check in with my buddies and check to see how they are doing, because maybe that one time I called and said “howdy” is going to change their mind.

But I also need to know that if a person does commit suicide it wasn’t my fault they chose that solution. We have plenty on our own shoulders, and if you’re anything like me, most of these stories you can look at and say “yup I understand why they did that.” But we cannot put every soldier’s suicide squarely upon our shoulders. That’s just going to drive you mad inside to the point of you committing suicide.

Never let that darkness take over your life. If there’s someone close to you who committed suicide and you feel part of the blame, please reach out to your battle buddies to let them know. I don’t know anyone who’s a veteran who has never personally known another veteran to take their lives. It’s a helluva weight to bare by yourself. Everything we’ve done in life that “SHOULD” have killed us and didn’t… and now they take their own life… it’s difficult to deal with. Rather than putting that burden on someone else talk to someone. Don’t be the next one because you tried to carry everyone else on your shoulders.

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Two Days of Triggers?

Ok, so maybe it wasn’t exactly 2 days of triggers. More like 2 days of being triggered. Once triggered though pretty much everything feels like a trigger as well. So it felt like 2 days of triggers. Truth be told my wife and kids had to deal with me in a pretty shitty mood all weekend last weekend.

I still don’t know what exactly triggered me. I woke up normal tried to be pleasant, and suddenly felt everyone was against me and acted accordingly. Anyone who has been through the counseling knows how important it is to identify what triggered you to begin with. Take a step back, analyze the situation, decide is this really as bad as I THINK it is or is it just me getting wound up? For the life of me I couldn’t figure it out. I still don’t have it figured out.

It’s Ok to Not Know

All the events, smells, sounds, etc. that trigger a person makes it difficult to identify the cause of the whole thing. Sometimes you won’t be able to connect the dots to the primary cause of what triggered you. I want you to know that’s ok. That’s ok because it may take a few times of that same trigger before we figure out what happened. It’s not a failure to not identify the trigger. It’s frustrating as hell, even more so when your wife brings up immediately that you’re triggered and need to figure out what it is. Oh boy, I went off on her. She was right though.

I’m lucky to have the wife I have. She sees me being triggered before I even know I’m triggered. She’s also absolutely right about me needing to figure out why. I couldn’t figure out why, and it pretty much carried on through Sunday night until bed, when a bit of “what the heck?” came through and I realized my wife was correct on all.

After the Fact…

After the fact, I’m still trying to sort out what may have triggered me this weekend. It’s possible that I never figure it out. My wife and I both prefer that I figure it out because once you have it figured out you can try and flank the trigger next time so it doesn’t hit so hard. But, as I said, sometimes it’s going to have to happen more than once for me to realize what it was exactly.

Why do I even bring this up when I don’t know any answers to what happened? Because there are many times I discuss triggers of us combat vets and we go into why it was a trigger and better ways to handle it. I go into this to let you know not all days are good. There are some days that the cause of the trigger won’t be discovered. Especially if you’re new at admitting you have PTSD, let alone know how to deal with any of it.

Don’t Dwell on Unknown Triggers

After the trigger has worn off it’s healthy to reflect on the past events to attempt to flag what it was exactly that triggered you. Do not dwell on the past though. Don’t hold it over your head, and for God sake continue living life it’s not the end of the world. It’s like anyone who has ever been on a diet or workout and you cheat or miss a day. You can’t let that affect you, if you do you’re going to lose all the progress you have gained along the way.

Tom MacDonald, so why the hell am I writing a post on my PTSD page about Tom MacDonald? Because, although we lived 2 completely different lives, the words he puts together and the beats he writes for them cross boundaries.

In the above video titled “Best Rapper Ever” Tom makes it obvious that it’s about dealing with his demons. I’ll never be a rapper, I cannot grow up to be like Tom, I’m too old for that. But the words he chooses and the inner battles going on, I can totally relate. It’s like Tom has the ability to put into words a shit ton of things I feel but cannot describe.

Does every song Tom make hit me perfectly? No, that’s just retarded. But, I will say that many to most of his songs Tom accomplishes putting things into words that that I can’t even rationalize to myself. Which leads me to the “why” I am posting about Tom.

Look, we all understand that the shit we deal with is difficult enough to rationalize in our own minds, but when someone can write a song and when we listen to it it’s like “DAMN, this guy’s really in my head” there is NOTHING more therapeutic than being able to figure out ourselves what we are dealing with. PTSD, cannot even begin to be addressed until we are able to take a step back and assess what is it that we are doing? Why are we doing it that way? Is there really a threat?

Let’s face it, there’s not taking any steps forward until we stop and take a moment to figure out where they hell we are to begin with. Much like map reading, if I don’t know where I am, there’s likely NO way that I will find where I need to go. Tom’s music not just this song, but all of his music, Tom is able to put into words issues and emotions that I can’t comprehend. Tom will likely never know me, or even how much his music has helped me. I don’t really care though Tom is a busy man doing his own thing and doing it well. I guess this is my way of saying thanks, and please keep doing what you’re doing.

