We have just changed to a VOIP for our phone service. We have a Colorado Springs area code because all our family is there even though we are stationed in Alabama. I had just phoned my Uncle on Sunday and gave him our new number. I guess nobody else had it though. Our cell phones don’t get service in this little valley we live in. The cell phone usually beeps when I get on the road above our driveway and lets me know that people had attempted to call my cell when I was at home and left messages. My husband’s cell beeped for him this morning when he was on his way to P.T.
They had been trying to phone all day yesterday to let me know that my Uncle had committed suicide on Wednesday. I have written quite a lot about him at times because he is a Vietnam Vet who did two tours. He had the recruiter waiting at the house when my grandmother got home shortly after he graduated. He wanted to be a Marine and serve his country and fight communism but he was only 17 and his mom was going to have to sign. My grandmother freaked. This was her only son but it was obvious that he wanted this and was going to have it one way or the other so she called the recruiter a dirty dog (just about the only swearing my grandmother was capable of) and she signed.
My Aunt was very upset with him and told him to serve his country some other way but he wanted this. They married in between the two tours he did and he was wounded and came home. He came home with PTSD.
He still finished college in Fort Collins and worked for the Bureau of Land Management, later he would retire out of the Department of Energy. He hated this war, was a Democrat, and was very supportive of what my husband and I had been experiencing with my husband’s own PTSD though he had never gone to any kind of the same treatment as my husband just has. I know that he did do some EMDR therapy a few years back, but he still had hell sleeping.
He and his wife own a beautiful home near the Air Force Academy. They had just refinished the kitchen and put marble countertops in. You can eat breakfast staring at the Rockies every morning. He started a painting business about three years ago because he said it was low stress work and kind of Zen for him. He has been booked solid for the past two years by word of mouth. My Aunt is a nurse, and he put his daughter through college for nursing also. His son wanted to be an artist and he supported his son every way possible in his desire until my cousin made a living at it, which sometimes isn’t easy for artists He has bent over backwards to do all he could to make up for the loss of my mom (his sister). He gave me away when I married. He has loved me and hugged me through so much I have gone through with my son and he has wined and dined me to get me to take my mind off of my husband being in Iraq. When I spoke with my Aunt this morning she said that he did leave a note, and that he was sorry but he couldn’t go on and he couldn’t find a way to make it any better. He was sorry he was leaving her in charge of all of this. I felt calm as she told me these things. Then quietly she added that, “and we have another Vietnam Vet on our hands”. Those words crushed me. He had wanted to go back to Vietnam to a certain place where he had killed three men one day, he had told me that much. He wanted to make peace there. He went to Australia though this past year instead. I have read that 80% of what people share in a healthy marriage stays between them, so I’m sure that there are many ghosts and many wounds that I know nothing about and perhaps my Aunt will share some of that if it is relevant.
I find myself so ANTIWAR these days I can think of little else. His service will be at the Shrine of Rememberance in Colorado Springs and it is looking like Sunday but I don’t have a time yet. It will be in the Colorado Springs Gazette though and I hope that any Vet in the area who would like to come and honor one of their own will know that their attendance would be treasured. I fly out in the morning.
P.S. I just wanted to say thank you to sgilman for posting on the Mojo thread the other day how to place a photo on here. Because of that I have been able to share his picture fresh out of bootcamp. UPDATED………………………………….. *Services for Michael J Thompson will be tomorrow, Saturday June 11, 2005 at 2:00 p.m. at the Shrine of Rememberance in Colorado Springs CO*
I’m very sorry for your loss, I wish I had better words to express what I feel. I hope your Aunt and you can find strength in each other to keep on.
I’m sorry, Tracy.
I haven’t lost anyone to war, but one of the first things that started me towards opposing wars was studying the World Wars, Korea, and Vietnam… And what happened to the people who came back. It’s horrifying, even more so when you consider how our culture glorifies the service and spits on the veterans.
I suspect he’s not the only Vietnam era vet who has been experiencing suicidal thoughts these days. I’m very sorry that for whatever reason he felt the need to act upon them.
Someday, they should add the names of all the soldiers who commit suicide after the war is over to the war memorials. They are just as much a casualty as those who died from combat wounds.
