Interview with Hipolito Arriaga, Marine Corps veteran

This is an interview with Hipolito Arriaga. Hipolito was born and raised in the Bronx, New York City. He comes from a Puerto Rican family. After graduating from high school, Hipolito joined the Marine Corps because he wanted to be like his father, who was also a Marine, and because he wanted to do something drastic with his life, also to see the world, and learn from other cultures. Hipolito was 19 years old in 2003 when he joined the military. In 2005, Hipolito was deployed to Iraq for seven months where he had different kind of jobs. Hipolito thinks that war is far from what a human being should be, because humans should be made of love. When Hipolito came back home from Iraq, he noticed that he was changed. He was numbed by the situation that he lived and he was very sad, so he started to drink a lot. During this time, Hipolito showed signs of PTSD (Post-traumatic stress disorder), which affected his military career. He was deployed again to Iraq to combat, and this time he was involved in different missions. When he came back from Iraq the second time, he decided to separate from the military. Since then, Hipolito has had to struggle with his emotions, such as sadness and anger. Hipolito has sought for help for his PTSD and his thoughts about suicide. Hipolito currently is working with other veterans on community service projects, and other activities like writing, that help him to heal from his traumatic war experiences.