It’s rare that I can point out one particular person who has helped me with my own damn PTSD without even knowing me. Tom MacDonald is the man, and the only artist in my life that I have ever actually paid to get their music. I can’t wait to get more of it. I guess I feel there’s no better way to say thank you Tom, than to actually put my money where my mouth is. Give Tom MacDonald a listen, I’m certain you’ll find what I say is true for most of us.

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January 1st 2024… It’s a new year and old me. What can I say, I’m a realist. Let’s go with honesty here! I could sit down and find a whole list of things that would be awesome! Most awesome things take years to obtain. Without instant gratification, that list makes it to the trash can faster than it took to come up with the list.

So what can people like us do to bring betterment to our lives in this new year? Any sort of change throws me and my entire world off the tracks. So like all things I hate, I’m going to have to force myself to make small changes, over time. I won’t be a “new me” by the end of this year. But I seem to have gotten a handle on this PTSD shit over the past 10 years. That’s right, 10 years to get to where I’m at with this shit.

Is a better me impossible? No. But there’s a difference between a “better me” and a “new me”. Nobody’s going to change because the year went from 2023 to 2024. Admit it you’ll likely spend the next several weeks writing 2023 on everything you have to fill out with a date on it. By February or March we may get the date writing down depending on how often we have to write the date on paperwork.

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The point is, every day is an opportunity to improve yourself. If you’re trying any big changes, make sure to keep reality in perspective. I want to lose 50lbs it’s not going to happen by February, so I should take those bigger goals and break them down. 50lbs for the year is not unobtainable, but even with that the longer it takes to get to the goal, the more opportunity we give ourselves for frustration. Don’t forget the ups and downs that come with working towards a goal.

I can’t tell you how many fitness folks I follow. Over the years very few of them ever change. Sure there’s some who go from “skinny geek” to “muscle bound hunk” but most the people it’s crazy. All that working out, but very little visible change. It’s easy to think that writing a list of goals changes you. Some of the people I follow work out constantly, but it’s a “usual” thing for them so much so that they don’t change their workout and they don’t really gain or lose anything.

Then of course there’s the ladies who hit the gym all about building a better ass. Oh dear lord some of them are very successful but I wonder why nobody tells them soon as life happens and they can’t continue the amount of butt workouts they do, it’s going to go to fat. Many ladies with big assets, get sick, or pregnant, or even God forbid some sort of accident. You see them disappear because they can’t workout any longer. All that shit goes to fat, then they re-appear trying to get back what they had.

At that point it’s too late. Most of those, “real life” continues to happen and they will be in shape, yes, but never to “where they were.”

I can relate to those. I will never be where I was in the height of my physical condition. But yes it’s one of my long term goals is to at least not be a fat body sitting around waiting for a heart attack.

So in summary ladies and gentlemen… 2024 is a whole new year, but it’s not a reason to guilt yourself into depression and self-induced failure. NOTHING is worse for a person dealing with all this shit than adding to the list of failure and depression. Instead focus on the better goals of what can you do today to at least start the process of improving yourself. Little things people, little things that count. Once you get into the habit of small victories, your larger victories will find you.

Happy New Year everyone! Lets realize that each day is an opportunity to do something better than we did it yesterday.

I’ll take the usual reminder to contact your buddies who share in your combat experiences and check up on them. Make sure all the merriment they are experiencing doesn’t drive them to an early end.

Do take the time to open yourselves up to the true meaning of Christmas, like there is a real God, his son’s name was Jesus, he was born to sacrifice for our sins, and he’s not a muslim. It should bring you some bit of joy inside knowing that muhammad is NOT Jesus. It brings joy to my heart knowing that.

Jesus was born in a shithole like what we fought in, surrounded by animals, and hated by most people around him. I will never say we are like Jesus, but Jesus and me, we ate some of the same dust. I can definitely understand a bit of what he experienced. I can also say that I have no idea how he stayed such a good person.

We fought for good, and in the end God wins. Merry Christmas to us filthy animals.

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I’ll be honest, I have missed typing in this stupid window. It’s therapeutic, yet at the same time a good way to let other vets know they aren’t the only ones pissed off. Starting this thing as a blog, then moving it to the sub-stack realm felt pretty stupid initially. Yet every now and then I get a comment from someone and it makes all of this worth it.

I have no idea when or how I’ll change from this free-be to a paid subscription thing. Frankly, I’m not sure I have any extra knowledge worth paying for but I may swap things to a pay-prescription later on to weed out the bots and get more quality conversation going.

Getting shit off your chest.

There aren’t many ways that are, shall we say, “socially acceptable” ways of getting shit off your chest. I’ve noticed being away from this for so long I have bottled up quite a bit and have had my blood boiling more often. I didn’t realize what an outlet this really was.

This new move I discussed yesterday has been a God-send. Everything about this new location is soothing for me. I realized I needed to be “out in the sticks” but seeing how happy my wife and kids are out here makes it much more worth it than just for me. My wife picked the spot and she couldn’t have picked better!

My new outlet is here. Maine. Never in my life did I ever consider Maine as a place to settle down and raise my family. Never in my life have I felt my country as a whole is going to shit. I have quite a few bitches and gripes since the 2020 election. Probably some you will agree with and some you will completely disagree with. I try to not bring politics into this PTSD zone, but lets be honest. Everything in life is technically in the PTSD zone for us.

