In nearly all cases of survival, a person must have great mental and physical fortitude in order to overcome the challenges that face them. Unfortunately, when these survivors return to modern society, they often struggle due to the stark contrast between the challenges in which they survived and the comparative mundaneness of everyday life. Almost all survivors will face this problem at some point in their life. One of the most common victims of this struggle are veterans. Jonathan Kirk Davis, in his article titled “How Do Military Veterans Feel When They Return Home From Combat?”, describes how members of the military treat one another when he says, “We are harsh with each other don’t often act with kindness or gentleness with one another”
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In John Grisham’s novel titled Gray Mountain, Grisham details the thoughts of Samantha, a lawyer, after she leaves the big city when he writes, “...what exactly, was she doing? Where was she going?” (Grisham 35). Samantha is confused about what she’s going to do in a small town. Similarly, in Legend by Marie Lu, June, a member of the military for the government, notices Day, a criminal at large, and his struggle with survival when she says, “...sometimes it feels like we’re...born in different worlds” (Lu 304). Day has constantly been on the run and in survival mode his whole life while June has had a fairly sheltered and structured upbringing. Both Samantha and Day are survivors in their own way. Samantha survived a job loss as a big-time lawyer, and Day is a criminal who has successfully evaded the police and military for years. We are able to see the confusion, lack of direction and struggle that these survivors face once they enter “normal” society. Samantha questions nearly everything about her life once she enters into this fairly normal, mundane town. It isn’t easy for her to assimilate into this new life. It takes her time to figure out how things are work in this small town, and how she needs to operate personally. Likewise, it’s almost like Day and June were “born in different worlds.” Day has been on the run for the majority of his life, …show more content…
One of these people is Rhonda Sciortino who reflects on what made her the person she is in her article called “Successful Survivors: Translating the Effects of Trauma into Life Skills” when she says, “I realized that the success I created… was directly attributable to the good characteristics and coping mechanisms I had acquired during the most painful times of my life” (Sciortino). This can be true in some cases such as Rhonda’s, but even for those who learned important traits while surviving, they usually struggle initially when returning to normal, everyday life. The traits may become helpful later in life, but as survivors re-enter society in the short-term, those traits have not yet become real positives, and they often have trouble adapting back into society. We saw this with the veterans earlier. While the traits veterans learned may help them later in life, we have seen that they work as negatives
In John Grisham’s novel titled Gray Mountain, Grisham details the thoughts of Samantha, a lawyer, after she leaves the big city when he writes, “...what exactly, was she doing? Where was she going?” (Grisham 35). Samantha is confused about what she’s going to do in a small town. Similarly, in Legend by Marie Lu, June, a member of the military for the government, notices Day, a criminal at large, and his struggle with survival when she says, “...sometimes it feels like we’re...born in different worlds” (Lu 304). Day has constantly been on the run and in survival mode his whole life while June has had a fairly sheltered and structured upbringing. Both Samantha and Day are survivors in their own way. Samantha survived a job loss as a big-time lawyer, and Day is a criminal who has successfully evaded the police and military for years. We are able to see the confusion, lack of direction and struggle that these survivors face once they enter “normal” society. Samantha questions nearly everything about her life once she enters into this fairly normal, mundane town. It isn’t easy for her to assimilate into this new life. It takes her time to figure out how things are work in this small town, and how she needs to operate personally. Likewise, it’s almost like Day and June were “born in different worlds.” Day has been on the run for the majority of his life, …show more content…
One of these people is Rhonda Sciortino who reflects on what made her the person she is in her article called “Successful Survivors: Translating the Effects of Trauma into Life Skills” when she says, “I realized that the success I created… was directly attributable to the good characteristics and coping mechanisms I had acquired during the most painful times of my life” (Sciortino). This can be true in some cases such as Rhonda’s, but even for those who learned important traits while surviving, they usually struggle initially when returning to normal, everyday life. The traits may become helpful later in life, but as survivors re-enter society in the short-term, those traits have not yet become real positives, and they often have trouble adapting back into society. We saw this with the veterans earlier. While the traits veterans learned may help them later in life, we have seen that they work as negatives