Repeat Reports Ignored on Repeat Deployments

It is almost as if we have been living in the Twilight Zone! News comes out explaining something, then nothing changes, but people end up wanting an explanation all over again!

CBS Twilight Zone

Repeat Iraq Tours Raise Risk of PTSD, Army Finds
Washington Post
By Ann Scott Tyson
Staff Writer
Wednesday, December 20, 2006; Page A19

U.S. soldiers serving repeated Iraq deployments are 50 percent more likely than those with one tour to suffer from acute combat stress, raising their risk of post-traumatic stress disorder, according to the Army's first survey exploring how today's multiple war-zone rotations affect soldiers' mental health........and read the rest here because the link is still live.

By 2007, a soldier was faced with his 5th deployment, along with many more. 

Soldier who fought fifth deployment to war deemed medically unfit

Lawyer says soldier wants honorable discharge and release from IRRBy Lisa BurgessStars and Stripes Mideast editionAugust 16, 2007
ARLINGTON, Va. — The Florida reservist who asked federal courts to block the Army from sending him to Iraq on a fifth deployment was excused from active service after being found medically unfit. He is still seeking an honorable discharge to prevent another call-up, according to his lawyer.
“Now we’re working to put the icing on the cake and get him out of the IRR,” or Individual Ready Reserve, Fayetteville, N.C.-based attorney Mark Waple said.
Sgt. Erik Botta, 26, of Port St. Lucie, Fla., won’t be finished with his eight-year obligation until October 2008, so he is asking for the discharge to ensure he will not get another call-up to Iraq, Waple said. 

read more here

A Fort Riley soldier was sent back after two months of being home, even though he had been diagnosed with PTSD. An Army Ranger was killed in Afghanistan on his 7th tour.

But while ignoring the risk of redeployments, they extended those deployments.

General Carter Ham, who would later talk about his own battle with PTSD, wanted 2 years in between deployments.

Oh well, I could keep going with this, but at least now you know, that what you are about to read is not new. Since they kept doing it, not matter what evidence came out stating it was a dangerous thing to do, they still did it!

Suicide risk rises with quick repeat deployments, study shows
The new way of war might be over-stressing soldiers
NBC News
by Maggie Fox
Apr.19.2018

Those re-deployed within six months or less were 60 percent more likely to attempt suicide.

Soldiers are more at risk of suicide when they’re repeatedly deployed with six months or less between rotations, and when they’re sent to war too soon after they join the service, new research shows.

Such quick turnarounds have become common as the U.S. sends combat troops to Afghanistan, Iraq and Syria. Of the 1.3 million or so active duty military personnel, about 160,000 are permanently stationed overseas, according to the federal government’s Defense Manpower Data Center.

At the same time, suicide rates have soared among veterans. On average, 20 veterans a day died by suicide in 2014, and many more attempted suicide, the Veterans Affairs Department says.

“Rates of suicidal behaviors, including suicide deaths, attempts, and ideation, among U.S. Army soldiers increased considerably during the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan,” Dr. Robert Ursano of the Uniformed Services University of the Health Sciences wrote in a report published Wednesday.

Ursano and colleagues studied a group of such soldiers: 593 men and women in the U.S. Army who had been deployed twice and who attempted suicide between 2004 and 2009. They were looking for specific factors affecting suicide risk.
read more here

What Are You Doing To Prevent Suicides?

Wanting To Do Something Not The Same As The Doing The Right ThingWounded Times
Kathie Costos
March 20, 2016

Caring about veterans and wanting to make a difference is not good enough. We have to take the time to give it all careful thought and research or we'll just keep repeating what has already been done and failed to achieve the stated purpose.

There is a veteran who subjected himself to a hardship that left me speechless. The reason to do something must have been based on caring about veterans but while the purpose may have been pure, the awareness was questionable.

Ryan Weldon walking 5,000 miles to "raise awareness" and set up a GoFundMe. Willing to walk that many miles to "do something" yet didn't read the report or he wouldn't still be using "22 a day" when talking about suicides.

“The journey is to get the word out there and let people know how serious it is,” Weldon said. “Twenty-two veterans a day take their own life due to post-traumatic stress and as a Marine, I refuse to sit by and do nothing.”

In another report after he finished the walk there was this from NBC.

Ryan Weldon was greeted by throngs of supporters when he reached San Francisco coastline.

