The good the bad, just not the ugly. At least that's what it feels like. It's been a few days since the last blog. Ive had a lot to say, don't get me wrong. Just struggling with the words on how to say it. Rather than wax lyrical and risk losing people in a minefield of metaphors and analogies, I'll start with some basics. I believe all the military caregivers I've spoken to. I believe all their stories, I believe and see the level of anguish they are feeling and I can understand their perspective. I believe, the service providers in the VA and units who have been part of the journey for these families want to do all they can to help and heal and get everyone moving forward in the best way possible. The problem, is it's not working. Somewhere, we're missing the mark. And so I have moments like this: I was supposed to meet her at a coffee shop, in the end we just sat outside, her staring at her parked car and me staring at her. I had drank all my coffee and she had fiddled with everything in her hand bag before, finally, she said. "They never cared about his drinking before he was wounded you know. They never gave a shit. He'd be gone away for training and after, they'd all go out and see how drunk they could get and still function the next day. It didn't matter then." It came so out of the blue, I wasn't really sure what to say next and hardly the 60 minute journalist, I just did what I always do in situations like this, I started ripping up my napkin. She looked back at the car, then the clock on her phone and sighed. "I'm not a caregiver, so I'm real glad you decided to speak with me. I just don't know what else to do. He needs help" For some back story. He is her husband. He has a TBI and PTS, he remains on active duty, by choice. And his wife, who I'm speaking with, has been asking his unit for help. She's not getting it. "When I first spoke to his captain we were at a function. They were talking about how much he could drink, like it was awesome or something and I told them it wasn't great to live with." She went on to tell me how hard it can be when he's drunk. He's never hit her, or the kids, but he tries to drive drunk, generally messes up the house and he's broken two TV's this year alone. "I guess I was mad at them, because I had to go home with the guy who had just run out in the street and jumped on a car. And it's not funny any more. It wasn't funny to start with" The next day, the captain joked with her husband about how controlling his wife is, not wanting to let him relax and have a few beers with his friends to unwind. "He came home so mad with me, he told me I had become a controlling bitch and I was never to speak to his work again. The he went out. And didn't come back until the next day." That's when it got worse. The drinking escalated, he spent more time out with his friends than he did at home, despite being gone frequently for training. He barely spoke to her, he yelled at their children. "I didn't say anything. I didn't want to cause a fight and I didn't want to get him in trouble at work and I couldn't talk to anyone because they just went straight back to him and made it worse." One day, when he had been home a few weeks, she went with him to the psych. He was supposed to go in alone, while she waited and they were going to run errands. "I don't know why I did what I did. I don't know why I went in there like that. I just couldn't understand why, if he was going to see the psychiatrist, he wasn't getting any better. So I went in" It didn't go well. Like most things borne from desperation, there ends up being a certain level of panic in a conversation like that. And what could have been, should have been, a spouse articulating her concerns over her husbands wellbeing, crumbled as she leant, screaming over a counter at the desk clerk. "Now I'm a psycho and no one will listen to me. They think I push him and make it worse for him and that if it was that bad, I should just leave" By now, like many conversations before, my napkin is ripped into little pieces, I have no coffee to drink and because I'm not a 60 minutes journalist. I've let one or two tears get by. Neither of us spoke. Me, because I knew her story could easily have been mine. Because it's the story of other people I know. That this 20 something girl in Oceanside CA feels all alone and in reality, she's not. Here's where we fail. This is the point. These are the people. Is she a caregiver? I don't know. I do know her husband needs care of some kind and right now, she's the one that stops him driving drunk, she's the one that makes sure he's up in the morning. She sends him the stuff he's forgot when he packs. She picks up his shortfalls, she covers his errors and she protects him, as best she can, from himself. She didn't ask for anything outstanding. Just help. And when she cracked, no one had the ability to look at her and wonder, what would make a normal woman wake up one morning and behave that way? What pressure is she under that would cause such a response. Where was the empathy? I haven't finished talking or driving. But I'm starting to believe some of our problems in addressing these issues come from the culture of the military. Military service members drink - if you ask the powers that be that's not an accolade they would acknowledge but ask any random civilian to list five things that they think of when they think of military, we can all agree that would be one of them. What this means is, generally, things have to get REALLY bad with alcohol, before someone raises an eyebrow. Like a DUI or harming someone else, or yourself. Wives weren't issued, so they aren't necessary. It doesn't matter how many family readiness programs you start, this attitude is prevalent, it's real and it damages families. I know, I spent 5 years working very hard on this issue. Because of this unspoken belief that 'wives' don't work here so they don't rate an opinion, 9 times out of ten, if a spouse is unable to articulate herself/himself in a rational manner, or is making seemingly wild accusations about a "good" Marine or Sailor or Soldier or Airman, then she's swiftly given a diagnosis of 'crazy' or 'psycho' and ignored.. I gave my new friend some resources, she looked at them half heartedly. I understood that. Because what they meant was, she was going to have to do all the heavy lifting. She was going to have to keep fighting, even though he didn't want it, even though she did not have the support of her peers. Alone. Is it any wonder it just felt easier to deal with the now of maybe he'll have a good day today? We're asking too much of these families. That I know.
