Q&A with Dean Yates

 

 

 

Dean Yates is the author of the memoir Line in the Sand: A Life-Changing Journey through a Body and a Mind after Trauma. A longtime journalist, he lives in Tasmania, Australia.

 

Q: What inspired you to write this memoir, and how was its title chosen?

A: I’d always rejected suggestions I write a book about my experiences as a foreign journalist. There are plenty by foreign correspondents better known than me, who witnessed more and are superior writers, was my usual response!

 

But then I was diagnosed with PTSD in 2016 and found myself in a Melbourne psych ward with broken veterans and first responders. Men and women who’d served their country and community but who’d lost their identity, were betrayed by their organisations, and left to rot.

 

Within days of my first admission, I felt deeply motivated to write my story because I knew I’d be able to share theirs. At the end of my first admission, when I asked other patients if I could have their email addresses because I was writing a book, every single one gave their contact details. I quoted many by name in the book.

The title Line in the Sand came from much brainstorming between Cate Blake, the publisher, and me. It was my idea.

 

Many lines in the sand get crossed in the book; journalists, first responders, soldiers, many of us have crossed lines in the sand in our work from which there is no going back mentally; Reuters crossed a line in the sand when it betrayed me; I crossed a line in the sand when I betrayed Mary with my serial infidelity with sex workers.

 

There was also the line in the sand where I finally said enough, I'm not going to let my trauma eat me alive and destroy my family.

 

When this title came to me I could feel the desert sand crunch under my boots, the powdery red clay from a Baghdad dust storm in my mouth.

 

Q: The author and journalist Thomas E. Ricks said of the book, “Dean Yates has produced the roughest, and most honest, journalistic memoir of war I've ever encountered.” What do you think of this assessment?

A: Frankly, it blew my mind because I have such enormous respect for Tom. His book Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq in my view is the best account of the utterly disastrous U.S. invasion and occupation of the country.

 

When Tom sent me his endorsement, I said, Are you serious, Tom? He said, As serious as a heart attack.

 

Tom also introduced me to various influential people in the United States, which I was very grateful for. He’s been extremely supportive of my writing on PTSD, moral injury, and the book.

 

I read probably 100 memoirs while writing mine. Personally, I think BBC journalist Fergal Keane writes better than anyone on war and PTSD. Perhaps what I’ve done more than other colleagues is reveal the toll it took on my family.

Q: Do you think treatment of PTSD has changed in recent years?

A: Sadly, I don’t think widely accepted treatments have advanced much in recent decades. Eye Movement Desensitization and Reprocessing (EMDR) has shown good results (it certainly helped me, and I know it has helped other journalists), but in Australia it is only readily available with private health insurance.

 

As I write in my book, I’ve concluded that the most critical factor in trauma recovery is the quality of someone’s support network: family, friends, GP, counsellor, psychologist/psychiatrist, employer, workmates, access to hospital services, housing, the justice system.

 

Yes, a support network extends beyond family and friends. It’s the breadth and depth of those networks and how they function together – not the original trauma – that largely determines recovery outcomes.

 

In other words, whether a trauma survivor can find safety. Process their trauma, rebuild relationships, find purpose in life, and live with dignity. We need this approach embedded into our systems and laws if we’re to move the dial on treating PTSD/trauma.  

 

Q: What impact did it have on you to write this book, and what do you hope readers take away from it?

A: Writing the book (over seven years) was painful at times but also cathartic. There is not much I don’t understand about myself now. I have deep insight into my triggers and what I need to do to stay inside my window of tolerance.

 

Writing the book helped me process my trauma at my pace. Writing is not as intense as speaking aloud, although I did a lot of that in therapy!

 

Most importantly, I was forced to confront how I’d betrayed my wife, Mary. There was no way of glossing over this, skirting the edges. It had to be confronted head on, in detail. That hurt Mary deeply, but the honesty was important.

 

We’ve been through a lot together and beyond still loving each other, found we had much to fight for in keeping our marriage.

I know some readers are finding hope in our honesty. But by far what is resonating most with readers is moral injury. Moral injury is a wound to the soul, a condition that shatters people’s sense of self.

 

It has similarities to PTSD but is a distinct affliction that can occur in any occupation/walk of life. All that’s needed is for someone’s idea of what’s right to be violated strongly enough.

 

Few readers have heard of the condition, but it is striking a chord. The way I explain moral injury seems to be giving people context, a framework, a better understanding of their traumatic experiences.

 

Finally – many are telling me – they have language for their rage and hopelessness, their guilt and shame. It might have been PTSD to begin with, but it is moral injury that is doing the damage now.

 

Or, they have never been diagnosed with PTSD, but were traumatised and didn’t know why. Their trauma didn’t fit any category. Or they just had a nagging sense something was wrong. Clinicians and counsellors are sharing their frustrations at the limitations of the PTSD definition.

 

Q: What are you working on now?

A: I don’t have any book projects on the go. I’m busy with my job as policy and advocacy lead for the Mental Health Council of Tasmania. It’s interesting work trying to help shape mental health policy as well as represent the interests of community mental health organisations in our small state.

 

But I keep an eye on how moral injury is becoming better understood and more mainstream. I am still interested in the evolving ways to treat moral injury. Like PTSD became the common language of trauma in the late 20th century, I think moral injury could be its lingua franca in the 21st.

 

--Interview with Deborah Kalb