Finding a New Mission

I cannot stress the importance of finding a new mission in the battle with PTSD. I haven’t quite sorted out a mission yet. I know I have 2 things that have to happen but I have issues getting them to happen.

1. I have to get this site up and going on a regular basis again

2. I have to write about some of my experience in a book

Both of which are difficult when anti-social and procrastination seem to be predominate symptoms of my particular PTSD.

Eventually my mission is to focus on my own business, something I can run and prosper and hand down if my kids want. No offense to my current line of employment, I enjoy it but lets face it, I want what every American wants… to do my own thing. “Independence” if you will.

Whether it’s writing, or computers, or teaching life skills and/or computers, I have no idea. I guess I’ll figure it out but I do need to pick one and shift gears into getting one done. Tomorrow is not promised to any of us. So I can sit here and come up with many reasons to push shit off, or I can stop bitching and procrastinating and get shit done.

Journey to Find my Mission

That’s what I will focus on here I guess. The new format of this will be heavy on discussing the day-to-day dealing with trying to push past the PTSD and actually “LIVE” life. And using my discovery of a new mission and my progress to my mission as updates on here.

Join me if you like, comment if you have ideas.

It’s been too long y’all. I moved to Baltimore in 2018 and really started falling behind in keeping up with posts. Ultimately it comes down to Baltimore wore me the F out! I pretty much hate everything about Baltimore, MD. I especially hate that everyone there is a prick who takes a political stand by hating Trump and everything else is crap as long as Trump isn’t in charge.

Really? That’s your stance? Baltimore is trash.

The Big Move

So, recently, I moved the wife and kids here to Lubec Maine. Oh my Lord what a wonderful place for me. I always thought that the location is a big part in my healing process from PTSD, but I never knew I could be THIS relaxed and THIS content.

Long story short (not really), my landlord in Baltimore (Alexander Karas) tried really hard to screw up my chances at a home loan. He then tried to blackmail me into signing into a year longer of a contract or be punished by adding $500/month from the day I moved in to today. Then when we got this house DESPITE him trying hard to screw us, he goes absolutely nuts and starts blowing my phone up. I ended up having to change my number sooner than planned and ended up with a smaller truck than I wanted so we left half our shit behind.

I am NOT dealing with you anymore Alex! When you try so hard to screw with me and my family, and then have the edacity to lecture me through text and e-mail how “nice” you are and how much you’ve “sacrificed” for me I’m going to cut you off! I know you know I have PTSD Alex, and I know you’re trying to trigger me to get me to flip and go nuts so you can call the cops. Not today asshole!

This move to Maine has been the best thing to ever happen for my family and the best move we have ever had. We are at just over a month living here and everything is better even without half our stuff. You want to talk about triggers, my landlord couldn’t have been more of a trigger! And I beat it! I win! I shut my mouth and I moved to better land!

Bankruptcy Fraud

I don’t know first hand, but I’m not a dumb guy. My ex-landlord Alexander Karas, sold just over a million dollars in real estate. A few months later made a surprise trip to Greece unannounced of course. Then came back and declared bankruptcy.

Alex got a “silent partner” to help him continue to try to do real estate and rentals in the area selling 2 of his fucked up houses to his silent partner screwing him big time with no ability to rent them out because they’re so fucked up from his half-assed “fixes”. All other property are in his wife’s name Amelia Karas. Obviously this is a way for him to keep his property and declare bankruptcy. I wouldn’t be surprised if he got an account in Greece, moved all of his money there in his wife’s name or someone else’s and then came back to declare bankruptcy. Bank of America should be aware of his moves if they haven’t already investigated.

Somehow the federal agency who investigates Bankruptcy Fraud has this information. We will see if they do anything about it or not. I should probably let Bank of America in on his recent transactions in his wife’s name and silent partner so they can be aware of it as well.

New Life in Maine

So if you wonder where I have been. I’ve been dealing with this douchebag for nearly 4 years. It sent me into a very dark place and I feel I now have a new life and opportunity that I haven’t seen for a long long time. PTSD and dealing with douchebags is NOT an easy task.

Well, let me correct that, PTSD and douchebags and NOT ending up in prison is not an easy task. I’m writing this to let you know I’m back. I’m going to be putting together a schedule to post regularly and to remind you you’re not the only one with shit going on in life combined with PTSD.

I ran into another veteran in town here just yesterday. It was nice to see other’s around like me. We exchanged numbers and hopefully I’ll be good support for him as well. Often times I choose to be non-social, even with other vets. But I think I’m in a good place to rebuild from here.

https://vocal.media/poets/comfort-1sdw00ji

It’s easy to get caught up in this shit. You start out with psyches and counselors telling you you’re fucked for life. You have media who ignores you and tells everyone that YOU are the threat to the security you’ve fought to provide. You have friends and family who don’t understand you. You have a president, who abandoned everything you sacrificed for. You have friends who’s deaths now seem pointless. The only people who did “get” you aren’t around anymore. Some of them still in, some of them dealing with their own demons.

