Category: Employment

On Suicide (Part I)

This article has been the hardest to decide to write. There is so much behind it emotionally for everyone; for parents of those who chose this action, comrades of the self-life takers, for those who would contemplate such an action, for those who want to prevent it. Look, there is no way this can be an easy discussion. And because of that we choose not to have it. It is like a car accident beside the road. We want to look. We take a peek. But we don’t tell anyone we peeked. It is time to openly take a peek. But we have to look at the real problem and the real solutions and stop with silly slogans. Open kimono, my best friend took his own life and I have been to the dark places we don’t talk about. If we are going to have an honest discussion, then it must begin with honesty.

So, here we are. We know the rhetoric; 22 Warriors a day take their own lives. We’ll, that’s not accurate. According to the 2020 VA Annual Report, on average 17.6 Warriors take their own life every day. And don’t ask me how .6 Warriors take their life. It’s an average ok? Why is this important? Isn’t one life too many? Yes. One life lost or taken is too many. But if we are going to have an honest discussion with the chance of identifying the problem, and coming up wih a solution, then we have to start with facts. Not a slogan, not a cool Tshirt saying that raises money, not the alliterative name of a nonprofit. That crap is for politicians. If we are going to talk about this honestly, then let’s talk about this honestly.

If we continue to talk with wrong numbers because we chose to name a fundraising goal or organization after it, we are slapping the truth in the face. We are taking away the individualality of those who chose this path by simply making them a cool slogan or backside of a challenge coin. To the parents, spouses, and children of victims of suicide we are saying they don’t matter, they are just part of some group that made a bad decision. Let’s look further at the numbers.

There are approximately 20 million US Veterans alive today. That is approximately 6% of the US adult population. Yet, approximately 14% of the 127 people who commit suicide are Warriors. When you adjust the study for age and sex to normalize it, the numbers are about 1.5 times that of civilians. But, these numbers are also a bit deceiving as the annual rate for our Warriors has mostly stayed the same over our longest wars, going up a few percent while the civilian population, not having gone to war, has skyrocketed almost 50%. While we consistently, in our rhetoric to sell t-shirts, talk of how PTSD in our Warriors is causing their suicides, this indicates it is not a primary or even probable associated factor. In fact, over 50% of those who took their lives while actively serving had never deployed. In fact, most were first-termers, young and male. Nearly 1000 more Warriors who took their life that were National Guard members never having been Federally activated, hence no combat, hence no combat-related PTSD. PTSD from Military Sexual Trauma is still a possibility regardless of deployment. But the VA does not classify them as Veterans. So, is combat-related PTSD the reason for the predominence of suicides? I don’t think so Carl.

Ok, we know that Warriors get beat up physically over their years in service. So, their injuries must be the cause? Well, not so fast there high-speed. Actually, Warriors who had service connected disabilities and get treatment at the VA seem to have had a lower rate. And while chronic injuries (e.g. TBI) with habitual medication use without resolution can be a large factor as hope for recovery is lost, it is still not the answer. Studies have shown that isolation is likely the biggest key in Warrior suicide.

Older, divorced, males are the highest age demographic. You know that old, grumpy, 50-somethinng, divorced, Clint Eastwood get off my lawn-acting neighbor? Yeah, he is in danger. Older Veterans, isolated and with mental health issues are a high number. For younger troops, it is likely failure to adapt to a new world as they join Chapter 2 of their life and fear what they don’t know about combat. For those in Chapter 3, it’s younger troops who don’t readjust well. I have long thought that most of this issue was an issue of adapting. Let’s be clear about what the SGM just said. I said difficulty in adapting. I didn’t say anyone was weak-minded or just “couldn’t get over it” or anything like it. I am saying we are failing to adapt to the new life and ruining others lives by taking our own.

Mental health issues in America have gone up over the last years, which can explain why some of our younger Warriors are having issues both in Chapter 2 and Chapter 3. Early studies showed that those who had pre-existing mental health issues were more likely to have a compounded problem down the military road so are now excluded from military service, generally. Today’s youth are simply different (insert “ok boomer” here). I’m not saying they are good, bad, better, worse, just different. Raised differently in a different world of not needing to cope with other humans behind their Facespace or Twitgram. Problem to solve? Ask Alexa. Don’t know an answer. Ask Google. And older Warriors isolated from family in a world they don’t understand, with mental health issues of their own, compounded by age, simply lose faith.