I am trying to be gentle on myself and everybody and I know that everybody is going to naturally blame themselves as is common in Suicide. I find myself today though wondering if it was difficult for him witnessing what is taking place in Iraq. I don’t know what I could have done about it and I will never know the answer to that question. Is the tragedy and troop abuse and the lies and the deaths all over again more than some Vietnam Vets will be able to bear? Is one of the things that gets them through a rough day the thought “NEVER AGAIN”?
I have had friends who committed suicide (no family luckily) and I worked on a suicide prevention hotline for a time when I was in college. We live in a society which like to assign blame and fault. One thing I learned though, it isn’t about fault, its about pain. I suffer from moderate depression, but I can’t imagine what it is like for someone dealing with severe anxiety and depression disorders, which is the situation which most frequently leads to suicide.
I will pray for your family and you that somehow you can avoid the blame. And I’ll pray for your uncle. I pray his pain is truly over.
Recommended.
Thanks for sharing this, I send warm wishes and prayers in the direction of your family.
Is unexplainable. If just one person questions War because I have been allowed to share this……well I can’t even begin to explain.
Profoundest condolence for your loss, Tracy. Your honesty and generosity of spirit make me feel as though I know you, and I feel shocked at this news for you. That’s the power of your soul and your writing: to reach through these wires to touch our hearts.
I hear your fear for your husband. It sounds like he’s luckier than your uncle. He’s got you. A strong, brave, genuine partner who can help him and carry him when he needs it. A wife who won’t let him become lost to that awful war. A comrade in peace. He is blessed to have you, Tracy. And because of that you’ll never get that call again.
Tracy, I am deeply sorry for your loss. Words really cannot express these sentiments well.
This just really enforces the fact that our Vets need every service available to them whenever they are all allowed to come home again.
You and yours will be in thoughts throughout this weekend.
So sorry to read this Militarytracy.
I’ve tears in my eyes here at the office. You’re uncle looked like a strong and proud young soldier.
I am so sorry; words are inadequate at these times.
Suicide is a way of finally taking control – of ending that which is unbearable. I don’t know whether you have any spiritual beliefs, but I believe that he is at peace now.
Try to remember that good times, and the good in people, never die.
Travel safely. Be well. I can’t type more now. Your strength amazes me.
I typed more (this is the first time I have ever let any first draft of anything I’ve written not “sit” — I may revise it but I wanted you to have it first:
Legacy (for Tracy’s Uncle)
the silence is deafening
and I can’t imagine
how much it must hurt your soul
to see it happening
all again
when the horrors of that place
must all be contained
inside
to make your life
you kept them at bay
looking for peace in the spirit
you grew in your family
not wanting to take
the ones you love
to that horrible place
you lived
your strength lives on
in those you left behind
finding it happening
all again
the silence is deafening
but
they will speak
and hear
both
the silence and the screams
ccw 6/10/05
I thought I had cried all I could this morning, but I still have tears for today. Thanks for this so much, and I will share it with my family.
I have shed a few tears myself this morning — let me know when I can do more.
Sometimes, I feel so helpless in the face of all of this — that’s why I write.
I write for the same reason
Your words mean so much to those of us who are not able to express ourselves so well.
ScientistMom in NY —
Without readers, there isn’t a written, only a writer. So, thank you too!
Someday I’ll diary about gender issues as they relate to a man quietly sobbing in his cubicle and how that was received by his coworkers.
But for now, I just feel for you and your Uncle, Militarytracy. It’s very brave to post something like this.
My uncle Marlon was another whom Vietnam ruined. He attempted suicide twice, then finally drank and drugged himself to death four years ago. His demons were so obvious it was painful just to talk with him. I am glad every day my own father ran away to Canada after all his other options were closed.
We need to learn how to help those whom war has twisted up this way. We have another generation of suffering Vets, and if they’re ever allowed to come home, they need our help.
I look forward to that diary! Legacy is for your Uncle too and all of the others who lived and still live with unimaginable burdens…
the parenthetical part of the title to (for Michael, Tracy’s Uncle or for Tracy’s Uncle Michael — I didn’t want him to be nameless (there are too many of those already), I just didn’t know his name when I wrote it….
Please feel free actually to change any part of it and/or add to it — you can make it yours in whatever way you want.
Another good man lost. Another hole in the ether.
the wonderful and sad movie “A River Runs Through It”?
Perhaps the brightest star of the family is also deeply troubled, going down a slow-motion path of self-destruction that even those closest to him cannot stop.