Ryan Weldon, a 34-year-old from North Myrtle Beach, South Carolina, started his treck in February 2015 to raise awareness for military and law enforcement veterans suffering from post-traumatic stress disorder. His journey started on the East Coast, in Delaware and spanned 5,000 miles.

According to that article he only raised $8,000 for a 5,000 mile walk, so obviously it wasn't about financial gain for himself. His service as a Marine wasn't about financial gain either.  No one puts their lives on the line in the military for a big paycheck.  When you actually think about what they make risking their lives and enduring endless hardships, they are making under minimum wage and well below the folks who protested to make $15 an hour to work in fast food services.

He documented the walk on Facebook. This veteran knows how to use technology and apparently he does care or he wouldn't have subjected his body to what he just went through. We are just left wondering what the point was. 

Doing "something" is not the same as doing something that can change what is happening.

There is a lot of that going on all over the country. Folks wanting to do something but never taking the time to discover what was already done anymore than they take the time to study the subject they want to raise awareness on.

PTSD is not the only cause for suicides tied to military life but it is tied to the majority of them. As Weldon points out, there are law enforcement veterans committing suicide as well as current ones and firefighters and emergency medical technicians.

The thing is, no one is going to change something they do not understand.  All the good intentions on this "awareness" raising has completely missed the opportunity to change what needs to be changed.

Veterans already know they are killing themselves, so quoting a 59 page report down to a slogan isn't helpful at all.

There was a followup to that study involving 21 states and this VA Suicide Report was from 23 states, released in 2014.

As you can see, that was after all these veterans were trained in "prevention" which clearly didn't work especially when you factor in the redeployment risk of PTSD raised by 50% which the Army figured out back in 2006.

"When we look at combat, we look at some very horrific events," said Col. Ed Crandell, head of the Army's Mental Health Advisory Team, which polled 1,461 soldiers in Iraq in late 2005. "They come back, they know they're going to deploy again," and as a result they don't ever return to normal levels of stress, Crandell said.

"The most likely explanation . . . is that a number of soldiers returned" to Iraq "with acute stress/combat stress symptoms" that were unresolved from previous tours, it said.

The report also found a doubling of suicides among soldiers serving in the Iraq war from 2004 to 2005, the latest period for which data are available. Twenty-two soldiers took their own lives in Iraq and Kuwait in 2005, compared with 11 in 2004 and 25 in 2003, Army officials said.

Despite what they knew, suicides went up and so did the number of redeployments. But too many only want to focus on the veteran suicides without ever thinking about the numbers going up in those committing suicide while still in the military.

We don't want to talk about the training these men and women had that were supposed to prevent them from happening or the fact that we've spent billions on them. What do members of Congress do about any of this? They don't even mention the prevention programs when they hold hearings, so the over 900 prevention programs continue and do do the suicides.

Military Suicides Rise, Despite 900 Programs

But what is not addressed in this testimony and what my post did address is that the 900 programs are not targeting the appropriate register of experience to heal the deep anguish that service members and veterans experience and often leads them to take their own lives. Stigma reduction, yes; availability of screening and mental health care, yes; peer counselors, yes. But these are not enough. 

Nothing will change as long as we walk away from the facts. Nothing will give the veterans hope until we actually start telling them they are not stuck suffering the way they are today and can heal their lives even though they cannot change their past. They need hope but they won't believe any of us if we allow something that just isn't true to be repeated over and over again.

If you really want to make a difference here's what all of us need to do.

1. Stop repeating the number 22.
That study was from limited data from just 21 states. The VA and the CDC are working on a more detailed report but first we need to understand the breakdown on the report already used and how what is being talked about is not the whole story.

While the figure is often cited in connection with recent wars in Iraq and Afghanistan (it also was used by Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, the group that pushed for the Clay Hunt act), the study was more telling of suicides among older veterans. The average age of male veteran suicides was 59.6 years old — older than non-veteran male suicides. (The Gallup pollshows the percentage of veterans climbs dramatically as the population gets older, making up a majority of those older than 65.) “It is therefore possible that epidemiologic characteristic of suicide in the general population (i.e. higher rates of suicide among older adult males) may contribute to a comparatively high prevalence of Veterans among those who die from suicide,” the VA report noted.

2. Stop saying "It's just a number" when that fact is pointed out to you. 
It is not just a number to be taken lightly. They were members of the military willing to die for someone else yet found it impossible to survive back home.

3. Find out what has already been done by others and join them.
Wanting to do something is great but means you are also willing to repeat the same mistakes by thinking no one else thought of it and has already done it.

