
When service members die by suicide, they look a lot like civilian suicides - curtis
https://fivethirtyeight.com/features/suicide-in-the-military/
======
VLM
Definitely written by someone not in, and not closely related to anyone on.

There is a sense of puzzlement that help isn't sought. But in some MOS and
some fields and some clearances seeking help is career suicide. Not all, but
some. Not all soldiers are career and not all MOS and security clearances
require no mental illness diag of course. So a soldier will only seek help if
he's ready to pull the trigger on career suicide in which case doing the real
thing is a microstep. You can tell people to seek help all you want to make
you feel better about doing something, but if they know by example that their
lifes work will be wiped out and they'll be unemployed in weeks if they
actually follow thru and seek help, well, you do the math.

Second gaping hole is some of the support REMF (I was a REMF so I can use that
acronym "proudly") have higher sec clearances than some front line. Naturally
that means some front line both see some interesting stuff and if they get
help for what they saw they might not lose their job. And the REMF now a days
might get blown up in a convoy or IED or whatever as bad as a front line, yet
if they seek help its bye bye MOS.

I have no personal experience with this, I was in during the early 90s but I
kinda keep up with the times. There's an old saying about it being a rather
permanent solution to a temporary problem. Young kids tend to have poor
concept of time. A year in Korea is bad, but not worth offing yourself, unless
you're a dumb kid, but then you don't want to speak ill of the dead, so ...

As with most big messes there is no simple solution and the more you know, the
more complicated it is...

~~~
AndrewKemendo
_But in some MOS and some fields and some clearances seeking help is career
suicide._

This is a truly toxic misnomer - and one that needs to die. As a former CC of
one of those types of units, I can tell you that the only way that would
happen is if your mental health issue caused a real world problem that created
a chance that you could be vulnerable to coercion from a FIA. I've never heard
of someone who got read off because they were diagnosed with something - it's
always been in conjunction with them doing something illegal or vulnerable to
exploit.

If an SCI troop seeks counseling, either through Doc or something like MIL One
Source, you will have no issues, even with a diagnosis. Once you've passed
through screening, indoc, training and are in the game it would be ridiculous
to take someone out cause they got rattled. In fact we always pushed it mental
health heavily to all of the other spooks cause there are real mind fucks in
playing our games that can get to people.

 _Second gaping hole is some of the support REMF (I was a REMF so I can use
that acronym "proudly") have higher sec clearances than some front line._

In fact, it's most likely that a REMF (read: non 11/18/03) will have a higher
clearance. Spot on too with the fact that a lot of non-standard troops are
seeing the worst parts of the shit. Aside from SOF, Docs, Spooks and Engineers
have been taking the brunt of it the past few years.

~~~
pram
This isn't true at all. I had a TS-SCI and was aircrew. I got diagnosed with
"Depressive Disorder Not Otherwise Specified" after a SINGLE visit to the base
psychiatrist and was permanently taken off of flight duty. It literally ruined
my career and I basically had to beg for an early discharge.

~~~
AndrewKemendo
Either someone fucked up really badly (happens with everything from time to
time) or this isn't the whole story.

If nothing else because no Mental Health professional would give a formal
diagnosis for DD-NOS after one visit. I know cause I was given that along with
a host of others after years of visits to Military Mental Health - so I'm no
stranger to the system.

Your SCI doesn't apparently relate to this story as you were made DNIF and
nothing else according to you. Did you get read off SCI?

I'm not saying that people don't get fucked, but there are as many people that
have been DNIF or separated for things like arthritis in the pinky toe (yes I
know someone that happened to) or some kind of funky random thing that
wouldn't otherwise be an issue.

~~~
pram
My point is: I was fed the line about 'just get help it won't hurt blah blah'
by people like you and it turned out to be lies. It isn't and wasn't good
advice. The stigma exists for a reason.

~~~
AndrewKemendo
It's no different than the other terrible advice of "Don't go to sick call
cause [insert bad outcome]." At the end of the day whatever problem you have,
physical or mental, is going to come out and be worse in left untreated.

99.9% of people in high stakes military jobs who seek treatment will have no
adverse impacts on their career from seeking mental health treatment.

I don't know enough about your case to make any further comment but the plural
of anecdote isn't data.

