For me, my greatest fear is getting recalled or drafted. I know that may sound weird, let me explain. I enjoyed my service and would never give it up for anything. But when in a full blown episode my fears evolve into phobias. I have no rational reason as to why this would frighten me, but it does. During some of my more out of control episodes, I have been curled up in a ball. Crying my eyes out, muttering "I don't want to go back." Over and over again I would mutter this, I remember people asking me "Go back where?". I would have no answer for them only continuous mutterings as fears icy grip tightened.
When at rest, calm and clear headed, the thought of having to be in again does not frighten me, it does trigger a small amount of anxiety. Because I am happy where I am in life, and do not want it to change. But I am not affected by it like I am after I hear gunshots or even angry shouts of [Arabic, Kurdish].
Explosions and gunshots send a grown man to his knees crying. Yeah, I just admitted that and posted it online.
Putting words to that is another fear of mine, which is why I did it. I have a fear of those around me, judging me as a murderer or psychopath, but the truth is, I am just man with scars that leave me broken. I am just a man trying to work through things. Things that don't make sense, like how I almost punched a five-year-old girl for trying to play cops and robbers with me. A five-year-old pulled finger guns on me and I reached back and balled a fist back as I stepped into her pretend advance on me.
That is not normal, but I have realized that my fears have and may lead to situations that can not be fixed with a sorry. I am unable to say these things to people who ask "how was it over there?" Because the answer is scarier than you can imagine.
The truth is, it was a blast, it was what I was trained to do. It was what I was enlisted to do. I was a tool that was finally getting used as it should. I was riding a high the likes of which I had never experienced. Every day was an adrenaline rush.
But every night was the dreaded withdraw and the realization of the days work. My nights were somber, dark brooding feelings of shame and regret. My dreams were those of the days events playing before me again, and again. I lived each and every day more times than I can remember.
The shame I felt at night was washed away with the rise of the sun. Only to return, once again, with the setting of night.
Now when asked how it was, I simply reply as if I spent my days camping or backpacking across Europe. I tell them about all the sites I saw and all the food I tried. But never about the darkness, that is my cross to bare. And bare it I shall, whether the shrinks and doctors say I shouldn't I will bare it in my own way. Because the fear keeps that cross up even in the darkest times, because as fearful as I am to share it with other, I am more fearful of letting that cross kill me.
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