Post by sarque on Mar 31, 2011 18:19:29 GMT -5
In my introduction I said that I'd been in the Luftwaffe during the war, and was told about this subsection of the forum for Luftwaffe memories so I thought I'd post this. I actually posted this on a another past life forum awhile back, right after I'd done the regression that brought this memory so vividly (I'd been dreaming about snippets of it for years, but I finally saw the whole thing). This is, I think, where my fear of flying and loud noises like fireworks or gunshots comes from now. This is what I regressed to when I was shot down:
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I remember I wasn't flying with the people that I usually did. I'd been transferred to another group because I was helping to instruct in flying as well as doing missions myself. It was right after I'd been transferred to this new group and I felt really cocky about my abilities--I was instructing other fighter pilots and I'd had a lot of success flying with my previous group. I definitely never thought that I would be injured in any way, despite the fact that one of my friends had been shot down recently, I just assumed that I was luckier. We were fighting a group of US planes and I was doing well.
Then there was that horrible noise. There wasn't any warning for it, I didn't see anything coming at me or anything. One moment I was thinking that this mission was easy, and the next moment there was this huge explosion/thunder like noise. I ducked, even though there wasn't really anywhere to go. Then there was another loud noise and I felt like I was falling. It really was like the floor had fallen out from underneath me, and I was swearing and trying to stay level and get away from what was going on. I was thinking that I'd made a terrible mistake somehow (I think my mistake was that I had been too overly confident that nobody would hit me, and I wasn't as cautious as I could have been). I was trying to make something happen in the plane to level it out or to get it steady but nothing I was doing was working. It felt as though none of the controls would respond to any of my attempts (my fear of loss of control in airplanes, perhaps?) but strangely enough I still wasn't getting scared. I knew that I'd been hit, I knew I was going down, but I still thought that I could somehow land the plane and walk away unharmed.
Then all of a sudden I became aware that the plane was on fire, and that because of where I'd been hit (I think I'd been hit in the tail area and this caused some kind of explosion) then the plane was spinning. That's when I panicked. I started swearing even more and thinking "I have to get out of here, I have to get out of here" but at that point I knew it was too late. I didn't even try to get out, everything was making horrible noises and I felt like the plane was falling apart around me. I closed my eyes and knew that I was essentially done for. That's when I think I blacked out because I don't actually remember hitting the ground, but I know I hit the ground shortly thereafter, and I think that I was quite fortunately thrown out of the plane and onto the ground myself, otherwise it seems likely that I would have died. I just remember that it hurt, worse than anything else had hurt before and that I couldn't move one of my arms, and that my head felt like it was literally splitting in half. I must have blacked out again because there aren't any more memories from actually crashing. I just knew that I wasn't dead, but I thought I probably was going to die before anyone found me or helped me, and even if I didn't die I'd probably never be able to fly again. Luckily that wasn't the case, for either of those things.
It was really traumatic to go through again. I just felt the terror and despair once I realized that there was no way out of the plane. I also felt stupid because I realized that I had been thinking I'd be fine even after my plane had been hit and was going down. If I'd been a little quicker and more willing to admit what was going on I might have been able to get out in time and avoid being so badly wounded. I realize that I've been blaming myself for this for so long--even though it was someone else that shot me down, I felt like it was my fault that I had been too cocky and unaware of what was going on around me. There is really nothing more terrifying than losing control in a situation like that and that's what happened to me.
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Even though I went back to flying after I recovered from my injuries, and this wasn't the crash that killed me (that was later, after the war), this is the thing I have the most trauma from. I still blame myself. Flying was my life, but I got too confident. I think that's something I still have to come to terms with now.
---
I remember I wasn't flying with the people that I usually did. I'd been transferred to another group because I was helping to instruct in flying as well as doing missions myself. It was right after I'd been transferred to this new group and I felt really cocky about my abilities--I was instructing other fighter pilots and I'd had a lot of success flying with my previous group. I definitely never thought that I would be injured in any way, despite the fact that one of my friends had been shot down recently, I just assumed that I was luckier. We were fighting a group of US planes and I was doing well.
Then there was that horrible noise. There wasn't any warning for it, I didn't see anything coming at me or anything. One moment I was thinking that this mission was easy, and the next moment there was this huge explosion/thunder like noise. I ducked, even though there wasn't really anywhere to go. Then there was another loud noise and I felt like I was falling. It really was like the floor had fallen out from underneath me, and I was swearing and trying to stay level and get away from what was going on. I was thinking that I'd made a terrible mistake somehow (I think my mistake was that I had been too overly confident that nobody would hit me, and I wasn't as cautious as I could have been). I was trying to make something happen in the plane to level it out or to get it steady but nothing I was doing was working. It felt as though none of the controls would respond to any of my attempts (my fear of loss of control in airplanes, perhaps?) but strangely enough I still wasn't getting scared. I knew that I'd been hit, I knew I was going down, but I still thought that I could somehow land the plane and walk away unharmed.
Then all of a sudden I became aware that the plane was on fire, and that because of where I'd been hit (I think I'd been hit in the tail area and this caused some kind of explosion) then the plane was spinning. That's when I panicked. I started swearing even more and thinking "I have to get out of here, I have to get out of here" but at that point I knew it was too late. I didn't even try to get out, everything was making horrible noises and I felt like the plane was falling apart around me. I closed my eyes and knew that I was essentially done for. That's when I think I blacked out because I don't actually remember hitting the ground, but I know I hit the ground shortly thereafter, and I think that I was quite fortunately thrown out of the plane and onto the ground myself, otherwise it seems likely that I would have died. I just remember that it hurt, worse than anything else had hurt before and that I couldn't move one of my arms, and that my head felt like it was literally splitting in half. I must have blacked out again because there aren't any more memories from actually crashing. I just knew that I wasn't dead, but I thought I probably was going to die before anyone found me or helped me, and even if I didn't die I'd probably never be able to fly again. Luckily that wasn't the case, for either of those things.
It was really traumatic to go through again. I just felt the terror and despair once I realized that there was no way out of the plane. I also felt stupid because I realized that I had been thinking I'd be fine even after my plane had been hit and was going down. If I'd been a little quicker and more willing to admit what was going on I might have been able to get out in time and avoid being so badly wounded. I realize that I've been blaming myself for this for so long--even though it was someone else that shot me down, I felt like it was my fault that I had been too cocky and unaware of what was going on around me. There is really nothing more terrifying than losing control in a situation like that and that's what happened to me.
---
Even though I went back to flying after I recovered from my injuries, and this wasn't the crash that killed me (that was later, after the war), this is the thing I have the most trauma from. I still blame myself. Flying was my life, but I got too confident. I think that's something I still have to come to terms with now.