By JAMES BELL
Hays Post
In 2003, Hays native Steven Elliott did what many young people do — dedicate years of his life to serving his country in the military, ultimately joining the ranks of the elite 75th Ranger Regiment of the U.S. Army in a deployment to Afghanistan.
A year later, he was involved in a high-profile friendly fire incident that led to two deaths, including former NFL player Pat Tillman.
After returning home and struggling to cope with his time in war, Elliott turned his experiences into a book — "War Story: Sometimes the Real Fight Starts After the Battle" — highlighting the need for improved mental health services for active duty and former soldiers in the U.S. Armed Forces.
The book covers his journey from boyhood to joining the military post-9/11, to deploying to Afghanistan as an Army Ranger and then dealing with the consequences of things that happen in war, Elliott said.
The book was published earlier this year and, this weekend, Elliott will speak about his story at 7 p.m. Saturday at the Hays VFW, 2106 Vine.
His story is both powerful and shared by many.
“We know the story is not unique to us in terms of dealing with the oftentimes unseen wounds of war, which were certainly a big part of my reality for a lot of years as I struggled to make sense of and live with things that happened on my deployment when I was an Army Ranger in Afghanistan,” Elliott said.
While progress has been made in helping victims of post-traumatic stress disorder and other unseen struggles, he said there is much that needs to be done.
“We have so much more at our fingertips as veterans today than we did 40 years ago,” Elliott said.
Both a variety of nonprofit organizations and the Veterans Administration have programs to assist veterans, but he said by that time for many it is already too late.
“A big part of the problem is the fact that the active-duty military component effectively has not evolved and does, generally, a very terrible job of engaging those issues at the point of trauma,” Elliott said.
Elliott said after returning from his deployment he suffered from survivor's guilt and PTSD.
“What I had can be compared to a gunshot wound,” he said.
But he didn’t know it until years later after some personal struggles.
“I was a case study in what not to do,” Elliott said. “I came home … and my approach was to pretend none of that happened.”
Only recognizing much later that he needed help.
“For me, that was almost a deadly, certainly very damaging approach,” Elliott said. “I had to experience enough pain before I was willing to basically raise my hand and say I can’t do this on my own and I don’t know how to fix things. That’s the scariest thing in my life I ever had to do.”
With "War Story" he hopes to help spread the message that there should be more and better services in place to help soldiers — and anyone struggling with unseen wounds.
“A lot of our focus and our concern is to change the narrative, change the culture and change the policy within the active-duty component because that’s where – as in any wound physical, emotional or spiritual – if we can identify and treat it closer to the point of woundedness we have a better chance of keeping people from having that wound metastasize into other things,” Elliott said. “There’s hope, that’s a big part of our story.”
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While he readily admits he is not a trained clinician, his experience gives him insight that a clinician might not have. Working together is the only way services can improve, he said.
“We need everybody,” Elliott said. “We need everyone working together so we can create a feedback loop and create solutions.”
But those solutions can not start without a better understanding of the current problems.
“There has to be a cultural shift and War Story certainly demonstrates some of the brokenness of that culture,” Elliot said.
“It’s not malicious, but it’s not helpful,” he said of the military's current approach to unseen wounds.
Solutions also depend on the person and their willingness to seek and accept assistance.
“Our hearts have to be open to it,” Elliott said.
And everybody’s journey is going to be their own, he said but is rooted in community.
"War Story" tells the story of what happens when you try to do it on your own and it doesn’t end well, he said.
He calls it a cruel irony that the individual is the best one to share what is going on, but often once the damage is done, is blind to see the problems.
“It very much a story about being human, about having hopes and dreams for what you are going to do in the world, and then having those hopes and dreams crash with reality,” Elliott said.
Sharing that story in Hays — where he lived until the age of 18 just down the road from the VFW where he will speak —is especially poignant for Elliott.
“It feels really great, but surreal, coming to share the message in Hays,” he said. “It means a lot to me. It's my home.”
For more about Elliot, the book or his advocacy, visit Elliottfund.org.
"War Story," is available on major online outlets and copies will be available at the event.
Doors open at 6 p.m. Saturday at the Hays VFW for the presentation and book signing.