So many lines from that movie make me cry, but especially the sermon later given by Paul’s father:
…And so, only after Paul’s death could his father tell a hesitant Norman that he knew more about his brother than the fact that Paul had been a fine fisherman: “He was beautiful” – and mourn in a sermon, even later, that all too frequently, when looking at a loved one in need, “either we don’t know what part of ourselves to give or, more often than not, the part we have to give is not wanted. And so it is those we live with and should know who elude us. But we can still love them. We can love completely, without complete understanding.”
I still have a lot of tears left, and boy does it ever feel this way. Everything on Sunday was about how WE were doing. My Aunt said that she keeps replaying the weekend, the beginning of the week, what did she miss? She says, “I must have missed something”.
My heart goes out to you and your family. Just know that there was nothing you or your aunt or anyone else could have done. This is simply the path that your uncle took and his suffering is over now. He doesn’t want you guys to blame yourself.
My brother suicided about 23 years ago. It took me some work with a grief therapist to stop blaming myself, this was after a few years in an emotionally shut down state heightened by alcohol (which I no longer drink).
“I should have, if only, what if, if only, if, if, if, if…” don’t let yourself do that to you, don’t let your aunt do it to herself. It’s not about what you didn’t do, it’s about what he did and what he chose to do.
I always was a tomboy and I think part of my problem was that it was “sissy” to cry. I had to pay somebody (okay my insurance company and I) $80.00 an hour to tell me that it was okay to cry…a little more complicated than that, but that was a real big issue for me. So if it’s a big issue for you, it’s okay to cry, as much as you want, anywhere you want, if somebody doesn’t like it tough…that’s their problem!
I wish I could be there to give you and your aunt and other family members a big hug and tell you over and over, it’s not your fault, there is nothing that you could have done, there was nothing for you to know, nothing for your aunt to miss. Please, please, keep this utmost in your mind.
Please let me know if there is anything I can do for you or support you or your aunt through this. My email is bah23704@yahoo.com
Tracy – I am so sorry for your loss. The tragedies of war last well beyond the end of the conflict.
My brother-in-law is a Viet Nam vet suffering from PTSD, and thankfully he was able to be rescued from a suicide situation.
A few years ago Bush closed the VA facility in his area, and now he has to commute to West Los Angeles from Santa Barbara for treatments, about 2 ½ hours each way.
I hate war too.
My heart goes out to you, Tracy. You’re a strong and eloquent woman, and I am so sorry for the burdens you bear. My sympathies to you and your family on the loss of your uncle.
But always I have been able to look back and understand eventually what it was that I learned and sometimes I even understand how I am meant to use that.
it’s that way, isn’t it? Our greatest sorrows can hold the most precious gifts within them, but unwrapping them is so painful that we can’t be blamed for not appreciating them for what they are until later.
Thank you for sharing your uncle with us, Tracy. I’m glad you are able to go and be with your family.
There are no words to sooth or heal that much pain
and needless suffering. I wish I could. I wish
we all could.
Now your uncle, at least, is no longer suffering.
Sorry. Hugs. Sorry,sorry. My thoughts are with you.
Julie
🙁
So sorry for your loss, Tracy.
I’ll light a candle for your uncle tonight, and will remember you and your family in my prayers.
No words can amount to anything that will bring you any comfort, but please know that you are not alone.
From a daughter whose father killed himself every damn day since he returned from Nam.
me.
I’m sorry that you share something in common with my cousins. I think his children have experienced things that I haven’t. He gave me the best that he had to give, and I wonder what it was like when he was very tired or very drained or got dealt a dirty day on top of whatever else lay back there in the trenches. I think his children know something of what he dealt with that I have no idea of, just small glimpses and noticing sadness around his eyes.
I’m so very sorry for your loss. This is a heartbreaking story. We’re still taking casualties from Vietnam, all these years later. Thank you for sharing this beautiful eulogy.
I didn’t know your uncle but he was my brother. I’ll be thinking of Michael tomorrow at 2 pm. All of your family here will likely attend in spirit.
I am so sorry, Tracy. If you feel a distant breeze, it’s my thoughts and prayers bound for you and your family from New York.
-dj
Damn girl don’t know what to say. What a waist of precious life over and over again.
be good to yourself
My brother was 18, about to enter the marines, when he shot himself. I’d heard he’d tried to opt out of enlistment, that he’d tried to reduce the number of years if not his full term. And that he was able to make it four years instead of six. But I guess that didn’t help in the end. It was 1982, Reagan was President, I was 13.