~~~
pram
Your fake statistic isn't data either lol.

~~~
AndrewKemendo
No argument there.

------
davewasthere
I think the article got it close that it's really to do with being: Male,
Young, White.

When I was with the firm, we had a spate of suicides on base over a short
period of time. Enough for 'management' to implement an in-loco parentis type
arrangement for the young, single servicemen (and women) who were housed on
base in barracks.

It meant great adventure trips away - and did help give some sort of support
network for those posted away from families. A better option than just
drinking in the bar, at least.

There are help options available (career suicide or not), but if you're
depressed/suicidal, it's actually quite difficult to reach out to those
options. In a well-run workplace environment, I found the Sergeants (and up)
to be both a wealth of knowledge/experience and most were quite actively
involved in taking care of the well-being of us young skins.

~~~
sandworm101
Ive seen similar attempts to compensate, to de-toxify a base by adding on new
activities. Im not a fan. It is the easy solution. The harder option is to dig
out the issues. Debt. Count the number of payday loan places and casinos near
the base. Drugs and alcohol. Count the bars. Then turn to the attitudes of
team leaders. Petty insults to subordinates might be part of military culture,
but that doesnt mean it has to remain so. The little things add up.
Improvement in these areas takes real effort, far more so than a weekly bus
trip. It requires commanders to act a bit like parents, something they used to
do but these days do not.

My gandfather used to speak of "hats off" activities on the base he ran. Rank
had no place during such things. He said he learned more about his people at
the weekly "hats off" card game than he ever did while on duty. Those sort of
back channels, without any risk of getting something on someone's record, are
imho missing from base culture today. But to maintain such things you need
stability of leadership. Today people move around so fast that commanders have
trouble even keeping track of names.

------
whb07
Solid reporting and analysis. To further the stark difference in point of view
from a veteran to civilian is a comic strip from a famous Marine illustrator:

terminallance.com/2012/01/23/terminal-lance-174-breaking-news/

~~~
averagewall
That's a weird mentality to think of a killer as a "dumbass" and a "huge dick"
when your own job is to kill people. Does it matter if they're Americans or
Iraqis? They're still people.

------
anotheryou
How to handle people that you know are suicidal, but refuse to undergo
treatment? I once had this situation (luckily with a happy end), that I only
knew the rough location (in another country) and tried to talk someone out of
it over the course of about a week. I was very close to calling the police,
but was afraid it would do more harm than good. The person I was dealing with
was very rational and calm about it and would probably just convinced the
police of beeing fine.

~~~
Kenji
I think you handled the situation correctly. You can't do much. Just like you
can't do much if a loved one is injured or sick and dying but they do not want
to go to a doctor (this actually happened to a friend). It's very hard to get
a handle on these situations because most 1st world countries have a strong
concept of individual liberty. I am actually glad it is that way, but I also
realize how awful those situations are. But frankly, I'd rather not erode
liberty to better deal with such cases, I think the problem has to be attacked
from another direction, i.e. not stigmatising mental health problems, more
conversation, tolerance, education about mental health, etc.

------
ryanmarsh
I just got a notice on Facebook. Another brother lost his battle. I don't use
Facebook except to every month or so check in on a group of guys I deployed
with. It seems like one or two each year take their own life. This has been
going on the last ten years. Many others have struggled but haven't committed
suicide (yet, it pains me to say).

After reading the article I still don't understand what's going on. I wonder
if it has something more to do with society in general and how men in this
demographic are received. I've heard almost all of my brothers say they feel
rejected by society, or like an alien in their community. I feel/felt the same
way.

~~~
jimbert
I agree with you that there's a feeling of alienation from society. From my
own experience, I felt a growing sense of isolation from the people that were
closest to me.

I feel that many coming out of the military are put at a disadvantage compared
to their civilian counterparts. Coming home from deployment, I'd lost touch
with many of my friends, had broken up with my long term girlfriend, and had
scarce job opportunities. The military has made some efforts to better help
reintegrate with the civilian world, but they all fall short because they have
no particular expertise or influence on what happens outside of service. They
can't help you much with finding a job or mending your relationships other
than impersonal job assistance programs or a couple MWR trips with your
family. I eventually found some success but my military service and its side
effects were a hole that I had to dig myself out of with the help of my
friends and family.

I think that successful reintegration requires a strong support network. I'm
fortunate to have strong family connections and a few friends that were there
for me. I still reach out to some of those I served with to have coffee and
just chat about life, though I'm ashamed to admit that I haven't been as good
about it as the years have gone by. Good on you for continuing to reach out to
your battle buddies -- I'm sure you're making a positive impact in each of
their lives.

------
gerdesj
All I can do is listen here and maybe learn something.

------
lebanon_tn
An insightful article from a few years ago:
[https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/20/us/marine-battalion-
veter...](https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/20/us/marine-battalion-veterans-
scarred-by-suicides-turn-to-one-another-for-help.html)

