Living with Death – It’s just their job
A forty year old First Sergeant left a message cancelling her appointment. The Staff Sergeant in her Special Ops unit had committed suicide. Her message sat in the back of my mind for the next 24 hours. Finally I called her back leaving this message.
“I was sorry to hear about the death of the Staff Sergeant in your unit. I assume he worked with or for you. I assume you have contacted a number of your colleagues and have been talking with them. From my experience I think it is important to talk about suicide—for yourself first of all and for your soldiers as individuals and as members of your unit-- especially for the future functioning of the unit. If you wish to talk about the effects of this suicide on yourself and others—or talk just about death—please call me back.” Her return call came within the hour.
The First Sergeant said she was fine, that she appreciated the call. Yet with little prodding she accepted an emergency appointment. She gave me the facts: the Staff Sergeant worked for her, she knew him and his wife well. They both were in the military and had just decided to retire. They had civilian jobs and were planning to move within the next months. He seemed fine with no sign of distress. The First Sergeant had no idea why he shot himself, especially having a wife and two small children.
It was not long before she acknowledged this was the third suicide in her unit in the past few months and that a few years ago her mother had committed suicide. “Where to begin,” I thought.
“What type of work does your Special Ops unit do?” I asked. “We monitor television screens all day,” she said.
“And what do you see?” I asked.
“We are looking at targets,” she said.
“Human targets?” I asked. “Is the purpose of this monitoring to kill people,” I wondered out loud.
“Yes,” she said, but she added, “We are very careful to recognize a person’s gait, movements, and various individual features. We have cameras on the ground, showing guys kicking down doors, and also aerial cameras. We know who we are killing. We work in 12-hour shifts and are debriefed after each shift. A behavioral health specialist is available for consultation if the work is too stressful.”
Trying to get my mind around how stressful this activity must be, I asked, “How often do you kill people once a month, once a week, once a day?”
“Every day,” she said. Sensing my disbelief she offered, “It is not a job for everybody.” My husband thinks it is terrible. Some people see it like a video game, others do not have the stomach for it.”
I suggested that three suicides in the past few months in this relatively small unit sounded like stress to me. She acknowledged how important it was for her to be available to everyone in the unit to talk about the suicide and to have a proper funeral. So when I asked about the soldier’s wife and children, she said that his wife had taken the children and
“gone home.” No official contact had been made between the wife’s unit and the husband’s unit. She explained that there was no official mechanism to have contact between units about these matters.
I cannot stop thinking about the military unit—just as I think about family—even though the military unit is not my patient. It is important for the members of the unit to talk about and “to metabolize” a trauma. The soldiers who worked with and for this Staff Sergeant should be talking to his wife, just like family members should reach out to one another. My patient agreed. She said she would be attending the funeral and would see what could be done.
As weeks passed, everything “returned back to normal.” The military had a proper funeral, the wife and family did not attend. No one spoke with the soldier’s wife, and no one knows if there was a separate family funeral. Where was he buried? Arlington? What type of real or symbolic closure is there for his widow and children, for this military unit or for our society?
The spirit of the Army is built on altruism and caring for others. Does the service member/widow think her husband gave his life for the unit and his country? Or, does she think the Army (job) killed her husband? Does she wonder where his colleagues and their altruism are now?
My patient and these soldiers in her unit are back at work monitoring television sets and killing human targets. Is that what they are going to do with the rest of their lives? Does their altruism exclude his widow and his children once their colleague has fallen? Do they even think about it? Have they fully done their job?
The war in Iraq is over for the United States except for Special Ops. The war in Afghanistan is over for the United States except for Special Ops. The war in Syria never started for the United States except for Special Ops. None of these wars ever began for 99 % of non-military American people.
I am surprised to learn that “our side” is killing people every day. Some of us who are killing them are then killing ourselves—in response! Most of us are on the sidelines and we are not watching. We are as disconnected from the killing as these soldiers apparently are disconnected from the widow and her children. Are we willfully blind or is the killing just part of the background noise that we have become accustomed to in our everyday living?
Ted Beal
Edward W. Beal, MD, Psychiatrist, Department of the Army, Department of Tele-Health, U. S. Army Medical Department Activity, Fort
Meade
