This story mentions addiction and mental health in veterans. The Veterans Crisis Line is available 24/7 at 800-273-8255 and press 1 for service members, their friends and family who are in need.
Western New Yorker Dan Mitchell served in the Army as a medic during the Gulf War until 1993. Over the next two decades, he’s medicated his untreated PTSD with alcohol until he was arrested for a DWI in 2013.
While November honors veterans who have served, more than half of all veterans like Mitchell who are involved with the criminal justice system have mental health problems or substance use disorders, oftentimes both co-occurring.
Buffalo planted a seed to help divert these vets away from the criminal justice system and instead connect them with the care and support they need when Judge Robert Russell founded America’s first Veteran Treatment Court in 2008.
Thirteen years later, it became a national model with over 600 veteran treatment programs operating as of November 2020.
Mitchell had the opportunity to have his DWI case transferred to Buffalo’s Veteran Treatment Court, a single choice that altered the course of his life.
"When you think of addiction, just imagine your head is being held underwater and all you can think of is to get you head up and breath," he said. "That’s the feeling when first coming in for treatment, when first coming in to get involved."
Mitchell now serves as the mentor coordinator for the program, where he partners veterans in the program with other vets who understand their lived experience, offering that same sense of community and understanding that altered the course of his life.
It was a similar situation that inspired Russell to start the Veterans Treatment Court after he saw a Vietnam vet involved in the Mental Health Court wasn’t thriving the way he had hoped.
"After we had that veteran, a Vietnam veteran, meet with two other veterans that person showed a remarkable response to how working with other veterans can motivate, encourage and stimulate him to address his underlying health care issues," Russell said.
Veterans in the state were eight times more likely to experience PTSD and 2 to 4 times more likely to experience major depression than civilians before the nearly two-year-long COVID-19 pandemic, according to a report by The New York State Health Foundation.
Patrick Welch served in the Marine Corps, where he saw warfare for six months before an injury in combat left him immobile for two years.
Nearly 30% of Vietnam veterans had PTSD, according to the National Center for PTSD by the U.S. Department of Veteran Services. Welch was not the exception.
"No one, absolutely, no one goes to war and ever returns the same person," Welch said.
Similar to Mitchell, Welch medicated his PTSD with drinking. Further exasperating his pain was the isolation Welch felt coming home from a war that the majority of Americans opposed.
Veterans often struggle with access to housing, health care, employment and other social determinants of health upon returning home. Addressing these barriers to care can help improve outcomes, according to The National Veteran Health Equity Report.
Decades later, the 20-month long COVID-19 pandemic worsened the isolation veterans like Mitchell and Welch.
The majority of veterans said their mental health worsened throughout the pandemic because of that compounded isolation, according to a recent survey by the Wounded Warrior Project.
The court quickly transitioned to virtual alongside the mentors and community partners to help mitigate as much damage as possible because of this, said Judge Betty Calvo-Torres, who took over the Veterans Treatment Court from Russell earlier this year when he retired.
"All of the challenges we talked about already were exasperated by COVID," Calvo-Torres said. "We had to be ever more cognizant and resilient in helping the veterans be resilient in responding to those challenges."
A major part of that resiliency was the support of the mentors like Mitchell and Welch to those going through the pandemic because they understood that lived experience and the struggles that come with coming home.
For Mitchell, returning home after deployment all of those years ago offered a sense of hope and community to what he says was an unrealistic expectation.
That idolized picture burning caused him to break down.
Only after attending and graduating from the Treatment Court program did he finally find what he longed for.
“This community is that thing we were looking for when we talked about coming home,” Mitchell said. “This is the coming home and it is so ironic that we should find it through going through the worst times of our lives.”
Veterans who are struggling can reach out to the Veterans Treatment Court for help connecting to services.
For those interested in helping, they can donate money to the non-profit Buffalo Veterans Mentor Group, which works adjacently with the court to address barriers to care like bus passes, rent money and security deposits. They are also actively recruiting veterans who would like to be mentors. To donate, or learn more about becoming a mentor, visit buffaloveteranstreatmentcourt.org, or contact Dan Mitchell at 716-308-4256.