By COL (Ret) Stephen B. Springer
Thoughts to Consider About Service Members’ Mental Health AS GUARD MEMBERS SERVE IN VARIOUS CAPACITIES, it becomes clear that in any assignment that the Guard teams and units are competent, hard-working, and dedicated service members. Although we strive to acknowledge, support and honor service members, there are those who may continue to struggle with self-esteem, family issues, and other stressful barriers. Granted, this issue has many facets and is beyond the scope of this short article. However, there are five points all service members might reflect on in relation to assisting others with mental health issues. Active Friendship is the first area that can make a difference. How many of us have numerous close relationships in the Guard that have grown stale and forgotten? The intention was to contact a person in a previous unit and commend them on a recent promotion…but our intent did not translate into action…instead it went inactive. Taking this into consideration, it is clear that to help we must listen to their lives and stay engaged with them. This leads to the second consideration…Active Listening. Although our military training and experience addresses the concept of listening and knowing what the requirements are including orders for each day, there is much more to this. Active Listening in all environments and times is a valuable tool. Do we really listen to veiled concerns in our individual teams when it is not even a drill weekend or a deployment? Even jokes sometimes provide the active listener keys to how persons are feeling even without hearing a direct concern. This then takes the discussion to thinking about Active Assistance. Active Assistance, when utilized, does mean you may spend some extra time with a team member or former team member. In essence, showing interest in another service member can begin with a statement verifying how the person is getting along. This is where you demonstrate you really care. That means more than “how are you doing”. That phrase is recognized as a greeting and likely will yield limited information. Furthermore, if we do initiate a discussion, all of us recognize the sensitive nature of topics where we may quickly discover that the topic is not something we can discuss due to our Guard position. It also may be a topic we fear ourselves and find too difficult to discuss. So, it may seem that we have come the full circle. We encourage Active Assistance, yet some topics cannot be discussed. Let us refresh the screen…Active Assistance is showing concern and support for the person by being there and this brings up Active Resources. One Active Resource is a listing of organizations and offices for help that is available to a service member. Although you may know that your unit, HQ, or other organization has already distributed information several times…because you bring it up to the service member you are making a difference! In some cases, being there while the service member calls the resource or going with the service member to the resources can be a turning point in assisting a person with a life change. This also directly impacts the family! The last area to be observed is the After-Action Report (AAR). The AAR is in this case the same as we evaluate our own units after training or deployments. How did I assist the service member, was it effective, what 20 | N a t i o n a l G u a r d A s s o c i a t i o n o f T e x a s
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would I do different in the future, and what about my own mental health? How am I doing? Let us all help each other sort through the issues we have. We can make a real difference. Dr. Stephen Springer is a retired Texas State Guard, Colonel and a NGAT Life Member. He is also a retired Emeritus as a University faculty member… having taught such courses as Human Relations and Leadership. He also has assisted service members with stress management. He is a Licensed Professional Counselor and Certified Public Manager and holds four Education Certifications in Texas. He can be contacted at sspri@juno.com. H