4. If you are a family member dealing with the loss, join or start a support group.
You may not be qualified to take on a troubled veteran but more than qualified to help another family with what they are going through. You know the pain they feel all too well and they need support, advice and encouragement to heal. They also need reassurance that it was not their fault. They did the best they could with what they knew at the time.  It would also be a good idea to invite someone looking for support while their veteran is still alive but won't seek help.

5. Research the subject you want to raise awareness on as if your life depended on it.
Make sure you understand what is already available in your area so you know what is lacking and fill in the gaps.  Don't just read something online about the limited attempts and then repeat them.

6. Don't think your attempt is the only thing that is needed.

Service Dogs are helpful but not the only answer. Some veterans do not like dogs, others are allergic to them, do not have the time or place to properly take care of them. There have been veterans committing suicide even with a wonderful service dog.

Sports and outings are great, get veterans out with others and put them into an different environment for a day, but after it is over, they are back with their thoughts, struggles and problems.

Peer Support is also limited. If the one offering the support has not been trained or does not know anything more than the veteran needing support, it can do more harm than good for both of them. Let's face it. It is stressful.

7. Find out what is going on in your own state. 
The Department of Veterans Affairs has an interactive map with every state, the number of veterans, how many males and female veterans as well as how many from each generation. There are 400,000 veterans charities out there already that may be doing some good but evidently not good enough. Plus top that off with the fact there are less than 22 million veterans in this country and you get the point.

8. Stop blaming the VA for everything since Congress has had jurisdiction over it since 1946 and no problem is a new one.
Plus there is the simple fact that most veterans do not go to the VA no matter if they know they need it or not.

9. Understand that it does not matter if it is a Republican or Democrat in the White House since every President has left the following one a backlog of claims in the 100's of thousands. 
There was a backlog of claims in the 90's as well as years of waiting for approvals.  My family was in that mess.

10. PAY ATTENTION TO WHAT IS SUPPOSED TO BE IMPORTANT TO YOU AND INVEST THE TIME OR NOTHING WILL EVER CHANGE!

When will the DOD actually do something on PTSD and suicides?

In 2006 thee was a bill introduced to "provide more funds for PTSD counseling and benefits. The bill includes $180 million extra for readjustment counseling and mental health services at Vet Centers, and a promise of one-on-one counseling for returning veterans in addition to group counseling."

In Connecticut there was this report about redeployments, PTSD and suicides

Army Spec. Jeffrey Henthorn, a young father and third-generation soldier, whose death last year is still being mourned by his native Choctaw, Okla.What his hometown does not know is that Henthorn, 25, had been sent back to Iraq for a second tour, even though his superiors knew he was unstable and had threatened suicide at least twice, according to Army investigative reports and interviews.

When he finally succeeded in killing himself on Feb. 8, 2005, at Camp Anaconda in Balad, Iraq, an Army report says, the work of the M-16 rifle was so thorough that fragments of his skull pierced the barracks ceiling.In a case last July, a 20-year-old soldier who had written a suicide note to his mother was relieved of his gun and referred for a psychological evaluation, but then was accused of faking his mental problems and warned he could be disciplined, according to what he told his family.

Three weeks later, after his gun had been handed back, Pfc. Jason Scheuerman, of Lynchburg, Va., used it to end his life.

Also kept in the war zone was Army Pfc. David L. Potter, 22, of Johnson City, Tenn., who was diagnosed with anxiety and depression while serving in Iraq in 2004. Potter remained with his unit in Baghdad despite a suicide attempt and a psychiatrist's recommendation that he be separated from the Army, records show. Ten days after the recommendation was signed, he slid a gun out from under another soldier's bed, climbed to the second floor of an abandoned building and shot himself through the mouth, the Army has concluded.

The Hartford Courent followed that report up with this one.

• Despite a congressional order that the military assess the mental health of all deploying troops, fewer than 1 in 300 service members see a mental health professional before shipping out.

• Once at war, some unstable troops are kept on potent antidepressants and anti-anxiety drugs with little or no counseling or medical monitoring, in violation of the military's regulations.

• Some troops who developed post-traumatic stress disorder after serving in Iraq are being sent back to the war zone.These practices seem to have fueled an increase in the suicide rate among troops serving in Iraq, which reached an all-time high in 2005 when 22 soldiers killed themselves — accounting for nearly one-fifth of all noncombat Army deaths.The investigation found that at least 11 service members who committed suicide in Iraq in 2004 and 2005 were kept on duty despite exhibiting signs of significant psychological distress.

