Mentally Not a Warrior

There is only so much a human can put themselves through. Each human is different, comes with their own stories, their own histories, but the end result is they are only human. They are not indestructible. They are not machines. No matter how much training they receive, these men and women are never going to be untouched.

A photographer is trained to take a picture. Sometimes they focus the lens on beautiful images but too often the lens finds something horrifying. They see the developed photo in their hands or on their computer. That one instant it took to take the picture stays with them. The soldiers are snapping pictures as well but using their minds to capture all of it. The difference between the photographer and the soldier is, they were part of the story, part of the details, part of the story being written in their minds. If all gets frozen. Sometimes they are able to push it back but sooner or later, it all gathers together for a perfect invasion force out to take over their lives.

Here's two stories proving just how human they are.

"Mentally Not a Warrior"
Posted: March 17, 2010

Lia Petridis
Journalist and editor

News about a record number of suicides within the US Army, 160 soldiers on active duty who took their own lives in 2009, sparked a debate in the US media in late 2009 that didn't last very long. The shame, the horror and if nothing else, the war fatigue is at least strong enough now to draw the attention of the Pentagon. Their Top Brass is striving for change and is trying to redefine the "American Warrior." Depression and other mental illnesses are to receive the same recognition and medical treatment in the future, as are physical injuries related to the war effort. Many returnees to the US are suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder or PTSD. Their condition will now be investigated more thoroughly and there is hope that taboos surrounding mental illness can be overcome. More and more veterans from different eras speak up.

This is their story.

Sgt. Loyd Sawyer is searching for words when he explains why he joined the US Army in 2005. He wanted to "do his part," for the country, in what he called "the cause in Iraq." The horror makes him falter. Mighty are the memories of war he is coping with these days.

Upon joining the Army Loyd, the general manager of a funeral home in rural Virginia, was assigned to a mortuary of the U.S. Air Force in the quiet town of Dover, Delaware. After his basic training in the U.S., he was transferred to the military base at Balad, north of Baghdad in Iraq.

"It was my job to prepare the bodies of my deceased comrades for their return to the US," Sawyer explains. He picked them up from the military hospital and drove them to the morgue. Upon a search of their pockets, he found letters, lucky charms, and very personal items. The dead are then flown back home in body bags. On his days off he helped to embalm the bodies. Sawyer was responsible for identifying individual body parts. The arm of a Marine soldier, recognizable by his "Semper Fidelis" tattoo, the Marines motto of unconditional loyalty till death. A foot. Facial skin he has to stretch out on a table.

Once, after a plane crash, he spent 82 hours in order to line up the bodies, "...and sometimes the remains are so hot that they melted the body bag." When Sawyer speaks, he sounds as if he is unable to believe or fathom the things he had to experience.
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Mentally Not a Warrior

The shattered Marine
3/16/2010 By Cpl. Katie Densmore, Marine Corps Base Camp LeJeune


Marine Corps Base Camp Lejeune — The shattered Marine Part 1
“I was killing myself without even knowing it,” said Pvt. Travis Westhoven, an inmate at the Camp Lejeune Brig.

However, this is not where Westhoven’s story begins, only where it almost ended.

As a lance corporal, he was a machine-gunner with Company B, 1st Battalion, 8th Marine Regiment, 2nd Marine Division, who was looking forward to his first deployment to Iraq.

The deployment began during September 2007 and started out smoothly. Westhoven had always wanted to travel and see different cultures. He was enjoying his experience overseas, but that would change with two incidents mere weeks apart.
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The shattered Marine