It’s amazing how the human brain picks up on something in childhood and clings to it. So it affects everything about a person years later. I discovered this in the course of therapy that I received to help with the aftermath of mental illness.
What happened to me was crazy, I had seen and done so many things in a short time. There is no way he will get out unscathed. I served in Iraq and Afghanistan, married twice, had three children, and tried to be in too many places at the same time. Too many turntables that inevitably collapsed.
Now everyone is looking at me warily, thinking that I am about to derail again. On the other hand, life is still quite hectic.
You see, my second wife lives 200 miles away, and try as we might, we can’t move on. We are at a standstill, neither wants to move to be with the other. As you will begin to see, I bit off more than I could chew.
So let me set the scene. In 2006 I joined the army and went to the Royal Military Academy at Sandhurst, the home of the British Army Officers Corps. Around the same time I met my first wife and got pregnant. Our oldest was followed by twins in 2 years. It’s time I wasn’t home due to back-to-back operational tours. Destined for failure, my wife left me when I was in Afghanistan and returned to our hometown. I suppose I could have left the army then, but I didn’t. I stayed, was posted near London, and met my second wife.
That’s when it got even more complicated for me. I’m trying to be a father whenever I can, trying to be the best husband and driven by my career, but I can’t pull it off. I unfolded myself again, but I knew my heart wasn’t in it. I wanted to be home, but my wife and I seemed to assault each other all the time. I got mad and stayed like that. I didn’t know what was going on, but she was crying as much as I was furious. I went to the doctor and they quickly diagnosed me with PTSD. I don’t know if it was just that, but my head was screwed. I started drinking more, closing in on myself, and generally blaming my wife for everything.
Then I made a mistake that started a spiral into despair, the mental hospital, and separation. I took my kids on vacation and decided to drink. They got scared and I lost them for a year. No contact.
I was admitted to a psychiatric hospital, but I couldn’t seem to recover. I was in such a dark place. I threw it all away to escape my brain. He left his wife, our house, everything.
And so I began my descent to the bottom before I decided that enough was enough and that I needed to fix myself or be doomed. I fully embraced my therapy, stopped drinking, spent a lot of time being mindful.
It was during this time that I learned a lot about how my brain worked and why I reacted that way. It started when my dad left when I was 4 years old. My young mind decided at this point that if he wasn’t around then I needed to replace him. I guess this was rational to my immature mind, but the problem is, you can’t be anyone else, you can only be yourself.
I tried to be him, act like he would have acted, put him on a pedestal and try to aspire to him. That’s why I also joined the army. I thought I would follow in their footsteps.
But then again, if that’s not me, how did I think trying to be someone else for years would help me? The other problem was that since I had put it so far out of reach, I felt like I was never good enough.
This continued for years and resulted in me developing a growing feeling of resentment whenever I felt that someone was putting me down or putting me down. Therefore, with so many dishes turning along with this growing sense of discontent, I began to vent my frustration on my wife.
Only in hindsight can I see this. At the time it was totally her fault, or his or hers. Never mine. Recipe for the disaster that brought me to the brink.
So I left, got a little apartment, and isolated myself. I worked to the darkest place and then recovered. Now I am not totally fixed. I still feel like drinking too much from time to time, I still get nervous, but I don’t have the feeling of resentment that has eaten me for years. Now I see things as they are. My brain works against me, maybe due to alcohol, perhaps due to frustration.
I had to learn to enjoy my own company, find an inner peace and I believe that I am there now. Which now means that I have to pick up the pieces of my life and fix them too. I started to see my children again, but I know that I will still be under the microscope for a long time. I started to make up with my wife, but I will work on it for a long time.
I accepted that my career in the military was over and began planning for a future based on using my experiences to help others like me. I mean, if I can help just one person, I’m doing the right thing.