The Army's top mental health expert, Col. Elspeth C. Ritchie, acknowledged that some deployment practices, such as sending service members diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder back into combat, have been driven in part by the troop shortage. "The challenge for us is that the Army has a mission to fight. And, as you know, recruiting has been a challenge," she said.Under the military's pre-deployment screening process — routinely no more than a single, self-reported mental health question on a form — troops with serious mental disorders are not being identified, and others whose mental illnesses are known are being deployed anyway.

We knew the same year that medications were also deadly. Again, this is from the Hartford Courant.

• Antidepressant medications with potentially serious side effects are being dispensed with little or no monitoring and sometimes minimal counseling, despite FDA warnings that the drugs can increase suicidal thoughts.

• Military doctors treating combat stress symptoms are sending some soldiers back to the front lines after rest and a three-day regimen of drugs - even though experts say the drugs typically take two to six weeks to begin working.

• The emphasis on maintaining troop numbers has led some military doctors to misjudge the severity of mental health symptoms.Some of the practices are at odds with the military's own medical guidelines, which state that certain mental illnesses are incompatible with military service, and some medications are not suited for combat deployments.

The problem is, they knew what this was producing in 2006 but did it anyway. The worst thing is they are still doing it. In Afghanistan, redeployed U.S. soldiers still coping with demons of post-traumatic stress

Army thinks redeploying PTSD soldiers is a good idea?

2008

Sgt. Coleman S. Bean will not be listed among the war dead. The 25-year-old Bean served two tours of duty in Iraq. He landed there with paratroopers from the 173rd Airborne Division during the first days of the war, and saw combat duty in Northern Iraq. Upon returning home he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. Despite the diagnosis, he was deployed to Iraq for a second time, returning home in May. A third deployment remained a possibility. Saturday night, following a car accident and a brief hospital stay, Bean returned to his home in South River and took his own life.

2011

Dr. David Jobes, a clinical psychologist and suicide expert who recently spoke at a Veterans Affairs conference in Louisville, said "the third deployment is the tipping point after which things begin to fall apart." Clinical psychologist and suicide expert Thomas Joiner, who also spoke in Louisville, proffers a theory that explains why individuals who feel like a burden to their loved ones and lack a sense of belonging to their community are especially vulnerable. This tendency is compounded when those who witness injury routinely and have developed fearlessness toward violence and harm may be at even higher risk for suicide.

2013

Six months before his deployment to Afghanistan, Capt. Anthony Martinez gravely doubted his ability to lead. He had post-traumatic stress disorder. He wasn’t sleeping at night and was barely holding it together during the day. He told his boss he couldn’t handle command of the battalion’s largest company. Senior noncommissioned officers asked leadership to remove Martinez. Six weeks before shipping off, Martinez threatened to kill himself. Then he wrote a formal memo detailing who should take over the company if he had a mental breakdown while in Afghanistan. The Army did nothing — except send him to war.

There are a lot more but you get the idea. Did they learn? Hell no. Did they learn in 2006 when the Army study showed the increase risk of PTSD with redeployments?

No. Now they seem proud of it.

In Afghanistan, redeployed U.S. soldiers still coping with demons of post-traumatic stress
Washington Post
By Kevin Sieff
Published: August 18, 2013

FORWARD OPERATING BASE ­ARIAN, Afghanistan — The soldiers of the 10th Mountain Division were among the first Americans to arrive in Afghanistan in 2001. Now, they will be some of the last to leave.

They have served as many as seven combat tours each, with the accompanying traumas — pulling a friend’s body from a charred vehicle, watching a rocket tear through a nearby barracks, learning from e-mail that a marriage was falling apart.

But a diagnosis of post-traumatic stress disorder is not a barrier to being redeployed. Not when the Army needs its most experienced soldiers to wrap up the war. Instead, the Army is trying to answer a new question: Who is resilient enough to return to Afghanistan, in spite of the demons they are still fighting?

As the Army has knowingly redeployed soldiers with symptoms of PTSD — and learned of the remarkable coping skills of some — it is now regularly embedding psychologists with units in the field. They are treating men and women recovering from 12 years of relentless combat, even as the soldiers continue to fight.
read more here

Afghan deployment was the beginning of the end for captain’s career

Afghan deployment was the beginning of the end for captain’s career
25 minutes ago
FEATURE STORY
by Megan McCloskey
Stars and Stripes
Published: June 27, 2013

Part 2: Red flags add up as Martinez heads downrange

FORT HOOD, Texas — Capt. Anthony Martinez arrived in Afghanistan in June 2010, in command of a 230-person company.

