As suicides rise among veterans, outreach increases

As suicides rise among veterans, outreach increases
Connie Cone Sexton
The Arizona Republic
March 19, 2013

The VA says there were an estimated 8,030 suicides among vets in 2010, an increase from 7,300 in 2000. PHOENIX -- Michael Rolack never heard the gunshot, only the screams of his grandson's fiancee.

Running to the front yard of his Phoenix home, he saw the body of 28-year-old Nicholas Rolack, a Marine Corps veteran, who had just put a bullet in his head.

Thinking back on that March 7, 2012, night, Michael Rolack's voice catches in grief.

"Just two hours before he killed himself, we had been watching a movie. I knew he was having a hard time after coming back from Iraq, but he wouldn't talk; he wouldn't share nothin'," Rolack said. "His hurt must have been so big that he couldn't get around it. Maybe he felt like he had to do it to keep from hurting us."

Suicide among veterans and active military members is not a new problem, but the number of incidents has risen significantly in the last decade, reaching what former Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta described as "epidemic" levels. His statement to Congress coincided with efforts by the military and the Department of Veterans Affairs to ramp up suicide-prevention programs.

Between 2000 and 2010 the number of veteran suicides rose from 20 to 22 per day, the VA reported last month. The total grew from an estimated 7,300 suicides in 2000 to an estimated 8,030 in 2010, for a difference of 730.
read more here