An Overview of the general course of PTSD with a focus on my personal combat experience.

1. PTSD
The Evolution of Lived Trauma
Today, there is a far greater understanding of the impact of trauma
than there was when I returned home from my military experience
in Vietnam. My discussion today will focus on my own PTSD
experience.
PTSD is the result of a violation of the individual’s fundamental
framework of personal reality, whether the trigger is a natural
disaster, a terrorist act, domestic violence, criminal assault, or
combat.
I want you to feel comfortable asking me any question that comes
to mind. I am now 45 years post combat, and 30 years post
significant PTSD symptoms.
Today, I want to share with you of a number of lessons I learned
from my own experience, and what I have learned from other
people with PTSD over my career in human services and as a
member of Michigan’s disability community:

2. ● Anyone can experience PTSD if the trauma lasts long
enough or is intense enough
● The experience of trauma is entirely unique to the person
● People who have traumatic experiences, but who don’t show
typical PTSD symptoms nonetheless have their brains
changed permanently
● Like every disability experience, the key to expanding
freedom and moving to a full life of personally chosen goals
with PTSD is peer recovery and disability pride, along with
customized support
● PTSD symptoms will fade over time, but substance abuse
and deliberately chosen isolation can make the symptoms
last much longer-maybe even a lifetime
● PTSD, concussion-based brain damage, exposure to
chemicals in herbicides, riot control agents, insecticides,
explosives, illegal substances, diabetes, and all other chronic
medical conditions can play an important role in the severity
and evolution of PTSD
● Trauma can be created by experiences that are socially
judged as entirely positive-going to the moon, defeating the
Nazis, saving someone’s life.

3. My Story
In brief:
● I came to Vietnam with pre-existing social anxiety and
depression, thought he social anxiety stopped while I was in
country
● I was in Vietnam for 21 months. in the First Cavalry Division.
If you saw “We were soldiers once, and young…”-that was
the First Cav
● I was part of what was called a chemical unit attached to the
Division. We did a wide variety of fairly odd tasks:
○ Sniffer missions-looking for smoke: riskiest work I did
○ Tunnel missions
○ Destroying the usefulness of caves and bunkers
○ Creating and installing perimeter defense weapons
called fougasse-also a kind of French bread
○ Small scale use of herbicides
○ Mosquito spraying
● I was involved in 2 major operations during my first 6 months:
○ The relief of Khe Sanh

4. ○ The A Shau Valley campaign
● I ran a small chemical support squad for the 1st Brigade of
the First Cav in Tay Ninh for most of my second year
● I left Vietnam around December 10th, 1969, and was
discharged on December 17, 1969-Two years, seven
months, and 9 days after my first day in the Army.
My Symptoms:
● Depression
● Anger
● Anxiety
● Rumination over traumatic experiences
● Hypervigilance
● Use of hallucinogens
● Though I didn’t experience it, dissociation is also a symptom
of PTSD

5. The 3 Worlds of Combat Meaning
There are three systems of meaning that people experience in
combat and use to interpret the experience. They don’t overlap with
one another. To understand the apparent paradoxes of war
experience and their relationship to trauma and PTSD, you need to
understand these three worlds of meaning:
● Spectacle: Movie and video game makers never capture the
spectacle of war in their creations. Arclight example
● Horror: For all the time and effort put into the visual aspects
of horror, again they never touch the parts of combat horror
that stay with you decades after the events. Smells, having to
work and function in an environment of horror. Story of
sapper.
● Shame: Not the shame of having done something immoral. I
never participated in anything that could be described as an
atrocity and I knew no one who did. The shame I am talking
about is merely being present in combat, the way presence in
combat taints and scars you, and the empathic shame that
arises when you see other soldiers devalued as people by

6. ● the violence and unavoidable circumstances of combat.
Again, no one has to perform an immoral act for these things
to accrue to you.
I think the same 3 worlds of meaning are part of the generation of
PTSD in any trauma experience, though the specifics obviously
differ enormously.