This post is a friendly reminder to get it out of your head! You’re “outside” now and 99% of the population will have no fucking clue what you did for your country. 99% of people will not find your sense of humor funny. 99% of people will likely look at you like your some sort of psychopath if you tell ANY of your stories from your past life.

That’s OK brother! That’s “normal” for US! It’s not fun, it’s not helpful, but we chose this path so 99% of the country doesn’t have to experience what we did. Mission Accomplished brother!

Now is time for you to find what you want to do. You write your own missions from here. You plan out the objectives and plan for the threats to your success. You and those of us still lucky enough to have our family and wives and kids. It’s time to make shit happen for them. For US.

Take these rules to heart. Get up! Get out there! BE something! There’s no command to dictate your left and right limits. NOBODY else can tell us what to do or how fucked up we are. We are what we make of ourselves.

You made yourself a soldier! You made yourself a warrior! Our warrior days are through, but now it’s time to make ourselves the heroes of our lives. It’s time to be what most of us would consider “selfish”

Get up… Dust off… Carry ON!

Your triggers are YOUR responsibility. I must admit, this here is difficult for me to wrap myself around. I KNOW, in my mind I know, how true this statement is. I have also been in “PTSD Mode”, or as my kids say “he has raditude” where my actions disagree with every bit of this statement.

What I Agree With

I agree whole heartedly that it’s not the world’s responsibility to tiptoe around you and your issues. How is anyone you never let “in” on any of this supposed to be aware of and sensitive to issues you may face? They aren’t.

I disagree with the signs people put up around 4th of July telling everyone a veteran lives here and they need to be sensitive to that lighting off fireworks. It’s not everyone else’s responsibility to push off an entire holiday just because an unexpected “boom” sends me to places I cannot control where.

What I disagree with

Honestly, my only disagreements come in the middle of being triggered. When I’m in a flashback then everyone get out of my fucking way. When something triggers me, then everything needs to stop. In that moment I’m not thinking clearly, therefore it’s really easy for me to blame everyone outside of me for what’s going on inside of me.

If that firework hadn’t gone off…

If you hadn’t drug me to somewhere with this big of crowd…

If that driver didn’t cut me off…

It’s unending the amount of blame I can place on the world around me. Nobody triggered me on purpose. Nobody saw that button and decided they just HAD to push it.

Where’s that leave me

That leaves me with the truth in this statement. It’s MY responsibility to learn, identify, understand, and control my triggers. This requires me to make a conscious decision to, number ONE, take good care of myself. Physically, mentally, spiritually, I have to consciously build each and learn to know myself.

Only THEN, I can be in a position to understand, what is going to trigger me, and what I can do to minimize the effects. Don’t get me wrong, there’s LOTS of shit out there that doesn’t work for me, it may or may not work for you. The point is it’s up to ME to find those things that work for me and USE them.

As stupid easy as it sounds it is not. We are men of service and protection. It’s easier for me to pay attention to others, to keep others safe. It’s “selfish” to take so much time to figure me out and spend time on what works for ME. You have to put it into perspective. Is life better because you are keeping your loved ones safe and ignoring yourself and things that could help you keep control of your triggers? Or is security of all better when you take the time necessary to be able to anticipate and control your triggers?

It’s not selfish when you realize everyone you love has a better day when you’re triggers aren’t affecting how they live their lives.

Click here to help, to share, or to pray for my family and I.

Isn’t it funny how flashbacks come up, just for a moment or two everything in front of you is just as it was, a snapshot in time. It’s real, the smells the sounds everything. The most confusing part is when you are ripped back to reality. You are left confused. For me, it’s almost worse coming back to reality than the flashback was. I feel the flashback was a chance for me to remember. Remember what happened, remember what all went on.

The Brain Knows No Bounds

My counselor explained to me once that the brain attempts to avoid pain. The brain knows no difference in physical, mental, or emotional pain. The brain does not differentiate between actual hurt or mental anguish. The brain has a way to take things that are mentally or emotionally painful and put them in the back, lock them up, and allow you to go on with life with out really knowing every detail to the day’s events.

With this said, my view of flashbacks has changed a bit. I find myself back in the other world trying to find the details I no longer have. In fact, I have come to a literal and figurative wall in my writing of my book because there are so many details that I cannot remember. Flashbacks are now my way of “interviewing” myself on the event.

Being ripped back to reality is often worse than the flashback itself. Many questions left unanswered, for in that brief moment I could not relive everything. Now that I am back to reality I find myself mentally stuck in the flashback trying hard to question every bit of what I saw. Was there something I missed? Was there anything new? I waste the rest of my day wrestling with why did I have the flashback, was it a smell? Was there a sound? Was it the environment I was in?

Dreams… Good or Bad?

My counselor asked me about my dreams and I responded to her, I have no idea I don’t remember any of them. She said it’s probably for the best, most who remember their dreams with PTSD have problems sleeping and it’s my brain attempting to block pain. I didn’t disagree, but I didn’t agree either. I took what she said and I pondered on it.

Now, I think that judging the rare dreams I do remember, there is more info in them that lets me know what’s blocking my damn memories. So the dreams not being remembered is just as bad as me being ripped back to reality after a flashback. There is info in there that I cannot unlock right now and it’s frustrating.

