PTSD support doesn't mean the more the merrier

If you Google PTSD Support groups you'll find "About 3,620,000 results (0.77 seconds)"

That's a lot and just shows how many "experts" are competing for you to visit their sites. It is easy for established groups to just get buried under all the new ones popping up.

When I am contacted about a new group starting, especially from Facebook, I ask them a series of questions first. Once they can't answer what real expert they are connected to, I stop asking questions. Simple as that. It is great to have a site where people just open up and share what is going on in their lives but when they have no one they can call on when someone is in distress, they do more harm than good.

Charities are another issue. Too many start up doing what has already been done by other groups. When they are not interested in helping out established groups or trying to get them do something they are not, then you have to wonder what the real motivation is. Do they really want to help or do they want to make a name (money) for themselves?

So far after 30 years, I've seen very little new coming out of the over 3 million search results above. That's pretty depressing.

Here is one group doing it all but getting very little attention for one simple reason. We're more about the work and not the publicity but that ends up creating greater challenges to being able to do the work.

Point Man International Ministries doesn't get a lot of press but while that is not always a bad thing it is when there are so many veterans needing help to heal and getting a load of empty promises, bad advice and still left searching for some support.

Since 1984, when Seattle Police Officer and Vietnam Veteran Bill Landreth noticed he was arresting the same people each night, he discovered most were Vietnam vets like himself that just never seemed to have quite made it home. He began to meet with them in coffee shops and on a regular basis for fellowship and prayer. Soon, Point Man Ministries was conceived and became a staple of the Seattle area. Bills untimely death soon after put the future of Point Man in jeopardy.

However, Chuck Dean, publisher of a Veterans self help newspaper, Reveille, had a vision for the ministry and developed it into a system of small groups across the USA for the purpose of mutual support and fellowship. These groups are known as Outposts. Worldwide there are hundreds of Outposts and Homefront groups serving the families of veterans.

PMIM is run by veterans from all conflicts, nationalities and backgrounds. Although, the primary focus of Point Man has always been to offer spiritual healing from PTSD, Point Man today is involved in group meetings, publishing, hospital visits, conferences, supplying speakers for churches and veteran groups, welcome home projects and community support. Just about any where there are Vets there is a Point Man presence. All services offered by Point Man are free of charge.

This is one of the comments left on the video you are about to watch.

"after seeing this i sought counseling after 3 combat tours and also gave my life to Jesus!"

You'll see the link to the first part video of this veteran's testimony but I want you to focus on the possible for now.

In this video an Iraq veteran named Paul talks about how he had the gun to his head when his wife walked in. She was on the phone with Dana Morgan, President of Point Man. Paul's life was saved that day but he also began to heal soon afterwards when he was able to forgive himself as much as he was willing to forgive others.

There is so much that is possible but if things keep going the way they were with all the new groups popping up, it will just take veterans longer to find Point Man and harder to find leaders willing to do the work God has pulled them to do.