7. Traumas, Small and Big: Spectacle
Some Spectacles:
● B-52 Bombing
● Typhoon
● River Ambush
● The A Shau valley

8. Traumas, Small and Big: Horror
Some Horrors:
● My First Rocket Experience, My Second Rocket Experience
● Battalion Ambush
● VN Ranger Assault

9. Traumas, Small and Big: Shame
Some Shame:
● JT’s injuries
● Helicopter Crash
● LZ Becky: Official Description of the combat

10. Killing As Trauma
“On Killing” by Dave Grossman:
● In the second world war only 20% of armed soldiers fired
when in a battle
● Starting with the Korean war, western armies began to try to
improve that rate
● In Vietnam, the firing rate was close to 95%
● This increase in firing drastically increased the individual
trauma associated with killing another human being
● Think “American Sniper”
● The British studied the impact of continuous combat on
soldiers in WWII
● At 60 days of continuous combat, over 98% of soldiers
showed symptoms of what today we would call PTSD
● The individuals that didn’t develop PTSD were aggressive
psychopaths who enjoyed killing and the intensity of combat
● In other words, almost everyone will experience PTSD is the

11. ● trauma is relentless enough

12. PTSD As An Ecosystem
Many threads can contribute to PTSD:
● Substance Abuse: often to go to sleep
● Chemical Exposures
● Brain Damage
● Multiple Traumas
● Stigma
● The vicious circle of shame
● Breakdown of the personal social network
A short overview of epigenetics:
● Biomes
● Inflammation
● Triggers

13. Recovery and Pride
Recovery:
● Recovery is not cure-The myth of cure
● The dysfunction of the sick role and the way it contributes to
maintaining symptoms
● Recovery is about iteratively learning to manage symptoms-
taking control, in other words
● Personal and social aspects of recovery; exercising
autonomy and benefiting from mutual support
● My symptoms and how I learned to manage them
● The problem with trying to feel safe
Pride:
● Disability Pride is the belief that disability brings with it
deeper personhood, skills for change, and unique gifts-that is,
the disability is inextricably integrated with selfhood.
● Pride directly counters the effects of stigma, shame, and
trauma: Her Power as an example

14. ● Pride can be cultivated iteratively through dialogue and
reflection
Apps: There are a growing library of apps to support individuals
with behavioral health, substance abuse, and PTSD related
symptoms
● MDRC held a webinar on the use of apps in the journey of
recovery. All the materials and an audio recording are
available at http://goo.gl/LlxGqm
● PTSD Coach at http://goo.gl/412ibP
● Android apps: https://goo.gl/6mCMni
● iSystem apps: https://goo.gl/t0Trkp

15. Last Thoughts
The image is from a Saturday Night Live satire of television
“inspirational mesages”.
If you truly want to understand something, try to change it.– Kurt
Lewin
There is nothing like returning to a place that remains unchanged to
find the ways in which you yourself have altered.― Nelson
Mandela
We could never learn to be brave and patient if there were only joy
in the world.― Helen Keller
You must take personal responsibility. You cannot change the
circumstances, the seasons, or the wind, but you can change
yourself.―Jim Rohn
Trauma fractures comprehension as a pebble shatters a
windshield. The wound at the site of impact spreads across the

16. field of vision, obscuring reality and challenging belief.―Jane
Leavy
If you read about the astronauts who went to the moon - the 12
who walked on it, and the others who orbited - all suffered serious
mental trauma of one kind or another.
―James Gray

17. Your Presenter
I am Norm DeLisle, Executive Director of Michigan Disability
Rights Coalition:
Short Bio: hubby2jill, 2dogs, advocatefor45yrs, change strategist,
trainer, geezer, pa2Loree, gndpa2Nevin
Email: ndelisle@mymdrc.org
Twitter: https://twitter.com/mdrcngd
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/disability.norm
Blogs:
Recovery Michigan: http://recoverymi.posthaven.com/
Disability Futures: http://normdelisle.posthaven.com/
Health and Disability: http://ltcreform.posthaven.com/
Economic Justice: http://economic-justice.posthaven.com/

18. Thank You!
I Appreciate Your Time and Attention!
Thank You!