From the introduction to Souled Out...

My purpose in writing this book is to share my personal experiences and continuing battle with Post-traumatic Stress Syndrome with those who have had, or will have, the same reaction to a traumatic event, as well as their families and friends. Whether from war, personal tragedy, rape, abuse or other violence, the lasting effects of these harrowing ordeals need much attention. Our society can, and should, learn to better understand and offer expedient emotional and spiritual relief for those souls and minds so deeply wounded.

Even though my own traumatic experience came from the Vietnam War, I do not have a particular interest in that war, nor its history, battles, strategies or politics; all of these are for others. I have no interest in telling war stories, but am including several descriptions of events for the sake of helping to visualize what I experienced, and the cause of the trauma that would take me through years of hiding deep in the jungles of Central Africa. Later, I continued on a thirty year nomadic wandering to almost every state in the US, across Canada, the Caribbean Islands, and Europe, trying desperately to keep my torment hidden behind an emotional shield I had developed to protect my sanity. Most of this wandering would be a futile effort to escape what my mind could not understand nor make into any acceptable rationale. But, no matter where I went and how far I ran, the one person I could not shake nor outrun was myself. I would eventually confront the haunting, eroded emotions and I would have one of two choices: I face myself, and examine the sensations that were safely hidden behind the protective, fortified barriers of my mind - the facade, the brick wall; or I could choose the eternal one. The second choice, suicide, fought a great battle to be heard; it would become almost a friend, no longer a fear. I convinced myself that if the mental torment got too bad, suicide was there to end it.

When I first realized, through various publications, that more Vietnam Veterans have died by suicide than died in the war, I was utterly shocked. I read where a retired VA doctor estimated that from twenty thousand to over one hundred and fifty thousand people have taken their lives after returning from this war. But these numbers, always rounded to the nearest thousand, are not as daunting to me as the suicide committed by a man who had stood next to me in flesh, blood and spirit...

~Read the complete text of the Introduction (PDF)

Excerpt from Chapter 8 - Gabon

It was nighttime when I arrived in Gabon. As had that unforgettable blast of heat and smells met me in the door of the plane when I first arrived in Vietnam, the fragrances and music of Africa greeted me first in the dark of that night. The scents in Vietnam were scorching air mixed with jet fuel at the base where the plane had landed. In contrast, the airport in Africa was near the ocean, and the hot air seemed stilled by the scent of flowers mixed with ocean breeze. I was immediately in love; the intrigue so powerfully pulling me in, I could give no resistance.

The next morning I saw Africa for the first time.

More (PDF)...