I’ve been working from home as a life insurance field underwriter, and as such I take a tally of people’s medications and prescriptions qualify them for policies. At least once or twice a week, I get someone taking medicine for nightmares, PTSD and depression. Occasionally it’s a survivor of domestic violence, but usually it’s a soldier. It doesn’t matter if they are in their thirties, forties, fifties or sixties—those traumas stick around. 

My children both have run into my bedroom with nightmares, but the scary images fade from their imaginations after a few moments, and they go back to their beds and sleep.  These poor souls that I talk with on the phone have actually experienced the worst kinds of things and had them chemically etched into their minds. As far as I can tell, the bad thoughts don’t simply go away.

Humans, I am convinced more than ever, were never meant for these kinds of protracted conflicts. They leave a piece of themselves on the battlefield and carry home the chaos.

For many, it’s an invisible battle because there is very little room in our civilian spaces to acknowledge such things. We have all seen a person on a street corner that has softened their senses with a drugs or alcohol, but there are many, many more at home that we don’t see and continue to suffer. 

The infinite conflict.