Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:05):
Multiple people in my family clean my father, are veterans.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
And the troops that have been to war and now
they're back and think and be grateful for their service.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Sacrifice, love for their country, just unselfishness, all that they
do for us.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
There are some people in this country who take extraordinary
steps to provide for the freedom and security.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
We forget that those people exist. We know them as
the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard. They
call themselves soldiers, seals, rangers, airmen, sailors, devil.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Dogs, and so much more.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
We call them fathers, brothers, sons and husbands, mothers, daughters,
sisters and wives. We call them friend and neighbor. These
veterans answered the call, now we answer theirs. They are
the best our country has to offer, and we love
(01:03):
them well. Today we honor them, and we certainly David
Malsby is your host, and he welcomes you to this
community of veterans. As together we are building.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
The road to hope, and indeed we are glad to
have you along. On a Sunday afternoon, loads of you
listening KPRC, the nine to five O and the AM
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(01:43):
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(02:03):
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going to love at Republic Grand Ranch dot Com. All right,
in the studio with us today, We've got a couple
of combat veterans with us, one currently in our program,
(04:38):
one that's on staff. Can you want to introduce you stuff?
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Yeah? Hey, how's it going, Kevin? I've been here before.
I'm a program mentor at Camp Hope currently Miller Bay's mentors.
I've my graduate graduated almost two years ago, so I've
been working at Camp Hope ever since.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
And Branch where you served?
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Oh, Army? Yeah, I was in the Army sixteen years.
I got a multiple performance. Those days are long behind me.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
But in the rearview mirror, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
What years did you go so I went in oh
five oh six, eight oh nine, eleven, and twelve.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
So you guys huddled crossover on your second one at
least tarrent time wise. Anyway, Uh, you want to introduce yourself, Mario,
just tell the world here you are.
Speaker 4 (05:28):
It's Marco Marco.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Sorry, I can't remoon right.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
From Pasadena, Texas Army deployed OIF one and OIF O
eight oh nine, and I'm a resident at Camp Hope
and grateful to be there.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
You originally from Pasadena, Yes, sir? All right, so just
down the road, local boy. Yeah. Absolutely. We don't get
a whole lot of those that are that close. When
we have some some that eventually ended up here, but
they weren't necessarily originally from here. But it takes all kinds. Yeah,
we let a few Yankees in. We talked about that
(06:06):
last week. I think we had a Yankee on the
show this last week.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Yeah, I'm a Houston resident. I thought i'd say that.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
Yeah, well I didn't either, Yeah, yeah, when I was Yeah,
never mind, it's not pertinent to the show. But yeah,
I'm surprised to live here, but now I wouldn't live
anyplace else. It's just kind of how that's worked out.
Like I don't, I don't want to go anywhere.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
I love it here, man. Yeah, I mean, you know,
I love fishing, and man, there's plenty of that here,
so many little ponds and lakes everywhere. So it's I'm
joining it. Community is awesome. I'm even though I'm a
a Rangers fan, you know, so a lot of people
don't like that here.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
We may have to run you through the program again
to go back through there. Clearly we didn't get everything
cleaned out of the closet. Yeah, there's plenty of fishing opportunities,
like you said, ponds, lakes. There's a big pond out there. Yeah,
and get out on a boat and go for it
for a while, do some deep sea fishing. So plenty
(07:04):
of opportunity for that. Do you go fish.
Speaker 4 (07:06):
I'm not a big fisherman. My thing is mountain bike.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Oh okay, Well we got lots of mountains, not that
much more cross country style mountain biking here in the
Houston area.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
But after I got out, I did move to Colorado Springs, Colorado,
So that's where I picked it up. Yeah, probably gonna
move back there one day once I get everything situated.
Situated with my.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Kids, got an aunt and uncle who lived there, and
that used to be our spring break. We would get
in the car and drive.
Speaker 4 (07:35):
It was beautiful.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Yeah, drive at Colorado Springs for the week.
Speaker 4 (07:37):
It was awesome.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
All right, Gonna take a quick break here in just
a moment, I wanna give you a phone number eight
seven seven seven one seven seventy eight seventy three. That's
our combat Trauma support line. Eight seven seven seven to one,
seven seventy eight seventy three. Will be right back and
(08:17):
we welcome you back Real Hope Radio. Glad to have
you along. Big thank you for being a part of
this show and sharing it wherever you can. Again, the
crisis number. I ran out of time. I just want
to mention to you, when you call our crisis line number,
a combat BET's going to answer the phone. And that's
(08:37):
absolutely critical for those who are veterans and struggling from
the traumas of war. When they call our number, a
combat BET's going to answer the phone. Someone who's experienced it,
someone who has learned to deal with it and move
forward and has received also an edition of that an
awful lot of training, but pulled a lot from their
own experience while you're chatting with them. But they also
(09:00):
have all kinds of all kinds of training to be
able to handle that phone. So eight seven seven seven
one seven seventy eight seventy three. Uh do you do
you like crawfish? That's the question of the day.
Speaker 4 (09:15):
I mean, it's all right, it's a lot of work.
It tastes good, but it's a lot of.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
Work as in eating.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
It's a lot of work as in eating.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Okay, all right, well, and I agree. I agree.
Speaker 4 (09:26):
I'm a steak guy.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
There you go. I like beef, okay, but if crawfish
showed up, I'd be happy to eat it. Yeah, what
about you.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
Yeah, I'm a fellow food I understand. But I do
like crawfish.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like to tell folks, our quote
unquote official tagline would be hope and healing for the
unseen wounds of war. Our unofficial taglines we like to eat.
Just keep it real.
Speaker 5 (09:56):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
So, those of you in the Houston area, particularly those
of you on the northwest side of Houston, this coming
Saturday is a great event put on by a couple,
a married couple in Cypress. So if you're anywhere around
the Houston. Are you know exactly where Cypress is? But
the Cypress VFW will be the eleventh annual Plumber's Crawfish
(10:19):
Boil Saturday, May eighteenth. Chris and his wife Susy are
both local school teachers, give an incredible amount of time
and energy into making this a great event. Every year
they've donated over one hundred thousand dollars through this crawfish
(10:39):
event that up until this past year they did it
in their front yard. It was the craziest thing in
the World's just and Chris is a he's a school teacher.
His wife also school teacher, so you know they're making
they're bringing down the cash right there. But Chris served
(11:00):
and like many, he's buried too many of his buddies
after coming home and he finally decided he needed to
do something. They found out about Camp Hope and they
started just a little crawfish bull invited the frints over
(11:21):
and they've raised one hundred thousand dollars doing that. Now
it's grown to the size that they keep adding friends.
They've grown to the size that they do now do
it in the parking lot the VFW and Cyprus right
on two ninety But that will be Saturday afternoon beginning
at one o'clock and it'll run late into the night.
Oh if you have a little crawfish hunger going on,
(11:43):
come on out raising money to support Camp Hope. It's again,
it's two amazing individuals that give so selflessly of their
time and energy and make this thing happen. And again,
over one hundred thousand dollars they've raised over the last
ten years. This pretty impressive. Just a couple of school
teachers that say, hey, here's something we can do. We
(12:05):
can buil crawfish and have a good time. So I
planning on being there and would love to see you
there as well. All right, Marco so Pasadena, Yes, sir,
what was your claim to fame in high school?
