There are multiple foolish ingrates on this forum who believe PTSD is just a scam.
But it really does destroy lives, mostly as you mentioned.
Withdraw. Isolation. Alcohol and Drugs.
They can’t get along with anybody and don’t want to.
I know, I’ve engaged a couple of them. One claimed to be a multiple tour combat vet that does not have it. PTSD depends on the stressing event and the person affected.
Constantly fearing for your life and seeing up front and close someones brains chasing a bullet as it leaves the skull really isn’t a memory a person wants to reminisce over just before going to sleep.
The vet’s brain is forever rewired, something that just cannot be helped. The self medication with drugs and/or alcohol only worsens it, something else that just cannot be helped.
I had a coworker die at a distant vet hospital last year. No notices in the paper, no funeral. Just buried in a vets grave yard like the subject of this article. So sad. And the man was very proud of his military service.
PTSD has been around as long as wars have been fought. During the Great War, The First World War it was called Shell Shock. In some cases men suffered from hysterical blindness, some lost their hair, or their turned white. The mind is wonderful and powerful, and we do not understand our mind’s potential. It is probably greater than we can imagine.