It's been over 9 years since you first killed a man. Nine years since the boy  man you called your brother, your best friend, was killed in an explosion at the age of 19, before ever having his first kiss. Nine years since your life changed forever.

It's been nine years since PTSD snuck  barged into our lives. It hit you us all at once with the force of a steam engine, shattering our lives into a thousand pieces. I've worked so hard to glue the pieces back together, and at times we managed to get the puzzle almost figured out, but PTSD is a stealthy bitch. It hides in the corner for months, just long enough to give us a false sense of security. Sometimes it sneaks in slowly, digging a hole of depression that you slide into with the speed of quicksand. Sometimes it hits with no warning, with the speed and intensity of a stick of dynamite. We do our best to avoid it, by avoiding what most people would call life - No cities, or crowds of people. And certainly no office buildings. No loud noises, especially construction sites or fireworks. And we try our best to avoid cars parked on the side of the road.

It's hard to believe that this has been our life for almost a decade. I naively thought that love would conquer all, but PTSD stomps on love and spits in its face. Our love has not given up. It still fights.

But ten years is a long time to fight.

Chronicles of our journey in poetry:
________________________________________________________________
I wish I could put into words
the emotions that sweep over me when we touch,
a liquid sugar flooding me with sweet sensations,
encircling me in a whirlpool filled with
harmonic chords and violins.
I find myself wrapped in silken undertones of vanilla
and orchestral honeys,
infused with subtle remnants of your presence
even long after our last embrace.
________________________________________________________________
I stood on a mountain with my arms outstretched and
I felt the wind caress my skin,
but not your fingers.
I felt the sun kiss my face,
but not your lips.
I felt the vastness of everything surround me,
but not your arms.
And though the wind and the sun and the sky made me feel at peace,
part of me still felt empty.

________________________________________________________________
I see it when I close my eyes,
a flash of white, then red
                                         red
                                                everywhere.
I hear the screams,
("Fuck! Get down!")

feel the sharp sting of shrapnel, 
grains of sand whipping like the bullets through the air. 

I feel you, your chest wet, 
sand-colored uniform dyed with crimson. 

Your voice cries out, screams turning to whispers
as my name struggles to leave your lips

And I sit a thousand miles away,
sipping my latte and wondering what clothes to wear.

_______________________________________________________________

Let me pry that steel blade from your fingertips,
heal your soul with kisses and tears
and save you from those silent screams of loneliness.

Just fall into my arms
where you will find a safe harbour for mending,
a place where crying brings no shame,
and fears and regrets may be unleashed.

Come to me
so that I may cry with you
and wash away everything that was

________________________________________________________

I remember you.
You're the one who loved me
once upon a time
in a life I lived like fairytales
of shining knights on gallant steeds.

Only your horse wasn't white,
and your armour lay soiled with blood and death.

You came to me tired and crying,
battered and torn like the flags of our fathers.
I held you, kept you safe from your nightmares,
and kissed away your fears,
secretly bleeding for you as I fought away your demons.

I lay broken,
shattered by the memories of battle I kept for you,
all the while fighting demons of my own.

and you scorned me and my weaknesses,
running away to find the beautiful princess
you never knew I could be.

It's been a while.
It is what it is.

The weather is getting cooler, and I love it. I love the feel of the crisp air against my skin, finally a reason to wear sweaters and boots. I love keeping the windows open and the air conditioning off. I love the color of fall leaves and the taste of pumpkin everything. But the cool air is a reminder, a reminder that it is moving close to the one year anniversary of when you took your own life.
It's still surreal, so surreal that there are days I forget that you are no longer here. I see your brother, your father, your mother, and have to remind myself not to ask where you are, how you are doing. I imagine your last moments, wonder what you were thinking, how you were feeling. How many seconds did you have for your thoughts to catch up with you after you jumped? Did you feel freedom? Did you panic?
I feel guilty, guilty for not seeing how depressed you were, for not spending more time with you. I look at your parents and wonder how they go on, thinking to myself, "what if that were MY son?" It hurts, more than I care to admit sometimes. I feel like I should be learning some life lesson, doing everything I can to not take things for granted, but the truth is I just feel sad and scared. I'm scared to lose more people I love, scared that I may be missing warning signs in someone else.

This kid says it all.

http://www.upworthy.com/this-kid-thinks-we-could-save-so-many-lives-if-only-it-was-okay-to-say-4-words?c=ufb1

No one said the road was smooth

I'm finding this journey to be much harder than originally anticipated. Perhaps I was being too idealistic, or naive. Regardless, I have to say.... I hate where I am right now. Not just on my life journey, but geographically as well. We're living in a tiny house with no furniture, attempting to cook with 1 frying pan and a small pot, and eating off of the 2 appetizer plates we have and the plastic bowls we bought at the store. The city could be described as borderline ghetto, with absolutely nothing to do within safe walking distance. To make things worse I am left alone in this empty house for hours on end while M and Z (our roommate and the owner of this house) go off and spend the income we don't have on fast food, nerf guns, and beer.
Our transition from military life to civilian life has not been smooth, for any of us. M's PTSD is worse than ever, and to make matters worse, Z lives like the typical bachelor and does not discourage M from acting the same way. For some reason I thought it would be different - different from the first time he got out, different from  before we were married - but it's not. The difference is now we are married, and we have a so who gets to be caught in the wake of this storm. But the actions are the same.
This is seriously trying my patience, my sanity, my devotion. I'm miserable, truly miserable, and I don't know how long it will be before things get better...