I did an exercise where I had to record myself talking about one of my memories from deployment in as much detail that I could recall. I did. I felt retarded, but I did it. Then my assignment for the week was to listen to it once a day and relive it with my eyes closed and see if any more detail came to mind.

The other part of listening to it repeatedly is that you, in a way, desensitize yourself from that memory by forcing yourself to relive and reassess the memory. Eventually, you reach a point where that memory doesn’t bother you as much as it would because you’ve had that chance to look at as many aspects of it as you could. You also start uncovering details the more you go over it.

The problem I have with this methodology is that there is no ONE event that gave me PTSD. I was deployed 3 times, there were many things that happened that pushed me to where I am at. I don’t think anyone would have enough time in a day to recall every event over 3 deployments and reassess every detail.

Personally, I have a couple events that stand out and I get stuck on the shit I can remember rather than attempting to recall the shit I don’t remember.

Unlocking the Brain

My brain has locked up many things. It’s frustrating when I think back and have to admit I don’t even recall the order of the missions. I just recall bits of missions and it could all be the same time for all I know. I think a part of it was my team was constantly hitting the ground running. Even though we have a ton of missions that I went on, it’s difficult to keep them straight.

There is no sure fire way to unlock the brain. Parts of the “tell a story and listen to it” have worked. Parts of flashbacks have brought up details I have lost. My wife wants to to try hypnosis, but I have yet to try. I’ll be honest I don’t believe hypnosis is real. My wife has also pointed out a method where you are supervised using some special herbal concoction that is supposed to bring up everything at once. Which is why you have to be observed while doing this method. Everywhere I work though there’s rules that I’m pretty sure the “herbs” break the rules of where I work and I would be fired.

One thing’s for sure the VA is not helpful. The Vet Center linked to the VA was where I received counseling to a certain point where they left me with “yay, you’ve come as far as you can go! Have a good life, call us if you need us.” WHAT? I’m done? I’m not fucking done! You start off by telling me “yup it’s the rest of your life” and finish with “yay you graduate, tell your friends about us.”

UPDATE:

I have taken some time to pray about the situation and calm down a bit. I am taking the time now to better describe the situation at hand. Unfortunately, give/send/go lets me add one picture so I am going to combine this with a blog post with the other photo’s of the foundation for those who need a better idea of what the problem is.

The history that led to the situation:

I was in the Army for 10 years. I was planning on staying for my full 20 years, but life had other plans. The Army medically retired me in 2015. Now with this part of what I was diagnosed with and dealing with was PTSD, hence the nickname PTSDDaddy. PTSD, combined with basically having to change careers unexpectedly led to a domino affect on my ability to make sound financial decisions. I panicked and went for the first job I got offered which meant I had to move my family from a house I owned in North Carolina to Florida and pay rent. We attempted to rent our houses out and with the cost of the move and one of our renters just not really caring and moving out in the middle of the night rather than pay rent, we ended up losing our houses to foreclosure. I tried working with the banks and THOUGHT I was making progress to keep the mortgages going, but I was unsuccessful, and they took the house.

I could not keep up with mortgage and paying rent to keep a roof over my family, and I lost control of all the finances at this point.

I wanted to sell the houses, but the real estate people I was talking to wouldn’t put my houses on the market for an amount that I could pay off the mortgages. In retrospect, I probably should have just sold them and paid off as much of the mortgage as I could, but that lesson has been learned the hard way.

So, I hit a depression and continued making bad financial decisions. I ended up having a vehicle repo’d along the way and at one point I was looking at attempting to file bankruptcy. I was paranoid about declaring bankruptcy because I had a job where I carried a security clearance and feared losing my job because of it. If I couldn’t work AND declared bankruptcy, how was I ever going to come back from that?

Bottom line, I was pretty down and depressed and unable to pay everything.

Fast Forward a bit:

I took a job in Maryland that paid twice as much as my job in Florida. I am by no means making a bad salary. Maryland is a heck of an expensive place to live. With the move and the animals, we have I didn’t have many options on places to move to and took a rental lease where I know I pay too much, but this was the first step I was taking a hit in order to make more and start paying things off and fixing my credit. The problem we have faced here is the bad credit. I have been working for past several years on fixing my credit, hoping to buy a house for my family, not just renting and spending way too much on someone else’s mortgage.

Progress to OUR HOME:

I have made a great deal of progress towards fixing my finances and my credit. I have been making much smarter decisions and it’s showing. The problem now was that my lease here is up in May 2023 and it’s stated in the lease that if we renew it will likely be more money per month. Renewal isn’t an option for me at this point, and I wasn’t sure how we would find a place in Baltimore that will allow our animals to move in.

Then God kicked in:

I had been working for nearly 6 years on getting some of my combat related special pay. Everyone told me I qualified for it but I had trouble filling out the paperwork and the contact I had to help me with this had lost contact with me. I finally just sat down, focus, and fill it out myself the best I could. It worked. Not only did I get my pay, but I got my back-pay as well.

