Follow me as I fight PTSD, smoking and getting my life back on track

I feel like a failure.

I’d given up smoking for 15 years (barring the odd one whilst deployed overseas – but they don’t really count do they?!?) and here I was lighting up again. I’ve always made fitness a high priority in my life and now I struggled to get through a workout. How did I get to this point? More importantly, how do I get back on track?

I’m a cop. I suffer from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder. During my 15+ years in the police I’ve seen and done things people should never have to see or do. These things haunt me and date back to my first few months in the ‘job’ around late 2002. I’ll spare you the gritty details of most of that.

Fast forward to mid 2014. A violent offender has breached his parole and is on the run. I decide I’m going to find him. Through luck more than good police work I find myself in the carport of a house as he runs at me armed with what I think may be a knife yet I’m not sure. My firearm is drawn and he tries to take it from me, yelling expletives and vowing he’ll kill me before going back to gaol.

A thousand things run through my mind in a split second. Am I justified in shooting him? Yes. Is he armed? I don’t know. Can I fend him off and holster my weapon? Most likely. If I die, who will look after my wife (heavily pregnant with our second child) and son? I don’t know.

I can even see the media headlines in my mind’s eye; ‘Cop shoots unarmed man’.

I land a good kick to the knee of the offender, folding it backwards and allowing me enough time to holster my weapon. The mother of all fights ensues, during which my radio is knocked from my hands, I deploy Taser and OC spray on numerous occasions and the offender continually tries to take my firearm from me. I struggle to restrain him and decide that it’s him or me and I’d have to knock him unconscious to cuff him (he’s 6 foot 2 and about 120kg). I rain blow after blow on him, blood splattering across the concrete until he’s unconscious and I can cuff him. I collapse in a heap. I’m alive.

Looking back now, this was the straw that broke the camel’s back. To everyone but my family I still looked like the normal Jerry; but at home things were vastly different. I was angry…..ALL. THE. TIME. I would snap at my children for making too much noise because I couldn’t handle being over stimulated. Trips to the shops were planned with military precision to ensure I was in and out in the shortest possible time. I hate to say it but I treated my wife horribly and when she didn’t meet my unreasonably high expectations I’d explode. I was now pushing away the very family I’d been so scared of losing as I fought that offender. It didn’t make sense and yet I couldn’t stop.

In mid 2016 at my wife’s insistence I saw my GP. He immediately diagnosed Post Traumatic Stress Disorder and I began medication but over the following months things got worse. I drank heavily. I stopped training. And I started smoking again. It began with one when I was particularly stressed, then that turned into a few more. Then, after a fight with my wife I bought a pack. I’ve been smoking ever since and I’ve been off work since October 2016.

I’m happy to say that after treatment including medication, a stint in hospital and a lot of therapy I’m back on track. I’ve started back at work – albeit only a few days a week and I credit the vast majority of my recovery thus far to ACT (Acceptance and Commitment Therapy) Therapy.

I’ve also reduced my smoking by quite a bit through using ACT principles and techniques but am struggling to shake the habit completely.

Follow me on my steemit blog as I fight the battle against PTSD, smoking and getting back into shape. I hope you enjoy the journey with me and get some inspiration along the way.