Iraq veteran wrestles with his invisible wounds
By David Crary
AP National Writer
On the plus side, David McBee has a fiancee who stuck by him, a 2-year-old son who loves him. They've helped him persevere through dark times -- blackouts, anger, confusion -- as he struggles with the invisible wounds of his combat duty in Iraq.
As a Marine, McBee engaged in the initial assault on Iraq from Kuwait in 2003 and the often-chaotic battle of Fallujah in late 2004.
He returned to the United States in 2005, worked for a time with the postal service and got engaged. His fiancee, Audra Cardoza, gave birth to a son in 2006.
About a year after his return, McBee began to notice a change in his personality, including what he describes as "blackouts" -- periods of time he couldn't account for.
"One day, me and my buddies and fiancee, we went out and started drinking," he said. "I had a meltdown. ... All this stuff that was in my head that I'd never said to anybody started coming out. I couldn't stop crying."
The "stuff" included images of Fallujah residents, children among them, killed by his own unit as it swept through neighborhoods that were supposed to have been evacuated.
"We search houses. We see people in there -- they're not supposed to be there. They're considered hostile. We just opened fire," he said.
"We saw a little kid in the middle road. There was no stopping the convoy. We ran him over."
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