Rising Tides of Female Veteran Suicides

This morning as I was driving back from my dawn workout at Red Rocks here in Colorado, I heard a story on National Public Radio about how female veterans were more likely to commit suicide than men. Three times as likely to "complete," as the language describes it. Thirty-three percent more likely to use a gun. We're comfortable with them.

The reasons vary, largely PTSD, but far more so the women list MST or Military Sexual Trauma. The government loves to use soft language to de-escalate the viciousness of ugly events.

It's rape. Rape is rape is rape is rape. It's precisely the same as using soft, distracting language like PTSD for what used to eloquently and properly describe, back in the first World War, "shell shock." Two powerful syllables that said exactly what it meant. Softened to the eight syllables that sound ever so much less damaging. This is otherwise known as government bullshit. Eight syllables-Military Sexual Trauma- to replace the one syllable that really says what this is.

RAPE.

Rape is a war crime. There are no two ways about it, folks. Perpetrated on our own women and girls. The UN Security Council passed Resolution 1820 in 2008 (it was about damned time) stating “rape and other forms of sexual violence can constitute war crimes, crimes against humanity, or a constitutive act with respect to genocide.”

How about when members of your own service commit the crimes? Then not only seek to cover it up, but punish the victim, ruin her career, close off her treatment and run her summarily out of the service for asking for justice? Where is the crime then?

Women veterans- and some men, let's be brutally clear here- get raped in the military. While the rules have changed - VERY slowly and not very much from the days I was on active duty - the fundamentals have not. Get raped, you report it, you get in serious trouble. The service has a nasty habit of closing ranks against those who report sexual misconduct. You're likely to get tagged the Barracks Whore. Harrassed. Raped again. Your situation becomes so untenable that your career is effectively over. The Army (or whoever) gets rid of the problem. YOU- the victim.

Oh I could go on.

In the mid-70s I went through that myself, as an E-3. I was groped by a doctor, a captain. I was drugged and attached to a gurney in the hallway, awaiting surgery at Walter Reed. I was traumatized (ya think?) and later assigned to an Army psychiatrist, a Lieutenant Colonel. That married-with-young-children "officer and a gentleman" who was supposed to be treating me for that sexual trauma delivered his "treatment" in the back room of his office. Over and over. I had nowhere to go. I had to report for the appointments or else I was AWOL (absent without leave). Imagine what that does to a 22-year- old woman. The other choice is complete career ruination and a dishonorable discharge permanently on your record. And he knew it.

An appalling abuse of power on someone who by virtue of the military system, by definition, has no power. Rank Has Its Privileges indeed.

There are words for what that POS did to me in today's courts of law.

All that colonel had to do, had I reported him, was to enter into my records that I was a danger to my unit and psychologically unfit for duty. He was, after all, my treating psychiatrist. So I did what most of us do- buckle down. Become a model soldier. Suffer the consequences. Even lied in my diary, terrified that someone would read it. I later dealt with PTSD ( I developed eating disorders) dealt with suicide (boy did I ever) and finally, years later, sought help from the VA. The VA pointed out that of course, I never reported the man. But you were a model soldier. See? Nothing in the records. Dust hands, walk away.

Perfectly elegant Catch-22.

It didn't even stop after the service. The three-star general, so supportive of my career, who retired as Army Deputy Chief of Staff for Personnel? The guy who penned the letter to get me into officer's candidate school, got me onto the Carter Inaugural as a butter bar (second lieutenant)? Right after he retired, he invited me to his private office to "show me around." Right.

And tried to bend me over the desk. Guess he felt he was due a quid pro quo for all those favors. I knew his wife. All ten of his kids. Considered him a mentor. Can't count how many times I'd been to his residence. As a family friend.

Didn't know I had a target on my back.

Fine upstanding Republican officers. Married to lovely women with beautiful kids. Right.

