Former England player Terry Butcher on his son’s death by PTSD: “He had two voices in his head. A civilian girl from Iraq and a sergeant-major figure, berating him and telling him how useless he was, why did he survive, how can he hold his head up when his mates have died, all that sort of thing.”
“A civilian girl from Iraq and a sergeant-major figure, berating him and telling him how useless he was, why did he survive, how can he hold his head up when his mates have died, all that sort of thing. Really, deeply negative. And that was with him all the time. The child, there was obviously an incident in Iraq. Something happened and it involved a little girl. And there was a guilt complex around his mates. He didn’t feel lucky to have survived. He said he should have died. That was hard for him to take, because when he went out there he told himself he wasn’t coming back. He was going to be totally committed, and he was. Never missed a convoy, never missed a memorial service for a colleague.”
“We didn’t have any help for him and that was the saddest thing. And there was a limit to what we could do. We’re not experts, we’re not carers, and he’s our son. We couldn’t help our son. It’s not even like your friend or a team-mate, anything like that, it’s your son. The number of nights we cried because we couldn’t get help, the number of times we’ve broken down.”
“Combat Stress and Help for Heroes wouldn’t take him on. He was assessed but they said the condition was too complex and too severe. He needed real professional help from a military expert, but we didn’t have that. So he was referred to the NHS and, bless them, they do a fantastic job but there was no one that was military based or had military experience.”
Source: https://www.reddit.com/r/soccer/comments/1tjk1kk/former_england_player_terry_butcher_on_his_sons