Why Wouldn't Clay Hunt Pass?

I am biased I guess because I already know what happens when a veteran commits suicide. I've been living it for nearly a year and a half. My husband, a recently retired Marine with 20 years of service took his life in 2013. He left behind myself and our three kids. It's been devastating. I back the Clay Hunt Act because I can't imagine another child crying themselves to sleep at night because their dad is gone. Sure, they had cried many night before as daddy was deployed nearly 3 years total of their life. It was different then, I could tell them he would be back soon. He was our hero. He was not with us so that other girls and boys could grow up in a safe place.  Now when they cry for him all I can do is lie right down next to them and cry too. I can only tell them I am sorry. He loved them to the moon and back and he's now up protecting God in heaven.

How could anyone not vote to save  not just the brave men and women  but their little children who sacrificed most of their life so far without their parent so they could serve this country? To serve you, your children. You know what, it's a shame that our vets would ever get so low that suicide is their only option but when they die their pain ends. Ours, the survivors has just begun. Do you know the statistics on children who lose a parent of suicide?

Now, I have to worry my kids could take their own lives, develop personality disorders, substance abuse, end up in domestic violence. On top of losing my husband to the war, I might lose my kids too. This Act isn't just for the veteran. THIS ACT IS FOR EVERY MEMBER OF THAT VETS FAMILY.

Why wouldn't we work hard to ending the stigma attached to ptsd in the military community? Provide peer counseling in a safe and healthy environment? Evaluate all of our current programs and  improve them to save lives? Train our medical professionals to provide the highest level of care possible? Train senior officers and enlisted of every group to detect the signs and symptoms of ptsd, depression, tbi so that they can advocate for their men and women? Why are we teaching service members on the most basic level to keep an eye out for your coworkers and friends behavior changes? Telling them it's not ratting them out if you are concerned....you're potentially saving their lives. You'd do it in a war zone, right? The battle is taking place in the mind of someone suffering  with ptsd and no one has his six. He or she fights it alone. They don't have to. We can prepare each of them to leave no man behind on and off the battlefield. We can give the the tools before the onset to identify issues. Early detection can make the difference between life and death. Noone should have to suffer to the point of suicide.

One of the core principals of our military is integrity. How can we possibly expect them to uphold that if we aren't modeling the behavior first. We should do this not because it's easy or cheap but because it's the right thing to do.

I would love for the Department of Veteran Affairs to start contacting the families of vets who committed suicide and begin compiling running lists of commonalities in the cases. Learning this information will help improve what services are provided and how they should be given. I read a DOD report that said the common thread in most suicides was family and financial problems. Superficially that sounds legit but if I told you people suffering with ptsd can no longer handle every day stressors  the way most people can wouldn't that make more sense? If I asked how many of you people reading this has ever had a family or financial problem most all of us would say yes. We're still here. We didn't commit suicide. We must dig deeper. You can't do anything  in the military half assed so why would you evaluate such high stakes issues for those men and women half assed?

With the Clay Hunt Act we can take a common sense approach to preventing veterans from dying needlessly, keep families together and do the right thing by them. They need this. We need this.