Fireside Chat: Six Degrees of Separation for Warriors and Families: The Impact of Mental Health Across Generations
Panelists are Moderator Scott Thuman, anchor, Good Morning Washington and ABC7 News; Lt. Gen. Bernard “Mick” Trainor, USMC (Ret), Korea and Vietnam veteran and former military correspondent for The New York Times; Debbie Sprague, author, A Stranger in My Bed: 8 Steps to Taking Your Life Back from the Contagious Effects of Your Veteran’s Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder; Bonnie Carroll, president and founder of the Tragedy Assistance Program for Survivors; and Maj. Kevin Polosky, USA, executive officer for the vice director for Logistics, Joint Chiefs of Staff, J4, and caregiver for his Army veteran wife.
Maj. Kevin Polosky, USA, an Afghanistan and Iraq veteran and a father of five, is caregiver for his wife, Christina, who was injured in Afghanistan in 2009. Christina suffers from depression. As the family struggled to adjust to a new normal since her return from war, Kevin realized he needed help. But, like many servicemembers and military caregivers, he was reluctant.
Despite calls by leaders such as Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff Army Gen. Martin Dempsey and Chief of Staff of the Army Gen. Raymond Odierno to encourage veterans with mental health issues to seek help, Kevin admitted a stigma still exists, especially among younger personnel. As the military begins shrinking its personnel numbers and promotion opportunities become more competitive, Kevin wondered whether those who choose to seek help for mental illness will be passed over for promotion.
To Kevin, who works at the Pentagon in Arlington, Va., seeking help was worth the risk. His path to healing began at a friend’s house over a cigar. “I just looked at him and said, ‘I’m having some problems.’ He looked at me and said, ‘Yeah, I’m having some problems, too.’ That was the best help I’ve ever gotten,” Kevin said. “It’s finding that peer or someone you can relate to … and just being able to bring [your problems] up in conversation.”
Though coping with mental illness is a long journey, it’s filled with hope for a better tomorrow. “It’s never going to get great,” Kevin said. “But it’s going to get good. We have to be happy with good.”
Debbie Sprague is all-too-familiar with that journey. Married eight months after meeting in 2000, she and her husband, Chief Petty Officer Randall Sprague, USN (Ret), had dreams for a great life together. But in 2003, Debbie noticed a change in her husband, a Vietnam veteran. Those dreams ended, Debbie said, when her husband began having nightmares.
“There’s a lot in the press about the suicide rate of veterans going up. But the statistic that gets lost is that for those veterans who are in our care, the rate is actually stabilizing or going down. I use that only as a plea to help bring people into the health care system, because if we don’t know about them, we can’t help them.”
— morning keynote speaker Robert L. Jesse, M.D., Ph.D., principal deputy under secretary for Health, Department of Veterans Affairs
54 MILITARY OFFICER NOVEMBER 2013
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