CHARLOTTE, NC — The opening of North Carolina's first Green Beans Coffee is to blame for one woman's debilitating anxiety attacks and Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder-related flashbacks, claim friends and family.
Green Beans, an American coffee chain, is almost exclusively found on U.S. military installations and overseas bases. The first off-post franchise opened in Charlotte last month, to a mostly welcoming reception. For many veterans of the Iraq and Afghan wars, however, Green Beans can be a grim reminder of hard times in unforgiving lands. One Charlotte veteran claims the new shop has forced her to add five minutes to her daily commute, just so she can avoid seeing it on her way to work.
Army Sergeant Christine Woodley spent most of 2011 at Bagram Air Field, an American base located near Afghanistan's capital, Kabul. According to her, conditions on the Army installation were “nightmarish,” and she recalls that so many stressful situations happened close to home, she didn't even have to leave the base to find them.
“When I arrived in Afghanistan, I was with a Civil Affairs Battalion, working to win the hearts and minds of Afghans all over Bagram," Woodley told reporters. "I could work anywhere from six-, seven-, even ten-hour days, printing out fliers, typing up counseling statements, or volunteering at the USO tent. I mostly had weekends off, but that didn't make the job easy.”
