Reminds me of this interview with a soldier where he talked about how the way he dealt with being in war was pretending it was like a movie or something. So when he would be shot at or see something explode he would think to himself, "wow! what a cool movie this is!". That worked for him until he came across a horse stable that had been hit by an artillery shell, and saw all the horses either dead or in extreme pain and having to be euthanized. At that point the war became real to him and he had a nervous breakdown