We had a fair chunk of money, not enough to buy a new house, but we could find a fix-r-upper and the house hunt began. My wife has M.S. and the heat during summertime has really affected her physically. We didn’t know this until we moved to Maryland, but it made sense why she was so unhappy in Florida now. I told my wife to pick the location we will move to, and we will look for an opportunity to purchase a house, and take time to fix it along the way.

The House:

We found a house in Maine for $29,000 large enough to keep comfortable, broken enough that it was in our price range. We could pay cash and not carry a mortgage. I sent my wife up to check it out, and she loved it. Unfortunately, my wife and I are not experts, and didn’t understand how bad the foundation of the house is. We have had a couple of estimates, the first one being 20,000 to fix. Not so bad, but that guy disappeared when he couldn’t get anyone to even attempt it at that price. We found another company and he couldn’t get into the house until the snow thawed. We found one more company, and they immediately went to our house to check it out. It’s a husband/wife team who really has gone above and beyond, taking their “date night” to go visit our house, sending us pictures, and talking to everyone required for building permits and such to put together an accurate estimate.

The Bad News:

Turns out this “take time to fix it up” idea that I had has turned into a “race against time” situation. The foundation is crumbling on 3 of the 4 sides of the house. They need to order specially made steel beams to brace the house before they can even attempt to fix the foundation. They also need to jack 3 sides of the house simultaneously to prevent the house from collapsing.

They explained to us that on foundations, if one wall is bad, they can jack up that one wall and fix it or do one wall at a time, but because of the extensive damage, they cannot do that in this case. The major risk is jacking up one wall, the other 2 will completely collapse and the house is gone, possibly hurting them in the process if not death. The other issue is likely the frozen ground is what’s keeping the house up right now and there is a risk of the house collapsing when the ground thaws. So, this is the main part that makes this an “emergency” rather than something I could save up for or finish fixing my credit and get a loan. I don’t have time at this point.

The cost, what we need:

To jack up the house and properly support it so it doesn’t fall, it will cost us $50,000. That is the emergency part.

To fix the foundation is going to cost $40,000, which after properly supported it’s not an emergency, but it can’t sit forever on those supports alone, so it needs to happen fairly soon after they propped the house up.

So, we are attempting to get $90,000 together to get this foundation fixed.

Why am I asking for help:

Ultimately, I wanted to get a loan to fix this house. Nobody will give me a loan, even putting the house/land up as collateral. So, a loan will not happen on time.

I looked into as many grants as I could find, and I make too much money a year to qualify for any grants. So, at this point there isn’t any grant I can apply for that I can find.

I don’t know anyone who has an extra $90,000 on hand so the other option is to ask for it.

My promise to pay it back:

I understand that for a random person to ask for everyone else to pay to fix my house is not really a cause everyone wants to help with. I want to make this point, that because I can’t get a loan, and getting a loan and paying it back would be OPTIMAL solution in this case I want to promise to put back every bit of money we earn back into give/send/go causes and send updates to anyone who wants the updates. I will do this in monthly payments, but I think that knowing your money will go to help not only me, but I will then continue to help others along the way would be a better way to ask for help.

Every penny we earn in this fundraiser to save my house, I will make payments back into give/send/go fundraisers to help others.

https://givesendgo.com/ptsddaddy

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This past week has been challenging for me. I have seen bits of the current events going on in Afghanistan and I have been dealing with much more emotions that I realized I had tucked deep within. As much as I hate Afghanistan and the Taliban, I have dedicated a sizeable portion of my life to trying to make shit better over there. Trying to keep terrorists from coming over here. Trying to train those who love Afghanistan as I do the United States of America. Hoping beyond hope they will take the torch and run with it. I now see many people who have not spent a day inside Afghanistan making many comments about it. I see people who have never fought for anything making lots of opinionated statements. This lack of experience in today's Afghanistan reminds me of 2012, when I was taking classes to get a Master's of Arts in Strategic Security Studies, from National Defense University.

What does school have to do with it?

We had one instructor during this master's program who was quite young. He is what you call a "professional student". He went from high school to his bachelors, to his master's, to his Ph.D. and suddenly he's an "expert" teaching us. Many times, this douche bag, who's only read about Afghanistan in books, would tell us (an entire class of combat veterans) what Afghanistan is "like" and tell us we were wrong if we said any different. His justification for us being "wrong" was that there wasn't a "peer reviewed" paper that said exactly what we were saying.

Now I see these folks online making many statements about Afghanistan and I guarantee there is no "peer reviewed" paper backing any of them up! No, I'm not here to pull the "who's your source" conversation. I'm arguing differently. My argument is what makes you say that? I can tell by the statements posted, who have been to Afghanistan versus who have never stepped foot in Afghanistan. The people I call out stating they have never been there can only retort with "what's your point?" My point is this! NOTHING is "like" Afghanistan! You, relating Afghanistan to anything else, are comparing apples to oranges! Shut your fucking mouths. I'm not saying you cannot have an opinion, but what I am saying is stop spouting off stupid shit like "Chicago is dangerous too what's the difference between Afghanistan and Chicago?"

Yes, that is one argument I saw! I'm certain you "could" get your head cut off in Chicago, but you would have to try a little harder than in Afghanistan.

So, then what?

