FORT HOOD — Sgt. 1st Class Sgt. Jeremy Ricketts made life-and-death decisions in Iraq that were learned in training and three combat tours.
But after experiencing a concussion — the kind of injury reportedly suffered by a GI now accused of killing 17 Afghans — Ricketts had a big problem.
Back home in Killeen after being flown out of Iraq in October, he told therapists at Fort Hood's Carl R. Darnall Army Medical Center Traumatic Brain Injury Clinic that he couldn't deal with people “standing and blocking” the aisles of a Wal-Mart.
“They would say, ‘Why would you worry about what anyone else was doing?'” said Ricketts, 33. “And I was like, I don't know. I don't know who they are, so therefore, you know, if I don't know them, I don't know what they're capable of.”
Hurt in a vehicle accident, he was diagnosed with traumatic brain injury, a traumatically induced physical disruption of brain function that can include unconsciousness and altered mental states at the time of the incident.
Ricketts is one of more than 320,000 U.S. troops in the past decade to suffer TBI. His case, like most of those diagnosed, is classified as “mild,” but symptoms can linger.
Reports that Army Staff Sgt. Robert Bales, 38, of Lake Tapps, Wash., had mild TBI launched speculation about its possible role in the Afghan shooting incident. But Bales, a four-tour veteran, had problems that included troubled finances and allegations he attacked a woman and was involved in a hit-and-run accident. He also might have had post-traumatic stress disorder, but mild TBI sparks a flurry of behavioral woes that include anxiety and PTSD symptoms, ranging from frustration, irritability and depression to reduced stress tolerance, guilt and denial.
PTSD occurs when a person is traumatized by a close call, while TBI is an actual brain injury, said Dr. Mark Goulston, a former professor at UCLA's Neuropsychiatric Institute and author of “Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder for Dummies.”
“I also think soldiers would prefer to admit to TBI than PTSD because my brain got injured,” he said.
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