One of the biggest problems in A Long Way Gone is war. Ishmael Beah is trying to show us the multiple issues that war can cause. Ishmael clearly shows how traumatizing a war can be to anyone. The biggest effects of the war are shown through the loss of kind and basic human interaction, the death and fighting that is happening, and the mental health issues of people who have been touched by the war.
One of the effects of war is the loss of normal human interaction, not only with families with ordinary strangers. When Ishmael is roaming the forest alone, he comes across a family in a lake. They are very weary of him because of the boy soldiers that have been recruited. Ishmael said, “It was clear from the tone of his voice that he didn't want
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Ishmael started having migraines before he became a solider; this is most likely from all of the horrible things he saw. "In my mind's eye I would see sparks of flame, flashes of scenes I had witnessed, and the agonizing voices of children and women would come alive in my head, I cried quietly as my head beat like the clapper of a bell. (Beah, 103) Ishmael saw other people have PTSD as well. "One soldier, who had sat on a cement brick underneath kitchen, bowed his head in his hands and rocked his body." (Beah, 105) During their first battle, Ishmael explains his experience as almost out of body, “I raised my gun and pulled the trigger, and I killed a man. Suddenly, as if someone was shooting them inside my brain, all the massacre I had seen since the day I was touched by war began flashing in my head." (Beah, 119) Then, when Ishmael is in the process of being rehabilitated, he PTSD is the worst. "I rolled my head on the cold cement floor, but it didn't stop. I went to the shower room and put my head under the cold water, but that didn't help either. The headache became so severe that I couldn't walk" (Beah,