The country is mourning the death of a great American, Clay Warren Hunt, a veteran of combat in Iraq and Afghanistan, who died from his wounds in Houston, Texas on March 31, 2011, at the age of 28.
Hunt was a Marine, a war hero and a true humanitarian. He was wounded in Iraq, and after recovering from his wounds he served as a scout-sniper in Afghanistan. He didn’t have to do that. He chose to go back because he thought it was the right thing to do.
Heroes do things the rest of us won’t do.
Think about it. If someone shot at you every time you did something, would you get up tomorrow morning and do it again?
Clay Hunt was handsome, vibrant and friendly; so outgoing that he was chosen to do a public service announcement reminding veterans that they aren't alone, no matter how bad it gets.
Hunt lobbied for veteran’s rights on Capitol Hill. He rode his bicycle on road trips with wounded veterans, and he did humanitarian work in both Haiti and Chile.
What more can you ask of anyone? Clay Hunt was the face of the fight against Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, the dreaded PTSD.
But two weeks ago, Clay Hunt bolted himself into his Houston apartment and shot himself.
What good is a chest full of medals when you have a head full of nightmares?
What good is it to be a hero when the Department of Defense treats you like shit?
The suicide rate among Iraq and Afghanistan veterans is astronomical, and continues to skyrocket, especially among active duty personnel, but the Defense Department is totally clueless about how to handle it.
Once again, we are involved in a seemingly endless war and the troops are suffering more than most people can possibly imagine.
To the troops, it doesn’t matter why this war has dragged on so long. What matters is how many times they have to return to the combat zone, what they see and experience while they are there, and how many of their friends are killed in combat.
Ask Clay Hunt, he experienced all of that, and even though he was the best of the best, as strong as they come, it was impossible to deal with it
He was alone..
Thousands upon thousands of our best and bravest have reached the end of their rope, and decided that suicide is a better alternative than facing the world every day. Meanwhile, the Department of Defense stumbles around trying to figure out what to do about it.
The Veterans Administration is trying hard. They have established “Vet Centers” around the country to provide counseling for veterans with PTSD. And non-profit organizations, such as the Veteran’s Outreach Center in RochesterNew York and the PTSD Foundation of America in Houston are doing everything anyone can do to help veterans with PTSD
But the Department f Defense still has its head in the sand.
In some ways, it’s a matter of respect.
Times have changed since Johnny Came Marching Home from World War II, when the men did cheer and the boys did shout, and the ladies they all turned out.
It isn’t like that anymore. It hasn’t been like that since Korea.
Today, our servicemen and women come home alone and are met only by their family and friends. It’s a lonely and depressing homecoming on the heels of a traumatic experience.
It is as bad, if not worse, than coming home from Vietnam and not being met by anyone at the airport.
The worst part is that the friends and families of the troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan can’t possibly understand what the troops been through.
The best thing the Department of Defense can do is award the Purple Heart to each and every serviceman and woman who has Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, the dreaded PTSD, because of their experience in combat.
That is the only way to remove the stigma from PTSD. It’s the only way to stop the epidemic of suicides in the military.
I want a little respect
Now, I get tired, but I keep on trying'
Running' out of fooli'. I ain't lyin'
Yes, respect, all I need is respect.
Aretha Franklin
Respect (1967)
But the DOD refuses to do that. They’ll award a Purple Heart for a concussion, but they won’t award a Purple Heart for a wound that literally changes the physical shape of your brain forever.
If you’ve never been there and done that, then you can’t possibly understand how horrible PTSD is. You can’t possibly understand what Clay Warren Hunt was going though.
If you’ve never relived the worst moment in your life over and over and over again, how can you possibly understand what Clay Hunt and thousands of other veterans, men and women, go through every day?
If you’ve never sat bolt upright in bed in the dead of night, drenched with sweat, and reeking with the smell the fear, then you’ve never had a flashback.
Flashbacks are bad like you can’t believe. Flashbacks are the devil incarnate. Flashbacks are hell in life, with no way out.
Until the Department of Defense recognizes this and awards a Purple Heart to those who have PTSD because of their time in combat, there is no hope. There is no other way to stop these suicides.
