Family hopes others learn from soldier son's suicide

PTSD among veterans: Camp Hill family hopes others learn from soldier son's suicide
Patriot News
By Carolyn Kimmel
Special to PennLive
March 26, 2014

Dane Michael Freedman was a machine gunner for the U.S. Marines who served two combat tours, one in Iraq and other in Afghanistan.

When he returned home, however, the 25-year-old Camp Hill man faced internal enemies of fear, guilt and hopelessness. But for these enemies he had no training and all the weapons he tried – counseling, medications and sheer will – failed.

Dane Freedman suffered from post-traumatic stress disorder, or PTSD, which doctors say can happen to anyone who is exposed to events that involve actual or threatened loss of life or limb. The exposure can be direct or indirect, such as first responders to the aftermath of a trauma.

“They take these boys who are gentle souls and they turn them into warriors and killers and they do nothing to help them return to the gentle souls they were; they send them home with no assimilation back into the life they used to live,” said Donnamarie Freedman, Dane’s mother.

Dane took his own life in December.

“Part of our decision to talk about the suicide is to do something about the stigma associated with mental illness . . . to let people know our soldiers are suffering when they come back and we need to do more for them,” Donnamarie Freedman said.
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