April 25 is our first performance of the Austin production of The Telling Project. I wrote last week about how satisfying and healing it has been to connect with other cast members, to form a circuit of energy, and to have my story be part of...

We stand in a circle, holding hands. The person to my right squeezes my hand, I squeeze the hand of the person to my left. The squeeze becomes a pulse traveling the circle, each person's hand and arm contracting and expanding. Faster and faster, until no time elapses in between...

The Lives of Others is a 2006 German movie about a secret policeman who spies on civilians suspected of criticizing the East German government. As well as revealing the consequences for the policeman of eavesdropping on individuals, the movie argues that a society's suicide rate (which the East German government...

On February 12, the Roanoke Times reported the arrest of Sean Duvall for carrying a firearm -- a crude gun he had made himself from steel pipe, a shotgun shell and a nail. The reason the Blacksburg, Virginia police became aware that Mr. Duvall was carrying a...

When you have suffered a major setback, experienced betrayal or loss, what have you found brought you some relief? Did the ear of a friend help? Someone listening, not trying to solve your problem, but showing in their eyes that they care. They hear, and they care.

Telling our stories...

"The True Cost of Our Wars," my last column for this publication, presented the staggering numbers of service members who will need mental health care. If the Veterans Administration is already overwhelmed, how will these veterans recover from their trauma?

Our society needs to step up to the plate to...

The numbers below come from a report released by Veterans for Common Sense (VCS), a nonprofit that "raises the unique and powerful voices of veterans" to protect and enhance our military, veterans, freedom, and national security. In assembling this report, VCS uses reports from the Department of...

Last week I wrote about the difference the Veterans Administration's Crisis Line has made for veterans vulnerable to suicidal thoughts. According to VA, as of July 31, 2011, the VA's Crisis Line received 462,854 calls. Of those calls, 259,891 were from veterans and 6,030 were from active duty...

As this week is National Suicide Prevention Week, and Sunday marks the 10th anniversary of 9/11, let us grieve those who have taken their own lives as a result of their service in Iraq and/or Afghanistan.

Every day 18 veterans commit suicide.

Let us commend the...

On May 11, the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals took a stand for veterans that has been shameful years in coming. It ruled that the Department of Veterans Affairs has been violating the due process rights of veterans in denying them meaningful access to critically needed mental health care.

On Wednesday, the White House announced a profound change in the government's response to service members who commit suicide. President Obama will now send their families condolence letters just as he does to families of troops who die in combat or as a result of noncombat incidents in a war...

Post-traumatic stress disorder has become a household term, especially in the context of combat. Every day, some media outlet in the country talks about the PTSD of our veterans and troops returning from Iraq and Afghanistan, with the number now estimated to be 95 percent rather than the 20 percent...

I spoke in several communities in New Jersey and New York for Yom Hashoah, the day of remembering the victims of the Holocaust -- or the Shoah, which in Hebrew means utter destruction. My talk differed from the usual Yom Hashoah focus. Since the day was inaugurated in 1951, communities...

Chances are if you went out on the street and asked every passerby if they believed our government should support our troops, they would say, "Of course!" If you had the opportunity to go into Congress and poll every representative and senator if they support the troops, they would fall...

I met Si Lewen's art before I met him. A friend who learned about him through the documentary "The Ritchie Boys" suggested I go to his website to get a sense of his art. It amazed me: canvases exploding with color, vibrant, pulsing with life. The art became...

The people of Japan have suffered severe trauma since last week's earthquake. And rather than experiencing conditions of secure normalcy that victims of trauma need to begin healing, Japan lives under the threat of a nuclear meltdown. Fear is ever present, their existence under siege.

How...

The figures have become familiar: the number of veterans and troops in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan who suffer from post-traumatic stress disorder are at record levels: 300,000 men and women. What isn't so well known is what most of these people experience when they turn to the military...

Those of us who have never gone to war -- and today that means about 90 percent of us -- how able are we to imagine it?

I thought I could. I thought I had a good enough imagination, aided by all the movies I've seen about war, by...

Back in November the "Modern Love" column of The New York Times ran a piece by the wife of an OIF veteran in which she says that the "real depth of devotion is proved not by the secrets we're told but by the decision to shield us from the...

Yesterday the head of our country's military -- Joint Chiefs Chairman Adm, Mike Mullen -- spoke about the chasm that exists between civilians and our service members. I was glad to see the military acknowledging and addressing the separateness created by our all volunteer army, because I think...