So, where does all this lead? What is the path forward? The path forward is to stop lying to ourselves, lying to the public, and lying to our Warriors about what the real problem is and how we can fix it. First, let’s follow this simple, but accurate, path. Pre-existing mental health conditions lead to poor adaption in Chapter 3, leading to poor social interaction, leading to economic disparity, leading to homelessness, leading to a bad ending. The path may get shortened anywhere along the way, unfortunately, due to the severity of any of those conditions, specifically mental illness. Alot of that can be alleviated through teaching our Warriors how to adapt to Chapter 3 better.

As I have stated on many occasions, our military’s inability to transition our men and women properly is largely at fault for their woes and even their suicides. Teach a Warrior how to adapt to Chapter 3, giving them ample time to determine a path forward, with experts in social interaction not just resume writers, and they will do better. Just because they can adapt to stressful situations like combat doesn’t mean they can adjust to the stress of working with people they feel aren’t as qualified as them or dealing with “whiners” and “oxygen thiefs.” It is simply not the same.

We must transition our Warriors to properly integrate with the pillars of life: family, fun, faith, friendships, employment and community. We must help the Warrior understand that his life is going to change dramatically. His relationships with his spouse, parents, and siblings has changed. In my article Why God Doesn’t Love the Infantry Anymore, I talk about the need to work on relationships. Relationships provide social integration, directly and indirectly. Directly, it is contact with another human with common goals, someone we trust, someone who trusts us, someone we need, someone who needs us. Sound familiar? Indirectly, they bring other parts of our pillars along with them. Other friends, other likes in the community etc. When we have a relationship with our spouse and children, it is also more likely will work harder to maintain employment. Employment gives us purpose, brain stimulation, and another set of possible friends with possible similarities of hobbies. Having this job, with new friends brings us further into different parts of the community. And lastly, these relationships with our spouse and children help give us faith. Faith in love, Faith in hope, Faith in a higher power. Faith in a higher power also gives us more access to more of the community, and more friends.

So, bottom line, in my humblest of opinions, with some pretty solid facts behind it, is that we need to address suicide at its root. It’s root is not wholly nor heavily from combat-related PTSD. It is from out inability to to adapt to Chapter 3. So, while it’s great that you offer free fly fishing trips to Veterans with PTSD, it is more important that you offer these opportunities to ALL Veterans. And while the VA will not solve all your problems, no health system in and of itself will, facts show that getting treatment lowers your risk of suicide. So, just go. Will you get poor treatment? Maybe. But hey, I have TRICARE and use the Military Treatment Facility and I get crappy treatment every now and then as well. Change Dr’s, get a second opinion etc. And finally, keep working on the pillars of life, which are important here to reiterate. Family, fun, faith, friendships, employment and community. Let’s transition and live!

—SGM DTB—

My Life Has No Meaning

As part of my continuing thread of discipline and action in Chapter 3 of our lives, post-Service, I know that many of us feel that our lives no longer have any meaning. We go through the day to day grind, doing only what needs to be done, not really feeling excited about it, thinking it has no meaning in comparison to Chapter 2, our time in Service. The daily tasks and excitement in Chapter 2 gave us a desire to get up every day, to put on that uniform, to interact with our brethren, to do great and varied things, to challenge ourselves and others. Now, not so much. We become complacent with the boredom, not doing the things we need to do, like we talked about in Discipline or Disaster, just going through the motions to get to the next meal, the next drink, the next text, the next mission in Call of Duty.

Let’s start out by talking about the perceived differences in meaning between Chapter 2 and 3. In Chapter 2, our time in Service, we served a greater calling, a greater good, something bigger than ourselves. We served an entire Nation, training to be able to deter aggression, around the world, against the weak or oppressed. We fought the bully, we stood up for what was right, defeated or punished those that were wrong, removed dangerous despots and dictators who committed terrible acts of genocide, mass imprisonment, executing protesters to keep the public down. Whether we practiced organized religion or not, we believed we served our God’s will. We were right and might over blight. We were such well trained machines that even the thought of us arriving could end oppression, chase dictators to other lands. We were Superman, Aqua Man, Wonder Woman, Captain America, Captain Marvel, The Fantastic Four and Iron Man all wrapped in a camouflage cape. I mean, we were amazing, doing amazing things.

Old Soldier – Marvel™

Now, we are salesmen, teachers, carpenters, small businessmen, insurance reps, mail carriers, plumbers and a host of other jobs that aren’t doing a damn thing to save the world or defeat any horrible despot, in our mind. Our boss doesn’t trust us to go outside for a smoke without having to sign out of the office or send him an email. We are not tasked with any real sense of responsibility, just making widgets until our next break, lunch or the end of day whistle. Our tasks are so mundane that the bosses nephew, who didn’t graduate high school, can do them to a sufficient level to collect a paycheck, likely greater than ours. Not only are we not super heroes anymore, but we are just another body on the subway, another patron at the bar, another employee ID number (I am number 3 by the way), just another John Q Public. We have never felt so useless. Even in Chapter 1, our childhood, at least we were cute and our parents fawned over us. Now, most people in the office barely know our name, much less what we have done, the crap we have seen, or the lives we have protected. What a depressing scene, bro.

