Now life's not fair, but you learn to drive on. So I lost a one-year-old daughter and had some time in the service as well and lost some buddies to include a really good friend and Afghanistan. And you learn to drive on, you come home and you do what you got to do. You stay strong, you don't show weakness. I'm worried that there was a stigma associated with some of the things I went through and there's shame if you show weakness and that's the way I felt through some of these traumatic experiences. I didn't realize I had some symptoms. I really was forgetfulness, this interest in activities. I didn't want to have relationships. Had some nightmares. Hit my wife in bed during my sleep and my wife just learned to deal with it somehow and to support me not knowing all these experiences I went through and the effect that they have on me. The aggression, the fear, the anxiety, they never manifested themselves in my professional life. I was doing well as a captain in industry and in the military I had a great career as well with early promotions and doing all the right things and helping soldiers out and getting ready for what we needed to do to the war. There was a day at work I was having chest pains and I literally thought I was having a heart attack. My civilian employer actually called ambulance I went to the emergency room. I had a full battery of tests for my heart. See if there's any pulmonary conditions and neurological issues that I may have and I came out as a fully functional, fully physical fit individual. At this point in life I didn't know that these were all signs of post-traumatic stress. About another month after that my general practitioner diagnosed me with post-traumatic stress. I could put on a regiment of different pills, everything from Benzos to Klanazepam for prescribed medication on a daily basis. I'm not sure how my wife handles this. She's an angel and a much stronger person than me. She put up with me and handled the household and it came to a culminating point about three years into this that she told me she can't handle it anymore and I needed to seek help. December 30th 2009 is the date of my wife helped and changed my life by telling me go to the Veterans Administration. Three days later January 2nd 2010 I was in the emergency room in urgent care. I started going through what would be a journey for the rest of my life. About a month later I saw psychologist Dr. C. To this day she's another person that's helped me in life. I asked her for my 90 day plan and my road to getting better and that was 10 years ago to the day. There is no 90 day plan. There's not a one day plan, there's not a one year plan or a decade long plan. It's different for everyone but I could guarantee you if you seek treatment and get some help you will get better. I'm happy to say that the relationship I have with my wife and now three children is a lot better. I fully progressed. I'd like to share my story today probably for the fact that I know what I went through and and other folks should not have to go through the same thing. There's no stigma, there's no fear that you should have, there's no shame with with getting help for a mental health disorder and at the end of the day it's really got the opposite effect. If you go get help it will be a stronger person. We have stronger soldier, husband or wife, brother or sister. My name is Brigadier General Ernie Lytinsky and I have post-traumatic stress.