My father suffered from PTSD and I am a product of that. The grog got him. Now cancer has him.
This will be his last Anzac Day.
I used to march with him. I used to be proud of him. Then I became a parent, and questioned his decisions. I couldn't understand, after having children myself, how he could choose alcohol over me. Over his own flesh and blood. How he didn't want to protect me, his child, from the atrocities that he had endured.
My biggest regret, is that he won't, or can't, share his stories with his family. My sister has suggested that he didn't serve, and that his stories of war are products of alcohol. I once saw him having a nightmare when he was passed out in his favourite chair. I roused him, and he groggily looked me in the eyes, with tears in his own, and said, "he's got no legs bub, he's got no legs!" and resumed his alcoholic slumber. I don't believe her theory.
When he applied for medals, the story of him having to fire on a village of women and children, and refusing to do so, was unsurprisingly, undocumented. Why would it be? That would be a war crime. Why would that be documented? Governments, in war time, perform atrocities. They seem to forget about the people they enlist to enact such atrocities. He received, what in essence was, a participation medal. A slap in the face. He was understandably, upset.
I am a Nurse, and I worked after a Vietnam Vet last weekend on a coronary ward. He sought solace in the fact, that he was not alone in having the dreams he was having, post-coronary bypass surgery. He appreciated, that the dreams he was having about his surgery, were not uncommon. I shared the stories my own father had shared; that he had vivid dreams of being on the table, with no anaesthetic. This man told me that his dreams, 'were nothing compared to the PTSD dreams'.
He understood, when I said that my own father had succumbed, many a time to those PTSD dreams. He told me, the grog had 'got him too'. He asked me to send my respect to my father. He was upset, that fellow Vet was on his last days, in a palliative care ward.
I struggled with that concept. Why would someone have such feeling for someone they had never met?
Today, was my last ANZAC day, with my father alive.
I work part time at an army barracks. Every time I work, I see young men and women come in with a vision of their deployment. "This is what we signed up for!" they say.
I feel sorry for them.
I feel sorry, that the people making the decisions to send 'boots on the ground', don't appreciate that those boots on the ground have REAL people in them, with REAL families, and REAL feelings.
I feel sorry that when those real people, with real families, apply for mental health help, are cast aside as 'broken' soldiers. They are medically discharged.
ANZAC day represents so much for me.
It is respecting those soldiers, that blindly follow orders, under the belief they are creating a better life for those who can't or won't blindly follow orders.
It is appreciating that those that who do that, have created a society that I can in fact speak out about the governments that do the above, without fear of being killed. It is appreciating that they, have in fact, taken on the burdens that I cannot fathom to burden myself with. That so many of us, cannot burden ourselves with.
It is also, a remembrance for all those families, and loved ones, who have to suffer from the effects of those orders. The partners who wake their loved ones from dreams, who care for those numbing those dreams with alcohol or drugs.
So today, let's tip our glass, to those that have served, are wanting to serve, or have paid the ultimate sacrifice of serving, for the country we live in today.
Where we still have the ability to question our government. Where we still have the ability to say, no, I will not blindly follow your political agenda.
Lest we forget.
Cheers,
Qld Nurse.
