Many veterans are reaching out to their peers who arehaving difficulty transitioning from being warriors in a threat-filled combatzone to resuming their lives as workers, students, spouses, partners orparents.
The transition from warrior to civilian isn’t easy,and can be made more difficult by financial stresses, unemployment,relationship crises, physical wounds such as traumatic brain injury (TBI) anduntreated mental health issues such as post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD)acluster of anxiety-related flashbacks, anger, sleeplessness and depression thatcan be triggered long after the soldier leaves the battlefield.
How long can PTSD linger? About half of the veteranscurrently seeking help for mental health are those who served in Vietnam, while about 20% served in Iraq and Afghanistan. The rest served inother battlesthe first Gulf War, Bosnia,Korea,even World War II.
Their PTSD is often triggered by current events, suchas news coverage of the war, or sounds or smells or tastes that take veteransback to the battlefield.
“You don't lose it 100%,” said veteran advocate PaulFine, a resident of Brown Deer who served in the Korean War in the early 1950s.
Dr. Michael McBride, a psychiatrist at the Zablocki VAMedical Center and a major in the Army Reserves who has served four tours in Iraq and Afghanistan, said PTSD is a normalreaction to the abnormal situation of war.
“Everywarrior who’s been to combat is significantly changed,” McBride said.
But he noted that about a third of recently returnedveterans experience more severe PTSD, which interferes with their lives, theirwork or their relationships.
“Veterans have the training to be in the combat zone,but they don’t have the training to be a civilian again,” he said.
And that’s where other veterans can help.
Vets Helping Vets
Veteran peer healers play an important role in thecommunity as more mental health experts are needed to serve the increasednumber of veterans who are struggling with civilian life. Since psychologistsand social workers don’t always have military experience, sometimes they don’tlink a veteran’s emotional issues to his or her time in the combat zone.
“They see the end result,” said Vietnam veteranRobert Curry. “They see the drinking, the suicides and the abuse in relationships,but they don’t link it back to PTSD.”
But veterans are more likely to do so, since they’veshared the same experiences. They know which questions to ask. They don’tjudge. They’ve been there.
Many of our local veterans are going to extraordinarylengths to help their fellow veterans. One example is the veteran-led nonprofitorganization Dryhootch, which offers peer-to-peer PTSD counseling, referrals toother resources, weekend retreats, community outreach and support for families.They’ve organized the Wisconsin Warrior Summit on Oct. 22 for veterans, theirfamilies and the mental health community to learn more about helping thewarrior transition to civilian life. (See “Wisconsin Warrior Summit.”)
Curry, one of the Dryhootch organizers, said peer groupsoffer a safe place to vets who feel they won’t be understood by their familiesand friends.
“The fear of a lot of veterans is that if I tell youwhat I really did over there, you’re going to judge me,” Curry said. “If I tellyou the brutal truth, you wouldn’t understand, so I can’t say what I reallyfeel. But I can tell it to another brother or sister who’s been there. Maybe Ican’t finish a sentence but they can finish it for me.”
Joe Mitchell, an Army veteran who has served in Iraq and Afghanistan, has been doingcommunity outreach with Dryhootch, trying to get recently returned veteranswith signs of PTSD to get help.
“Everybody’s got problems, but to know that there arepeople you can talk to and who can relate to your concerns is half of thebattle,” Mitchell said. It isn’t always easy, he noted. “There are places youcan go, but you have to be willing to accept that help and do something aboutit.”
Greater Awareness of the Warrior’s Experience
The current outreach for veterans stands in starkcontrast to the return of Vietnamveterans and the mental health community’s previous understanding of PTSD.
Although combat-related trauma was identified duringancient times, it hadn’t been well understood until recent yearsand thatknowledge is still evolving.
While 20th-century soldiers experienced PTSD, theAmerican Psychiatric Association and the military didn’t acknowledge it until1980. When Vietnam veterans reported having hallucinations and smelling odorsor tasting things that reminded them of the battlefield, those experiences werewritten off as schizophrenia or drug or alcohol abuse, said Dr. MurrayBernstein, a Vietnam veteran who’s worked with other veterans and prisoners ofwar since 1970.
Bernstein said veterans began raising awareness ofPTSD simply by sharing their experiences with each other.
“It began with veterans talking about it amongthemselves,” Dr. Bernstein said. “They were saying things like, ‘I feel likeI’m ‘in country’ again.’”
Bernstein said treating PTSD has changed over the yearsas well. He advocates helping a veteran recondition his or her brain “to getthe person to balance the past and the present.” As a result, the vet will beless likely to sense constant threats during sleep, in crowds, or in tensesituations.
Families should also be involved in a veteran’streatment, Bernstein said, because they need to know how to deal with theirrelative’s transition, and also acknowledge that they’ve been changed by thesoldier’s deployment.
Bernstein said American-Indian healing strategies canalso help, because they involve multiple generations of veterans sharing theirexperiences. He leads Warrior Questretreats for veterans of all warsincluding World War II veterans in their 80swho want to tell their stories.
“They need to have an elder, a role model,” Bernsteinsaid of younger veterans. “It gives them more stability.”