At Forward Operating Base Spin Boldak, a base with a couple of thousand servicemembers in southern Kandahar, Martinez was appointed “mayor” of the facility, meaning he was in charge of keeping the place running. If a septic tank burst, for example, Martinez was the go-to officer to arrange for it to be fixed. In all, he was responsible for $141.6 million worth of equipment.

First Sgt. Malaloa Vaomu, the top enlisted soldier in the company, said he and Martinez were stretched thin, and “the level of stress amplified [Martinez’s] issues.”

Martinez, a West Point graduate who by all accounts was an excellent Army officer, started to struggle when he got home from his second deployment to Iraq. He was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder, had insomnia and eventually deteriorated in mental health to the point of suicidal thoughts.

About a month and half before deploying, Martinez threatened suicide, but the gesture and other red flags were largely ignored by his commanders. Vaomu had asked for Martinez to be replaced as company commander to no avail.

As the summer in Afghanistan progressed, Martinez increasingly had angry outbursts at soldiers, often ordering counselings for them that his company leadership disagreed with as unnecessary. At one point, for three days Martinez “shut himself in his office and only came out for meals and to use the latrine,” Spc. Brandon Petty testified at an eventual board of inquiry for Martinez’s elimination as an Army officer.

The first week of August, Martinez hit a wall. He decided to quit not just command but the whole Army. He went to his battalion commander, Lt. Col. Calvin Downey, to resign his commission.

Martinez said Downey told him he would send his resignation up to legal, but nothing came of it.

Yet another red flag, unnoticed.

Martinez recalled Downey told him to “keep his head up and drive on.”

“I was so overwhelmed,” Martinez said. “On many nights I would go to my [room] and I thought about killing myself. Even loaded my gun.”
read more here

Army didn't help Captain screaming for help, now they want him out?

When you read editorial comments on Wounded Times and you get the impression I am pissed off, you are correct. Maybe after reading the story of Captain Anthony Martinez you'll get pissed off too. Lord knows with everything going on, we should be!

This is part one and there is another one up on Stars and Stripes to follow this one.

An officer on the brink
FEATURE STORY
by Megan McCloskey
Stars and Stripes
Published: June 26, 2013

Part 1: The rise and fall of Army Capt. Anthony Martinez

FROM WEST POINT TO IRAQ
From early in his career, Capt. Anthony Martinez excelled in the Army. Then came PTSD and suicidal thoughts. The Army ignored his struggles and sent him back to war. Not until Martinez lost control in Afghanistan did the Army decide to pay attention. Now the service wants to kick him out.

FORT HOOD, Texas — Six months before his deployment to Afghanistan, Capt. Anthony Martinez gravely doubted his ability to lead.

He had post-traumatic stress disorder. He wasn’t sleeping at night and was barely holding it together during the day. He told his boss he couldn’t handle command of the battalion’s largest company. Senior noncommissioned officers asked leadership to remove Martinez.

Six weeks before shipping off, Martinez threatened to kill himself.

Then he wrote a formal memo detailing who should take over the company if he had a mental breakdown while in Afghanistan.

The Army did nothing — except send him to war.

No one in his chain of command questioned whether a suicidal officer, hobbled by PTSD and addled by psychotropic drugs, was fit for combat.

Once in Afghanistan, Martinez quickly cracked under the pressure, and the meltdown some had been afraid of became a reality. He isolated himself, had angry, irrational outbursts and, finally, in the culmination of his ruin, threatened two soldiers.

He told one to get out of his office “or I’ll shoot you in the face.” Then, during an argument with his supply sergeant, he ordered a private in the room to load his weapon — an unheard of escalation on a fellow soldier.

Now the Army wants to act.

After ignoring the issues, the service wants to kick Martinez out for the very behavior that medical experts say proves why he never should have been in Afghanistan in the first place.
read more here

Third deployment tip of the suicide spear?

Dr. Jobes said, "the third deployment is the tipping point after which things begin to fall apart" and this makes a lot of sense. For over thirty years researchers discovered that one out of three exposed to trauma develop some level of PTSD. Sending them back into combat for a third time wipes out the chance of walking away.