Speaker 4 (12:22):
Unfortunately, my high school years weren't that good. Oh yeah, yeah.
My mom she was actually terminally ill during my high
school years, so my dad had to pass when I
was twelve years old and it was just me and
my little sisters. So I actually worked a lot and
I didn't go to school that much, so I was
actually in ninth grade three times. My third year, they
(12:43):
told me I needed to get my ged if I
wanted to continue to try to get my diploma. So
I got my ged in ninety nine. I was initially
scheduled to graduate in class of two thousand, went back
to school, went back to school for a little bit,
made it all the way through my till like my
junior year. But then by that time I was a
sole breadwinner of the house. We were getting some ssd
I stuff for both my dad passing away and my
(13:06):
younger sister's dad passing away. So I just decided is
to work full time. And so I had one job working.
It's a place in the southeast side called Magneto Distributors,
Magneto and Decent Distributors. I was the warehouse guy for them,
and that was the one job I had before joining
the military.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
Who were you living with?
Speaker 4 (13:27):
My mom lived with me, okay, gotcha? So I had
my own place at seventeen. She had a boyfriend at
the time, but before they got real serious, she'd.
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Lived with me.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
I took care of her and my two sisters, and
then her boyfriend became her fiance, and then her and
my sisters moved in with him, and I went to
the army.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Gotcha? So why the army?
Speaker 4 (13:53):
The Army for me was number one my uncle, my
mom's brother. He's the oldest out of my mom, one
of seven. So he was in the army. He served
in Germany. And then my high school counselor, mister Gary Hips,
he was in Apache Pilot. So those two and one
of the movies me and my mom saw together before
(14:13):
she passed away was Forrest Gump actually, so believe it
or not, me and my mom watching that more Sump
motivator for it, you know, you know, the connection with
his mom and the tragedy and all that. Yeah, and
if he could do it, I mean, who who can't.
But I wanted to be a teacher, so that was
that was my goal, you know, pre nine to eleven.
(14:34):
So I joined July two thousand and one, and you
know in basic training when nine to eleven happened, and
you know, changed everything.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
For me, right, and so having joined pre nine to
eleven time, basically relatively speaking, peace we weren't at war
with anybody. Cold war had been completed, could have been
at least conceived. You could have gone and done a
four or five years stamp. Yeah, that would they don't
(15:01):
have to face war. Just this is my job right now,
helps me get ready to go do school or whatever
else you want to do afterwards.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
And that was the intent because you know, with my
mom not having you know, a job or anything like that.
You know, I was I needed to find a way
to pay for college to be because I wanted to
be a teacher. I wanted to be a basketball coach
and a math teacher. So that was the goal going in.
A lot of stuff changed after my deployments.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
So yeah, yeah, when did you join?
Speaker 3 (15:33):
I joined on November ninth, two thousand and three. Yeah,
so it was after nine or whatever. Yeah, which kind
of that's what led me to joining. I'd always wanted
to join kind of you know, I was a gung
ho kid, you know, took playing war to a new
level type of thing.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
Yeah, yeah, that's a new level. Yeah, welcome to Iraq.
They rolled up red carpet. Right, glad you guys are here.
Uh huh oh man. All right, So you join h
pre nine to eleven by a few months, sir. You
(16:13):
mentioned you're in basic when it.
Speaker 4 (16:15):
Happened, Yes, sir, we were getting issued Class a's and
the ladies that worked there, they were listening on the
radio and I guess they thought it was the joke,
you know at first, and then we found out it
was not a joke.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
So yeah, I just recall, you know, when the first
plane hit, it got everybody's attention clearly because that's not normal.
But we didn't know exactly what it was until that
second plane hit. Then we knew what we were up against.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
People were thinking it was an accident.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Yeah, yeah, not two of them weren't too sure, but yeah, yeah,
all right, so join the Army nine to eleven happens?
Oh man, sir? That what what changed within your you
know what what changed? Well? You were basic what happened?
Speaker 4 (16:59):
No, it was one of the fun the things I've experienced.
So I was at Fort Knox, Kentucky, home of the
Armored Division, and they made us pull guard of our
barracks with Rubbert in sixteen. So that was one thing,
you know, we were, we were, we were. We didn't
really know much what was going on. I didn't have
much experience with how to get on and off post,
(17:21):
so I didn't We didn't see them, you know, because
they had fifty cows and everything at the at the gate.
Once that happened, I didn't really see any of that
until I got to Fort Hood, which was my first
duty station.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
When'd you make in the Hood.
Speaker 4 (17:32):
In January of two thousand and two.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
January, all right, okay, we're gonna take a break here
in just a moment, those of you listening on the
nine five oh, catch a few minutes of news updates,
and those of you listening through the magic of podcast
can hear just a little bit of music, and we'll
be right back with more of Road to Hope Radio.
(18:20):
And we welcomed back Road to Hope Prediom. Glad to
have you along. David Malsby. Here, we got Kevin, a
combat VET currently on staff the PTSD Foundation about two
years now. You said, that's that's awesome.
Speaker 5 (18:34):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
And then we've got Marco, United States Army Vet. Two
deployments to Iraq, Yes, sir. Uh. How much difference was
there between those two deployments for.
Speaker 4 (18:44):
You, night and day, Yes, sir. Because my first deployment
we had to convoy from Kuwait all the way up
to the crit and so that was, you know, an
experience that changed my life forever and then and I
didn't have any kids up until that point, so it
was just leaving my my newlywed wife behind and my
(19:05):
Terminalio Mom, which was not fun. But the second time
was to Alisade and they flew us from Kuwait to Alasade,
so there was no more convoy unless you absolutely had to.
And besides, three months I spent out on a fob
a little further out west supporting the Marines. Besides that,
I don't know, it was a fobbit, So I didn't leave.
(19:25):
I didn't leave the base at all. You know, just
how we were a transportation company, so we had the Kalamars,
so it's the container handlers and uh so we're just
doing all that stuff. And they had some guys go
out on convoy because we ran the convoy support center
for Alasad and so, but it was just a lot
of on base operations and a lot of nymities that
(19:49):
we didn't have the first go around. You know, green
bean coffee, burger key, all that type of stuff.
Speaker 2 (19:57):
Gotcha. I've heard a lot of stories regarding those convoys,
some pretty tough moments. Absolutely, we're not a war story show,
so we're not going to get into all that. But
give us an idea of just when did you notice,
first of all, what you now know to be PTSD.
(20:19):
I'm sure you didn't even come close to think of
it in those turns when you first start having whatever
those symptoms were for you, What was going on?
Speaker 4 (20:28):
Yeah, so I mine's kind of compounded with what was
going on with my mom, sure also with that and yeah, plus.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
As you mentioned, deploying while she's with that diagnosis.
Speaker 4 (20:37):
And I volunteered for that deployment. Yeah, I wasn't even
scheduled to go. So but uh, you know, back then
when I got back, they really weren't talking about it
too much yet. It wasn't until maybe about a year
or so afterwards that they finally started to bring it
up to get away from the whole shell shock and
all that type of references. So I really didn't deal
(20:58):
with it well at all. I didn't get diagnosed until
twenty thirteen, So it took a lot of bad experiences,
a lot of alcohol abuse to really feel to realize
that I that I had an issue.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
So you were still in yes, sir, if it was thirteen?
