San Diego area non-profit Veterans 360 expanding its reach to help vets, others suffering from PTS
Like countless military parents, Dave Mewes was thrilled his son, Drew, safely was home from a year-long Iraq combat tour with his Army National Guard
battalion. Over several years, Drew thrived. He got his own apartment and, using the 9/11 G.I. Bill, took college courses and became a certified automotive technician.
But Drew’s transition home from soldier to civilian unraveled. He quit a job or was fired. He drank heavily. An extrovert, he withdrew from family and friends. Unbeknownst to his family, he had suffered a brain injury from explosive blasts in Iraq. The disability provided a small monthly benefit, service therapy dog and medical care by the Department of Veterans Affairs, but VA-prescribed pain pills led him to addiction. He lost several friends in his Guard unit to suicide, and funerals added to his depression and post-traumatic stress. “He just couldn’t function,” his father recalled. “It was a perfect storm.”
In January, Drew’s struggles came to a head. “He finally broke down,” Dave Mewes said. “I received some very desperate calls.” Worse, he said, Drew “had basically given up. I didn’t want to lose my son.” Dave Mewes, a business executive, lost much sleep worrying. He tried to understand the often complex
and confusing military and government bureaucracy. “I was just looking for somebody who understood this problem Drew had,” he said. One night scouring Internet resources, he came across Veterans 360, a Del Mar-based non-profit group providing veterans support and transition resources.
He fired off an email to executive director Rick J. Collins. A British military veteran who founded the group in 2011, Collins quickly replied and soon spoke with Drew. The two connected as soldiers do, sharing military slang and trading stories. “Rick was able to line him up with people who could be able to disassemble the complexity” of what Drew was experiencing, including other combat vets, Dave Mewes said.
Veterans 360’s mission is pretty simple: Normalize and civilianize PTS and eliminate its stigma.
Trauma often can lead to depression, anxiety, withdrawal or addiction, but these usually are normal human reactions to it, Collins said. Education is a huge
part of the group’s work connecting veterans and affected loved ones like the Mewes family with help and resources.
Collins said he wants vets “to put their hands up and say, I’m struggling with PTS.” The group focusing on that critical Step 1. While the VA and other organizations “focus on Steps 2 through 10, we focus on just Step 1,” he said.
Veterans 360’s latest work is spreading the message that not only vets suffer PTS. It affects untold others – an abused child, a car crash victim, firefighters, police and other first-responders who witness death and suffering, Collins said. In January, he launched its “Carry The Challenge” campaign to reach more struggling men and women and create a “First Responder” volunteer network of veterans to help them transition to health, work, school and overall productive life. A national case management system will tie together networks of resources from the VA and other government, civilian and non-profit organizations and, with volunteer responders, “get them to Step 2,” Collins said. “They have to make it easy for them to say, I need help.”
What works? “Most of the time, it’s having somebody listening and connecting them” to someone who helps, he said. Maybe it’s another combat veteran or retired cop who shares the lingo and can encourage them toward help. “Just having somebody to talk is
plenty,” said Collins.
For the Meweses, that help from Collins and Veterans360 may be life-saving. “We got more done in a period of about 60 days than we had all the time, in four or five years,” Dave Mewes said. “Drew was at a crisis period. It’s looking a lot better…. There are more positive days now.” Father and son plan to travel to San Diego in April and participate in a fundraiser and gala marking Veterans 360’s “Carry The Challenge” campaign. In late February, Drew was participating in a week-long outdoor retreat program offered by Semper Fi Odyssey, a Pennsylvania-based nonprofit. “We’re still not out of the woods,” his father said, “but, wow, it’s helped a lot.”
BY GIDGET FUENTES
