SOF OPERATOR, 2017 — When the mission was lawful and I still can't square it

I am writing this carefully because there is a lot I cannot say and a lot I will not say. The mission was lawful. The rules of engagement were followed. The intelligence was good. The outcome was that several non-combatants were also in the structure and did not survive. I have read the after-action review more times than I have read any other document in my life. It does not absolve me. It does not condemn me. It just describes what happened. The clinical term is moral injury. I learned the term two years after I left service. My therapist at the Home Base Program at Massachusetts General is the first person who used the term with me, and the first thing she said was that moral injury is not PTSD and the two should not be treated the same. PTSD is the body remembering. Moral injury is the conscience remembering. The treatment is different. I do not have a clean ending for this. I am still in treatment. I still wake up at 0300 most nights. I have stopped expecting myself to feel okay about what happened that night and started expecting myself to keep showing up anyway. That has been the useful reframe.