What No?
Speaker 4 (21:15):
I got out in September of twenty ten. Oh okay,
but then I didn't get diagnosed officially until January twenty third, Yes, sir,
here in Houston.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
What led you to go.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
So I had the alcoholism, you know, got bad in
the military, and it got bad after and just you know,
basically lost my family over it, and I had a
couple of instances of showing force towards my wife that
I didn't want. You know, I never I was never
that type of person. I grew up, I was raised
(21:50):
by my mom, so I was never that type of person.
And it was just like a snap, instant type thing.
So I knew I had a problem.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Can want an war store, But what can you pinpoint
as something that drove that. Whether it was the you know,
the jumping to anger so quickly, the self medication, something
happened I presume, or a series of something's that happened.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
Yeah, it was the nightmares for me mostly so the
lack of the lack of sleep, and then I didn't
even to this day. You know, most of my stuff
is convoy type stuff, so being on the road is
when I get really agitated. But when you go to combat,
you get into a mind frame that something bad is
going to happen, right, so you get on that high
(22:41):
alert status and coming back. I've never been able to
get away from that. I've always maintained that and especially
at a time where I wasn't getting any therapy. I
wasn't you know, doing anything for my mental health, and
so it was running wild at all times. And so
it was just an alert status type thing where she
woke me up out of my sleep, you know, and
(23:01):
I reacted in a certain way, you know, And that
was the main thing for me, besides you know, my
you know, during traffic or something road rage incident that
might happen.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
Approximately when was it, like you mentioned her waking you unexpected?
Speaker 4 (23:19):
That was in December of twenty twelve, twelve, So that was,
you know, the last time I lived with my family,
and so I had already been going to see them,
right because that was the second time I had reacted
in that way. The first time was after my first deployment,
after my mom passed away. You know, there were some
things that I had found out that happened while I
(23:41):
was gone, and I had a bad reaction to that,
and then it hadn't happened all the way until twenty twelve.
So from two thousand and four it happened the first
time and into twenty twelve because there was a lot
of family stuff that had occurred, we didn't have kids
at first, and we had kids and several separations, and
then finally in twenty twelve, we separated for good.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Gotcha, Kevin. One of the reasons, one of the things
that makes us stand out from a lot of other
nonprofits that deal with some form of PTSD in the
veteran community is we also run not only support for
our veterans, but also support for the families. And I
think that's that's why I asked the year because early
(24:28):
on my experience, like two thousand and nine, so just
a couple of years before your instance, but I was
running into a lot of guys that were homeless downtown
that were twenty four, twenty five, twenty six years old,
and they came home and something like that happened. They
end up in front of a judge and then they
end up homeless, and so we we very instantly knew
(24:53):
we have to do something to help the family members.
How do you see that working for our our guys
in our program.
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Oh yeah, so yeah, I'm glad you brought that up.
Just not talked about enough, I feel like, so I
have experience with it myself, but just to touch on it,
you know, PTSD believe it or not, a lot of
people don't understand this. You can actually pass that on
to people that you're around, especially spouses.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
Is a real thing. Yeah, it is diagnosis.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Yes, it's one man. I mean, it's amazing. How the
That's probably the greatest joy I get out of working
at Camp Hope and being a part of the this
fellowship we have there is seeing this family support and
the reconnect back with guys with their families, whether that
(25:47):
be spouses or kids, mothers, sisters, brothers. It's amazing. And
you have, you know, families, you know, families need that
support just as much as you do his combat veterans,
some more so.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
Yeah. Well, and I think this what you just mentioned
is it tells the story of what happened. Families didn't
know what to do. And I always kind of put
it in the terminology. And when Johnny comes marching home again,
Like when Johnny comes home, he's got both his arms
and his legs and his eyes and he looks okay,
and he you know, for the most part, he acts okay.
(26:24):
He's like, oh good, just so glad he's home. Right.
But I talked to one guy, one of the very
first guys I spoke with downtown. He was, you know,
having legal issues, what's going on, and he had something
and he came home and his mom was just so excited,
(26:45):
you know, just so excited he was home and she
invited all of his friends over. And that was the
worst thing in the world. And it didn't she got
in the way, there was a push. He's in front
of a judge. None of it intentional by anybody, but
it was just the lack of we'll have the friends over,
(27:08):
but tonight's probably not the night. He was just so
tired and you know, just you're bringing home war in
your mind. Give me a minute, you know. So we
try to help the families understand that, which can help
mitigate some of the legal issues some of our guys
have to end up facing. All right, So twenty twelve,
(27:32):
you went to the VA or thirteen twenty thirteen.
Speaker 4 (27:34):
Twenty twelve. Yeah, I got there. I got my rating
in January twenty thirteenth.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Okay, what did they do besides just say you have PTSD?
Speaker 4 (27:44):
So really, when by the time that I went through,
I was suffering from homelessness and I didn't make a
lot of my appointments for my physical injuries and everything
like that. But I was lucky to make that one.
So I started seeing doctor Tennessee here in Houston, and
he was really helpful. How often I would at first
(28:06):
I was going at once every three months at first,
and you know, starting with the medication and everything like that,
and the thing that it helped me with the most
antidepressants and all that is everything that I had bottled up.
I could no longer bottle it up and I needed
to release that. And it wasn't pretty. I was crying
a lot, but it's some stuff that I had to
(28:28):
I had to let go. Unfortunately, I didn't have my
family support, right my mom had passed away and my
my my wife decided she wouldn't didn't want to be
a part of it no more so a lot of
it I have to sufferer alone. Yeah, and that's why
it's taken me so long to get to a healthy
point in my life.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
All right, Okay, we're going to take one final break here.
We'll come back. I want to dig into just a
little bit more of of that recovery and how you've
gotten to the place where you are today. All Right,
we'll be back with more vote hope radium, just a moment.
Speaker 5 (29:05):
Who draws the ground in the place A loud baby.
It's the gets out man, and.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
We welcome you back.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
With Kevin and with Marco, a couple of combat veterans
multiple tours, talked a little bit about that struggle coming
home and then self medicating and things like that. One
of the things you have struggled with that I wanted
to bring up and just kind of chat on it
(29:48):
for just a little bit because it doesn't get talked
about a lot. There's PTSD, actual something in the brain,
that's an actual brain issue. But we also heavily deal
with what we call the moral injury, and sometimes that
can be very closely associated, if not just completely hand
(30:10):
in hand with survivor's guilt. I don't know what your
story is there, but survivor's guilt is part of what
you're dealing with.
Speaker 4 (30:21):
Yes, they're absolutely so. For one, For one, having the
feeling that because my mom passed away on my first deployment,
ended up getting a Red Cross message and coming home
got back the day before she passed away, was able
to say my goodbyes, but she was no longer able
to speak, and so that and feeling like she gave
(30:42):
her life so I could come home safely. So that
was one after the funeral and everything like that. They
didn't allow me to go back. I tried to go back,
but they it just wasn't in the cards for me.
You know, I got you know, I was a lower enlisted.
