US veterans left to fight post-war demons alone

Published: 31 May, 2011, 09:19

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American soldiers who return from Iraq are often left to adjust to life after service all by themselves, struggling to make sense of and justify the deaths caused by the war. The US government is often accused of failing to help them.

Â*RT met one former member of the military whose account of her grueling endurance sheds light on the harsh life of a returning soldier.

Jessica Goodell, a 28-year-old ex-marine, is an American who abandoned her weapon for written words, to tell a story she says is kept censored from US citizens. She is the author of Shade it Black: Death and After in Iraq.

“Even though people know it affects us, I don’t think they understand the weight and the toll that it takes on us. Seeing the effects of war, the literal effects, the dead bodies, the remains, the flesh, I couldn’t figure out what are we doing. Why are we doing this? Was this person’s life worth this,â€