I just had lunch with my buddy Steve and will soon join him at the motor pool to await a chopper that will begin his long journey home.
Steve expressed to me his surprise at some of the emotions during the past couple of days. His wife is excited to cuddle with him when he gets back. His immediate (unspoken) reaction? "So I'm leaving the real world of this deployment to cuddle?" The thought turns his stomach. He is also finding that a lot of people want to spend time with him upon his return. He has no desire to spend time with them. He is cynical, believing that these people don't really care about him, but only want to buddy up with the returning soldier to hear stories. He is already imagining himself sitting through long, tedious, meaningless conversations. His realization: "I don't want to go home."
There is nothing unusual about Steve's reactions (per the earlier post about the pervasive nature of PTSD). He has spent the better part of a year normalizing the abnormal. People want to kill you? Don't let them. Is the post receiving indirect fire (IDF)? Go inside. Did someone you know die? Or were they responsible for someone's death? This is war. Stuff happens.
For soldiers, the world often becomes inverted during and after a deployment. Chaos is normal. Normal life at home becomes chaos. It is important for soldiers to recognize this fact. When they display irrational anger or sadness at given circumstances or people, they must take responsibility for their irrational feelings and thought patterns. They must realize that their irrationality is normal for redeployed soldiers, but also can and must be changed. Thus, they also have the responsibility to argue with their feelings and begin to re-calibrate toward true normalcy.
At the same time, loved ones must adjust their expectations for the "new normal" that will accompany their soldier's arrival home. Here's some of what they can expect:
1) Seclusion. Even extroverts like me become incredibly burned out by a lifestyle that never allows for strategic retreats in order to socially and psychologically recharge. When I return, with the exception of worship services, I will initially avoid public places and large crowds. I will rarely leave the home, and when I leave with the wifey and boy on vacation, it will be to very low-key locations.
2) Mental fogginess. As much as I love ruminating and pontificating on theology, philosophy, politics, economics, psychology, etc, my mind will likely go on autopilot when I return. Loved ones must not expect profound responses to questions they ask, nor should they expect any measure of decisiveness (unless the soldier still thinks he is deployed and runs roughshod over the normal decision making processes). Expectations of profundity or decisiveness will often be met with frustration--i.e., What do you want for dinner? Don't know, don't care.
3) Cynicism. As exemplified by my friend, Steve, a deployment affects a soldier's worldview. He comes back to a society that often pays lip service to his service, but is largely detached from his service. America didn't go to war--the military did. None of the soldiers from my unit are coming back to a welcome home ceremony. They will be flown to the airport closest to their home. Someone will pick them up and take them home. They will expect social occasions to be superficial and will be more pessimistic in general.
4) Impatience and irritability. This accompanies the mental fogginess and cynicism. The soldier may react poorly to idle chatter, or what seems like pointless events or decisions. They might even display these traits against the heroes of their deployment--their spouses. The same things that kept their spouses going during a deployment--shopping excursions, home projects, etc--will be things that could particularly raise the ire of a soldier. "I don't care where you went shopping." "Who cares if the curtains are black or red?" This irritability is unfair, but it makes sense knowing where the soldiers has come from.
5) Yearning for anything but home. Nothing will keep the adrenaline going like a deployment. Soldiers will sit in a cubicle, thinking back upon the intensity of convoys and missions. They will motorcycles, hoping that going 100 mph on the highway will reproduce that same rush. Comfort will antagonize them, smiles and laughter will taunt them. "This is not the real world--it is all a mockery," their mind will tell them, when in truth, there life at home is as real as war.
When soldiers return home, rather than riding off into the sunset, a new battle must begin: A battle to reclaim the home, the family, and a normal life. It will be messy and awkward. They will have to fight to check their thoughts before they become attitudes and behaviors and invade the peace of the home. They will have to fight to respect normalcy and cherish the sacrifices of their families. And their families and friends must fight the temptation to say "You've changed," and instead, help soldiers ease back into a world where a loving wife awaits them in the next room, not a potential assassin.
And as God is just as gracious in sanctifying His people as He is in justifying them, we must trust that the heart that has been hardened in the fires of suffering will in the long run, be made that much more mature and malleable toward the plight of sin and the need for the grace of Christ.