I wasn't you know, essential to what was going on. So,
you know, you feel you lift the guys behind. Luckily,
(31:04):
nobody in the unit that I deployed we've died at
that moment. But I've always been a very empathetic person,
and I've felt deeply for everyone we lost, not just
on our side, but also you know, the innocent people
that were lost over there, you know or right so,
and you know, just dealing just dealing with that on
(31:26):
a spiritual level, dealing with that, you know, in feeling
like I don't deserve to be here, I don't deserve
to be happy, that I should be struggling in some
way at some times, and then just you know, struggling
to find a way to be happy at other times.
(31:48):
And I've had several buddies of mine, you know, that
have taken their own life, you know, and I've been
you know, very close to that that door as well,
and once again, you know, feeling lucky to have survived
my attempt, but knowing that you know, friends outside the
military and inside the military, you know, have have gone
(32:11):
all the way with it.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
Yeah, it's it's I went back and reread a report
this past week in preparation for a meeting that we
were having. Twenty twenty one, a study came out of
the Watson Institute from Brown University. So it's twenty twenty one,
so we're actually still in Afghanistan at the time. But
(32:35):
the stat that they came up with and I don't
know where they stopped counting, because the report comes out
in twenty twenty one, so you do the research and
then it takes a while to write the report. But
at the time they stated we had lost just over
seven thousand troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. We had already
lost thirty one thousand plus Iraq and Aganistan vets to suicide.
(33:02):
So four to one, that's a staggering, staggering number. The
crazy thing is it's the exact same ratio believed to
be of our Vietnam veteran era, So four to one
for everyone that was killed in Vietnam four were lost
(33:23):
to suicide. This is coming home. The difference was that
took five decades to get to that number. We were
still in Afghanistan, we were already there.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yea.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
And as you mentioned, you've lost buddies, I'm sure you have.
Speaker 3 (33:37):
Yeah, I was gonna I was thinking about the numbers
in my head. My worst appointment was my first one,
which is a pretty bad one. We had four in
my platoon killed in action. But then I was just
kind of thinking, you know, I don't know where I
would draw that line of what I'm counting, platoon, company, whatever.
But I've been to Yeah, I mean, I've been at
(33:58):
least twelve to fifteen veteran, and I was in for
a while, so I have a know quite a few people,
at least twelve to fifteen. It's probably much higher than
that of that I served with who you know, committed suicide,
and then others that I've met since then, you know,
so it's it's up there, probably higher. And that's that's
just what they count as suicide. Yeah, yeah, as you know,
(34:23):
still suicide, but it's not maybe going to show up though.
Speaker 2 (34:26):
Yeah, yeah, drank themselves to death, you know, killing all
their major organs the Hearts. Anyway, Okay, so how did
you hear about Camp Hope?
Speaker 4 (34:40):
For me? I was actually I was at West Oaks
because I had I had tried another program and I
was I was doing okay. But then the therapist that
I had there, wonderful lady, Miss Kelly Anne Robinson, she
actually on the way to work one morning, she was
struck by a garbage truck and so that just threw
(35:02):
me for a whole nother loop.
Speaker 2 (35:03):
There's another on top of drawn.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
And was still having some family issues with my kids
or you know, young adults at this time, and you know,
mom's not really encouraging them to reach out to their
dad in any shape or form. So I went back
to the bottle and went back, you know, to other things.
And so I went to West Hols to clean up.
And I had some other plans and in the in line,
(35:31):
but they didn't fall through, and I'm grateful for that.
And I know a lot of guys there there they
were talking about Camp Hope. So that was the that
was the second option only because the other option wasn't
a treatment program. So I was going to be able
to do what I wanted to do. But I couldn't
be more happier that that first option fell, because I
(35:51):
know I probably would have went back to drinking, and
you know, who knows where I would be at this point.
Speaker 5 (35:57):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (35:58):
When did you get to Camp Hope.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
In Him March twenty eighth of twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Okay, see you've been there a couple of months, Yes, sir,
How you doing.
Speaker 4 (36:10):
I'm doing really well, you know, still struggling with some
of the family stuff that I got going on, but
just reconnecting with God. I'm glad that's such a big
part of it. And then you know, reconnecting with buddies.
You know, nobody that I served with, but we're all alike,
(36:30):
as different as we are. We were talking about people
coming from other states and stuff like that. I'm happy
for that because moving back to Houston, it never felt
like home again because I had served with so many
other different types of people from all all walks of life.
I got used to that. I got used to us
bonding over similarities instead of looking for differences. And you know,
(36:52):
having that fellowship again and being a part of AA
actually something that I've I've never attempted to do, has
brought me back from the brink.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
Thank god, thank god. Uh And you mentioned a little
while ago you were homeless, so I mean your mom
had passed, so you lost all your family. You and
your wife had separated, so you were fighting that battle
very much alone. And then you get to Camp Hope
and it's like they're everywhere. Yeah, Kevin, how how important
(37:30):
do you think that is?
Speaker 5 (37:31):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (37:31):
Man, that's that's you can see the smile on.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
My face, like even years afterwards.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
Right, Oh, it's yeah, it's a I mean it's it's
maybe the number one thing.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
Right.
Speaker 3 (37:42):
You know, when we're in the military, we have all
this camaraderie and all this stuff, and then when we
get out, we lose that period. You just can't. You
can't get that anywhere else. There's other things, fellowships you
can have here and there, organizations you can be a
part of, but there's nothing like a fellowship of veterans,
especially of combat veterans, right, And that's what we have there.
(38:04):
That's the wonderful thing about Camp Hope. It's the peer
it's peer to peer support. And not just I'm not
just talking about for most from staff that work there,
I'm talking about as a whole.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Right, You know guys actually in the program, absolutely all right.
For more information on all the programs, not only Camp Hope,
but also our support groups that do operate somewhat similar
to an AA or NA type group if you're familiar
with those, but for combat vets. We also do it
for first responders law enforcement so PTSD post traumatic stress
(38:35):
Disorder PTSD USA dot org is the website PTSD USA
dot org and follow us on social media. It's a
great way for you to share our organization with your network,
both on Facebook and well what was formerly known as
Twitter now X and YouTube. PTSD US a PTSD USA
(38:58):
on Facebook X and YouTube, and a PTSD Foundation of
America on the Instagram. Thank you for joining us. We
look forward to being with you again next week for
more of Road to Hope Radio
Multiple people in my family clean my father, are veterans.
Speaker 2 (00:08):
And the troops that have been to war and now
they're back and think and be grateful for their service.
Speaker 3 (00:14):
Sacrifice, love for their country, just unselfishness, all that they
do for us.
Speaker 2 (00:19):
There are some people in this country who take extraordinary
steps to provide for the freedom and security.
Speaker 1 (00:25):
We forget that those people exist. We know them as
the Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, and Coast Guard. They
call themselves soldiers, seals, rangers, airmen, sailors, devil.
Speaker 2 (00:38):
Dogs, and so much more.
Speaker 1 (00:42):
We call them fathers, brothers, sons and husbands, mothers, daughters,
sisters and wives. We call them friend and neighbor. These
veterans answered the call, now we answer theirs. They are
the best our country has to offer, and we love
(01:03):
them well. Today we honor them, and we certainly David
Malsby is your host, and he welcomes you to this
community of veterans. As together we are building.
Speaker 2 (01:20):
The road to hope, and indeed we are glad to
have you along. On a Sunday afternoon, loads of you
listening KPRC, the nine to five O and the AM
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(01:43):
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(02:03):
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(02:25):
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it's all about the community. That's Republic Grand Ranch. You're
going to love at Republic Grand Ranch dot Com. All right,
in the studio with us today, We've got a couple
of combat veterans with us, one currently in our program,
(04:38):
one that's on staff. Can you want to introduce you stuff?
