My Turn: Story of a returned soldier

The true story of a PTSD veteran

Published: Friday, March 21, 2008
By Benjamin Hiscock

I know that my story is the same as many of my fellow soldiers who left to serve our country return only to be lost. I will speak of myself for everyone’s story over there is different and yet many have the same result.

I served twice in Iraq. When I came home I felt no different yet everything that I loved before no longer interested me. I found myself irritated by the smallest incidents. I refused to accept that I was different, and still do to myself most days. The war hadn’t changed me, and no one could tell me it had. I was still the same loving, gentle person in my mind. At least, that is how I perceived myself. Others around me would definitely paint a different story if you were to ask them.

There is a strong dislike in the military for feelings for they will not get the job done and get in the way. This strongly accounts for why I was denying the symptoms to myself, a non-commissioned officer. I couldn’t accept that I was damaged emotionally. That would be a sure sign of weakness in an institution where strengths are highlighted and sought after. I was not going to accept it.

Quickly, life changed for me as I got out of the military and tried to fit into society. I began drinking more after my first deployment and it only intensified after the second. I found that people liked me better when I was drunk. So, it seemed natural to keep drinking because it made me a more likable person and feel normal. This is the problem with such behavior, it only ends in disaster.

I have lost my marriage, my license, and my pride. I found myself now seeking the help that I once denied needing, the help that I so desperately needed to keep from sleeping with a loaded handgun under my pillow for a year. I have found solace in joining the National Guard, to be around others like me, some more scarred and some less.

For awhile we were banding together on our own personal time after work or such to talk and try and make ourselves feel better, but that was not a long affair. The drinking kept getting worse, only now the scared military man was still there when I drank — he just wouldn’t go away.

All my problems came crashing down early this November when I received my second DUI. Everything began making sense. Was I trying to die? Or maybe I felt invincible, or just lost all regard for living. That I am still not sure of. I am sure that things had to change not for me but for the two children I have who live with their mother. I might be lost, but those two boys need their dad and I couldn’t let them down any more.

I find myself now visiting the Veterans Administration for counseling and seeking solutions to get back that lost part of myself which loved life. I have found that I am having to bring myself back to the norms of our society. In Iraq, reality changed my thought processes. All, I want now is to find myself, pick up that lost part and integrate back to who I was.

So next time you see one of my brothers or sisters, please remember we have given much and lost more then most could imagine. And I would do it again for our nation. 

Army Sgt. Benjamin Hiscock lives in Barton.

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His story is one of thens of thousands just like it, how do I know, I to am this story, and the VA hospital has hundreds of thousands more, the sad part is the hundreds of thousands that haven't admitted it yet, and still don't see they have a problem. As they say "Welcome Home soldier"

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