More than 20 years after Saddam Hussein's soldiers in Iraq killed his brother in front of him, Ali Alghazally still suffers from night terrors he blames on post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD), a common problem among refugees often left untreated.
As the United States prepares to take in 10,000 or more Syrian refugees in the coming year, social service groups are urging more funding for mental health counseling for cases like Alghazally's, saying it makes resettlement easier.
The 48-year-old finally began undergoing psychotherapy last year in Dearborn, a southeastern Michigan city that is home to many Arab-Americans - but not before becoming addicted to anti-anxiety pills and leaving his job as a limousine driver.
"The best time to get treatment is once it's fresh and it's new," said Sharehan Ayesh, Alghazally's counselor at the Arab Community Center for Economic and Social Services in Dearborn, which calls itself the nation's largest social service agency for Arab-Americans.
"We're having to do 20 years' worth of repair that should have been done" earlier, Ayesh said recently.
[For more of this story, written by Megan Cassella and Serena Maria Daniels, go to http://www.huffingtonpost.com/...afbfe4b0631799101f9b]
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