SAN DIEGO _ With a name like Robert Blessing, he seemed destined to become a preacher.
But the decision to join the U.S. Army as a chaplain? That was all his doing.
And his undoing.
Like thousands of others, the 61-year-old San Diegan struggles with memories of what he saw while he was away at war, struggles with what was lost.
Eighteen men and women he served alongside during a year-long deployment to Iraq were killed. Dozens of others were injured.
It was his time-honored job _ Army chaplains have been around since the Revolutionary War _ to lead memorial services for the slain, offer encouragement to the wounded, counsel those who doubted the presence of a holy spirit in a place filled with hatred and violence.
But who comforts the comforters?
Blessing came home and returned to his life as a husband and father of two, resumed his duties as a priest in a University City Episcopal church. Nightmares and his own questions about God followed.
He tried to tough it out. "I'm a chaplain," he said. "I don't need help; I give help." He told himself the anguish _ sorrow and survivor's guilt, mixed with a desire to go back and be with soldiers again _ would fade as the years went by. It didn't.
Sometimes he grew angry and irritable, took it out on those around him. He thought about killing himself.
The diagnosis: post-traumatic stress disorder.
He prefers another term: post-traumatic growth.
"People think heroes are the ones who go off to war," he said. "They are, but I think heroes are the ones who go to war, come back with extraordinary experiences, learn how to process those in positive ways, and then figure out how to share all that with others so they can be helped, too."
It's a journey, he said, and he means that literally. Taking his cues from ancient times, when battle-weary Crusaders took long pilgrimages on foot to recover from what they'd been through, he's found that walking calms his mind and soothes his soul.
He's started taking other veterans on hikes of healing, too, and his is the voice of experience: one step at a time.
