The Emotional Scars Of War: Mosul’s Mental Health Crisis [HuffingtonPost.com]

The father arrived at the clinic with one child in his arms and another in a stroller.

Obviously distraught, he would not let the stroller out of his sight.

It took a few moments for me to register the gravity of what had happened: the children had been hit in a crossfire — one of them fatally. The father, faced with the inconceivable decision of having to seek care for one wounded child and burying the other, had no choice but to bring both to the clinic. The sound of mortars crashed in the distance as he tried to navigate saving one child’s life, while mourning the loss of the other.

As a father of four, this scene will forever be seared in my memory. I have spent over eighteen months in Iraq as the director of mental health and psychosocial support for the humanitarian organisation International Medical Corps. I have witnessed indescribable suffering and heard tragic stories of loss, but nothing could have prepared me for this moment.