Here's an item from a woman I admire to the hilt, who has been the wife of a Vietnam veteran since she was 24. Her husband, more or less 10 years older, fought in Vietnam, and has suffered from PTSD ever since. She ended up writing a book about how she came to learn about PTSD and how it affects the family, and since then has done exceptionally kind, warm-hearted and great work on behalf of veterans and their families with PTSD. In her case, she found that being married to someone with PTSD presented unique relationship challenges, which didn't always work out to her satisfaction. On balance, she still accepted and took comfort in the relationship, but the sexual aspect was hard to work through, and painful to talk about. With her permission, we have excerpted the relevant passages from her book (these passages offer a look at a slice of life from decades ago, but they are very accurate nonetheless, as hard as this stuff is to share):
Some general information about the situation:
It is amazing what changes happen to a person. Facing Jack’s problems and sticking it out made me realize something about myself that had to be changed. It was time to make the same commitment to my current job and stick it out. All the other jobs I had, I ran away. I would quit the job and move on to another one. I was always good at what I did and tried to give 100% but I never felt that my effort was appreciated. I was always taken for granted and devalued. I was feeling the same way about my current job. I didn’t want to run away this time and end up learning a job all over again. I didn’t want to start from scratch. I was just going to make my attitude different and stick it out.
It took five years of going to the VA for help before Jack eventually dropped out of
treatment. The denials were like a knife in his back. He couldn’t take it any more. It was causing us financial hardship and he lost time at work going to the appointments along with the times he couldn’t function at all. There were so many times that he couldn’t bring himself to get up off the couch. There were times when I saw it coming. He would become edgy, agitated and quick to anger, then silent, motionless holding his head in his hands. I was losing the battle. The fight had gone out of me and I was looking for a reason to stay with a man who could no longer be a husband or a father. I was in all respects a single parent. I had stress at home and a stressful job.
It tore at me knowing that no matter what I did, I would not be happy. If I left him, I would have felt guilty for turning my back on part of my family. If I stayed I knew that I wouldn’t be happy knowing what I would never have again. I didn’t know if I could do it. I didn’t know if I could keep looking in the mirror as the years left their mark on me, knowing that I would never feel desire or passion again.
It was like living on a roller coaster. I would start to relax when Jack would level off and he would be easy to live with, then just when I was getting over the bad days, they would come again. It was as if he couldn’t stand being emotionally close to me. There were times of the year that seemed worse for him. November was bad, the month he went to Vietnam and the month he came home. It was also the same month that Camp Evans had the 122mm rocket and mortar attack. February was a bad month for him. So was April. The other months were bad but those three months seemed the worse for him. I suppose I could have become an angry, bitter woman. I could have taken out the unfairness of my life on others. I could have but I didn’t. I credit God and Jesus, as well as an understanding of the Bible for providing me with the strength and courage to stay true to who I was.
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About their honeymoon, and subsequent relationship:
We went to Niagara Falls but it was not romantic. We had a king-size bed and I am sure that he didn’t sleep in it for more than a few hours. I’d wake up in the morning and Jack was sitting in the chair watching TV. I think that we made love once, maybe twice on our honeymoon. During the day it was romantic and we were happy. We kissed a lot, held hands and held each other. At night it was as if he couldn’t stand me near him. Sex was never really that important to us. I already had a marriage where sex was too important. That didn’t bother me as much as the fact that he didn’t want to hold me or be near me. I thought there was something wrong with me. It hurt. I understood quickly that to wake up Jack was like waking a grizzly bear. He was ready to attack but stopped himself.
We continued to visit his friends and enjoy life. I got over the hurt of his lack of desire and realized that he was older than I was. I thought that maybe his sex drive wore down with age. We still hugged and kissed a lot. We both worked hard, so when we did get to “fool around” it was enough. It was at least once a week and that was enough for me.
Once in a while we would end up down the beach and make love in the car even though we were married and finally had a place to be alone. He said it brought back memories. It felt good to just be in his arms.
There were still times when I wondered how this happened and I will probably wonder for the rest of my life. I wondered what it would have been like if the first time I left him, it ended. I listened to the experts on TV when they talked about marriage. They could only give advice on a limited basis to the “normal” side of society.
The experts never had much to say about a family like mine. I laughed knowing that a marriage could survive without sex, without the partnership. Children could thrive in a dysfunctional home if there is love there. An illness did not have to mean the end of everything. It was hard. Don’t get me wrong. There are families with alcoholics who in the process of their illness hurt the only ones who should matter to them. I believed that they feel so terrible about themselves that they strike out at the ones they are letting down unable to face the truth. The families are left to pick up the pieces of shattered lives and emotions. A father is supposed to love us and protect us. A mother is supposed to support us emotionally and nurture our souls. Husbands and wives are supposed to complete each other, keep us grounded when we get too full of ourselves and build us up when we feel pulled down. Home is supposed to be a place of refuge from the craziness of humanity and obligations. A place where we feel we are able to be ourselves and be loved despite ourselves.
I did have a place to be myself and I tried to give Jack a safe haven, a place where he didn’t have to worry about the outside world and his past. At times it seemed impossible but still there was a bond between us that existed before the illness was into full swing, before all the tragedies happened. We are not married in many senses of the word but the one that matters most of all to us, a bond that is strong.
The woman who wrote this is tremendously compassionate and knowledgeable about PTSD and veterans. She is warm, caring, and selfless about sharing what she knows with others, and openness like this is only part of her "secret sauce" for helping veterans and their families cope with the many unforeseen difficulties of PTSD.
