Hypervigilance: always on alert

I was outside talking to my sister and a car drove by

and these guys were all staring at me and to me it was a threat.

I ended up going into my house

and I still contemplating about that.

I looked back outside and the vehicle was driving

by my house again and stopped and so I went outside

and chased them down the road.

Then later I kind of went to a combat mode,

went up onto my deck and I was laying prone up there waiting

for this vehicle again and it was at night time

as they came down the road.

They turned out their lights and coasted for awhile.

And so in my head I'm thinking, "OK, I got to get

out of my house this way, come around, take the guys

out before they get mean."

Come to find out it was just a boy trying to ask my 17 year old

to a dance at the high school, you know.

So for her, she thought it was kind of funny, but for me it was,

it took me about an hour to calm back down from, you know,

and I had to explain to her, hey,

those kids are pretty lucky 'cause, you know,

if she wouldn't have said, "Hey, these guys are calling me

and telling me you're freaking them out,"

then I probably would have done something crazy that day.

It's just simple things

that probably a civilian wouldn't understand or pick

up on to where a combat soldier gets alerted to it and they go

on high alert and turn into combat mode.

You know, it was kind of scary

for me 'cause I knew exactly what I was planning on doing

to these guys in this truck.

I worried about being ambushed.

For some reason, I couldn't leave Iraq where Iraq was.

Everywhere I go, I'm setting up a perimeter.

I'm looking at this, I'm looking at that.

I'm hearing sounds, I'm hearing different

things happen that would automatically

take me right back to a patrol.

Or being outside, like we say in the military,

outside the wire.

So that caused a lot of isolation.

As long as I can control my little area,

then I'm fine.

But outside of that box, I'm vulnerable.

I wasn't sleeping.

I was taking Ambien to sleep and I was waking up hungover

but without the previous night of partying.

I was very hypervigilant when I would sleep.

I'd hear everything.

I'd smell everything.

I can always think that there was something there

when there wasn't.

My insecurities would take control instead

of my rationality.

Locked the doors.

Make sure the gun was loaded underneath my nightstand.

Baseball bat next to the side of the house.

Kid was tucked in.

Blinds were closed.

Normal things that the rest of the Vets go through.

When we were over there, I don't know if you guys heard about it

or not, but the May 19th attack

on Bagram Airfield was the largest most significant attack

on Bagram Airfield since its existence.

And one of the major attack points happened probably 200

yards from where I sleep or slept over there I should say.

And waking up at four in the morning to the sound

of an AK-47 firing is very awakening I guess you could say.

AK-47 makes a very, very distinct sound.

There's nothing like it in the world that I've ever heard.

When you hear AK-47s firing and it's enough to,

and I'm a pretty sound sleeper.

I can pretty much sleep through,

well I can actually say I can sleep through rocket attacks.

But to wake up to AK-47s, it's like wow,

you know they're pretty close and that startles you.

So we get up and the attack was in the middle of it.

The Apaches are flying over.

They're firing the 30 millimeter guns

and that's pretty awakening.

So now you hear a bump or something at night

and it's like OK what is that?

I actually have a firearm that I sleep with next to my head

with a flashlight on it and that's the first thing I go to.

I grab that.

[laughs] I mean it might sound a little extreme

but it's just how it is.

I can't sleep without it anymore.

So, that's kind of, I just sit there and listen.

The anger started to come.

The persecution

of anyone around me was there.

I was so mean and vindictive

and I felt that it was right.

I felt the way that I felt

was perfectly fine, and if you

didn't like it, you could take a hike.

I didn't care.

My family actually would apologize

to wait staff at restaurants

before I said anything

because I would treat them so poorly.

That is not in my original makeup.

That is something that PTSD had given to me.

I quit going to crowded areas.

I used to love to walk the National Mall,

or go into the museums, or go to different venues

in and around Washington.

I just quit going

because I couldn't enjoy it, I didn't enjoy it.

I was constantly on guard, looking around,

watching everybody's movement.

And something that a lot of people can relate to probably is

I still have a hard time going into a restaurant

and not sitting with my back to the wall,

sitting out in the middle of the floor.

I'm getting better, and it's taken a long time,

but still, given a preference, I will sit with my back

against the wall, able to watch the windows and the door.

And it's like I don't know how to tone it down.

I'm the same person that was

running through the sands of Iraq,

like, just a little while ago.

And it's like, "Just a little while?

That was five years ago, sir.

You need to remember you've been on American, safe,

totally, like, clean, and you don't have to worry about

where your water comes from.

All these things that stressed you out in Iraq

aren't following you here."

And that's what freaks me out, you know what I mean?

You keep waiting for that thing to happen to you

that never occurs, and the fact that it never occurs

only makes you more anxious.

It's terrible, oh my gosh.

It wasn't long after we got home that we moved

out to the country which is really nice.

It's about 400 yards from the front gate to my door

so you aren't going to make it

to my house before somebody hasn't,

something hasn't seen you.

I've got dogs and geese that let me know everything

that goes on the property.

I mean you find yourself just surrounding yourself

with all these safety measures so you can relax.

You don't think about it first and after a while you think,

"Wow, that's ridiculous."

[laughs] But, you do it.

My treatment has been a blessing to me and my family.

It really helped.

It's hard to put into words just how you feel after you know

that you can control your anger

and you can control your emotions.

They're still going to show up every so often.

There's gonna be times when you're stressed

and you're gonna feel that build-up in you where you want

to get angry or you want to fight back

but the treatment has just kind of allowed me to realize

that there are ways to cope with it and to deal with it.

The program I went through, in addition to

re-living and regurgitating and recounting

the incidents or incidences, you had homework assignments.

And it started off in baby steps,

identifying those things that made you aware.

One big thing for me is being in a crowd.

So, I took it in baby steps.

The first thing I started doing was attending

the very small but crowded farmer's market here, in Charleston,

every Saturday during the spring and the summer.

And then, as I felt more and more comfortable and with

the coaching of my counselor, I expanded it to other things.

And one of the crowning achievements, it's crazy to say,

but one of the crowning achievements is my daughter,

my 18-year-old daughter, wanted to see

an Alice Cooper concert this summer.

And lo and behold, who was right there

in the middle of it with her?

I was there.

And that was a big step for me, to be,

number one, in a crowded place, that was fairly dark,

so I couldn't really see a lot what was going on.

And if you're an Alice Cooper fan, you know what kind of

folks follow Alice Cooper, so it kept me pretty vigilant,

but after being able to do that, you know, I've been able to

go to other crowded venues and not be quite as

hyper-vigilant as I have been in the past, or uncomfortable.

I can actually enjoy myself, somewhat.

I enjoyed Alice Cooper.

I wish he'd come back.

The next concert she wants is KISS. [Laughs]