Speaker 3 (04:40):
Yeah? Hey, how's it going, Kevin? I've been here before.
I'm a program mentor at Camp Hope currently Miller Bay's mentors.
I've my graduate graduated almost two years ago, so I've
been working at Camp Hope ever since.
Speaker 2 (04:57):
And Branch where you served?
Speaker 3 (04:58):
Oh, Army? Yeah, I was in the Army sixteen years.
I got a multiple performance. Those days are long behind me.
Speaker 2 (05:06):
But in the rearview mirror, yeah, yeah.
Speaker 3 (05:10):
What years did you go so I went in oh
five oh six, eight oh nine, eleven, and twelve.
Speaker 2 (05:19):
So you guys huddled crossover on your second one at
least tarrent time wise. Anyway, Uh, you want to introduce yourself, Mario,
just tell the world here you are.
Speaker 4 (05:28):
It's Marco Marco.
Speaker 2 (05:30):
Sorry, I can't remoon right.
Speaker 4 (05:32):
From Pasadena, Texas Army deployed OIF one and OIF O
eight oh nine, and I'm a resident at Camp Hope
and grateful to be there.
Speaker 2 (05:44):
You originally from Pasadena, Yes, sir? All right, so just
down the road, local boy. Yeah. Absolutely. We don't get
a whole lot of those that are that close. When
we have some some that eventually ended up here, but
they weren't necessarily originally from here. But it takes all kinds. Yeah,
we let a few Yankees in. We talked about that
(06:06):
last week. I think we had a Yankee on the
show this last week.
Speaker 3 (06:09):
Yeah, I'm a Houston resident. I thought i'd say that.
Speaker 2 (06:12):
Yeah, well I didn't either, Yeah, yeah, when I was Yeah,
never mind, it's not pertinent to the show. But yeah,
I'm surprised to live here, but now I wouldn't live
anyplace else. It's just kind of how that's worked out.
Like I don't, I don't want to go anywhere.
Speaker 3 (06:27):
I love it here, man. Yeah, I mean, you know,
I love fishing, and man, there's plenty of that here,
so many little ponds and lakes everywhere. So it's I'm
joining it. Community is awesome. I'm even though I'm a
a Rangers fan, you know, so a lot of people
don't like that here.
Speaker 2 (06:42):
We may have to run you through the program again
to go back through there. Clearly we didn't get everything
cleaned out of the closet. Yeah, there's plenty of fishing opportunities,
like you said, ponds, lakes. There's a big pond out there. Yeah,
and get out on a boat and go for it
for a while, do some deep sea fishing. So plenty
(07:04):
of opportunity for that. Do you go fish.
Speaker 4 (07:06):
I'm not a big fisherman. My thing is mountain bike.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
Oh okay, Well we got lots of mountains, not that
much more cross country style mountain biking here in the
Houston area.
Speaker 4 (07:17):
But after I got out, I did move to Colorado Springs, Colorado,
So that's where I picked it up. Yeah, probably gonna
move back there one day once I get everything situated.
Situated with my.
Speaker 2 (07:28):
Kids, got an aunt and uncle who lived there, and
that used to be our spring break. We would get
in the car and drive.
Speaker 4 (07:35):
It was beautiful.
Speaker 2 (07:35):
Yeah, drive at Colorado Springs for the week.
Speaker 4 (07:37):
It was awesome.
Speaker 2 (07:38):
All right, Gonna take a quick break here in just
a moment, I wanna give you a phone number eight
seven seven seven one seven seventy eight seventy three. That's
our combat Trauma support line. Eight seven seven seven to one,
seven seventy eight seventy three. Will be right back and
(08:17):
we welcome you back Real Hope Radio. Glad to have
you along. Big thank you for being a part of
this show and sharing it wherever you can. Again, the
crisis number. I ran out of time. I just want
to mention to you, when you call our crisis line number,
a combat BET's going to answer the phone. And that's
(08:37):
absolutely critical for those who are veterans and struggling from
the traumas of war. When they call our number, a
combat BET's going to answer the phone. Someone who's experienced it,
someone who has learned to deal with it and move
forward and has received also an edition of that an
awful lot of training, but pulled a lot from their
own experience while you're chatting with them. But they also
(09:00):
have all kinds of all kinds of training to be
able to handle that phone. So eight seven seven seven
one seven seventy eight seventy three. Uh do you do
you like crawfish? That's the question of the day.
Speaker 4 (09:15):
I mean, it's all right, it's a lot of work.
It tastes good, but it's a lot of.
Speaker 2 (09:19):
Work as in eating.
Speaker 4 (09:21):
It's a lot of work as in eating.
Speaker 2 (09:23):
Okay, all right, well, and I agree. I agree.
Speaker 4 (09:26):
I'm a steak guy.
Speaker 2 (09:27):
There you go. I like beef, okay, but if crawfish
showed up, I'd be happy to eat it. Yeah, what
about you.
Speaker 3 (09:37):
Yeah, I'm a fellow food I understand. But I do
like crawfish.
Speaker 2 (09:40):
Yeah, yeah, yeah. I like to tell folks, our quote
unquote official tagline would be hope and healing for the
unseen wounds of war. Our unofficial taglines we like to eat.
Just keep it real.
Speaker 5 (09:56):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (09:57):
So, those of you in the Houston area, particularly those
of you on the northwest side of Houston, this coming
Saturday is a great event put on by a couple,
a married couple in Cypress. So if you're anywhere around
the Houston. Are you know exactly where Cypress is? But
the Cypress VFW will be the eleventh annual Plumber's Crawfish
(10:19):
Boil Saturday, May eighteenth. Chris and his wife Susy are
both local school teachers, give an incredible amount of time
and energy into making this a great event. Every year
they've donated over one hundred thousand dollars through this crawfish
(10:39):
event that up until this past year they did it
in their front yard. It was the craziest thing in
the World's just and Chris is a he's a school teacher.
His wife also school teacher, so you know they're making
they're bringing down the cash right there. But Chris served
(11:00):
and like many, he's buried too many of his buddies
after coming home and he finally decided he needed to
do something. They found out about Camp Hope and they
started just a little crawfish bull invited the frints over
(11:21):
and they've raised one hundred thousand dollars doing that. Now
it's grown to the size that they keep adding friends.
They've grown to the size that they do now do
it in the parking lot the VFW and Cyprus right
on two ninety But that will be Saturday afternoon beginning
at one o'clock and it'll run late into the night.
Oh if you have a little crawfish hunger going on,
(11:43):
come on out raising money to support Camp Hope. It's again,
it's two amazing individuals that give so selflessly of their
time and energy and make this thing happen. And again,
over one hundred thousand dollars they've raised over the last
ten years. This pretty impressive. Just a couple of school
teachers that say, hey, here's something we can do. We
(12:05):
can buil crawfish and have a good time. So I
planning on being there and would love to see you
there as well. All right, Marco so Pasadena, Yes, sir,
what was your claim to fame in high school?
Speaker 4 (12:22):
Unfortunately, my high school years weren't that good. Oh yeah, yeah.
