Mental health, from a military perspective

Content warning: This story mentions suicide.

Three people in Daniel Johnson’s former military unit died by suicide. The experience has given him an all-too personal view of a military suicide rate that is four times higher than deaths in military operations.

“They are still casualties of war. That’s why the military is one of the deadliest professions,” Johnson said.

Johnson, a nine-year Army veteran who served as a public affairs officer in Iraq, is now a Roy H. Park Fellow at the Hussman School of Journalism and Media. He published a book, “#Inherent Resolve,” about his unit’s war experience, and wrote an article last month about military and veteran mental health issues for Task and Purpose, a news website targeted at a military audience.

That article was prompted in part by the release of a June 2021 study from Brown University’s Cost of War project showing that, since 9/11, an estimated 7,057 service members have died during military operations compared to an estimated 30,177 deaths due to suicide.

Daniel Johnson was in ROTC at Appalachian State University before being deployed to Iraq. (Courtesy Daniel Johnson)

“There have been many attempts by leaders in the Department of Defense to shift blame for these numbers, all towards places except where it is most deserved: the military’s own leadership, and a military culture that creates overwhelming stress, contributes to mental health issues, and then stigmatizes mental health treatment,” Johnson wrote.

He’s encouraged by the Biden administration’s Reducing Military and Veteran Suicide report, released Nov. 2. “The president is saying it starts at the top. So that’s progress,” he said.

In his own unit, soldiers were afraid to seek help because it was seen as a weakness and used against them in evaluations. “It holds up your career. They say you’re not fit to lead, or they don’t trust your ability,” he said.

Importance of leadership

Experiences vary based on leadership. While Johnson said seeking help for mental health issues was stigmatized in his unit, for Ethan Williams, “help definitely was there and available.”

Williams went into the Army after graduating from high school in Detroit and was deployed twice to Afghanistan as an engineer. But instead of building bridges, Williams found himself doing one of the most stressful of all military jobs: checking roadways for improvised explosive devices.

“We made sure we supported each other,” Williams said. During his first deployment, he was a private who relied heavily on his team and squad leaders. By the time of his second deployment, he was a noncommissioned officer and the one providing the leadership. “I knew what was available from my leaders beforehand. I knew the things to look for and how to comfort those who needed it.”

Ethan Williams

Williams is now enrolled in ROTC as an undergraduate at Carolina, double majoring in political science and public policy. When he graduates, he will be a commissioned officer in the Quartermaster Corps, in charge of logistics and supply.

“This is a different type of mental stress,” Williams said, admitting to feeling isolated from his fellow students because of differences in age and experience. “I am 32, and I have three kids as well. And I have to get up at 4:30 a.m. to drive to Chapel Hill from Holly Springs,” he said.

Exercise helps him cope. In a gym he put together in his garage, he lifts weights, does CrossFit training, punches a boxing bag and hits a tire with a sledgehammer. “I feel better coming out. It gives me energy,” he says.

While he has embraced his education as another form of training, Williams is eager to return to the military full time. “I can’t wait to go back,” he said.

Legacy of learning

Johnson, the son of a military man, is glad to be out. “The military culture was overbearing. You can’t escape it,” he said. “Now I can be a regular person, not defined by rank.”

As a fellow and a teaching assistant, Johnson looks forward to teaching full time, a profession that also runs in his family. He wants to use his journalism research and experience to help students navigate a world full of misinformation, to “give them the tools to understand the complexities of the world.”

Teaching is also the public service profession with the longest life expectancy, he said.

“Teaching people — that’s like the very definition of public service,” Johnson said. “My great-grandmother was a teacher. She passed away, but her lessons are still being used. My mother is passing them onto my nieces. That’s immortality.”

If you or someone you know is in crisis, call The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline at 800-273-TALK (8255) or call 911 immediately.