
When a country is at war, the soldiers that are sent overseas are often praised for the physical sacrifices they make for their home; however, the emotional hardships they inevitably endure go overlooked most of the time. Whether it is out in battle or back at camp, these praised warriors have to withstand gruesome sights every single day. All of these components slowly stack up and come together to form Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in the minds of these people. The Things They Carried, a novel written by a Vietnam War veteran, does a fine job of not only showing the physical deterioration of soldiers at war, but also the mental and emotional tolls they face. From the beginning of the story to the end, the author Tim O’Brien provides the reader with many instances where conclusions about the disorder can be drawn. When reading The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien, we can analyze how the soldiers gradually develop Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder through the actual “things” the soldiers are carrying, the destruction of the village Than Khe, the death of Ted Lavender, and the repetition of diction.

The U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs defines Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder as, “having flashbacks, upsetting memories, and anxiety following a traumatic event” (1). Those affected by PTSD have to relive some of the worst moments of their lives over and over, making them oddly obsessed with the thought. Also, based off of that definition and its source, we can conclude that war itself would potentially be one of the leading causes of PTSD. Tim O’Brien’s story is unlike others because of his first-hand experience in Vietnam. Along with describing the physical deterioration of the soldiers, O’Brien’s text also shows how their minds are degrading as well. There are multiple incidents that contribute to that definition throughout the novel.

The soldiers in the novel are all described as carrying items with them on their journey in Vietnam, and almost all of the items can contribute to how they eventually acquire PTSD. When Lieutenant Jimmy Cross describes what each of the other members of the Alpha Company are carrying with them it is easy to pick out the physical items that can provoke PTSD. Lieutenant Cross himself carries letters and photos from Martha, his love that he hopes to return to someday. Being separated from someone he loves causes him to get more and more attached to her and over time that starts to take over his mind and distract him from his sanity. Ted Lavender carries around marijuana and tranquilizers with him to calm him down if he needs, and that can directly correlate to PTSD. Also, along with the personal belongings, the soldiers all carry their weapons. These are the same weapons that take the lives of people and cause other traumatic events. On the other hand, while some of the items are physical, the other things that are named include intangibles like guilt and fear, which both directly corrode the mind. While there were components of the novel that contributed to mental destruction, there was also an event that created physical destruction. 

A main and undeniable reason why soldiers develop PTSD is because of the events they witness while at war. While analyzing The Things They Carried, Tina Chen quotes Tim O’Brien talking about how the events from Vietnam affected him, “After Vietnam, it becomes impossible to tell where you are and why you’re there, and the only certainty is overwhelming ambiguity” (Chen 79). This shows us that confusion and ambiguity both stem from traumatic events. One of these traumatic events that is mentioned in the novel is when the soldiers raided and destroyed the village of Than Khe, while murdering many innocent civilians. This was one of the reasons the soldiers weren’t welcome with open arms when coming home. They brutally murdered and raped innocents, and destroyed everything they own. So not only did they destroy the village, but they did it in a very gruesome fashion, imposing more reason for the soldiers to acquire PTSD after the war. Tim O’Brien even said in The Things They Carried himself, “But the thing about remembering is that you don’t forget” (32).

Another traumatic event depicted in The Things They Carried occurs with the death of one of the soldiers, Ted Lavender. This event itself happened because of mental deterioration. The soldiers were on a mission to destroy tunnel complexes, but Jimmy Cross got distracted and pictured the tunnels falling on him and Martha and he couldn’t stop thinking about her once he started. Due to Cross’s lack of focus on his post, Ted Lavender ended up getting killed on his way back from going to the bathroom. Being away from the woman he loved caused Cross to have a corrupted mindset, and that only led another tragic memory to haunt these soldiers. When something starts corroding there’s no going back, and their minds have already started to give into the PTSD even though they’re still at war. Along with the pain endured from losing someone from their lives, the soldiers had to bear with looking at the corpse of their companion until the helicopter came to carry it away. As they were waiting for this helicopter, the soldiers smoked Lavender’s marijuana to take their mind off the anxiety that is slowly but surely building up inside each of their heads. 

The final supporting claim to Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in The Things They Carried by Tim O’Brien is the repetition of diction. PTSD is a disorder that makes you obsess oddly over scarring events that you’ve experienced. It repeats in your head all day long, and that is reflected by the diction and structure of the words when O’Brien describes what all of the soldiers are carrying; he repeats the same, identical phrase over and over, sounding like a broken record. Quoting the U.S. Department of Veteran Affairs again, “[Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder is] having flashbacks, upsetting memories, and anxiety following a traumatic event” (1). O’Brien repeats the same formatted sentence again and again because he remembers it like a script. Since his experiences in Vietnam were so awful and gruesome, it replays in his head all day every day.

We can conclude that soldiers off at war often endure just as much mental damage as they do physical damage. Every day they have to bear with witnessing some horrible and gruesome things. All of these events start to stack up and cause the formation of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder in their minds. The Things They Carried, a novel written by Tim O’Brien, does a fine job of not only showing both the mental and physical breakdowns the soldiers endure. O’Brien uses his first-hand experience from the Vietnam War to accurately portray PTSD in the life of soldiers in the field. When analyzing Tim O’Brien’s novel to a further extent and focusing on when he describes the things the soldiers are carrying, the destruction of the village Than Khe, the death of Ted Lavender, and how he structures the diction, it allows us to realize how they all contribute to PTSD and to learn more about the disorder.
