Can you describe how you felt coming home from a deployment or combat?

Happy to be home and ready for a lot of questions.

Coming home from a deployment is a roller coster of emotions. You are happy to be home, happy to be back with your family, but thw adjustment can be hard and take some time to get used to.

Honorable and Proud

Relieved. I was happy to be home, safe.

I felt lost!--Army basically said go back to your previous life--they never said a word about Agent Orange Poisoning. I was sprayed for 14 months in Nam. Nobody ever said a word about SURVIVORS GUILT and how to deal with it ,nothing about PTSD. We were just a bunch of disposables.
I left Nam in Dec 1969 and wound up with A.O.P in 2001--my second wife INSISTED I get my PSA done--my number jumped from 4 to 7--the Dr. wanted me back in 30 days--he did another test and my number wert to 10--he said I was A WALKING DEAD MAN BUT HADENT FALLEN OVER YET---
The happy kid that got on the plane in Oct 68 NEVER CAME HOME.

I felt out of place which was such a weird feeling. I thought that I would have felt relieved to be back in the states, but honestly I felt burdened. I did not want to meet with my family or close friends… I just wanted to stay local. I started developing signs and symptoms of PTSD without even knowing it.

Excited, like i haven't seen my home in years

I felt excited, confused, anxious, and so much more

Coming home from Viet Nam was a surreal experience. I wasn’t sure I even wanted to go home to my wife, my eight-month old daughter I had never seen, and my family. I knew I wasn’t the same person that had left them. The Army had taken my uniform and I was once again in civilian clothes. I had served proudly and bravely in uniform but now I was just an ordinary American in ordinary clothing. It was as if my identify had been altered. The crowd of family at the airport, all with welcome signs, was something I rather expected but dreaded at the same time. My senses had been scarred by a not-too-distant attack, a rocket, a borage of mortar rounds. I wasn’t ready to make the adjustment to a safe environment. I endured the family greeting and was determined to bring my life back to something considered normal. I eventually became a husband, a Dad, returned to my civilian job and became a responsible member of society. For years though, a siren, a loud blast or a helicopter flying overhead would take my mind, and my senses, back to Viet Nam. Fifty three years later The memories, feelings, and images remain.

After my second combat tour to Iraq I had the honor of coming home on advanced party. We arrived back home at 0 dark thirty; no welcome party, no fanfare. 7 of us from the battalion, met by our Major who gave us a couple of beers and the next day off. May seem simple and bland but stepping on US soil after 7 months of hell, a cold beer and a day off was all that I could ask for. Ever grateful just to be home.