Analysis Of Stop The Sun By Gary Paulsen

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Expedition Balance says that 200,000 veterans go homeless each night and 45% of them suffer from PTSD or mental illness. “Stop the Sun” by Gary Paulsen is about a boy named Terry whose father was in the Vietnam War. After Terry’s father came back from the war he started to act differently which made terry worry for his father. When terry does ask his mom about his father she only tells him the doctor calls it Vietnam Syndrome, but that's all she told him. Terry now wants to know why his dad acts them ways he's been acting and how he got Vietnam Syndrome which now is believed to be PTSD. Once Terry does confront his father and asks him what happened during the war his father says that he was the only one out of 54 to survive an attack. Gary Paulsen successfully showcased the causes, symptoms, and treatment of PTSD in his story “Stop the Sun.” Two Causes of PTSD are traumatic events and combat exposure. Terry’s dad had to hide under his friend Jackson’s dead body to survive the attack that hit them (52). According to Medicine.net, “PTSD is caused by any traumatic event.” When Terry’s father was in Vietnam, he was the only man out of 54 to survive an ambush (54). The National Institute of Mental Health list “combat exposure” as one of the most …show more content…

When Terry and his father went to the mall, Terry’s father had a flashback in the hardware store and caused “His father was squirming along the floor on his stomach. He was crying, looking terrified, his breath coming in short, hot pants like some kind of hurt animal. Medicine Net states that flashbacks are one of the effects of PTSD and they occur over and over again. Terry’s father avoided talking about what happened while he was in the war. National Institute of Mental Health says that avoidance of places, people, and things is a symptom of PTSD. These two symptoms of PTSD are both showing within Terry’s dad in the story, but the both have

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