My mom she was actually terminally ill during my high
school years, so my dad had to pass when I
was twelve years old and it was just me and
my little sisters. So I actually worked a lot and
I didn't go to school that much, so I was
actually in ninth grade three times. My third year, they
(12:43):
told me I needed to get my ged if I
wanted to continue to try to get my diploma. So
I got my ged in ninety nine. I was initially
scheduled to graduate in class of two thousand, went back
to school, went back to school for a little bit,
made it all the way through my till like my
junior year. But then by that time I was a
sole breadwinner of the house. We were getting some ssd
I stuff for both my dad passing away and my
(13:06):
younger sister's dad passing away. So I just decided is
to work full time. And so I had one job working.
It's a place in the southeast side called Magneto Distributors,
Magneto and Decent Distributors. I was the warehouse guy for them,
and that was the one job I had before joining
the military.
Speaker 2 (13:26):
Who were you living with?
Speaker 4 (13:27):
My mom lived with me, okay, gotcha? So I had
my own place at seventeen. She had a boyfriend at
the time, but before they got real serious, she'd.
Speaker 2 (13:38):
Lived with me.
Speaker 4 (13:39):
I took care of her and my two sisters, and
then her boyfriend became her fiance, and then her and
my sisters moved in with him, and I went to
the army.
Speaker 2 (13:50):
Gotcha? So why the army?
Speaker 4 (13:53):
The Army for me was number one my uncle, my
mom's brother. He's the oldest out of my mom, one
of seven. So he was in the army. He served
in Germany. And then my high school counselor, mister Gary Hips,
he was in Apache Pilot. So those two and one
of the movies me and my mom saw together before
(14:13):
she passed away was Forrest Gump actually, so believe it
or not, me and my mom watching that more Sump
motivator for it, you know, you know, the connection with
his mom and the tragedy and all that. Yeah, and
if he could do it, I mean, who who can't.
But I wanted to be a teacher, so that was
that was my goal, you know, pre nine to eleven.
(14:34):
So I joined July two thousand and one, and you
know in basic training when nine to eleven happened, and
you know, changed everything.
Speaker 2 (14:41):
For me, right, and so having joined pre nine to
eleven time, basically relatively speaking, peace we weren't at war
with anybody. Cold war had been completed, could have been
at least conceived. You could have gone and done a
four or five years stamp. Yeah, that would they don't
(15:01):
have to face war. Just this is my job right now,
helps me get ready to go do school or whatever
else you want to do afterwards.
Speaker 4 (15:08):
And that was the intent because you know, with my
mom not having you know, a job or anything like that.
You know, I was I needed to find a way
to pay for college to be because I wanted to
be a teacher. I wanted to be a basketball coach
and a math teacher. So that was the goal going in.
A lot of stuff changed after my deployments.
Speaker 2 (15:26):
So yeah, yeah, when did you join?
Speaker 3 (15:33):
I joined on November ninth, two thousand and three. Yeah,
so it was after nine or whatever. Yeah, which kind
of that's what led me to joining. I'd always wanted
to join kind of you know, I was a gung
ho kid, you know, took playing war to a new
level type of thing.
Speaker 2 (15:52):
Yeah, yeah, that's a new level. Yeah, welcome to Iraq.
They rolled up red carpet. Right, glad you guys are here.
Uh huh oh man. All right, So you join h
pre nine to eleven by a few months, sir. You
(16:13):
mentioned you're in basic when it.
Speaker 4 (16:15):
Happened, Yes, sir, we were getting issued Class a's and
the ladies that worked there, they were listening on the
radio and I guess they thought it was the joke,
you know at first, and then we found out it
was not a joke.
Speaker 2 (16:26):
So yeah, I just recall, you know, when the first
plane hit, it got everybody's attention clearly because that's not normal.
But we didn't know exactly what it was until that
second plane hit. Then we knew what we were up against.
Speaker 4 (16:38):
People were thinking it was an accident.
Speaker 2 (16:40):
Yeah, yeah, not two of them weren't too sure, but yeah, yeah,
all right, so join the Army nine to eleven happens?
Oh man, sir? That what what changed within your you
know what what changed? Well? You were basic what happened?
Speaker 4 (16:59):
No, it was one of the fun the things I've experienced.
So I was at Fort Knox, Kentucky, home of the
Armored Division, and they made us pull guard of our
barracks with Rubbert in sixteen. So that was one thing,
you know, we were, we were, we were. We didn't
really know much what was going on. I didn't have
much experience with how to get on and off post,
(17:21):
so I didn't We didn't see them, you know, because
they had fifty cows and everything at the at the gate.
Once that happened, I didn't really see any of that
until I got to Fort Hood, which was my first
duty station.
Speaker 2 (17:31):
When'd you make in the Hood.
Speaker 4 (17:32):
In January of two thousand and two.
Speaker 2 (17:34):
January, all right, okay, we're gonna take a break here
in just a moment, those of you listening on the
nine five oh, catch a few minutes of news updates,
and those of you listening through the magic of podcast
can hear just a little bit of music, and we'll
be right back with more of Road to Hope Radio.
(18:20):
And we welcomed back Road to Hope Prediom. Glad to
have you along. David Malsby. Here, we got Kevin, a
combat VET currently on staff the PTSD Foundation about two
years now. You said, that's that's awesome.
Speaker 5 (18:34):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (18:34):
And then we've got Marco, United States Army Vet. Two
deployments to Iraq, Yes, sir. Uh. How much difference was
there between those two deployments for.
Speaker 4 (18:44):
You, night and day, Yes, sir. Because my first deployment
we had to convoy from Kuwait all the way up
to the crit and so that was, you know, an
experience that changed my life forever and then and I
didn't have any kids up until that point, so it
was just leaving my my newlywed wife behind and my
(19:05):
Terminalio Mom, which was not fun. But the second time
was to Alisade and they flew us from Kuwait to Alasade,
so there was no more convoy unless you absolutely had to.
And besides, three months I spent out on a fob
a little further out west supporting the Marines. Besides that,
I don't know, it was a fobbit, So I didn't leave.
(19:25):
I didn't leave the base at all. You know, just
how we were a transportation company, so we had the Kalamars,
so it's the container handlers and uh so we're just
doing all that stuff. And they had some guys go
out on convoy because we ran the convoy support center
for Alasad and so, but it was just a lot
of on base operations and a lot of nymities that
(19:49):
we didn't have the first go around. You know, green
bean coffee, burger key, all that type of stuff.
Speaker 2 (19:57):
Gotcha. I've heard a lot of stories regarding those convoys,
some pretty tough moments. Absolutely, we're not a war story show,
so we're not going to get into all that. But
give us an idea of just when did you notice,
first of all, what you now know to be PTSD.
(20:19):
I'm sure you didn't even come close to think of
it in those turns when you first start having whatever
those symptoms were for you, What was going on?
Speaker 4 (20:28):
Yeah, so I mine's kind of compounded with what was
going on with my mom, sure also with that and yeah, plus.
Speaker 2 (20:34):
As you mentioned, deploying while she's with that diagnosis.