Those feelings, and many more are felt by more than just Warriors every day. They are felt by the average American worker, who, day in and day out works his fingers to the bone for something seemingly unimportant. I see the comments on social media; “you are working your butt off for an employer who will replace you within 24 hours of your death.” Maybe the Warrior, and his civilian counterpart have forgotten about the importance of the complete industrial and retail base in American, and its vitality to this Nation. Right now, we are in the midst of a worldwide pandemic, the COVID-19 virus. In our country, schools are closed down, most businesses are closed, save a few essential stores, like liquor stores and grocery stores and gas stations. Mothers and fathers are having to work from home or not work at all to watch their children. The service industry is mostly shutdown with all of your friends who serve you drinks and bring you pulled pork sandwiches sitting at home wondering when this will be over. Government employees, home. Waste disposal, reduced to minimal operations. Elective procedures? No. Routine healthcare? No. Shopping for new shoes? Nope. Amazon deliveries? Oh yes, cause, well, it is Amazon after all. So, all those “meaningless jobs” we now realize are extremely important to our life.

We have figured out that sports athletes aren’t our heroes, its the college girl who brings us shot after shot at the bar. It’s not the movie star that helps us, it is the guy who answers the phone at the insurance company because we still managed to ding our bumper. It’s not the weather guy who shows up at every hurricane, it’s the guy who can fix our leaky faucet that is driving.us.nuts. Drip drip drip. It’s not the politician who makes our life better, it is the school teacher who teaches my precious grand babies instead of them having to move in with me and HH6 for a month or more. It’s not the guy who plays the newest rap tune, it’s that farmer who is still working his ass off to get food to MY table tonight; to your babies breakfast tomorrow.

So, maybe those jobs aren’t meaningless. Maybe it is okay I am a plumber, or carpenter, or delivery guy. Maybe everything everyone does contributes to the greater good after all. Maybe this boring day to day, not give a crap, not improve my position, just get complacent in my own boring skin, is better than I thought. Maybe if I felt a little better about what I am doing to contribute I wouldn’t get complacent. Maybe I would do more, try harder, give a little extra, tolerate that idiot boss of mine (not mine FYI just in case he reads this). This is important. Complacency leads us down a bad road. IF we are not satisfied, not fulfilled, not feeling like we are contributing, we will seek other alternatives to give us that rush, that fulfillment. A lot of these things are not so awesome for us. Dangerous activity like riding the bike too hard, alcohol and drug over use, risky sexual behavior, fights at bars, and negative thoughts about living or dying.

Don’t get me wrong. Nothing will likely give you the feeling of self-worth like dragging your 180 lb buddy out of the direct line of fire, like dropping from the sky with 100 of your best friends, like climbing a steep mountainside roped to another Warrior. Let’s face it, you were getting a life time worth of adventure, team building and adrenaline building activities in a very short time. It may never be AS thrilling as that. But it doesn’t mean that it can’t still be good. Accept good. There is nothing wrong with good. A lot of people will never be blessed to feel good. And, if the day to day is not enough, even though you now understand it’s s important, try something more. While I worked for the government developing combat equipment after I retired from the Army, despite how cool and fulfilling that was, I felt the need to help my brethren more.

So, I started a Veteran non profit. Building that from the ground up was exhilarating and fulfilling, more than enough. Go volunteer at a soup kitchen. That, too, was very fulfilling and gave me a good sense of balance and gratefulness. Go mow your neighbor’s lawn. Go play checkers with your elderly Sergeant Major. PS, let him win because he gets grumpy easy. Ok, he is always grumpy. My point is, don’t think what you do isn’t important and don’t get complacent with your day to day grind. Get out and do something if you think your job isn’t fulfilling enough. Workout, learn something, read that book again, help someone else, help you.

During these difficult times of stress and virus and unemployment, don’t just sit and watch the negativity on the boob tube all day. Do something. Be positive, change your game up a little, go help someone. I hope you all stay safe. Don’t just sit there and be angry about how Chapter 3 is meaningless. Your life DOES have meaning. You are destined for meaning, for good, great, and amazing. Go find that destiny. Don’t forget to check in on your elderly neighbor, via phone, of course. Be safe my friends.

—SGM DTB—