But wait..

There's been an interesting turn of events lately.
Firstly, I got back my GRE scores. Not good. At least not to me. They changed the format of the test so I can't even compare my raw scores to what the University wants. They did give me my percentiles, and the numbers made me cry. For math I got better than 65%. Disappointing, but pretty much what I expected since I had to teach myself almost everything. Verbal was 77%. Not terrible considering my vocab knowledge was next to nil before I got the prep book, but compared to the A's and B's I got in college the score seems almost insulting. And finally, the sour cherry on top of my disappointing sundae....for writing....29%. Now, I know it's been about 5 years since I've written an essay, but a 3.5 out of 6? I read the sample essays for scores of 3 and 4 and there is NO WAY my essay was that incoherent. Seriously, my heart sunk. Grad school? Good-bye.
And, based on what the 4 recruiters I have talked to have said, the chances of me getting in and doing what I want without my doctorate are slim. People just don't move from enlisted to medical so they don't have a program that facilitates it. Air Force currently has about a 1% acceptance rate, and Army has said they will do what they can to get me in, but right now I would outright fail the PFT.
It's been discouraging to say the least, but this turn of events does have a silver lining.
I recently started selling Pampered Chef products. I was nervous at first but finally came to the conclusion that even if I couldn't sell, I wanted enough of the products anyway that the investment would be worth it. And it has been. After getting my first shipment of products I got SO excited about all the things I could do with them. I mean, more excited than anyone should get over cooking tools. But it made me realize something. I love cooking. It's the one thing I have remained passionate about my entire life. While I have an extreme interest in psychology and could probably never learn enough about it, it's not the same thing as being passionate. Cooking makes me happy. It relaxes me. And teaching other people how to cook delicious food that is also healthy gets me all fired up.
It may not offer health insurance, or a monthly allowance for housing, but I think I'm really going to love this job.

Day 29: Something you hope to change about yourself. And why.

I apologize in advance for my extremely cliche answer, but the truth is if I could change anything about me it would be my weight. I've never been skinny. Ever. I have struggled with my weight since I was in elementary school and it seems no matter how hard I try I will never fit in anything smaller than a size 7. And now that I've had a baby I'm beginning to think that even a size 9 will be stretching it.
Besides the fact that I weigh more than the maximum amount allowed for the army I'm sick of not being able to wear short sleeve shirts because my arms are too big. I'm sick of not being able to wear shorts because they ride up and my thighs chafe as they rub together with every step. I'm tired of doing downward facing dog and seeing the fat from my thighs practically swallow my knees.
I've tried diets. I've tried the Insanity workout. It seems like no matter what I try I plateau very quickly and never manage to decrease the size of my problem areas.
My next step is to get a personal trainer to hopefully target those areas specifically.

Day 28: What if you were pregnant or got someone pregnant, what would you do?

At this point getting pregnant is not exactly in "our plans." It would disqualify me from going to bootcamp, and in about 5 months we'll be without health insurance for an indefinite period of time. So, needless to say, it would not be ideal. Luckily, because of this implant in my arm, the chances of getting pregnant are pretty slim.

Day 27: What’s the best thing going for you right now?

How fitting that I would find the time to answer this question on Mother's Day. I would have to say my son is truly the light of my life. I have a lot of good things going for me right now, but he is by far the most positive. I am so thankful to have such a beautiful, talented, and healthy son.

Day 26: Have you ever thought about giving up on life? If so, when and why?

I wouldn't say that I thought about "giving up" on life. It was more that I thought everyone had given up on me, that they wouldn't care if I was alive or not. I wish I could pinpoint one time in my life when I felt this way, but to be honest it's how I spent most of my adolescent life. I've never been that popular - I was always outspoken and overweight. My fluctuating hormones didn't help much either.
It wasn't until the end of college that things got better. Even now I still struggle with self image. But unlike then I now have people I can count on and people who depend on me.

Day 25: The reason you believe you're alive today

This is a question I struggled with for the longest time. In the grand scheme of things I felt like a grain of salt in the middle of an ocean. What did my presence really matter? It took lots of soul searching before I realized that though I may be small, I am a part of something so much bigger.

Funny how getting better also means good-bye

Sorry to those who were actually following my 30 days of truth. I promise I will finish it eventually... it's just going to be put on the back burner for a while.
For those of you who didn't know I've been seeing a psychiatrist since early in my pregnancy. Nothing super serious - just a way to keep my hormones in check and a preemptive measure for warding off the post-partum depression I was positive I was going to experience. Well, apparently my brain just works different than most. Having my son actually got rid of all the anxiety and depression I had pre-pregnancy. So what does this mean? I'm actually doing way better than expected, and because of that "our therapeutic goals have been met." Which also means it's time to say good-bye to my therapeutic relationship.
I'm not sure how many of you have been to therapy, but it's quite easy to get attached to your therapist. Not in a romantic type of way mind you, but in a friendly dependent way. You see, this man understands me. He is the one who helped me discover that I was better suited for clinical work than research. He has been my confidant and mentor, and now that things are going better for me it means I can't see him anymore. It feels like I'm losing a friend. To make things worse though, when you get down to the real truth of the matter, he's not my "friend." He's my therapist. There's a line there that shouldn't be crossed.
I knew there was going to be a time when we would part ways. I just didn't realize it would feel so sucky.