Feb

15

WICKED PROBLEMS

Filed Under Combat PTSD, PTSD, PTSD treatment, Tears of a Warrior, Trauma, Treating PTSD, War 

by Janet J. Seahorn, Ph.D

 ptsd-warrior

 

 

 

         No doubt about it, PTSD is a very Wicked Problem.  Wicked Problems, by definition, are those dilemmas that cannot be solved easily by using a typical approach. Anyone living with traumatic stress, especially those pressures caused by combat, will attest to the challenges of trying to solve the predicament of moving through his/her life carrying the memories and phantoms of war.  If the solution was easy, it would have been found centuries ago.  Yet, here we are today, in 2011, and the Wicked Problem still exists. 

 

One of the Wicked Problems of trauma is surviving the depression that can be a part of the conflict. How does a person live with long-term depression that often becomes the new normal after battle? Constance Gibbons, one of our readers, wrote last week and shared how depression has been the new normal for many vets including her husband. After years of having it a part of their daily being, it becomes their after war identity. She stated: Another interesting aspect from those of us observers – spouses, et al – was that universally we noted the levels of sort of a baseline enthusiasm, whereas, the vet thought they were quite fine.  

 

            She explained further: As you continue to think of ‘depression’ as it may be portrayed by the vet, maybe think of a sense of resolution, unknowing acceptance, somewhere in a lower zonal level (between overconfidence and fear) from the years of living on the cusp of life and death, at a level of continuing risk so great that without the impact of the continuing penetration, after, into youthful vulnerability, it appears to those of us in observation to be baseline depression…where it is not to the vet; just an absence of heightened stimulation.  Wow, now how would anyone solve such a Problem?

 

            Veterans carry many Wicked Problems – ghosts of death and shocks of battle, memories that make if difficult to stay grounded in every day activities, and struggles to avoid the sleepless nights where staying awake is one way to keep the dreams of foreign battles from returning. New therapies and medications have helped lower the impact of PTSD but it has not solved the Problem. I read many blogs and articles relating combat PTSD to the trauma that the average person might experience. Things such as car accidents, rape, assault… all which are terrible and difficult to cope. Yet, these are hard to compare to combat where trauma occurs every day, often numerous times in a day. One of the biggest differences is besides being the prey, in combat you must also become the predator. Instead of being involved in one brutal injury or death, you may experience many.

 

            Fighting the Wicked Problems of war takes work. It requires listening to your gut feelings as well as how others around you perceive your behaviors. The good fight involves muffling the loud voices in the head long enough to examine realistic solutions. Perhaps there will be no absolute solution to PTSD, but every day there are warriors who conquer their demons and live full and meaningful lives. Wicked Problem you may remain, but you will not take more of a warrior’s life than you already stole. You will not win this internal war, even if you succeed in taking an emotional battle now and then. You see, Wicked PTSD Problem, in spite of your persistent, you are no match for the courage and willpower of a WARRIOR.

 

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