Editor’s note: Ortonville resident, 1963 Brandon High School graduate and Vietnam veteran Jan Mayhew, 62, served as an aircraft and maintenance repair specialist near the Vung Tau. He was in Vietnam for five years and seven months. His PTSD story follows:
Post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) began affecting me during active military duty. Shortly after I returned home from Vietnam, I did not know how to get help after a southeastern Michigan VA Hospital would not properly treat my symptoms. Then I became employed and was ashamed to seek assistance.
With PTSD, a destructive cycle develops. I try to stay busy with work both for financial security and to suppress symptoms; however, symptoms increase anyway. There’s little time to leave from work for treatment because of the urgent need to support the family.
The greater effort needed to work while trying to endure PTSD causes more stress and physical problems.
The resulting weaker mental and physical condition (increased symptoms) forces me to struggle still harder to survive.
I finally crash and burn with depression, gastrointestinal distress, chest pain, confusion, and hopelessness. After a forced period of rest, the cycle resumes with an even more difficult struggle and fatigue caused during the effort to make up for lost time.
During the cycle, numerous nights filled with violent dreams cause me to begin the day already exhausted. During my five years and seven months in Vietnam, I felt actively obligated to help defeat North Vietnam. I have never been able to accept our nation’s final defeat at such a great cost. I don’t hold a grudge against any Vietnamese citizens, but I frequently dream that I’m fighting the North Vietnamese Army.
I’m not asking for sympathy or complaining with a self-centered attitude. My intention is to help the public be aware of what some veterans and other citizens who have had traumatic experiences must endure. PTSD is now recognized as an illness and includes involuntary thoughts and physical responses that arise and haunt the victim.
Many, like me, have suffered silently most of their lives. There was always the fear that I, a basically strong ambitious person, will be considered ‘weak.?
In recent years, more is known about treating PTSD. I’m still symptomatic, but I now receive excellent medical care at Michigan’s Veterans Administration Healthcare Clinics.