Some people like the idea of a gun in the house. I don’t. And I guess I’ve always held a grudge against the military because of my brother and the pain his death caused me and my family. Of course I know the connection isn’t totally rational. I never held a grudge against him. I understand what it feels like to be conflicted and depressed. I respect my brother’s decision, but I wish I’d had the chance to help him.
In the end, I’ve experienced a gift in losing my brother, in letting go and trusting that something very surreal and wonderful and transformative is happening in that loss… for everyone concerned. You take care now.
I am so sorry, Tracy. Words cannot express my condolences.
Have a safe journey and a warm welcome from your extended family. May you all find peace.
My condolences to you and your family. I have friends in Iraq and one in A school, and I worry about them every day. I can’t imagine how hard ths is for you right now. My warmest wishes and prayers are with you and your family.
Sorry and utterly stunned at your travails as of late.
I feel okay this afternoon, or as okay as one can feel I guess right now. His home though in Colorado Springs today must be so intense my husband has said. As we have conversed back and forth and I have spoke to many people there today, it seems that they are either extremely upset or oddly composed. Maybe it is the suicide factor.
I am very sorry to hear about your loss. I am speechless.
Tracy,
I’m so sorry about your uncle. It must be so hard for guys who were in Vietnam to see this happening all over again.
My first husband went to Vietnam in 1968, and he came back completely changed. That time was really painful for me. We married when I was only 21, and then suddenly I was all alone and scared all the time that he would be killed.
I wrote to him everyday, I went to all the anti-war demonstrations in Boston and the marches on Washington. I can’t describe to you my anger when Nixon said he had watched a football game while hundreds of thousands demonstrated. But my husband and I didn’t stay together. We were both so changed by the war. I pushed down the feelings about all of it for years until I finally worked it all through in therapy in my 40’s.
When I first heard John Fogerty’s new song, Deja Vu all Over Again, I sobbed for the person I was then and for all the men and women who are going through it again. Here’s the song:
It’s Like Deja Vu (all over again)
Did you hear ’em talkin’ ’bout it on the radio
Did you try to read the writing on the wall
Did that voice inside you say I’ve heard it all before
It’s like Deja Vu all over again
Day by day I hear the voices rising
Started with a whisper like it did before
Day by day we count the dead and dying
Ship the bodies home while the networks all keep score
Did you hear ’em talkin’ ’bout it on the radio
Could your eyes believe the writing on the wall
Did that voice inside you say I’ve heard it all before
It’s like Deja Vu all over again
One by one I see the old ghosts rising
Stumblin’ ‘cross Big Muddy
Where the light gets dim
Day after day another Momma’s crying
She’s lost her precious child
To a war that has no end
Did you hear ’em talkin’ ’bout it on the radio
Did you stop to read the writing at The Wall
Did that voice inside you say
I’ve seen this all before
It’s like Deja Vu all over again
It’s like Deja Vu all over again
to you and your family, Tracy.
About all I can really say right now… :”'(
Tracy, when it rains, it pours. I am so sorry to hear about your loss. On top of everything else you’ve been dealing with, this cannot be easy for you.
My small laundry list of illnesses includes PTSD as well, which was diagnosed 10 years ago. I know the daily struggles that go with fighting off suicidal thoughts and actions. I’ve been through extensive therapy, some that I don’t even want to talk about, numerous medications and, when it all came down to it, I just couldn’t shake the call to suicide no matter what I did. So, I just deal with it day to day. Some people who know me would never suspect that this was the case because, most of the time, I can certainly still “function”. I’m so sorry to hear that your husband is suffering as well. I think the key to it all is to stay on top of the irrational thoughts and feelings every single moment. The slide into the insanity of it comes very quickly. He’s very lucky to have you. May you find and he find all the strength you need to deal with it.
The Vietnam war left so many scars, as has the war on Iraq. If you ever need a shoulder to cry on or someone to rant and rave to, please contact me. I can be a good listener. hugs
May your uncle truly rest in the peace he so deserves.
