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They say that past is past and that we should leave the past behind and look to the future, but how can one look at the future if their pasts are haunting them. It is really easy to say, but those things aren’t as easy as said when you are the one that are going through it. Take a look at the soldiers returning home to their love ones, they are not the same after they returned.
A new television series, "Coming Back with Wes Moore", which airs on PBS in Montgomery, gives viewers the reality of soldiers after they come back from war. It is all about the struggles they need to face after coming back home.
Director and producer Wes Moor shares his stories after being deployed in Iraq and Afghanistan is important. He knows the subject very well because he has been there.
"I was a paratrooper in the 82nd Airborne Division, and we were in Afghanistan for 2005 and 2006, and part of the motivation for even doing this was I saw what the reintegration process was like firsthand, and I saw how it was like for my paratroopers," Moore said. "I saw that it's not easy."
Moore and the soldiers that shared their experience in the series found themselves searching for a new mission in life, a new purpose and a new identity.
"When I came back from war, my family wanted to ask me questions, but they were afraid because they didn't want to trigger anything. They didn't want me to relive bad memories, so what they did was try to return to normalcy as quickly as possible without understanding that there is no returning to normalcy. ... All veterans are changed people," Moore said.
In the first episode of the series, "Coming Back," he shares the story of his friend and fellow officer Brian Collins, after getting married and beginning a new career, unexpectedly committed a suicide. This leaves Moore left with the urge to understand why some soldiers can get on with their live, while there are those that can’t move on.
In the second episode, "Fitting In," Moore investigates what happens during the deployment and how their identity got altered after they come home.
Finally, "Moving Forward," the last episode, studies the drive of veterans to find a new mission, to contribute, to be part of something bigger than them.
Brad Messner, an Army veteran medic who was deployed to Iraq twice, watched the first episode of the series and watched one of the filming of the series near his home. What he saw echoed with him.
"It's hard to watch. I've been out several years, and I haven't been around a lot of other veterans or active duty, so it's kind of interesting being pulled back into what my life used to be like and the people I was around," Messner said.
Moore hopes the public to understand that struggles veterans are facing. He want to help people that has a family of soldier understand what that soldier is undergoing and he hopes that through his TV show it will spark some conversations.
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