Summer Reading: Pinellas Resident Chronicles Battle With PTSD

ST. PETERSBURG, FL — An ex-Army combat medic from Pinellas County has penned her struggle with post-traumatic stress disorder in a memoir published by St. Petersburg Press.

In her book, “Invisible Wounds of War: My Redemption," retired Col. Beverly Smith-Tillery chronicling her struggle with PTSD through a series of poems she began writing as a way of coping with the trauma.

A registered nurse, Smith-Tillery was a U.S. Army reservist called up to serve in the Iraq-Afghanistan War. She worked as a nurse anesthetist at Landstuhl Regional Medical Center in Germany where the wounded were transported for surgery.

She said the things she witnessed haunted her dreams and shook her to her core, even after her retirement from the military in 2011. Eventually, Smith-Tillery found a coping mechanism by writing poetry about her experiences.

“I thought maybe if I put these thoughts down on paper, it will help me deal with them,” she said. “So if I woke up and I had a nightmare about a soldier that I was taking care of in the operating room who didn’t make it, I would sit down and I would write phrases about that.”

In “Invisible Wounds of War,” each poem is preceded by a short narrative, explaining the poem’s origin.

Her book is intended for combat personnel, civilian victims of trauma and all those who sometimes find it daunting to face another day.

“If they could see that I went from being absolutely crushed from PTSD to a time of hope and coping, then maybe my book can serve a purpose,” Smith-Tillery said.

The book is available on Amazon. For more information, contact Amy Cianci at St. Petersburg Press, amy@stpete.co.