Manns Medium

When you assume the rank of supervisor within any of the branches of the U. S. Armed Forces beginning at E-4, with it comes the responsibility of troop welfare.  Today, troop welfare has been down-graded on the list of paramount trait required to lead and it appears so far down that list now, many often forget it is even there.  This seems to be the condition that many military commanders and their staff are suffering from right now.  The mission is no longer making sure that their troops are properly prepared and ready to engage at all times, the mission is protecting those in command and the upper echelon from anything that could possibly make waves or result in being skipped over for promotion.  Today, commanders and their staff ignore troop welfare and even troop equipment by concentrating more on troop numbers and anything that will embarrass the command. Today’s troops cannot be compared to yesterday’s troops because of how much things have changed.  ...

I have often sat up many nights wondering why so many good men and women are taking their own lives after enduring so many traumas, drama, pain and suffering.  After they may have seen their best friend die right in front of them or held them in their arms as they took their last breath.  Whether it had to pick up pieces of brethren, hoping that by some miracle a Navy Corpsman/woman or some doctor can put them back together and make them whole like they were just minutes before.  Whether their dreams and nightmares are any similar to mine and make me not wish to sleep for the fear of dreaming.  I often wonder if I am personally doing enough to help my fellow brothers and sisters and why a country who says they so love their troops are not doing more.  I wonder these things and other things but the answer seems to come back to one solid clue.  We are losing the good souls not only because of the things I just mentioned but other things that no one wishes to...

We understand that some of you wish nothing more than to help and reduce the burden this disorder has on those that they occupy but before you can help, you must first understand just what is happening to that person you love so much and would give anything to help but can’t.  First you must realize that it is not all about you and stop thinking that you are failing because you can’t help.  It is and always will be about the person suffering but when you switch it and make it all about you, the help that you could have given is no longer welcomed by the one who is doing the suffering.  If you wish to help, I mean truly want to help then listen closely as I tell you what you can do. First get over yourself and realize that only those who want help will take it and not everyone who asks for help really want it.  The best you can do in this situation is to listen without judging and without conversation.  Just listen as they talk because the more they talk the...

As it is often the case, we spend more time trying to find others to blame for something that went wrong instead of trying first to find out where we, as individuals, went wrong.  While filing lawsuits may correct the behavior in some, it only fuels the many and makes us even more determine to not first look to ourselves for an answer but depend even more on the answers to come from others.  While the below article is a sad time for all of us that breath air it is also a lesson on how we can begin to correct this problem if we could only see deeper into that image that stares back at us in a mirror. The article is titled “ Parents sue Florida school district over bullied son's suicide ” written by Tiffany Walden for the Orlando Sentinel.  It is a story about a complete failure on all parts which resulted in a young life being extinguished but it is also a story about a young life making a serious choice and while we mourn this young life we should also celebrate his ...

When I first heard this story on The Rachel Maddow Show, I was immediately concerned that something just wasn’t right.  Based on the story, it was assumed that Missouri State Auditor Tom Schweich’s “suicide” came at the hands of the Missouri GOP chairman John Hancock’s false assertion that he was Jewish and the “suicide” death of his aide, Robert Jackson was a result of the many other prominent Republicans did not demand Mr. Hancock’s dismissal.  It is being seen as the results of the new GOP’s brand of politics.  I just can’t see that. As reported in an article titled “ Tom Schweich spokesman Spence Jackson found dead of apparent suicide ” by Dave Helling and Jason Hancock for the Kansas City Star, it states “For the second time in a month, Missourians struggled Monday to understand the unfathomable — why a leading political figure in the state would take his own life.  Robert “Spence” Jackson, a prominent Republican spokesman and media liaison for more than a ...

For years now I have been fighting this invisible enemy and just recently come to realize who and what this enemy is.  This enemy used to get the best of me in the beginning but until recently I truly thought I had it under control.  Those nightmares and wondering minds as well as those hype-reactions took its toil but I made a fight of it.  I was just sitting here a few minutes ago and thinking that I had endured enough.  I couldn’t seem to stop the voices but as my day was getting darker, it finally occurred to me why. The enemy is PTSD and whether those in the medical community wish to acknowledge it or not, I know that it exists.  It’s invisible to many but ever present for many more.  People wish you to believe that it is only exclusive to a certain segment of society but I know that it is not.  People want you to think that they understand what it is and how to treat it but they have no clue.  People want you to believe that only those ...