God Catnip,
It’s funny how I get a stereotyped thing in my head about something. It was always so hard for me to remember that my Uncle had PTSD, he made it all look so good, he was so articulate and talented. Funny how I get it into my head that all PTSD must eventually sleep on park benches. I have no idea what you go through pulling it all together sometimes, you are just as precious and gifted as he so please always take care of yourself first. WE LOVE YOU SO AND CHERISH YOU SO AND I AM A BETTER PERSON FOR HAVING YOU IN MY LIFE IN THIS VIRTUAL COMMUNITY TICKLING MY MIND INTO NEW AVENUES OF GROWTH!
Thank you so much. Wow. You just keep writing because you’ve been a great inspiration to me.
I relate to the stereotype thing. When I was diagnosed, my first reaction was “what?? I’m not a war vet!”. I am a survivor of my own personal wars though.
I am so sorry about your uncle. I am sending you strength, love, and peace. Since my father committed suicide when I was 16, I know a little of what you and your family may be going through.
I visited the Vietnam memorial in Washington in May of last year. While I was there, the name of a Vietnam vet who had recently committed suicide was being added to the wall. As a society, we may be making some progress in recognizing the costs of war. I certainly hope so.
I’m in the process of moving right now. If that weren’t the case, I would invite myself to your uncle’s service tomorrow. I will observe a moment of silence for him.
As a wise friend said to me recently, life shouldn’t have to be so hard.
Peace.
So sorry about your father also. This is very confusing right now losing someone so dear to suicide.
Getting the family together will help everyone, but there will be unanswered questions for everyone.
No one is to blame, of course, but you may all blame yourselves for things you wish you had done, and things you wish you hadn’t done.
Be easy on yourself.
So sorry about your father, my brother suicided. I guess though if life weren’t so dam hard we wouldn’t have the opportunity to grow so dam much…
I’m so sorry!
Thanks for your courage and for sharing with us.
My father killed himself when I was fifteen, just as his mother had done when he was a teen. (I intend to discontinue the pattern.) It’s so different from a “normal” death, I think, in the way people react to it and the way others treat the grieving family.
Strangely coincidentally, I only a few days ago watched the excellent documentary film “Regret to Inform” about Vietnam War widows (both American and Vietnamese). One of them had a story to relate much like your aunt’s. Here’s how Roger Ebert described it:
Alan
Maverick Leftist
Slacker, sorry about your father, another survivor here, my brother – and then dad died a year later of “heart trouble”…I always said that he died of a broken heart.
It definitely is a different, to me more complicated grief.
The one thought that has always kept me from repeating the pattern is the thought of what it does to those you leave behind.
I can’t believe how much you and your family have suffered of late, Tracy. I can’t wrap my mind around it.
The thought that the Iraq war may be driving Vietnam vets to suicide is going to keep me awake at night. Is this what it feels like when a nation circles down the drain to hell?
And you lost your mother so young, and now her brother is gone, too. Tracy, my dear, in case you start to feel like you are all alone, like the world is slowly abandoning you to the wind … you are not alone, we see you and are with you. Keep writing and keep reaching out. I will hold you in the Light.
So Sorry Tracy.
I understand how you and your Uncle’s family feel. I only wish the blogs had been around several years ago.
I hope the support coming from this community is of some help.
Dear Tracy…my heartfelt condolences to you and to your family. My brother was like your Uncle in that all he ever wanted was to be in the army. He didn’t make it back from Nam, and after reading the two letters I did get from him, so full of his angish and shock at the realities of that war, sometimes I think he was one of the lucky ones. So many vets I’ve worked with as a nurse were so wounded inside, healing could nevr be complete.
Will keeo you and yours close in heart.
Je suis de tout coeur avec toi, Tracy.
Melanchthon
and for you.
For my family men, all military, all patriots, all democrats.
Iowa
’cause the aunts live in places named Keokuk and Grinnell and Kellogg and Attumwa.
’cause sweet corn tastes like sunshine
and tomatoes are a fruit.
’cause jello is both a food group and an art form.
’cause they play serious pinochle and cutthroat dominoes.
’cause your favorite uncle will tell you what war is really like and he doesn’t sugar coat or hold back.
’cause he’ll tell you that he lived 50 years with a devil of guilt, that he reveled in unspeakable cruelty delivered to another human being.
’cause he left his soul on the battlefield and he knows that there is no glory or honor in the drug death leaves in your veins.
’cause he told you things he could never tell his own children.
’cause he finally sleeps next to his parents, next to your father who carried the same drug in his veins but would never speak, only rage and self destruct.
’cause the debt can never be paid, but there is still a chance to shine light in the world.
’cause the life I have began there.