Poppyscotland case study: Who we help. Steve Beedie.

I loved army life. It was my whole dream and serving my Queen and country was what I wanted to do. I first saw action in 1999. It was nothing like I had ever expected. We started to be around death quite a lot. Near the end of the operational tour there was a commotion about 100 metres in front of us and a boy, who was about 13 years old, was playing football, completely innocently, and had stepped on a landmine. His body was just in pieces. I was only 19 and I just didn't really know what to do with it. There is no training for that. You're just a person and that kid had nothing to do with it. I left the army in 2005, it was the 26th of October. It was a difficult time. It was not what I expected and financially we were in dire straits. I had no money management skills, I'd never had to worry about paying bills really, I was a soldier, they weren't my concerns really and things got really, really out of control. I developed what's called PTSD which is Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, which I believe were linked to some of the things that I had witnessed as a young guy. I didn't know how to talk about it. I didn't know how to express the emotional trauma that I had been part of and that came out in all the wrong ways. That came out as stress, anger, fear. I was being a terrible husband. I really, really needed help and I didn't know where to go. We were with a private landlord, we were evicted from there, the council gave us temporary accommodation and with it being temporary accommodation there just wasn't the house available for us, there was nothing available and we were threatened with homelessness again. My pride was getting in the way of trying to look for help and so my amazing wife she jumped in and helped me and she phoned Poppyscotland on my behalf. I don't know what we would have done if Lindsay hadn't phoned. They were very quick in getting in touch with us again. The lines of communication were always open. They were always on the phone, talking, making sure we were OK and they explained clearly how they could help and that they wanted to help. They arranged financial help very quickly. I mean it was over £1000 which was massive to us. It was really, really a big help. It's given us a chance to get back on track. I've actually completed a course now and I'm going offshore and I've got a job lined up. Things are looking good. Poppyscotland helped me personally but because of that they helped my wife, they helped my children, they helped my future, they helped my prospects, they helped finances. They helped me get my confidence back. They allowed me to remember who I was and what I was about.