Speaker 4 (20:37):
And I volunteered for that deployment. Yeah, I wasn't even
scheduled to go. So but uh, you know, back then
when I got back, they really weren't talking about it
too much yet. It wasn't until maybe about a year
or so afterwards that they finally started to bring it
up to get away from the whole shell shock and
all that type of references. So I really didn't deal
(20:58):
with it well at all. I didn't get diagnosed until
twenty thirteen, So it took a lot of bad experiences,
a lot of alcohol abuse to really feel to realize
that I that I had an issue.
Speaker 2 (21:10):
So you were still in yes, sir, if it was thirteen?
What No?
Speaker 4 (21:15):
I got out in September of twenty ten. Oh okay,
but then I didn't get diagnosed officially until January twenty third, Yes, sir,
here in Houston.
Speaker 2 (21:28):
What led you to go.
Speaker 4 (21:30):
So I had the alcoholism, you know, got bad in
the military, and it got bad after and just you know,
basically lost my family over it, and I had a
couple of instances of showing force towards my wife that
I didn't want. You know, I never I was never
that type of person. I grew up, I was raised
(21:50):
by my mom, so I was never that type of person.
And it was just like a snap, instant type thing.
So I knew I had a problem.
Speaker 2 (22:00):
Can want an war store, But what can you pinpoint
as something that drove that. Whether it was the you know,
the jumping to anger so quickly, the self medication, something
happened I presume, or a series of something's that happened.
Speaker 4 (22:20):
Yeah, it was the nightmares for me mostly so the
lack of the lack of sleep, and then I didn't
even to this day. You know, most of my stuff
is convoy type stuff, so being on the road is
when I get really agitated. But when you go to combat,
you get into a mind frame that something bad is
going to happen, right, so you get on that high
(22:41):
alert status and coming back. I've never been able to
get away from that. I've always maintained that and especially
at a time where I wasn't getting any therapy. I
wasn't you know, doing anything for my mental health, and
so it was running wild at all times. And so
it was just an alert status type thing where she
woke me up out of my sleep, you know, and
(23:01):
I reacted in a certain way, you know, And that
was the main thing for me, besides you know, my
you know, during traffic or something road rage incident that
might happen.
Speaker 2 (23:14):
Approximately when was it, like you mentioned her waking you unexpected?
Speaker 4 (23:19):
That was in December of twenty twelve, twelve, So that was,
you know, the last time I lived with my family,
and so I had already been going to see them,
right because that was the second time I had reacted
in that way. The first time was after my first deployment,
after my mom passed away. You know, there were some
things that I had found out that happened while I
(23:41):
was gone, and I had a bad reaction to that,
and then it hadn't happened all the way until twenty twelve.
So from two thousand and four it happened the first
time and into twenty twelve because there was a lot
of family stuff that had occurred, we didn't have kids
at first, and we had kids and several separations, and
then finally in twenty twelve, we separated for good.
Speaker 2 (24:03):
Gotcha, Kevin. One of the reasons, one of the things
that makes us stand out from a lot of other
nonprofits that deal with some form of PTSD in the
veteran community is we also run not only support for
our veterans, but also support for the families. And I
think that's that's why I asked the year because early
(24:28):
on my experience, like two thousand and nine, so just
a couple of years before your instance, but I was
running into a lot of guys that were homeless downtown
that were twenty four, twenty five, twenty six years old,
and they came home and something like that happened. They
end up in front of a judge and then they
end up homeless, and so we we very instantly knew
(24:53):
we have to do something to help the family members.
How do you see that working for our our guys
in our program.
Speaker 3 (25:02):
Oh yeah, so yeah, I'm glad you brought that up.
Just not talked about enough, I feel like, so I
have experience with it myself, but just to touch on it,
you know, PTSD believe it or not, a lot of
people don't understand this. You can actually pass that on
to people that you're around, especially spouses.
Speaker 2 (25:21):
Is a real thing. Yeah, it is diagnosis.
Speaker 3 (25:24):
Yes, it's one man. I mean, it's amazing. How the
That's probably the greatest joy I get out of working
at Camp Hope and being a part of the this
fellowship we have there is seeing this family support and
the reconnect back with guys with their families, whether that
(25:47):
be spouses or kids, mothers, sisters, brothers. It's amazing. And
you have, you know, families, you know, families need that
support just as much as you do his combat veterans,
some more so.
Speaker 2 (26:03):
Yeah. Well, and I think this what you just mentioned
is it tells the story of what happened. Families didn't
know what to do. And I always kind of put
it in the terminology. And when Johnny comes marching home again,
Like when Johnny comes home, he's got both his arms
and his legs and his eyes and he looks okay,
and he you know, for the most part, he acts okay.
(26:24):
He's like, oh good, just so glad he's home. Right.
But I talked to one guy, one of the very
first guys I spoke with downtown. He was, you know,
having legal issues, what's going on, and he had something
and he came home and his mom was just so excited,
(26:45):
you know, just so excited he was home and she
invited all of his friends over. And that was the
worst thing in the world. And it didn't she got
in the way, there was a push. He's in front
of a judge. None of it intentional by anybody, but
it was just the lack of we'll have the friends over,
(27:08):
but tonight's probably not the night. He was just so
tired and you know, just you're bringing home war in
your mind. Give me a minute, you know. So we
try to help the families understand that, which can help
mitigate some of the legal issues some of our guys
have to end up facing. All right, So twenty twelve,
(27:32):
you went to the VA or thirteen twenty thirteen.
Speaker 4 (27:34):
Twenty twelve. Yeah, I got there. I got my rating
in January twenty thirteenth.
Speaker 2 (27:38):
Okay, what did they do besides just say you have PTSD?
Speaker 4 (27:44):
So really, when by the time that I went through,
I was suffering from homelessness and I didn't make a
lot of my appointments for my physical injuries and everything
like that. But I was lucky to make that one.
So I started seeing doctor Tennessee here in Houston, and
he was really helpful. How often I would at first
(28:06):
I was going at once every three months at first,
and you know, starting with the medication and everything like that,
and the thing that it helped me with the most
antidepressants and all that is everything that I had bottled up.
I could no longer bottle it up and I needed
to release that. And it wasn't pretty. I was crying
a lot, but it's some stuff that I had to
(28:28):
I had to let go. Unfortunately, I didn't have my
family support, right my mom had passed away and my
my my wife decided she wouldn't didn't want to be
a part of it no more so a lot of
it I have to sufferer alone. Yeah, and that's why
it's taken me so long to get to a healthy
point in my life.
Speaker 2 (28:47):
All right, Okay, we're going to take one final break here.
We'll come back. I want to dig into just a
little bit more of of that recovery and how you've
gotten to the place where you are today. All Right,
we'll be back with more vote hope radium, just a moment.
Speaker 5 (29:05):
Who draws the ground in the place A loud baby.
It's the gets out man, and.
Speaker 2 (29:23):
We welcome you back.
Speaker 1 (29:25):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (29:26):
With Kevin and with Marco, a couple of combat veterans
multiple tours, talked a little bit about that struggle coming
home and then self medicating and things like that. One
of the things you have struggled with that I wanted
to bring up and just kind of chat on it
(29:48):
for just a little bit because it doesn't get talked
about a lot. There's PTSD, actual something in the brain,
that's an actual brain issue. But we also heavily deal
with what we call the moral injury, and sometimes that
can be very closely associated, if not just completely hand
(30:10):
in hand with survivor's guilt. I don't know what your
story is there, but survivor's guilt is part of what
you're dealing with.
