Our little story

Rob and I have been married for almost 7 years now. We were married for five months before he joined the army and at nine months we moved to Ft. Campbell, KY where we we're stationed for four years. Rob was deployed to Iraq five days after I moved out there and we didn't see each other again until just a few days before our first anniversary. When he got back I could tell he wasn't the same man I married and fell in love with but I wasn't the same person either so we decided to work on our marriage and fall in love with each other all over again. It worked, we had almost a full year together before he deployed again but this time it was to Afghanistan for a full year. When he deployed we were told it would be 18months before he came home. Luckly six months out the army changed their mind and shortened it to 12 months. While over there he had to do things better left unsaid and a good friend of his almost lost his life. Because of this he has been forever changed. When he got back after a year there I barely recognize him, physically he was the same except tanner than before. But mentally and emotionally he was a whole new person. All of the military spouses were briefed and given information on what changes we might see and what to look out for to keep ourselves and our soldiers safe. After a few months I knew something was wrong, he was more irritable and short tempered, he was also having some nightmares and flashbacks, but we were assured that this was normal give what he had gone through and should fade in a few months. During this time we were trying to get pregnant and were told that we had a 2% chance of conceiving naturally. But lo and behold just a month later we found out that we were pregnant with our fist child. When I was five months pregnant we got out of the military and moved back home to be with family. Things were going great and we were excited to welcome the newest member of our family. While I did notice signs that he was struggling to come to terms with what he saw and did while deployed I figured that he would talk when he was ready to and I left him alone. Fast forward about a year later. Some things were going great I had given birth to a healthy baby boy we named Adam, and we found out when he was six months old that we were expecting again. We were ecstatic that we were expanding our family again. But I began to worry about keep our family together. Rob was moody and despondent one moment and then he would be bouncing off the walls the next. He was having nightmares and reliving moments from his deployments. When I asked him to get looked at because it seem he might have PTSD he shrugged it off thinking I was overreacting because of the hormones from the pregnancy. I began to doubt myself too it wasn't like it was all the time and he was a great father and he never hurt us, but I still had that nagging voice in my head to get him evacuated as soon as possible. I finally got him to agree to see a VA counselor that came up from the VA every week to at least talk to him and see what he thought and to at least have someone to talk to about his combat experience since he wasn't confortable talking about with with me not that I blame him. He seemed to to better but he still denied that he had PTSD because in his mind that meant he was weak. It wasn't until he pinned Adam face down on the mattress,to get him to be quiet,in his sleep and had no recollection the next morning that I finally got through to him that something was very wrong and he needed help. Thankfully Adam wasn't hurt and I was able to get Rob off him and move us to another room for the rest of the night. The next morning Rob said he didn't remember doing it but that he had a nightmare, when I told him what he did he got really upset and was terrified to touch me or Adam in fear that he would hurt us. He quickly called his dr and explained what was going on and we got an appt for a psychiatrist to evaluate Rob and recommend treatment whether that was drugs or behavior modification. While we waiting for the appointment to come up, I gave birth to another healthy baby boy. We named him Parker and his older brother loves him a lot. Rob was extremely worried that something would happen and he would hurt one of us but he was down better just talking with the counselor every week and gettin this frustrations off his chest. We were also working together to figure out his triggersn ad help him avoid them as much as he could. When we finally met with his psychiatrist he said that he had no doubt that he had PTSD and that he was going to start him on medication right away. He has been in treatment for almost a full year now and is going a lot better, we still have our good days and our bad days but the good days are better and the bad days aren't as bad anymore. Rob has been doing so much better that he has finally started working on his college degree. He is able to be in large crowds although an hour is his max it is a lot better and his previous five minutes. He also hasn't had as many nightmares or flashbacks. It is exciting to see my "first" husband coming back.