At 6 years old, Hannah Grace doesn’t understand wars, flashbacks or night terrors. But she already knows the most vital intel to gather from former Army Spc. Joshua Grim each morning: “Daddy, are you in a bad mood today?”
During operation Iraqi Freedom, Joshua Grim spent 14 months in combat as an infantryman in the 172nd Stryker Brigade Combat Team. From 2005 to 2006, his unit was deployed to Mosul and Baghdad where seven days a week, he and his fellow soldiers engaged insurgents, “kicking in doors and performing missions during all hours of the day,” he wrote in his journal. As a Radio Telephone Operator (RTO), Grim was a prime target for enemy snipers and hard to miss wearing “a 15-pound target strapped to my back with an antenna sticking up in the air.”
Though he managed to avoid catching any bullets in Iraq, Grim didn’t return unscathed. He brought home all the sights, sounds and smells of modern war—AK-47 rounds pinging off the armored personnel carriers, the whine of incoming artillery shells, the IED explosions that splattered “blood and guts and pieces of flesh everywhere.”
Honorably discharged in 2007, Grim is one of nearly 300,000 returning veterans of Iraq and Afghanistan dealing with the symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) or major depression. Everyday frustrations have the potential to trigger an emotional crisis. He can’t tolerate crowds or anyone “sneaking up” behind him. He scans unfamiliar places for exit routes and the pop of fireworks sends his mind rocketing back to Iraq. A mere whiff of Parmesan cheese reminds him of rotting bodies, stockpiled in the desert heat. If he can get to sleep, nightmares make staying in the same bed with his wife or napping with Hannah Grace or 2-yearold son, Kaysen, impossible.
It isn’t just the veterans who suffer from PTSD. Friends, family and loved ones often find themselves the target of their veteran’s rage, and the burden of keeping families together falls to spouses like Heather Grim.
“He doesn’t talk to me much about his time over there. All I know is he tells me he wants me and our kids to ‘stay innocent,’” says Heather Grim, who describes her husband as emotionless and robotic much of the time. “When Josh first came home, he was so sweet when we were together—unless he would drink. Then the anger would come out.”
Haunted by memories of the buddies he lost, Grim would experience bouts of depression and rage that served as “his first wake-up call that something just wasn’t right,” she says. “Honestly, I thought he was bipolar. He would be the sweetest person in the world for four months, then he’d crash. I love my Josh. I don’t love the other person.”
Wives and children suffer as much as the veteran with PTSD, says John Garland, a Rock Hill clinical therapist who counsels veterans, National Guardsmen, reservists and their spouses in North and South Carolina.
“When the one you love has PTSD, your entire world begins to center around keeping your veteran happy and calm,” Garland says. “Unfortunately, every attempt in the world [can’t] control the veteran’s anger, fear, resentment, depression and anxiety. Spouses must take steps to protect themselves from the onslaught of demands on their time—and that will be one of the hardest things to do while dealing with PTSD.”
Over the past five years, Heather Grim has been at her husband’s side as he’s fought for every small victory over PTSD. Josh gave up alcohol and avoids situations that might trigger a crisis. He’s been keeping his counseling appointments, taking his medications, and making remarkable progress. “He has worked so incredibly hard to get to where he is now,” she says. “It’s something he will have to deal with forever because there is no ‘cure.’ ”
Earlier this year, Josh escorted Hannah Grace to a father-daughter school dance and got in one dance before the noise and crowds redlined his anxiety level. Retreating to a back wall, he texted his nervous wife and observed his daughter’s joy from a safe distance. Entering a strange environment and risking a panic attack was a selfless act of courage that won’t earn Josh Grim a military commendation, just his little girl’s happiness—the only reward he needed.
“He tells me all the time Hannah and I saved his life and he wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t for us,” Heather Grim says.
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Editor’s Note: Joshua Grim avoids encounters that could exacerbate his PTSD and declined to be interviewed for this story. Details of his combat experiences were gathered from his journal.
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