It has ripped my heart and the hearts of so many like me from our chests this week. It completely torn those of us who survived into pieces. Brothers and sisters lost their lives and the country, and the media ignored a war was even going on. Anytime there was an operation with an Afghan civilian injury or casualty, it was immediately stop the presses and see which American we can send to prison. Generals would have lunch with us only to tell us, "If you get into a firefight, run away. I'd rather have one of you get shot than another Afghan civilian." Really, boss?!?!

• Fact: Because of the U.S. running missions, LESS civilian injuries and casualties occurred!

• Fact: Taliban would call up the local government and say "Americans are killing women and children" mostly when it was Taliban killed. They would throw a dress on him and report it as Americans killing women.

• Fact: Those in charge, because of political reasons, would trust the Taliban report over our report, causing many undue "investigations" and an extended halt to operations, causing more American deaths.

Anger!

I am so frigging angry about the events occurring in Afghanistan. There are many questions I have that I know the only answer that could be is "go fuck yourself!"

• Why did you not pull out American Civilians before pulling the military? "Because go fuck yourself!"

• Why did you leave all the equipment behind for China and the Taliban? "Because go fuck yourself!"

• Why would you think that a military of 300,000 who can't do jumping jacks, be able to hold off Taliban fighters? "Because go fuck yourself!"

• Did you not realize that these Afghan military check for IEDs by shooting the ground in front of them before they step? "No, go fuck yourself!"

• Did anyone in the past 20 years at least inform you that the "highly trained" Afghan Special Forces, when asked to use a shitter and shower properly, could not comprehend how the fuck to use them? Even when instructed on the proper way to sit on a toilet before you shit, not squatting on a toilet breaking it? Or even more so you don't shit in the shower and then stop on the turds to get them down the drain? "No… go fuck yourself!"

I am certain there is ample information available that would show you cannot just rip out the American military and everything goes honkey dory! I am certain there is zero information that you could present that would even imply things would be ready for American Forces to leave.

So, what's the reason they made this decision?

Gross incompetence? No, there is no friggin' way that many people in leadership roles are that fucking stupid. Statistically, someone there would have accidentally reasoned that "this is a bad idea!"

Bought and paid for! More likely the reason for deciding to pull out the military BEFORE bringing U.S. Citizens home, and BEFORE helping those who helped us out, and BEFORE leaving an entire military supply of vehicles, armor, night vision, helicopters, tanks, etc. Is because someone was paid to do it and do it NOW!

The other justification I have seen attempts at is "Intel collapsed and dropped the ball!" That's NOT the reason. Look, I hate many of the intel creeps myself, but there is NO FUCKING WAY that many intel agencies got it wrong.

All signs point to someone got "told" or "paid" to make this decision. There is one point of failure for this and it's "No Go Joe"! Now, if you follow the trail starting from there, you will discover all the connections of shady shit going on. I'm uncertain why events of the past week have not already caused arrests to occur. This is beyond criminal! Everyone in the room of this decision should be arrested and questioned. Investigations should follow of all connections of these individuals. The enemy is INSIDE the White House!

This was not an accident!

This was NOT unforeseen!

Who is responsible?

What are their connections?

Heads need to roll, this is unacceptable!

 I'm Death and Distruction!

As a combat veteran, I will tell you that my PTSD comes from nothing that includes bad guys dying. Even with that I can at least justify in my mind why good men die while at war. I can tell myself "they were grown adults, they knew what they volunteered for", or "shit happens in a war, it's just the way it is", even the classic "go-to" of "when it's your time it's your time."

Civilian Life Excluded

It's different when it's someone on this side of the world. Someone who has nothing to do with the war or the military. They may have at some point but while they died it had nothing to do with war or danger. They just died.

They were here, and now they are gone. and in my head I have no good justification for why? I can throw the "when it's your time it's your time" but I don't believe that. Not here, not after all I have done to ensure you, here, now, are safe.

How the hell am I going to keep you safe if you died?

Shit Don't Make Sense...

You see it comes down to we serve and protect. It's what we do. We can see that because we kept bad guys away they are not coming here to where you are, so you're safe.

But you died anyways. I couldn't protect you from the cancer, I didn't even see the cancer coming. I turned away for just a moment and when I looked back the cancer had taken everything from me. Not just taken from me but gave me no time to get used to the idea that there was something out there I could not fight off of you. You were here and then you were gone!

I want to control things and I couldn't control the cancer. I had no say so in if you lived or died from it. I had no cure, I had no way to help, all the first aide training in the world could not have given me any clue to how to fix you.

And now, you're dead. The cancer came and took you away. The cancer took everything I was fighting for away. Now what was I fighting for?

Seriously, what the hell has my life been about?

There is a God!

There really is a God... and he took you from me. I had all the tools and training I could. I put my body and mind and heart and soul into learning everything to become a weapon, to keep evil away.

And I failed.

The first and easiest way to justify this is to blame God. It's his fault, all this evil in this world that I get to see first hand and I come home to you dying? The greatest person I have ever known in my life, and God reduced you to this ragged little cancer ridden dragged out ragged death of a man?