In a flashback you relive the worst moment of your life, the moment when you realized you were going to die, the moment when you realized you can’t possibly survive, or the moment you realized that your best friend had been blown apart.
I don’t know where your best friend is, mine is on panel 51 W on The Wall in Washington DC.
PTSD is devastating, and it isn’t a new phenomenon. Homer wrote about it in the Iliad, in the 8th century B.C.
In World War I it was called Shell Shock. In World War II it was called Battle Fatigue. Now it is called PTSD, but it is the same wound. And we still don’t honor the men and women who have suffered so much, and who continue to suffer every day, because they served their country in combat.
You are awarded a Purple Heart if you are wounded in combat, regardless of whether that wound is a devastating injury or less serious injury that only draws blood and leaves a two inch scar.
That’s the way it is and that’s the way it should be.
Everyone who has been awarded a Purple Heart deserves both our utmost respect and our appreciation of their sacrifice.
But the servicemen and women who have suffered devastating psychological wounds because of their time in combat deserve our utmost respect and our appreciation of their sacrifice too.
Unfortunately, they have received neither our appreciation for the enormous sacrifices they have made, nor our respect for the wounds they have suffered, and continue to suffer every day of their lives.
In fact, the Department of Defense disrespects those who suffer from PTSD because of their time in combat. For some inexplicable reason, the Department of Defense continues to deny the Purple Heart, or any other medal, to servicemen and women who have PTSD.
Despite thousands of pages of data on PTSD, the Department of Defense is still in the 19th Century. It still doesn’t realize that combat can cause permanent brain damage, without shedding a drop of blood.
PTSD causes damage you can’t see with the naked eye, and that can’t healed with stitches and sterile dressings. The damage is much deeper, much greater than that, and it lasts for the rest of your life.
If the Department of Defense wants to do something meaningful to stem the skyrocketing suicide rate among servicemen and women returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, then it has to remove the stigma from PTSD.
And the only way the Department of Defense can do this is to add PTSD to the wounds that qualify for the Purple Heart.
Creating a new PTSD Medal will never work. That will only entrench the stigma the military has given to PTSD. A new medal will simply become the “crazy medal” even though people with PTSD aren’t crazy.
That would just perpetuate the bad rep that those afflicted with PTSD have had to deal with forever.
They’ve been wounded, that’s all. And their wounds happened while they were in combat. It’s just that nobody recognized that they had been wounded until much later.
It is like hitting a pothole and note getting a flat tire until the next morning. The pothole still caused the flat tire, regardless of how long it took for the tire to go flat.
Let’s recognize that, and do something to reduce the number of American servicemen and women who are committing suicide because of the horrors of combat they have to deal with because of multiple deployments to Iraq and Afghanistan.
According to the PTSD Foundation of America, a Houston based organization:
- On average, five active-duty troops attempt suicide every day.
- One in five returning troops are diagnosed with serious Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) symptoms, but less than 40% of them will seek help.
- In 2009, a record breaking year for suicides in the service, 245 soldiers killed themselves.
- 1,100 Troops have taken their own lives since 2006.
- For troops suffering from combat trauma, two out of three of their marriages are failing -- 200,000 military marriages have been broken, more than 27,000 in 2009 alone.
- Veteran homelessness is on the rise with 1/3 of our nation’s homeless being veterans. That is disgraceful.
- Add Clay Warren Hunt to that list.
It doesn’t matter if you agree with the way the war against al-Qaida has been waged. What matters is that servicemen and women are afflicted with PTSD.
The New York Times has published dozens of articles in the past few years about the devastating effects of PTSD on Vietnam Veterans as well as Iraq and Afghanistan veterans, but the Department of Defense continues to do nothing.
When is Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates going to get it?
Tomorrow morning, Gates should walk into his office and sign a directive that every serviceman and woman, and every veteran who has ever been diagnosed with PTSD is immediately eligible for the Purple Heart.
That will change the equation. That will give the veterans who have PTSD hope that maybe someday, before they die, people will realize that hell is nothing compared to PTSD.
Listen to those who have been to hell and back. They know.
For more information contact the PTSD Foundation of America.
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