disorders. They are two to four times more likely than other women to
be homeless; men have more problems with violent aggression and
substance abuse, but plenty of women experience these also.
By all indications, the women on our trip were like Tania Herrera,
who’d been an eager, straight-A high school student from North
Philly: highly competent, enthusiastic recruits when they started out.
Their intelligence and toughness were still in evidence. But pieces of
them had crumpled. They no longer felt whole, or secure, or capable.
Now they were grieving their lost selves. As Herrera put it during one
group session, “I never thought I’d be thirty-four and unable to take
care of myself. When I went to war, I thought either you die or you
make it out. I didn’t factor in what if you came out different than
when you went in.”
The women described daily lives involving constant physical pain.
They couldn’t concentrate well. They were sometimes jumpy,
depressed. They didn’t like being with people, but they didn’t like
being alone all the time. The wars had taken away their ability to
sleep well.
IT WAS TIME for the women to get out of their lives and into the river.
The first named rapid, called Killum, came up fast. I was paddling
one of the four inflatable kayaks, and I saw the kayak in front of me
meet a short wall of water and flip. I hit the same cold sideways wave,
my paddle dove, and I flipped too. Happily, the Class II and III rapids
in this stretch are more wave than rock, and they are short,
interspersed with deep, calm stretches. I managed to claw back into
my boat. The six women paddling the raft cheered me and the other
kayakers on.
Many rapids followed before camp, and I was alternately
exhilarated, nervous, cold and determined in that I’m-committed-now
kind of way. Entering a rapid, your vision narrows and so does your
focus. Your heart rate picks up, your breath quickens, and your skin