For years now, I have been railing about the mental health services in this country.  My biggest concern is the cost and next is the availability to those who actually need it.  I’ve read several articles and opinions about mental health and many of them say the biggest obstacle is those who need it seeking it and while that does have a scent of truth, it’s more like those who need it don’t know where or have access to it.  I finally decided to just created my own Suicide Prevention page on Facebook to offer any assistance and was content to let it go at that, until my wife sent me this article. It was written by Christie Aschwanden for Health & Science titled “ Military life is stressful on all concerned; efforts to help often fall short” .  The article touches on a number of subjects and is well-written.  It makes points that once seemed only obvious to me.  In it she writes “The military has never been a particularly family-friendly career. (Thu...

For those of you who are unfamiliar with the rank structure in our military and do not know what a non-commissioned officer is, let me explain.  There are your commissioned officers beginning at Warrant Officer to General (W-1 to O-10) and then there is your Staff Non-Commissioned Officers ranking from Enlisted 6 (E-6) to Enlisted 9 (E-9).  There are your lower enlisted ranks of Private, Private First Class and Lance Corporal (E-1 to E-3 respectively) and finally you’re Non-Commissioned Officers which is Corporals (E-4) to Sergeants (E-5).  There are particular requirements to obtain these ranks and move up much of it is mostly time in grade/rank and time in service.  There was a time where only those who showed pure leadership was allowed to grab that next rung of the ladder and move up but that time was swiftly taken over by being the quietest of having slightly more resources than the others.  You had to keep your head down and not make any waves if you want...

Many questions surrounds why a politician like Tomas Allen Coburn would use his final act as a U.S. Senator to block a bill designed to help ease and/or eliminate the suicides of veterans.  A man who, at many times, have called himself a champion of veterans and large supporter of our troops. This same question is asked in an article titled “Tom Coburn Blocks Bill On Veterans' Suicide Prevention” by Matthew Daly for the Associated Press.  Mr. Daily reports that “Veterans groups blasted Oklahoma Sen. Tom Coburn Monday for blocking a bill intended to reduce a suicide epidemic that claims the lives of 22 military veterans every day.  "This is why people hate Washington," said Paul Rieckhoff, CEO and founder of Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America, an advocacy group. Rieckhoff accused Coburn of single-handedly blocking a bill that could save the lives of thousands of veterans. Coburn, a Republican, is retiring after 10 years in the Senate. In a floor speech Monday ni...

The recent report of an Iraq Vet killing of ex-wife and five in laws tops the news and has been for the last few days but what many are not talking about is the very large and often hidden elephant in the room.  Oh yes, they will mention the lack of services that are available to our service men and women and they may mention post-traumatic stress disorder.  They may mention the signs that lead up to the killing and how someone should have known and acted and of course they will spare no expense in finding something or someone to blame.  Some will stand in defense of the Marine while others will stand in defense of those who were killed and still a few will stand in defense of agencies who were established to help but was handcuffed.  All will have a point but none will discuss or even have the backbone to bring up the one true culprit. Before we begin, let’s just get a taste of what we can expect from those who call the experts to give them their view of how th...

Heard a story about this new bill working its way through Congress called “The Clay Hunt Suicide Prevention for America Veterans Act” on the Rachel Maddow Show on MSNBC.  This bill calls for independent evaluations of all mental health-care and suicide-prevention programs in VA and the Defense Department, a student loan repayment program that would offer up to $120,000 per year to recruit psychiatrists who commit to working for VA, and a program that would take back unneeded prescription drugs from patients at VA facilities.  Now while all this may sound good and is needed much of it is actually worthless in solving the problem of veteran suicide.  Clay Hunt’s mother said that after he finally got in to see a  psychiatric , he called her and said that he was not going back, the Iraq and Afghanistan Veterans of America (IAVA)  and other veterans groups believe to solve this problem VA needs more psychiatrist.  Both completely ignoring the fact that mor...

You know I used to think that the reason why many of my fellow veterans commit suicide was due to their inability to find jobs, feed their families and keep a roof over their heads.  I used to think that it had quite a bit to do with not finding the same type of cohesiveness that they found in the military and it was because they just can’t seem to catch a break and all these so-called programs established to help them are nothing more than a smoke screen and some wealthy person looking for a tax write off of some organization making a name for themselves at the expense of those who suffer.  I used to think that this was the entire case but events of today have led me to believe there is one other thing. Today I was trying to speak to landlords about property that they advertised as empty and what I discovered paled in comparison to any of those reasons listed above.  I ran into people who appeared to be far too busy to speak even after leaving their number on the ad...