Speaker 4 (30:21):
Yes, they're absolutely so. For one, For one, having the
feeling that because my mom passed away on my first deployment,
ended up getting a Red Cross message and coming home
got back the day before she passed away, was able
to say my goodbyes, but she was no longer able
to speak, and so that and feeling like she gave
(30:42):
her life so I could come home safely. So that
was one after the funeral and everything like that. They
didn't allow me to go back. I tried to go back,
but they it just wasn't in the cards for me.
You know, I got you know, I was a lower enlisted.
I wasn't you know, essential to what was going on. So,
you know, you feel you lift the guys behind. Luckily,
(31:04):
nobody in the unit that I deployed we've died at
that moment. But I've always been a very empathetic person,
and I've felt deeply for everyone we lost, not just
on our side, but also you know, the innocent people
that were lost over there, you know or right so,
and you know, just dealing just dealing with that on
(31:26):
a spiritual level, dealing with that, you know, in feeling
like I don't deserve to be here, I don't deserve
to be happy, that I should be struggling in some
way at some times, and then just you know, struggling
to find a way to be happy at other times.
(31:48):
And I've had several buddies of mine, you know, that
have taken their own life, you know, and I've been
you know, very close to that that door as well,
and once again, you know, feeling lucky to have survived
my attempt, but knowing that you know, friends outside the
military and inside the military, you know, have have gone
(32:11):
all the way with it.
Speaker 2 (32:14):
Yeah, it's it's I went back and reread a report
this past week in preparation for a meeting that we
were having. Twenty twenty one, a study came out of
the Watson Institute from Brown University. So it's twenty twenty one,
so we're actually still in Afghanistan at the time. But
(32:35):
the stat that they came up with and I don't
know where they stopped counting, because the report comes out
in twenty twenty one, so you do the research and
then it takes a while to write the report. But
at the time they stated we had lost just over
seven thousand troops in Iraq and Afghanistan. We had already
lost thirty one thousand plus Iraq and Aganistan vets to suicide.
(33:02):
So four to one, that's a staggering, staggering number. The
crazy thing is it's the exact same ratio believed to
be of our Vietnam veteran era, So four to one
for everyone that was killed in Vietnam four were lost
(33:23):
to suicide. This is coming home. The difference was that
took five decades to get to that number. We were
still in Afghanistan, we were already there.
Speaker 1 (33:33):
Yea.
Speaker 2 (33:34):
And as you mentioned, you've lost buddies, I'm sure you have.
Speaker 3 (33:37):
Yeah, I was gonna I was thinking about the numbers
in my head. My worst appointment was my first one,
which is a pretty bad one. We had four in
my platoon killed in action. But then I was just
kind of thinking, you know, I don't know where I
would draw that line of what I'm counting, platoon, company, whatever.
But I've been to Yeah, I mean, I've been at
(33:58):
least twelve to fifteen veteran, and I was in for
a while, so I have a know quite a few people,
at least twelve to fifteen. It's probably much higher than
that of that I served with who you know, committed suicide,
and then others that I've met since then, you know,
so it's it's up there, probably higher. And that's that's
just what they count as suicide. Yeah, yeah, as you know,
(34:23):
still suicide, but it's not maybe going to show up though.
Speaker 2 (34:26):
Yeah, yeah, drank themselves to death, you know, killing all
their major organs the Hearts. Anyway, Okay, so how did
you hear about Camp Hope?
Speaker 4 (34:40):
For me? I was actually I was at West Oaks
because I had I had tried another program and I
was I was doing okay. But then the therapist that
I had there, wonderful lady, Miss Kelly Anne Robinson, she
actually on the way to work one morning, she was
struck by a garbage truck and so that just threw
(35:02):
me for a whole nother loop.
Speaker 2 (35:03):
There's another on top of drawn.
Speaker 4 (35:05):
And was still having some family issues with my kids
or you know, young adults at this time, and you know,
mom's not really encouraging them to reach out to their
dad in any shape or form. So I went back
to the bottle and went back, you know, to other things.
And so I went to West Hols to clean up.
And I had some other plans and in the in line,
(35:31):
but they didn't fall through, and I'm grateful for that.
And I know a lot of guys there there they
were talking about Camp Hope. So that was the that
was the second option only because the other option wasn't
a treatment program. So I was going to be able
to do what I wanted to do. But I couldn't
be more happier that that first option fell, because I
(35:51):
know I probably would have went back to drinking, and
you know, who knows where I would be at this point.
Speaker 5 (35:57):
Uh.
Speaker 2 (35:58):
When did you get to Camp Hope.
Speaker 4 (35:59):
In Him March twenty eighth of twenty twenty five.
Speaker 2 (36:04):
Okay, see you've been there a couple of months, Yes, sir,
How you doing.
Speaker 4 (36:10):
I'm doing really well, you know, still struggling with some
of the family stuff that I got going on, but
just reconnecting with God. I'm glad that's such a big
part of it. And then you know, reconnecting with buddies.
You know, nobody that I served with, but we're all alike,
(36:30):
as different as we are. We were talking about people
coming from other states and stuff like that. I'm happy
for that because moving back to Houston, it never felt
like home again because I had served with so many
other different types of people from all all walks of life.
I got used to that. I got used to us
bonding over similarities instead of looking for differences. And you know,
(36:52):
having that fellowship again and being a part of AA
actually something that I've I've never attempted to do, has
brought me back from the brink.
Speaker 2 (37:05):
Thank god, thank god. Uh And you mentioned a little
while ago you were homeless, so I mean your mom
had passed, so you lost all your family. You and
your wife had separated, so you were fighting that battle
very much alone. And then you get to Camp Hope
and it's like they're everywhere. Yeah, Kevin, how how important
(37:30):
do you think that is?
Speaker 5 (37:31):
Oh?
Speaker 3 (37:31):
Man, that's that's you can see the smile on.
Speaker 2 (37:34):
My face, like even years afterwards.
Speaker 3 (37:36):
Right, Oh, it's yeah, it's a I mean it's it's
maybe the number one thing.
Speaker 2 (37:41):
Right.
Speaker 3 (37:42):
You know, when we're in the military, we have all
this camaraderie and all this stuff, and then when we
get out, we lose that period. You just can't. You
can't get that anywhere else. There's other things, fellowships you
can have here and there, organizations you can be a
part of, but there's nothing like a fellowship of veterans,
especially of combat veterans, right, And that's what we have there.
(38:04):
That's the wonderful thing about Camp Hope. It's the peer
it's peer to peer support. And not just I'm not
just talking about for most from staff that work there,
I'm talking about as a whole.
Speaker 2 (38:12):
Right, You know guys actually in the program, absolutely all right.
For more information on all the programs, not only Camp Hope,
but also our support groups that do operate somewhat similar
to an AA or NA type group if you're familiar
with those, but for combat vets. We also do it
for first responders law enforcement so PTSD post traumatic stress
(38:35):
Disorder PTSD USA dot org is the website PTSD USA
dot org and follow us on social media. It's a
great way for you to share our organization with your network,
both on Facebook and well what was formerly known as
Twitter now X and YouTube. PTSD US a PTSD USA
(38:58):
on Facebook X and YouTube, and a PTSD Foundation of
America on the Instagram. Thank you for joining us. We
look forward to being with you again next week for
more of Road to Hope Radio
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