The Foreign Service Journal, May 2019

34 MAY 2019 | THE FOREIGN SERVICE JOURNAL The Call to Help Haiti In January 2010, I received a call. I would be part of the team that was going to Haiti to assist in the earthquake rescue effort. My initial reaction was excitement. This is why I became a medi- cal professional, to help people. Less than three hours after I received that call, I boarded a C-130 in Miami, and we flew to Haiti. Landing in Port-au-Prince, I surveyed the airport. It had received significant damage to its infrastructure from the earthquake, and was unable to sustain operations without U.S. military support. The rest of the city fared no better. On our drive to the U.S. embassy, we encoun- tered bodies in the road and people suffering and begging for assistance. It was an apocalyptic nightmare. I expected to see this; I’d thought I was mentally prepared for it. When we arrived at the embassy, I linked up with the Air Force Special Operations Surgi- cal Support Team and began treating casualties. At first it was routine things, the stuff I was expecting to see—broken bones, broken spinal columns with paralysis and similar injuries. But the number of wounded kept pouring in. The flow didn’t seem as if it was going to stop. The casualty collection point was saturated with wounded American and Haitian civilians. We set up improvised surgical rooms and a makeshift intensive care unit in an attempt to keep up; the need was overwhelming, and our team was inundated. I took quick five-minute breaks as I could, but I had no time to grieve or process the situation and what I was seeing. We had work to do. I had been working on adults for hours when a baby was brought into the casualty collection point. The child was rela- tively healthy, just a little dehydrated. I gave her a makeshift bottle of water, and she was on her way. Then it was like the dam broke. Child after child streamed in, with injuries ranging from internal bleeding and burns to broken bones and other damage. And then the orphans came into the embassy. They were scared, they were hungry, and some needed medical attention. I saw my 1-year-old son in each and every child that I treated. I now know that this was when my invisible wounds were inflicted, but I would not recognize it for years. We were in Haiti for two weeks. When I left, I felt like I was not finished; there was more to do. But I was happy to get home and see my family. Memories Out of Nowhere Over the next year, I experienced more heartache: my father passed away, and my mother’s health began to deteriorate. As I look back, I remember having thoughts of Haiti jump into my mind out of nowhere. I would work very hard to suppress those memories. As time went on, however, I became more and more depressed and agitated. My angry outbursts came more often. I was stressed all the time, and I couldn’t feel anything positive. When people would ask me how I was doing, I would reply, “I’m fine.” But the memories kept pop- ping into my mind. The harder I tried to repress them, the worse my situation became. Despite my emotional downward spiral, I did not ask for help. I was worried about the stigma and the repercussions it could have on my job. I was always taught to repress my emotions as a man and push through whatever was bothering me. For four years I battled, getting more depressed and angry. I became withdrawn, I lost my sense of humor, I no longer enjoyed the things I used to. Finally my wife, a firefighter paramedic, recognized that I was suffering from depression. She gave me an ultimatum: go see the doctor “or else.” On our drive to the U.S. embassy, we encountered bodies in the road and people suffering and begging for assistance. It was an apocalyptic nightmare. James Eusanio (in rear) and others assisting in the recovery efforts have just finished loading a casualty onto the helicopter to be medically evacuated. Port-au-Prince, January 2010. COURTESYOFJAMESEUSANIO