Vietnam Veteran Finds Redemption and Recovery Through Therapy
I want my community to recognize the sacrifice. I had a protestor spit on me. My anger from that point on was debilitating.
Eldson, US Army from 1967 to 1969. Initially I went straight to Fort Benning, Georgia, where I took basic training. I had a 30-day leave and went to Vietnam. So I was point man for my platoon, and we was taking rocket fire, which is hard to dodge. I was the radio man at that point, and I was next to my platoon leader. Helmet was tore up. M16 that I had in my hand was tore up. Had it not been for the radio on my back, I probably would've been KIA'ed myself. But my platoon leader, part of his brains was in my face. That was the most impactful moment. It changed my whole perspective about the war, about life.
My best experience I think in Vietnam was serving with the guys. We became brothers forever, and we looked forward to coming back to the world. We was going to do all these amazing things. And when I came back through Fort Louis, there was protestors everywhere. I couldn't understand them protesting against me and those of us that served, so that anger ate my life up as a young person.
So, being a returning wounded from Vietnam, I felt my country let me down, so I started using drugs, self-medicating, which I did for about three or four years. My first encounter with drug use was morphine. When I got hit, somebody in Vietnam introduced me to heroin. I separated myself from everybody that knew me. I probably OD'ed 10 or 15 times. It was a suicide journey.
I robbed banks to get drug money, a twisted sense of revenge. I had life without the possibility of parole. The warden, he was actually my case manager. He was a Veteran. One day I looked up, the law had changed, and this warden went up to parole board with me, and he was the reason I got out of prison. I became a different person because I felt the wrong that I had done. I was not in my right mindset, so I apologized to my family and to my country.
On the day I got outta prison, I went to VA. So they put me in what they call the CWT program, Comprehensive Work Therapy for Disabled Veterans. And I went through that program and they hired me. And the therapy has helped a lot because it teaches me how to do these things that I need to do for myself, even when I'm by myself.
PTSD is a bad behavior disorder. You trigger it and you got bad behavior. I go talk with my therapist once a month, you know, and that keep me from being in crisis. I learned to look at myself and accept the fact that I had a mental problem, and that mental problem could be my master or I could master it.
Peace with my PTSD. I got peace with myself. And since then I have been working with VSO, Vietnam Veterans of America. That's my therapy. We are brothers, you know? When one roll, all of us roll. We have a saying that all gave some, but some gave all, and I should be just as proud of what I gave. The community is there for you. You know, you need to be able to enjoy your freedom, the freedom that you served to protect and provide for everybody else. You need to enjoy 'em and you can't enjoy 'em if you're not taking care of your mental health, you just can't.