A 2012 Department of Defense study reported that some 25% of female service members experience sexual assault, 80% have been sexually harrassed. That's just those who chose to speak up. If you think it's not still a problem, kindly read what Human Rights Watch has to say about it (https://www.hrw.org/report/2016/05/19/booted/lack-recourse-wrongfully-discharged-us-military-rape-survivors).

Today's VAs are still unfriendly to women. There have been times that I've had to sit in the Denver VA prescription waiting room full of filthy, smelly men who aren't quite all there, who lean into my lap and try crawl all over me, who verbally abuse me - at my own VA. You wonder why women don't seek treatment. I'm still "Mr. Hubbel."

When I shifted my care from Grand Junction to Golden, Colorado, I insisted on a female nurse. I got one. That helps. But I continue to work with a tone deaf system that just Does.Not.Want.To.Know. Happily I have a DAV counselor who, in my estimation, walks on water. He's been tireless in fighting for me. Has for decades. That's what it takes. Decades.

When female veterans return from war and attempt to transition into civilian life, they get a double whammy. They're often trying to deal with what they saw, what they had to suffer personally. Now their own families want soft, sweet Mommy back. Just like she was before she headed off to serve.

Folks, she's gone. She may never come back. She's been a warrior. She may have killed. She may not have all her limbs. She cannot unsee what she has seen. Nor can you demand that those memories be erased and suddenly she morphs into Little Miss Muffet overnight. If she's been raped, her ability to be intimate again with her loved one may be severely impaired. She may not be able to broach the topic. Yet everyone wants her back to normal. You're home, right? Everything's okay now, right?

That's patently unfair. And folks, that's one of the reasons, one of many, we are losing our women veterans. She feels enormous guilt on all sides: guilt about the abuse, guilt that she's not able to live up to her family expectations, guilt that she's not Superwoman.

The services continue to place a double standard on us women. I survived. I am still battling the VA for fair treatment. But I survived. Not everyone does.

The man who raped me died in a skydiving accident in 1989. My guess is that the rest of those he raped are all still around. Karma, man. The best revenge is to live well.

My story reflects that of thousands upon thousands of women though the decades who were similarly treated, cast aside, denied care, counseling and proper treatment. Or worse, punished for standing up for themselves. My experience taught me compassion. I don't consider myself a victim- and that's a fundamental point of freedom. That's not always the case. I didn't have a family to deal with, young kids who wanted Mommy back, an expectant husband. Those women from 18-35 who are returning often have to deal with a raft of unreasonable expectations- including those they heap on themselves.

In the Inland Northwest, my closest friend Jill Smith has been holding retreats for women veterans every May for a number of years. Through games, play, pottery, horses and the sheer fun of being outside in a pretty place, these women have found a way to come together and begin the process of healing. Rather than concentrate on what's wrong, they form bonds with those who understand where they've been, and the need to find what is right with the world. The need to cry. Laugh. Giggle. Be girls again, no matter what age.

While Jill is not a veteran herself, her recipe is simple. A safe place where folks can be playful. Have fun. Form lasting, powerful bonds. No one understands us better than someone who has worn the uniform. We've all paid those dues. At Jill's events, unlike at the VA where these women are lumped in with the men, these women get heard. Jill's a master at getting people to relax and be joyful. And that is a huge part of bringing us back home to ourselves.

We women warriors threw down for our country. All of us. And some of us got used in ways we didn't sign up for. If the VA or anyone else really cares about women veteran suicides, my suggestion is begin at the source. Begin with accountability. Right at the top. Stop blaming the victim. Create woman-safe places where we can properly heal. Hold the abusers accountable for their crimes.

Stop blaming us for being women. We only wanted to proudly serve our country. Like for so many other returning veterans, our country currently doesn't want to deal with the reality of how the service treats its women. We don't want to look in the ugly face of reality.

It's not "Military Sexual Trauma," Ladies and Gentlemen. Let's begin with the raw, nasty truth. It's rape.

And it's a war crime.