Living in Florida we get a lot of thunderstorms. These are pretty powerful storms with a lot of lightening. Imagine having to take your dog out during one of them and then imagine seeing a lightening bolt strike the ground near you. A fear would come over you every time you walked out the door growing stronger with each and every other close call. You manage to relax as long as there isn't a thunderstorm overhead but the next time, every nerve in your body is on edge.

When they deploy into combat, that have that feeling of dread. They live on the edge for the entire time they are deployed. When they get to go back home, they believe they can pick up where they left off, relaxing out of danger.

Some come home with juvenile case of PTSD. Symptoms are mild at that point and leaves them with the impression they will just "get over it" and everything will be fine as they battle the nightmares, block out the flashbacks and numb their jumping nerves. But PTSD manages to grow up fast as life happens and other events feed it. It grows stronger and they have to fight harder to stop it. Somedays they win. Most days they lose especially with the news coming they will be sent back again. The second time heading home they wonder more about how they managed to survive. The juvenile PTSD they came home with the last time has grown up to be a six foot teenage bully hell bent on causing as much havoc as possible. This level of PTSD begins to use guilt against them making them believe they have become evil. By the third time sent back PTSD has grown into an adult taking over the whole neighborhood of the "man/woman" while gaining strength from every event that happens that trip back.

State's high suicide rate traumatizes
By Melinda Moore and Julie Cerel
Posted: 12:00am on Sep 11, 2011
All summer long, we've seen tragic stories strewn across the headlines and news broadcasts of anguished Kentuckians dying by their own hands.

There was the young politician, the parishioner outside the Catholic Church, and the elderly gentleman who refused help as he drove his car into the Kentucky River.

Each of these stories represents a tragic and often preventable form of death: suicide.

Sept. 10 of every year has been declared World Suicide Prevention Day, but for those of us who research and take care of suicidal individuals it is an issue that we think about every day.

Dr. David Jobes, a clinical psychologist and suicide expert who recently spoke at a Veterans Affairs conference in Louisville, said "the third deployment is the tipping point after which things begin to fall apart." Clinical psychologist and suicide expert Thomas Joiner, who also spoke in Louisville, proffers a theory that explains why individuals who feel like a burden to their loved ones and lack a sense of belonging to their community are especially vulnerable. This tendency is compounded when those who witness injury routinely and have developed fearlessness toward violence and harm may be at even higher risk for suicide.

read more here

Redeployed with PTSD, another soldier dies by suicide

Gregory Bean was forthcoming in telling his son's story in hopes it can prevent a similar tragedy. "If another young man hears his story, and we can do something to change another outcome, a story can have a positive result," he said.

East Brunswick soldier kills self after returning from second Iraq tour
Bean, 25, had been diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder
By RICK MALWITZ • STAFF WRITER • September 9, 2008


EAST BRUNSWICK —When the final tally is made of American casualties in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, Sgt. Coleman S. Bean will not be listed among the war dead.

The 25-year-old Bean served two tours of duty in Iraq. He landed there with paratroopers from the 173rd Airborne Division during the first days of the war, and saw combat duty in Northern Iraq.

Upon returning home he was diagnosed with post-traumatic stress disorder. Despite the diagnosis, he was deployed to Iraq for a second time, returning home in May. A third deployment remained a possibility.

Saturday night, following a car accident and a brief hospital stay, Bean returned to his home in South River and took his own life.

Wednesday night at 5, family, friends and several dozen army buddies from around the country will gather for a memorial service at the United Methodist Church on North Main Street in Milltown. The service will include an honor guard, taps and a presentation of the American flag to his family.

"He was a casualty of this war in a different way," said his father, Gregory Bean, who remains angry that his son was returned to the war, despite a diagnosis of PTSD he calls "dramatic."

Sixty-two active-duty soldiers committed suicide so far this calendar year, according to Col. Eddie Stephens, the Army's deputy director for human resource policy. Another 31 deaths are being investigated as possible suicides.

click post title for more

Another death that will not be counted just because the enemy came home inside of a soldier. What was he doing be redeployed with PTSD and why in the hell wasn't someone helping him when he came home? What is wrong with the DOD they keep this dangerous practice going on? They were thinking of sending him back a third time!

Gregory Bean is a hero to all who serve and come home wounded. Because he is willing to understand what wounded his son, what actually claimed the life of his son, he will end up saving some lives. He understand what PTSD is and finds no shame in his son being wounded but what we are doing to all of them is something to be ashamed of. How many more will die and not be counted? How many more will have to be buried when they could have been healing? kc