I sat down and wrote to describe to you to describe what life is like in my home as my husband struggles with PTSD. The man I knew previous to PTSD was a man full of self confidence, he was both intelligent and articulate, an extroverted and social individual; he was kind, patient, and gentle with others. This is not the man who I am married to now. My husband spends most of his time preferring to be in our home. Eric would not get out of bed each day if he was not required to do so. He would rather spend his days locked in our house, wearing his pajama pants and a t-shirt not getting out of the bed at all. There are days that I have to pester Eric to shower and take care of himself. My husband does not function in environments which include a crowd of people, loud noises of any kind, sudden noises or light changes, and any new environment is an uncomfortable event for our family because Eric cannot handle being there for more than 30 minutes or so.

Eric has panic attacks in the car when we drive on the highway and for many months we were unable to ride on the highway at all because we were had to stop at every exit or every time there was something in the road or on the median. We were taking back roads to all of our destinations and even on those we were stopping every town we came to or every twenty minutes whichever happened to be first. He is back to the point in which he is unable to drive himself and gets very restless, distressed, and flustered when riding in our car. My husband paces most of the time whether we are at home, at church, at appointments. If he is not pacing then he is sitting down and his legs are generally shaking because his anxiety level stays pretty elevated. We try different activities to lower the anxiety such as going to the gym, taking a walk, finding something around the house that can be done to try and keep his mind off of the nervous and agitated state in which is currently his way of life, we have yet to find a solution that works for more than a brief period of time. He has nightmares that send him running out of bed and down the hallway and sees people standing in front of him or out of the corner of his eyes when there is not anyone in the room other than us. Eric frequently has paranoia tendencies and feels as if he is being watched and at times he has felt as if he was being followed. He trusts very few individuals and has developed and obsessive tendency to not allow something to drop that is bothering him (such as the answer to a question that he wants to know). He will go on and on about whatever it is that is bothering him until he either gets an answer or I finally snap at him to let it rest. At this point he may not discuss it with me for that current time being but it is brought up again until he is satisfied that the answer or whatever he is obsessing about has been taken care of. He has developed OCD features and frequently repeats steps of just about everything that he does. He does things in sets of fours such as flipping light switches, closing doors, walking in and out of rooms, walking up and down the stairs, setting items down. Just about everything that he does is done in a multiple of four and if he is constantly asking me to tell him to stop what it is he is doing because he cannot make himself refrain from what he is doing.

My husband is easily frustrated with himself and others. He frequently snaps at me and our children when a few minutes previous to that everything seemed to be going well. He gets agitated and then when confronted about the agitation he either gets overly agitated at one of us or angry with himself for snapping at us. He has to spend a huge amount of time isolating himself from us because he does not want to take out his frustrations on us and this is extremely difficult on our children to understand. I have had phone calls from my husband in which I have had to tell him to leave the house because he has been so frustrated that he has wanted to kill one of our dogs. He has the presence of mind to call me, so far, when he has felt like this but I do fear that one day our children could come home to a loved pet who is no longer there and a father who cannot explain to them why this has happened. He has admitted to me that our family is the only reason he is alive and that even with our family there are times that he would like to hurt himself.

Eric has a hard time forming words and finishing his thoughts out loud. He is unable to focus on even the smallest tasks and frequently has to ask me what it is that he is doing or was planning to do. He repeatedly asks me the same question because his short term memory does not function as it should. He has been able to accomplish many college courses previous to PTSD and is presently unable to sit in a classroom and focus or complete an online class that would require any amount of focus on a text book. With this illness my husband is almost like a young child with substantial anger issues. I love my husband and I vowed to stand by his side through sickness and in health. I will continue to do so because he is my heart and I know the man who he was and I know that this is not the man who he wants to be. I need you to understand that this sickness has deeply affected our household in a negative manner. I am fully aware that Eric may never be the Eric who I met again and that this will be an extensive period of healing and adjustment for our household. My husband will need continuous counseling and medication for an indefinite period of time. He is unable to function in public settings and holding down a job is going to be impossible for him in his current state of being. I do not know how else to convey to you the severity of the situation my family lives with and that my husband bears daily.

I thank you for taking the time to review what I have to say and for giving it thoughtful consideration.

What have we actually accomplished by this war? There are young men and women who joined the service right before 9/11 and all they know is Iraq tours. I understand that you take this risk by joining the Armed forces but there are families suffering severly due to a war that we should not be in anymore.

Misty Copeland