What the Fuck! Seriously, what in the hell is going on? These evil men I had to let go and let live because I obeyed the rules, are living life healthy and happy and the greatest man I know died a slow horrible death?

Sick Joke!

It's got to be some sick joke! There's no way this really ended this way. It's probably just the crazy in my head that's not letting me see the reality of what just happened. If I keep on...

But I wake up and you're still dead and gone.  The world is empty without you here. Whenever anything really good ever happened, you were the first one to call, "Dad I just did this and no one else could do it the way I could!"  Bad shit would happen and you were the first one I would call "Dad I just lost two friends in Afghanistan I'm pissed off what the fuck do I do?" and you would always have the words to make it all make sense.  Now good or bad happens I run to my phone to call you and have a revelation that there is no one on the other side of that phone call. What do I do now? Something great happens and I can't wait to tell... no one. I have no one to tell.

Now even the great moments have no meaning at all.

This Fuckin' Head of Mine!

It tells me lies! This mind of mine is gone off the deep end. It says your dead! Probably because I've lost friends, it can't be true. I'm stuck in this fucked up reality where nothing burns worse the the silence of your absence. Like knives stabbing into my eardrums.

I wish they would pierce the brain and put me out of this misery. This pain like no other and there is nothing there. My ears burn, my head hurts, my thoughts go a million miles an hour. Death is a welcome thought. To end it now, oh how great would it be?

That's it! Death is the answer. If I died now all of this would be over! The pain gone, and you would be back. The devil has gotten inside me now! Testing me and using my own mind against me. Death seems more and more welcome, "Please Death, come and sit with me awhile, we'll discuss this you and I."

Everything is going so fast, I cannot keep up. Everything I am doing I just don't give a shit. Because it's all going so fast, and I don't give a shit, everything is failing. I went from failing you to failing everyone. This world would really be better off without me.

BOOM!

There is the justification! The answer I have been looking for! My one last hope at taking care of everything and every one is death. By killing myself you all will have better lives. And the circle of protection makes death a viable option. Death went from "never going to get me asshole" to "this is a great idea!"

WAIT!

What just happened? No, that's not how it works! Don't you realize that in death this suffering you are dealing with now will be an eternity of this! Don't you realize that killing yourself is going to hell and going to hell is the permanent burning, and piercing will be never ending. Not only that but I will never see you again.  You see I was born and raised Catholic, and as a catholic I know that suicide is a selfish answer. It's the "easy way out" and no easier path to hell then suicide.

Now I'm debating in my own head good and evil. All of this comes down to good and evil. Am I good or am I evil? Lets just start with coming to terms that I'm likely going to hell anyways. So if hell is the punishment then there's really no reason for me to delay it suicide is the option. But on the other hand I can't justify suicide as helping everyone else because what about the bills food and shelter for the family? They'll get alot of money if I die but the insurance doesn't cover suicide. They would get nothing.

As good and evil go to war within me the crazy goes wild. At this point I could probably convince myself of anything.  Many don't see this or understand this part of it.

I do.

I have experienced having life ripped apart. And I tell you the answer is always "keep going"

Why Keep Going?

Because... the opposite to answer "when it's your time it's your time" is "when it's NOT your time, it's NOT your time." Now take into considerations everything that can go wrong if it's not your time. Suicide turns into "attempted suicide" which depending on how you go about it can turn your life into an even bigger living hell than now. Bullets or OD can really fuck you up! Now you're alive, crazy, and retarded or maimed. Congratulations asshole you would the stupid award!

Why keep going? Because the way you are now is the way you can be an example to all of the rest of us going through this same shit! The horror you live today could be the horror someone needs to read or hear about tomorrow to make sense of themselves. Your NOT committing suicide may be the reason that other dude you knew doesn't commit suicide.

Why keep going? Because my dad, and my buddies are not continuing on in life and I'm the only fucker who can tell the world how great they were. I'm the only one who's going to have stories of their heroics. I'm the only person who's going to keep their sacrifice in my heart and in how I live life and lead others.

I am here because it was NOT my time. Ultimately, it's not MY decision it's something bigger than me, and if I don't use this time to figure out how I can make this shitty world better then I will waste away into nothing which is worse than death and suffering. I cannot be part of the problem I need to be part of the answer.

I'm writing this for a brother of mine who needs to know my crazy thoughts. He needs to know that "yeah, I know." And he needs to know that I'm not telling you anything I wouldn't tell myself in the same situation.

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Farcebook Is Now MeWe

I know the changes are confusing but just to clarify I am moving my Farcebook PTSDDaddy Page to the eqivalent on a social network called MeWe. This change is costing me money to do so it's not a change I take lightly. You are now able to find us at

https://mewe.com/p/ptsddaddy

I will be working to make it just the same as I do Farcebook. Bare with me during the transition I'd like to do so without losing all of you.

Twit Is Now Parler

On the other hand I am moving my Twitter feed to a social media platform called Parler. The good news about these moves is that I can now sync everything accordingly and have a better more consistent push towards helping those with PTSD battle PTSD. I think the fresh start fresh look is required anyways. I have dropped the ball alot on everything and it's time to get it all back up and running.

On Parler you can find us at:

https://parler.com/profile/PTSDDaddy/posts

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