So Let's Get Started...

[mlportersr]

My name is Michael Porter and I have PTSD.
It has taken me years to come to that realization and now that I have, I doubt anyone in a position of authority will ever admit it - just like they will probibly never admit that I was involved in a war. You see I was in the Air Force with the Strategic Air Command (SAC) and I was stationed with the 28th AMS at Elsworth AFB in South Dakota, with occasional side trips to Minot AFB in North Dakota. My job was as the radio maintenance tech flying on the EC135 airborn command posts. I was responsible for maintaining the aircraft's radio and telephone equipment in flight, as well as all the assorted crypto gear that allowed us to launch nuclear missiles. I fought the cold war, which for me was not an abstract concept or academic footnote in a history book. It was a very real war, but one in which there were no parades and no grand battles - all we had were casualties. I have come to realize that just as there are wounds that don't bleed or appear on xrays, so there are a lot of ways to die that fool your heart into continuing to beat and your lungs into pumping air in and out of your body.
Part of my duty was to stand alert a week at a time at both Ellsworth and Minot. To the outsider, "standing alert" looked a lot like "sitting on your butt", since most of the time was spent waiting. But waiting for what? Waiting for WWIII to start. Waiting for someone in Washington or Moscow to go seriously insane and decide to kill the planet and everyone and everything on it. By regulation there had to be a klaxon every week for practice so we knew the horn was comming and we knew that there was a 99.99999999999999999% chance that it was just another practice. But it was the 0.00000000000000001% chance that it was real that made you lie awake at night or do anything to distract yourself from what you were doing.
And then there were the time when we were flying when we thought for an hour or so that WWIII had started...
Well, for the most part that's how I got to where I am today, trying to find healing for myself. I'm hoping that this will be a place to start finding it.

Mike...

 

[Ned]

Morning Mike. Was that what us Brits understood as 'Looking Glass'?
I understand the 'is this drill or real?' bit too.
In BAOR we used to have 'Active Edge', you can sort of work out what that's meant to be.
Anyway, welcome.

 

[Wagon]

Hello Mike. Welcome to the site.

I was a cold warrior also..... and sometimes hot. Were you in During Winter 87. There was 4 days of nail biting shit going on. All the way up to Defcon holy shit here come the Ruskies. I was at the sub base in Groton. Allot of sureal things happening that only happen when you expect to get nuked.

A decade later it turned out that SAC or NORAD had a computer glitch and accidentally ran a doomsday scenario for real. Or at least thats the story according to Discovery channel.

Again. Welcome.

 

[Anglesachse]

Welcome Mike. I think that is something that just about all of us here can relate to. "Hurry up and Wait"

'Active Edge'

Cheers Ned, I lost count of how often that little f*cker showed his head.

Years of waiting for the commies, so we could nail them on the "North German Plain" and they never came, All that rushing around, geting on the bus geting of the bus, and nail biting. waiting for the Nuke that never happened.

 

[Jimmy1]

Mike,

Welcome to our dysfunctional family.

Just my opinion.

I think we can all associate waiting for something to happen, especially something where your life could be in danger.

What we have to be careful though is the differences between symptoms of PTSD and symptoms of anxiety and other shit brought on by our military conditioning.

They reason we have a different forum from the rest of the people out there is partly because we were trained (conditioned) and therefore don't feel a lot of emotion or play nice. The conditioning just amplifies some of the symptoms.

For instance, hypervigilence is taught to us at basic training and is also one of the many symptoms in the DSM IV. We have to be on alert. Its like training exercises and the real thing. Shift work around the clock whether it be in an OP, as a listening post, or in the CP. Everything has you juiced up. They have to otherwise we would not work under pressure and more people will die.

Hurry Up And Wait, I think is something said in every language in every defence force in the world.
Waiting for imminent danger is something totally different. I remember being on 'Call Out'. Not allowed to have a drop of alcohol, not allowed to go anywhere within a certain time frame, you could not plan anything.
And then they ramped it up and you parked every vehicle on a massive parade ground and the numpties came through checking everything from id's, inoculations down to how much toilet roll you had. Then they would send you home again.

The hardest part for you will be trying to prove to the VA that you were in combat.

Its no secret anymore, and I think all documents are available no matter what you did, well not really, some SF stuff will never be opened, but for you role, I don't think its so secret anymore or you would no be talking about it.
So, maybe you can extract some files that will help you get the treatment you need.

Good Luck mate.

 

[deborah l. boylan]

Welcome Mike! Here to help if I can. Lots of good people here so pull up a chair and sit a spell.

Deb

 

[gibrokedown]

welcome mike, anytime you wish or need to talk I have an ear,. I see your stress, but wish I knew more of how you got ptsd. if you don't wish to tell me it's ok. but know loose lips sink ships and I wouldn't sink a ship unless it had pirates on it. ;)
my ex was in panama during that time. I entered my first service in 86 so I caught your tail.

 

[reddevil1111]

Welcome. Hope this site can help you like it has me. Sorry you have this shit. If you discover a cure (becides a bullet) let me know, I'm first in line for it.